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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/29516-8.txt b/29516-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..854e7dd --- /dev/null +++ b/29516-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,9659 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 86, +December, 1864, by Various + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 86, December, 1864 + +Author: Various + +Release Date: July 27, 2009 [EBook #29516] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ATLANTIC MONTHLY, DECEMBER 1864 *** + + + + +Produced by Joshua Hutchinson, Josephine Paolucci and the +Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net. +(This file was produced from images generously made +available by Cornell University Digital Collections.) + + + + + + + + + + +THE + +ATLANTIC MONTHLY. + +A MAGAZINE OF LITERATURE, ART, AND POLITICS. + + +VOL. XIV.--DECEMBER, 1864.--NO. LXXXVI. + +Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1864, by TICKNOR AND +FIELDS, in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of +Massachusetts. + + + + +THE HIGHLAND LIGHT. + + +This light-house, known to mariners as the Cape Cod or Highland Light, +is one of our "primary sea-coast lights," and is usually the first seen +by those approaching the entrance of Massachusetts Bay from Europe. It +is forty-three miles from Cape Ann Light, and forty-one from Boston +Light. It stands about twenty rods from the edge of the bank, which is +here formed of clay. I borrowed the plane and square, level and +dividers, of a carpenter who was shingling a barn near by, and, using +one of those shingles made of a mast, contrived a rude sort of quadrant, +with pins for sights and pivots, and got the angle of elevation of the +bank opposite the light-house, and with a couple of cod-lines the length +of its slope, and so measured its height on the shingle. It rises one +hundred and ten feet above its immediate base, or about one hundred and +twenty-three feet above mean low water. Graham, who has carefully +surveyed the extremity of the Cape, makes it one hundred and thirty +feet. The mixed sand and clay lay at an angle of forty degrees with the +horizon, where I measured it, but the clay is generally much steeper. No +cow nor hen ever gets down it. Half a mile farther south the bank is +fifteen or twenty-five feet higher, and that appeared to be the highest +land in North Truro. Even this vast clay-bank is fast wearing away. +Small streams of water trickling down it at intervals of two or three +rods have left the intermediate clay in the form of steep Gothic roofs +fifty feet high or more, the ridges as sharp and rugged-looking as +rocks; and in one place the bank is curiously eaten out in the form of a +large semicircular crater. + +According to the light-house keeper, the Cape is wasting here on both +sides, though most on the eastern. In some places it had lost many rods +within the last year, and erelong the light-house must be moved. We +calculated, _from his data_, how soon the Cape would be quite worn away +at this point,--"for," said he, "I can remember sixty years back." We +were even more surprised at this last announcement--that is, at the slow +waste of life and energy in our informant, for we had taken him to be +not more than forty--than at the rapid wasting of the Cape, and we +thought that he stood a fair chance to outlive the former. + +Between this October and June of the next year I found that the bank had +lost about forty feet in one place opposite the light-house, and it was +cracked more than forty feet farther from the edge at the last date, the +shore being strewn with the recent rubbish. But I judged that generally +it was not wearing away here at the rate of more than six feet annually. +Any conclusions drawn from the observations of a few years or one +generation only are likely to prove false, and the Cape may balk +expectation by its durability. In some places even a wrecker's foot-path +down the bank lasts several years. One old inhabitant told us that when +the light-house was built, in 1798, it was calculated that it would +stand forty-five years, allowing the bank to waste one length of fence +each year, "but," said he, "there it is" (or rather another near the +same site, about twenty rods from the edge of the bank). + +The sea is not gaining on the Cape everywhere: for one man told me of a +vessel wrecked long ago on the north of Provincetown whose "_bones_" +(this was his word) are still visible many rods within the present line +of the beach, half buried in sand. Perchance they lie along-side the +_timbers_ of a whale. The general statement of the inhabitants is, that +the Cape is wasting on both sides, but extending itself on particular +points on the south and west, as at Chatham and Monomoy Beaches, and at +Billingsgate, Long, and Race Points. James Freeman stated in his day +that above three miles had been added to Monomoy Beach during the +previous fifty years, and it is said to be still extending as fast as +ever. A writer in the "Massachusetts Magazine," in the last century, +tells us, that, "when the English first settled upon the Cape, there was +an island off Chatham, at three leagues' distance, called Webb's Island, +containing twenty acres, covered with red-cedar or savin. The +inhabitants of Nantucket used to carry wood from it"; but he adds that +in his day a large rock alone marked the spot, and the water was six +fathoms deep there. The entrance to Nauset Harbor, which was once in +Eastham, has now travelled south into Orleans. The islands in Wellfleet +Harbor once formed a continuous beach, though now small vessels pass +between them. And so of many other parts of this coast. + +Perhaps what the ocean takes from one part of the Cape it gives to +another,--robs Peter to pay Paul. On the eastern side the sea appears to +be everywhere encroaching on the land. Not only the land is undermined, +and its ruins carried off by currents, but the sand is blown from the +beach directly up the steep bank, where it is one hundred and fifty feet +high, and covers the original surface there many feet deep. If you sit +on the edge, you will have ocular demonstration of this by soon getting +your eyes full. Thus the bank preserves its height as fast as it is worn +away. This sand is steadily travelling westward at a rapid rate, "more +than a hundred yards," says one writer, within the memory of inhabitants +now living; so that in some places peat-meadows are buried deep under +the sand, and the peat is cut through it; and in one place a large +peat-meadow has made its appearance on the shore in the bank covered +many feet deep, and peat has been cut there. This accounts for that +great pebble of peat which we saw in the surf. The old oysterman had +told us that many years ago he lost a "crittur" by her being mired in a +swamp near the Atlantic side, east of his house, and twenty years ago he +lost the swamp itself entirely, but has since seen signs of it appearing +on the beach. He also said that he had seen cedar-stumps "as big as +cart-wheels" (!) on the bottom of the Bay, three miles off Billingsgate +Point, when leaning over the side of his boat in pleasant weather, and +that that was dry land not long ago. Another told us that a log canoe +known to have been buried many years before on the Bay side at East +Harbor in Truro, where the Cape is extremely narrow, appeared at length +on the Atlantic side, the Cape having rolled over it; and an old woman +said,--"Now, you see, it is true what I told you, that the Cape is +moving." + +The bars along the coast shift with every storm, and in many places +there is occasionally none at all. We ourselves observed the effect of a +single storm with a high tide in the night, in July, 1855. It moved the +sand on the beach opposite the light-house to the depth of six feet, and +three rods in width as far as we could see north and south, and carried +it bodily off no one knows exactly where, laying bare in one place a +large rock five feet high which was invisible before, and narrowing the +beach to that extent. There is usually, as I have said, no bathing on +the back side of the Cape, on account of the undertow; but when we were +there last, the sea had, three months before, cast up a bar near this +light-house, two miles long and ten rods wide, over which the tide did +not flow, leaving a narrow cove, then a quarter of a mile long, between +it and the shore, which afforded excellent bathing. This cove had from +time to time been closed up as the bar travelled northward, in one +instance imprisoning four or five hundred whiting and cod, which died +there, and the water as often turned fresh and finally gave place to +sand. This bar, the inhabitants assured us, might be wholly removed, and +the water be six feet deep there in two or three days. + +The light-house keeper said, that, when the wind blowed strong on to the +shore, the waves ate fast into the bank, but when it blowed off, they +took no sand away; for in the former case the wind heaped up the surface +of the water next to the beach, and to preserve its equilibrium a strong +undertow immediately set back again into the sea, which carried with it +the sand and whatever else was in the way, and left the beach hard to +walk on; but in the latter case the undertow set on, and carried the +sand with it, so that it was particularly difficult for shipwrecked men +to get to land when the wind blowed on to the shore, but easier when it +blowed off. This undertow, meeting the next surface-wave on the bar +which itself has made, forms part of the dam over which the latter +breaks, as over an upright wall. The sea thus plays with the land, +holding a sand-bar in its mouth awhile before it swallows it, as a cat +plays with a mouse; but the fatal gripe is sure to come at last. The sea +sends its rapacious east-wind to rob the land, but before the former has +got far with its prey, the land sends its honest west-wind to recover +some of its own. But, according to Lieutenant Davis, the forms, extent, +and distribution of sand-bars and banks are principally determined, not +by winds and waves, but by tides. + +Our host said that you would be surprised, if you were on the beach when +the wind blew a hurricane directly on to it, to see that none of the +drift-wood came ashore, but all was carried directly northward and +parallel with the shore as fast as a man can walk, by the in-shore +current, which sets strongly in that direction at flood-tide. The +strongest swimmers also are carried along with it, and never gain an +inch toward the beach. Even a large rock has been moved half a mile +northward along the beach. He assured us that the sea was never still on +the back side of the Cape, but ran commonly as high as your head, so +that a great part of the time you could not launch a boat there, and +even in the calmest weather the waves run six or eight feet up the +beach, though then you could get off on a plank. Champlain and +Poitrincourt could not land here in 1606, on account of the swell, (_la +houlle_,) yet the savages came off to them in a canoe. In the Sieur de +la Borde's "Relation des Caraibes," my edition of which was published at +Amsterdam in 1711, at page 530 he says:-- + + "Couroumon a Caraibe, also a star [_i.e._ a god], makes the + great _lames à la mer_, and overturns canoes. _Lames à la mer_ + are the long _vagues_ which are not broken (_entrecoupées_), + and such as one sees come to land all in one piece, from one + end of a beach to another, so that, however little wind there + may be, a shallop or a canoe could hardly land (_aborder + terre_) without turning over, or being filled with water." + +But on the Bay side, the water, even at its edge, is often as smooth and +still as in a pond. Commonly there are no boats used along this beach. +There was a boat belonging to the Highland Light, which the next keeper, +after he had been there a year, had not launched, though he said that +there was good fishing just off the shore. Generally the life-boats +cannot be used when needed. When the waves run very high, it is +impossible to get a boat off, however skilfully you steer it, for it +will often be completely covered by the curving edge of the approaching +breaker as by an arch, and so filled with water, or it will be lifted up +by its bows, turned directly over backwards, and all the contents +spilled out. A spar thirty feet long is served in the same way. + +I heard of a party who went off fishing back of Wellfleet some years +ago, in two boats, in calm weather, who, when they had laden their boats +with fish, and approached the land again, found such a swell breaking on +it, though there was no wind, that they were afraid to enter it. At +first they thought to pull for Provincetown; but night coming on, and +that was many miles distant. Their case seemed a desperate one. As often +as they approached the shore and saw the terrible breakers that +intervened, they were deterred. In short, they were thoroughly +frightened. Finally, having thrown their fish overboard, those in one +boat chose a favorable opportunity, and succeeded, by skill and good +luck, in reaching the land; but they were unwilling to take the +responsibility of telling the others when to come in, and as the other +helmsman was inexperienced, their boat was swamped at once, yet all +managed to save themselves. + +Much smaller waves soon make a boat "nail-sick," as the phrase is. The +keeper said that after a long and strong blow there would be three large +waves, each successively larger than the last, and then no large ones +for some time, and that, when they wished to land in a boat, they came +in on the last and largest wave. Sir Thomas Browne, (as quoted in +Brand's "Popular Antiquities," p. 372,) on the subject of the tenth wave +being "greater or more dangerous than any other," after quoting Ovid,-- + + "Qui venit hic fluctus, fluctus supereminet omnes: + Posterior nono est, undecimoque prior,"-- + +says, "Which, notwithstanding, is evidently false; nor can it be made +out by observation either upon the shore or the ocean, as we have with +diligence explored in both. And surely in vain we expect a regularity in +the waves of the sea, or in the particular motions thereof, as we may in +its general reciprocations, whose causes are constant, and effects +therefore correspondent; whereas its fluctuations are but motions +subservient, which winds, storms, shores, shelves, and every +interjacency irregulates." + +We read that the Clay Pounds were so called "because vessels have had +the misfortune to be pounded against them in gales of wind," which we +regard as a doubtful derivation. There are small ponds here, upheld by +the clay, which were formerly called the Clay Pits. Perhaps this, or +Clay Ponds, is the origin of the name. Water is found in the clay quite +near the surface; but we heard of one man who had sunk a well in the +sand close by, "till he could see stars at noonday," without finding +any. + +Over this bare highland the wind has full sweep. Even in July it blows +the wings over the heads of the young turkeys, which do not know enough +to head against it; and in gales the doors and windows are blown in, and +you must hold on to the light-house to prevent being blown into the +Atlantic. They who merely keep out on the beach in a storm in the winter +are sometimes rewarded by the Humane Society. If you would feel the full +force of a tempest, take up your residence on the top of Mount +Washington, or at the Highland Light in Truro. + +It was said in 1794 that more vessels were cast away on the east shore +of Truro than anywhere in Barnstable County. Notwithstanding this +light-house has since been erected, after almost every storm we read of +one or more vessels wrecked here, and sometimes more than a dozen wrecks +are visible from this point at one time. The inhabitants hear the crash +of vessels going to pieces as they sit round their hearths, and they +commonly date from some memorable shipwreck. If the history of this +beach could be written from beginning to end, it would be a thrilling +page in the history of commerce. + +Truro was settled in the year 1700 as _Dangerfield_. This was a very +appropriate name, for I read on a monument in the graveyard near Pamet +River the following inscription:-- + + Sacred + to the memory of + 57 citizens of Truro, + who were lost in seven + vessels, which + foundered at sea in + the memorable gale + of Oct. 3d, 1841. + +Their names and ages by families were recorded on different sides of the +stone. They are said to have been lost on George's Bank, and I was told +that only one vessel drifted ashore on the back side of the Cape, with +the boys locked into the cabin and drowned. It is said that the homes of +all were "within a circuit of two miles." Twenty-eight inhabitants of +Dennis were lost in the same gale; and I read that "in one day, +immediately after this storm, nearly or quite one hundred bodies were +taken up and buried on Cape Cod." The Truro Insurance Company failed for +want of skippers to take charge of its vessels. But the surviving +inhabitants went a-fishing again the next year as usual. I found that it +would not do to speak of shipwrecks there, for almost every family has +lost some of its members at sea. "Who lives in that house?" I inquired. +"Three widows," was the reply. The stranger and the inhabitant view the +shore with very different eyes. The former may have come to see and +admire the ocean in a storm; but the latter looks on it as the scene +where his nearest relatives were wrecked. When I remarked to an old +wrecker, partially blind, who was sitting on the edge of the bank +smoking a pipe, which he had just lit with a match of dried beach-grass, +that I supposed he liked to hear the sound of the surf, he answered, +"No, I do not like to hear the sound of the surf." He had lost at least +one son in "the memorable gale," and could tell many a tale of the +shipwrecks which he had witnessed there. + +In the year 1717, a noted pirate named Bellamy was led on to the bar off +Wellfleet by the captain of a snow which he had taken, to whom he had +offered his vessel again, if he would pilot him into Provincetown +Harbor. Tradition says that the latter threw over a burning tar-barrel +in the night, which drifted ashore, and the pirates followed it. A storm +coming on, their whole fleet was wrecked, and more than a hundred dead +bodies lay along the shore. Six who escaped shipwreck were executed. "At +times to this day," (1793,) says the historian of Wellfleet, "there are +King William and Queen Mary's coppers picked up, and pieces of silver +called cob-money. The violence of the seas moves the sands on the outer +bar, so that at times the iron caboose of the ship [that is, Bellamy's] +at low ebbs has been seen." Another tells us, that, "for many years +after this shipwreck, a man of a very singular and frightful aspect used +every spring and autumn to be seen travelling on the Cape, who was +supposed to have been one of Bellamy's crew. The presumption is that he +went to some place where money had been secreted by the pirates, to get +such a supply as his exigencies required. When he died, many pieces of +gold were found in a girdle which he constantly wore." + +As I was walking on the beach here in my last visit, looking for shells +and pebbles, just after that storm which I have mentioned as moving the +sand to a great depth, not knowing but I might find some cob-money, I +did actually pick up a French crown-piece, worth about a dollar and six +cents, near high-water mark, on the still moist sand, just under the +abrupt, caving base of the bank. It was of a dark slate-color, and +looked like a flat pebble, but still bore a very distinct and handsome +head of Louis XV., and the usual legend on the reverse, "_Sit Nomen +Domini Benedictum_," (Blessed be the Name of the Lord,)--a pleasing +sentiment to read in the sands of the sea-shore, whatever it might be +stamped on,--and I also made out the date, 1741. Of course, I thought at +first that it was that same old button which I have found so many times, +but my knife soon showed the silver. Afterward, rambling on the bars at +low tide, I cheated my companion by holding up round shells (_Scutellæ_) +between my fingers, whereupon he quickly stripped and came off to me. + +In the Revolution, a British ship-of-war, called the Somerset, was +wrecked near the Clay Pounds, and all on board, some hundreds in number, +were taken prisoners. My informant said that he had never seen any +mention of this in the histories, but that at any rate he knew of a +silver watch, which one of those prisoners by accident left there, which +was still going to tell the story. But this event is noticed by some +writers. + +The next summer I saw a sloop from Chatham dragging for anchors and +chains just off this shore. She had her boats out at the work while she +shuffled about on various tacks, and, when anything was found, drew up +to hoist it on board. It is a singular employment, at which men are +regularly hired and paid for their industry, to hunt to-day in pleasant +weather for anchors which have been lost,--the sunken faith and hope of +mariners, to which they trusted in vain: now, perchance, it is the rusty +one of some old pirate's ship or Norman fisherman, whose cable parted +here two hundred years ago; and now the best bower-anchor of a Canton or +a California ship, which has gone about her business. If the roadsteads +of the spiritual ocean could be thus dragged, what rusty flukes of hope +deceived and parted chain-cables of faith might again be windlassed +aboard! enough to sink the finder's craft, or stock new navies to the +end of time. The bottom of the sea is strown with anchors, some deeper +and some shallower, and alternately covered and uncovered by the sand, +perchance with a small length of iron cable still attached,--of which +where is the other end? So many unconcluded tales to be continued +another time. So, if we had diving-bells adapted to the spiritual deeps, +we should see anchors with their cables attached, as thick as eels in +vinegar, all wriggling vainly toward their holding-ground. But that is +not treasure for us which another man has lost; rather it is for us to +seek what no other man has found or can find,--not be Chatham men, +dragging for anchors. + +The annals of this voracious beach! who could write them, unless it were +a shipwrecked sailor? How many who have seen it have seen it only in the +midst of danger and distress, the last strip of earth which their mortal +eyes beheld! Think of the amount of suffering which a single strand has +witnessed! The ancients would have represented it as a sea-monster with +open jaws, more terrible than Scylla and Charybdis. An inhabitant of +Truro told me that about a fortnight after the St. John was wrecked at +Cohasset he found two bodies on the shore at the Clay Pounds. They were +those of a man and a corpulent woman. The man had thick boots on, though +his head was off, but "it was along-side." It took the finder some weeks +to get over the sight. Perhaps they were man and wife, and whom God had +joined the ocean-currents had not put asunder. Yet by what slight +accidents at first may they have been associated in their drifting! Some +of the bodies of those passengers were picked up far out at sea, boxed +up and sunk; some brought ashore and buried. There are more consequences +to a shipwreck than the underwriters notice. The Gulf Stream may return +some to their native shores, or drop them in some out-of-the-way cave of +ocean, where time and the elements will write new riddles with their +bones.--But to return to land again. + +In this bank, above the clay, I counted in the summer two hundred holes +of the bank-swallow within a space six rods long, and there were at +least one thousand old birds within three times that distance, +twittering over the surf. I had never associated them in my thoughts +with the beach before. One little boy who had been a-bird's-nesting had +got eighty swallows' eggs for his share. Tell it not to the Humane +Society! There were many young birds on the clay beneath, which had +tumbled out and died. Also there were many crow-blackbirds hopping about +in the dry fields, and the upland plover were breeding close by the +light-house. The keeper had once cut off one's wing while mowing, as she +sat on her eggs there. This is also a favorite resort for gunners in the +fall to shoot the golden plover. As around the shores of a pond are seen +devil's-needles, butterflies, etc., so here, to my surprise, I saw at +the same season great devil's-needles of a size proportionably larger, +or nearly as big as my finger, incessantly coasting up and down the edge +of the bank, and butterflies also were hovering over it, and I never saw +so many dor-bugs and beetles of various kinds as strewed the beach. They +had apparently flown over the bank in the night, and could not get up +again, and some had perhaps fallen into the sea and were washed ashore. +They may have been in part attracted by the light-house lamps. + +The Clay Pounds are a more fertile tract than usual. We saw some fine +patches of roots and corn here. As generally on the Cape, the plants had +little stalk or leaf, but ran remarkably to seed. The corn was hardly +more than half as high as in the interior, yet the ears were large and +full, and one farmer told us that he could raise forty bushels on an +acre without manure, and sixty with it. The heads of the rye also were +remarkably large. The shadbush, (_Amelanchier_,) beach-plums, and +blueberries, (_Vaccinium Pennsylvanicum_,) like the apple-trees and +oaks, were very dwarfish, spreading over the sand, but at the same time +very fruitful. The blueberry was but an inch or two high, and its fruit +often rested on the ground, so that you did not suspect the presence of +the bushes, even on those bare hills, until you were treading on them. I +thought that this fertility must be owing mainly to the abundance of +moisture in the atmosphere, for I observed that what little grass there +was was remarkably laden with dew in the morning, and in summer dense +imprisoning fogs frequently last till mid-day, turning one's beard into +a wet napkin about his throat, and the oldest inhabitant may lose his +way within a stone's-throw of his house, or be obliged to follow the +beach for a guide. The brick house attached to the light-house was +exceedingly damp at that season, and writing-paper lost all its +stiffness in it. It was impossible to dry your towel after bathing, or +to press flowers without their mildewing. The air was so moist that we +rarely wished to drink, though we could at all times taste the salt on +our lips. Salt was rarely used at table, and our host told us that his +cattle invariably refused it when it was offered them, they got so much +with their grass and at every breath; but he said that a sick horse, or +one just from the country, would sometimes take a hearty draught of salt +water, and seemed to like it and be the better for it. + +It was surprising to see how much water was contained in the terminal +bud of the sea-side golden-rod, standing in the sand early in July, and +also how turnips, beets, carrots, etc., flourished even in pure sand. A +man travelling by the shore near there not long before us noticed +something green growing in the pure sand of the beach, just at +high-water mark, and on approaching found it to be a bed of beets +flourishing vigorously, probably from seed washed out of the Franklin. +Also beets and turnips came up in the sea-weed used for manure in many +parts of the Cape. This suggests how various plants may have been +dispersed over the world to distant islands and continents. Vessels, +with seeds in their cargoes, destined for particular ports, where +perhaps they were not needed, have been cast away on desolate islands, +and though their crews perished, some of their seeds have been +preserved. Out of many kinds a few would find a soil and climate adapted +to them, become naturalized, and perhaps drive out the native plants at +last, and so fit the land for the habitation of man. It is an ill wind +that blows nobody any good, and for the time lamentable shipwrecks may +thus contribute a new vegetable to a continent's stock, and prove on the +whole a lasting blessing to its inhabitants. Or winds and currents might +effect the same without the intervention of man. What, indeed, are the +various succulent plants which grow on the beach but such beds of beets +and turnips, sprung originally from seeds which perhaps were cast on the +waters for this end, though we do not know the Franklin which they came +out of? In ancient times some Mr. Bell (?) was sailing this way in his +ark with seeds of rocket, saltwort, sandwort, beach-grass, samphire, +bayberry, poverty-grass, etc., all nicely labelled with directions, +intending to establish a nursery somewhere; and did not a nursery get +established, though he thought that he had failed? + +About the light-house I observed in the summer the pretty _Polygala +polygama_, spreading ray-wise flat on the ground, white +pasture-thistles, (_Cirsium pumilum_,) and amid the shrubbery the +_Smilax glauca_, which is commonly said not to grow so far north. Near +the edge of the banks about half a mile southward, the broom-crowberry, +(_Empetrum Conradii_,) for which Plymouth is the only locality in +Massachusetts usually named, forms pretty green mounds four or five feet +in diameter by one foot high,--soft, springy beds for the wayfarer: I +saw it afterward in Provincetown. But prettiest of all, the scarlet +pimpernel, or poor-man's weather-glass, (_Anagallis arvensis_,) greets +you in fair weather on almost every square yard of sand. From Yarmouth I +have received the _Chrysopsis falcata_, (golden aster,) and _Vaccinium +stamineum_, (deer-berry or squaw-huckleberry,) with fruit not edible, +sometimes as large as a cranberry (Sept. 7). + +The Highland Light-house,[A] where we were staying, is a +substantial-looking building of brick, painted white, and surmounted by +an iron cap. Attached to it is the dwelling of the keeper, one story +high, also of brick, and built by Government. As we were going to spend +the night in a light-house, we wished to make the most of so novel an +experience, and therefore told our host that we should like to accompany +him when he went to light up. At rather early candle-light he lighted a +small Japan lamp, allowing it to smoke rather more than we like on +ordinary occasions, and told us to follow him. He led the way first +through his bedroom, which was placed nearest to the light-house, and +then through a long, narrow, covered passage-way, between whitewashed +walls, like a prison-entry, into the lower part of the light-house, +where many great butts of oil were arranged around; thence we ascended +by a winding and open iron stairway, with a steadily increasing scent of +oil and lamp-smoke, to a trap-door in an iron floor, and through this +into the lantern. It was a neat building, with everything in apple-pie +order, and no danger of anything rusting there for want of oil. The +light consisted of fifteen argand lamps, placed within smooth concave +reflectors twenty-one inches in diameter, and arranged in two horizontal +circles one above the other, facing every way excepting directly down +the Cape. These were surrounded, at a distance of two or three feet, by +large plate-glass windows, which defied the storms, with iron sashes, on +which rested the iron cap. All the iron work, except the floor, was +painted white. And thus the light-house was completed. We walked slowly +round in that narrow space as the keeper lighted each lamp in +succession, conversing with him at the same moment that many a sailor on +the deep witnessed the lighting of the Highland Light. His duty was to +fill and trim and light his lamps, and keep bright the reflectors. He +filled them every morning, and trimmed them commonly once in the course +of the night. He complained of the quality of the oil which was +furnished. This house consumes about eight hundred gallons in a year, +which cost not far from one dollar a gallon; but perhaps a few lives +would be saved, if better oil were provided. Another light-house keeper +said that the same proportion of winter-strained oil was sent to the +southernmost light-house in the Union as to the most northern. Formerly, +when this light-house had windows with small and thin panes, a severe +storm would sometimes break the glass, and then they were obliged to put +up a wooden shutter in haste to save their lights and reflectors,--and +sometimes in tempests, when the mariner stood most in need of their +guidance, they had thus nearly converted the light-house into a +dark-lantern, which emitted only a few feeble rays, and those commonly +on the land or lee side. He spoke of the anxiety and sense of +responsibility which he felt in cold and stormy nights in the winter, +when he knew that many a poor fellow was depending on him, and his lamps +burned dimly, the oil being chilled. Sometimes he was obliged to warm +the oil in a kettle in his house at midnight, and fill his lamps over +again,--for he could not have a fire in the light-house, it produced +such a sweat on the windows. His successor told me that he could not +keep too hot a fire in such a case. All this because the oil was poor. A +government lighting the mariners on its wintry coast with +summer-strained oil, to save expense! That were surely a summer-strained +mercy! + +This keeper's successor, who kindly entertained me the next year, stated +that one extremely cold night, when this and all the neighboring lights +were burning summer oil, but he had been provident enough to reserve a +little winter oil against emergencies, he was waked up with anxiety, and +found that his oil was congealed, and his lights almost extinguished; +and when, after many hours' exertion, he had succeeded in replenishing +his reservoirs with winter oil at the wick-end, and with difficulty had +made them burn, he looked out, and found that the other lights in the +neighborhood, which were usually visible to him, had gone out, and he +heard afterward that the Pamet River and Billingsgate Lights also had +been extinguished. + +Our host said that the frost, too, on the windows caused him much +trouble, and in sultry summer nights the moths covered them and dimmed +his lights; sometimes even small birds flew against the thick +plate-glass, and were found on the ground beneath in the morning with +their necks broken. In the spring of 1855 he found nineteen small +yellow-birds, perhaps goldfinches or myrtle-birds, thus lying dead +around the light-house; and sometimes in the fall he had seen where a +golden plover had struck the glass in the night, and left the down and +the fatty part of its breast on it. + +Thus he struggled, by every method, to keep his light shining before +men. Surely the light-house keeper has a responsible, if an easy, +office. When his lamp goes out, _he_ goes out; or, at most, only one +such accident is pardoned. + +I thought it a pity that some poor student did not live there, to profit +by all that light, since he would not rob the mariner. "Well," he said, +"I do sometimes come up here and read the newspaper when they are noisy +down below." Think of fifteen argand lamps to read the newspaper by! +Government oil!--light enough, perchance, to read the Constitution by! I +thought that he should read nothing less than his Bible by that light. I +had a classmate who fitted for college by the lamps of a light-house, +which was more light, methinks, than the University afforded. + +When we had come down and walked a dozen rods from the light-house, we +found that we could not get the full strength of its light on the narrow +strip of land between it and the shore, being too low for the focus, +and we saw only so many feeble and rayless stars; but at forty rods +inland we could see to read, though we were still indebted to only one +lamp. Each reflector sent forth a separate "fan" of light: one shone on +the windmill, and one in the hollow, while the intervening spaces were +in shadow. This light is said to be visible twenty nautical miles and +more, to an observer fifteen feet above the level of the sea. We could +see the revolving light at Race Point, the end of the Cape, about nine +miles distant, and also the light on Long Point, at the entrance of +Provincetown Harbor, and one of the distant Plymouth Harbor Lights, +across the Bay, nearly in a range with the last, like a star in the +horizon. The keeper thought that the other Plymouth Light was concealed +by being exactly in a range with the Long Point Light. He told us that +the mariner was sometimes led astray by a mackerel-fisher's lantern, who +was afraid of being run down in the night, or even by a cottager's +light, mistaking them for some well-known light on the coast,--and, when +he discovered his mistake, was wont to curse the prudent fisher or the +wakeful cottager without reason. + +Though it was once declared that Providence placed this mass of clay +here on purpose to erect a light-house on, the keeper said that the +light-house should have been erected half a mile farther south, where +the coast begins to bend, and where the light could be seen at the same +time with the Nauset Lights, and distinguished from them. They now talk +of building one there. It happens that the present one is the more +useless now, so near the extremity of the Cape, because other +light-houses have since been erected there. + +Among the many regulations of the Light-House Board, hanging against the +wall here, many of them excellent, perhaps, if there were a regiment +stationed here to attend to them, there is one requiring the keeper to +keep an account of the number of vessels which pass his light during the +day. But there are a hundred vessels in sight at once, steering in all +directions, many on the very verge of the horizon, and he must have more +eyes than Argus, and be a good deal farther-sighted, to tell which are +passing his light. It is an employment in some respects best suited to +the habits of the gulls which coast up and down here and circle over the +sea. + +I was told by the next keeper, that on the eighth of June following, a +particularly clear and beautiful morning, he rose about half an hour +before sunrise, and, having a little time to spare, for his custom was +to extinguish his lights at sunrise, walked down toward the shore to see +what he might find. When he got to the edge of the bank, he looked up, +and, to his astonishment, saw the sun rising, and already part way above +the horizon. Thinking that his clock was wrong, he made haste back, and, +though it was still too early by the clock, extinguished his lamps, and +when he had got through and come down, he looked out of the window, and, +to his still greater astonishment, saw the sun just where it was before, +two-thirds above the horizon. He showed me where its rays fell on the +wall across the room. He proceeded to make a fire, and when he had done, +there was the sun still at the same height. Whereupon, not trusting to +his own eyes any longer, he called up his wife to look at it, and she +saw it also. There were vessels in sight on the ocean, and their crews, +too, he said, must have seen it, for its rays fell on them. It remained +at that height for about fifteen minutes by the clock, and then rose as +usual, and nothing else extraordinary happened during that day. Though +accustomed to the coast, he had never witnessed nor heard of such a +phenomenon before. I suggested that there might have been a cloud in the +horizon invisible to him, which rose with the sun, and his clock was +only as accurate as the average; or perhaps, as he denied the +possibility of this, it was such a looming of the sun as is said to +occur at Lake Superior and elsewhere. Sir John Franklin, for instance, +says in his "Narrative," that, when he was on the shore of the Polar +Sea, the horizontal refraction varied so much one morning that "the +upper limb of the sun twice appeared at the horizon before it finally +rose." + +He certainly must be a son of Aurora to whom the sun looms, when there +are so many millions to whom it _glooms_ rather, or who never see it +till an hour _after_ it has risen. But it behooves us old stagers to +keep our lamps trimmed and burning to the last, and not trust to the +sun's looming. + +This keeper remarked that the centre of the flame should be exactly +opposite the centre of the reflectors, and that accordingly, if he was +not careful to turn down his wicks in the morning, the sun falling on +the reflectors on the south side of the building would set fire to them, +like a burning-glass, in the coldest day, and he would look up at noon +and see them all lighted! When your lamp is ready to give light, it is +readiest to receive it, and the sun will light it. His successor said +that he had never known them to blaze in such a case, but merely to +smoke. + +I saw that this was a place of wonders. In a sea-turn or shallow fog, +while I was there the next summer, it being clear overhead, the edge of +the bank twenty rods distant appeared like a mountain-pasture in the +horizon. I was completely deceived by it, and I could then understand +why mariners sometimes ran ashore in such cases, especially in the +night, supposing it to be far away, though they could see the land. Once +since this, being in a large oyster-boat two or three hundred miles from +here, in a dark night, when there was a thin veil of mist on land and +water, we came so near to running on to the land before our skipper was +aware of it, that the first warning was my hearing the sound of the surf +under my elbow. I could almost have jumped ashore, and we were obliged +to go about very suddenly to prevent striking. The distant light for +which we were steering, supposing it a light-house five or six miles +off, came through the cracks of a fisherman's bunk not more than six +rods distant. + +The keeper entertained us handsomely in his solitary little ocean-house. +He was a man of singular patience and intelligence, who, when our +queries struck him, rang as clear as a bell in response. The light-house +lamps a few feet distant shone full into my chamber, and made it as +bright as day, so I knew exactly how the Highland Light bore all that +night, and I was in no danger of being wrecked. Unlike the last, this +was as still as a summer night. I thought, as I lay there, half awake +and half asleep, looking upward through the window at the lights +above my head, how many sleepless eyes from far out on the +ocean-stream--mariners of all nations spinning their yarns through the +various watches of the night--were directed toward my couch. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[A] The light-house has since been rebuilt, and shows a _Fresnel_ light. + + + + +ENGLISH AUTHORS IN FLORENCE. + + +Bella Firenze, "Flower of all Cities and City of all Flowers," is not +only the garden of Italy's intellect, but the hot-house to which many a +Northern genius has been transplanted. The house where Milton resided is +still pointed out and held sacred by his venerators; and Casa Guidi, +gloomier and grayer now that the grand light has gone out of it, is of +especial interest to every cultivated traveller. A gratified smile, born +of sorrow, passes over the stranger's face, as he reads the inscription +upon the tablet that makes Casa Guidi historical,--a tablet inserted by +the municipality of Florence as a grateful tribute to the memory of a +truly great woman, great enough to love Truth "more than Plato and +Plato's country, more than Dante and Dante's country, more even than +Shakspeare and Shakspeare's country." + + Quì scrisse e morì + Elisabetta Barrett Browning + Che in cuore di donna conciliava + Scienza di dotto o spirito di poeta + E fece del suo verso aureo anello + Fra Italia e Inghilterra + Pone questa memoria + Firenze grata + 1861 + +Here wrote and died Elizabeth Barrett Browning! + +Tradition says that years ago Casa Guidi was the scene of several dark +deeds; and after having wandered through the great rooms, for the most +part perpetually in shadow, one's imagination puts full faith in a +time-worn story. Whatever may have been the stain left upon the old +palace by the Guidi, it has been removed by an alien woman,--by her who +sat "By the Fireside," and toiled unceasingly for the good of man and +the love, of God. Casa Guidi heard the whispering of "One Word More," +the echo of which is growing fainter and fainter to the ear, but +subtiler to the soul; and looking up at _her_ house, we hear the murmur +of a poet's voice, saying,-- + + "God be thanked, the meanest of His creatures + Boasts two soul-sides, one to face the world with, + One to show a woman when he loves her." + +The unsuspected prophecy of "One Word More" has been fulfilled,-- + + "Lines I write the first time and the last time,"-- + +for Destiny has given to them other than the author's meaning: because +of this destiny, we pass from the shadow of Casa Guidi with bowed head. + +It is a beautiful custom, this of Italy, marking the spot where noble +souls have lived or died, that coming generations may learn to venerate +the greatness of the past, and become inspired thereby to exalted deeds +in the present. We of America, eagerly busy jostling the elbows of +To-Day, have not even a turn of the head for the haunts of dead men whom +we honor. No tablets mark their homes; and indeed they would be of +little profit to a country where mementos of "lang syne" are never +spared, when the requirements of commerce or of real estate issue their +universal mandate, "Destroy and build anew!" America shakes all dust +from off her feet, even that of great men's bones; though indeed Boston, +which is not wanting in esteem for its respectable antecedents, has made +a feeble attempt to do honor to the Father of his Country. The tablet is +but an attempt, however, which has become thoroughly demoralized by +keeping company with attorneys' signs and West-India goods; the bouquet +of law-papers, _plus_ coffee and tobacco, has deprived the salt of its +savor. + +Far different is it in Florence, where the identical houses still +remain. Almost every street bears the record of a great man. To walk +there is to hold intimate communion with departed genius. What traveller +has not mused before Dante's stone? The most careless cannot pass +Palazzo Buonarotti without giving a thought to Michel Angelo and his +art. An afternoon's stroll along the Lung' Arno to drink in the warmth +of an Italian sunset is made doubly suggestive by a glance at the house +where set another sun when the Piedmontese poet-patriot, Alfieri, died. +We never passed through the Via Guicciardini, as clingy, musty, and +gloomy as the writings of the old historian whose palace gives name to +the street, without looking up at the weather-beaten _casa_ dedicated to +the memory of that wonderfully subtile Tuscan, Niccolò Macchiavelli; and +by dint of much looking we fancied ourselves drawn nearer to the +Florence of 1500, and read "The Prince," with a gusto and an +apprehension which nothing but the old house could have inspired. This, +at least, we believed, and our faith in the fancy remains unshaken, now +that Mr. Denton, the geologist, has expounded the theory of +"Psychometry," which he tells us is the divination of soul through the +contact of matter with a psychometrical mind. Had we in those days been +better versed in this theory of "the soul of things," we should have +made a gentle application of forehead to the door-step of Macchiavelli's +mundane residence, and doubtless have arisen thoroughly pervaded with +the true spirit of the man whose feet were familiar to a stone now +desecrated by wine-flasks, onions, cabbages, and _contadini_. + +Mrs. Somerville, to whom the world is indebted for several developments +in physical geography, is almost as fixed a Florentine celebrity as the +Palazzo Vecchio; and Villino Trollope has become endeared to many +_forestieri_ from the culture and hospitality of its inmates. It is the +residence of Mr. and Mrs. Thomas Adolphus Trollope, earnest contributors +to the literature of England, and active friends of Cavour's Italy. +Justice prompts us to say that no other foreigner of the present day has +done so much as Mr. Trollope to familiarize the Anglo-Saxon mind with +the genius and aspirations of Italy. A constant writer for the liberal +press of London, Mr. Trollope is also the author of several historical +works that have taken their place in a long-neglected niche. "A Decade +of Italian Women" has woven new interest around ten females of renown, +while his later works of "Filippo Strozzi" and "Paul the Pope and Paul +the Friar," have thrown additional light upon three vigorous historical +characters, as well as upon much Romish iniquity. "Tuscany in '48 and +'59" is the most satisfactory book of the kind that has been published, +Mr. Trollope's constant residence in Florence having made him perfectly +familiar with the actual _status_ of Tuscany during these important eras +in her history. The old saying, "Merit is its own reward," to which it +is usually necessary to give a Pre-Raphaelite interpretation, has had a +broader signification to Mr. Trollope, whose efforts in Italy's behalf +have been appreciated by the _Rè Galantuomo_, Victor Emanuel, by whom he +has been knighted with the Order of Saints Maurice and Lazarus. As the +decoration was entirely unsolicited,--for Mr. Trollope is a true +democrat,--and as he is nearly, if not quite, the only Englishman +similarly honored, the compliment is as pleasing as it is flattering. + +Historian though he be, Mr. Trollope has more recently made his mark as +a novelist. "La Beata," an Italian story, published three years ago, is +greatly praised by London critics, one strong writer describing it as a +"beatific book." The character of the heroine has been drawn with a +pathos rare and heart-rending, nor can the reader fail to be impressed +with the nobility of the mind that could conceive of such exceeding +purity and self-sacrifice in woman. Mr. Trollope's later novels of +"Marietta" and "Giulio Malatesta" have also met with great success, and, +although not comparable with "La Beata," give most accurate pictures of +Italian life and manners,--and truth is ordinarily left out of +Anglo-Italian stories. "Giulio Malatesta" is of decided historical +interest, giving a side-view of the Revolution of '48 and of the Battle +of Curtatone, which was fought so nobly by Tuscan volunteers and +students. It is a matter of regret to all lovers of Italy that Mr. +Trollope's works have not been republished in America, as no American +has labored in the same field, nor do Americans _en masse_ possess very +correct ideas of a country whose great future is creating an additional +interest in her promising present and wonderful past. Mr. Trollope's +"History of Florence," upon which he is now at work, will be his most +valuable contribution to literature. + +Mrs. Trollope, who from her polyglot accomplishments may be called a +many-sided woman, has been, both by Nature and education, most liberally +endowed with intellectual gifts. The depressing influence of continual +invalidism alone prevents her from taking that literary position which +good health and application would soon secure for her. Nevertheless, +Mrs. Trollope has for several years been a constant correspondent of the +London "Athenæum," and in all seasons Young Italy has found an +enthusiastic friend in her. Many are the machinations of the clerical +and Lorraine parties that have been revealed to the English reader by +Mrs. Trollope; and when, some time since, her letters upon the "Social +Aspects of Revolution in Italy," were collected and published in +book-form, they met with the cordial approbation of the critics. These +letters are marked by purity of style, quaint picturesqueness, and an +admirable _couleur locale_. As a translator, Mrs. Trollope possesses +very rare ability. Her natural aptitude for language is great. A +residence in Italy of seventeen years has made her almost as familiar +with the mother-tongue of Dante as with that of Shakspeare; and we make +bold to say that Giovan Battista Niccolini's most celebrated tragedy, +"Arnaldo da Brescia," loses none of its Italian lustre in Mrs. +Trollope's setting of English blank-verse,--Ah! we cannot soon forget +the first time that we saw this same Niccolini, the greatest poet of +modern Italy! It was in the spring of 1860, upon the memorable +inauguration of the Theatre Niccolini,--_ci-devant_ Cocomero, +(water-melon,)--when Florence gave its first public reception to the +poet, who was not only Tuscan, but Italianissimo, and rendered more than +a passing homage to his name in the new baptism of a charming theatre. +Since 1821 Niccolini had been fighting for the good cause with pen as +cutting as Damascus blade; the goal was not reached until the veteran of +eighty-two, paralyzed in body and mind, was borne into the presence of +an enthusiastic audience to receive its bravos. So lately as the +previous year the Ducal government had suppressed a demonstration in +Niccolini's favor: _this_ night must have atoned for the persecutions of +the past. It was then that we heard Rossi, the great actor, declaim +entire scenes from "Arnold of Brescia"; and though he stood before us as +plain citizen Rossi in a lustrous suit of broadcloth, the fervor and +intensity with which he interpreted the master-thoughts of Niccolini +forced the audience to see in him the embodiment of the grand +patriot-priest. We have witnessed but few greater dramatic performances; +never have we been present at so impassioned a political demonstration. +Freedom of speech was but just born to Italy, and Florence drew a long +breath in the presence of a national teacher. Eighteen months later +Niccolini gazed for the last time upon Italy, and saw the fulfilment of +his prophecies. + +We wish there were a copy of Mrs. Trollope's translation of "Arnaldo da +Brescia" in America, that we might make noble extracts, and cause other +eyes to glisten with the fire of its passion. We can recall but one +passage, a speech made by Arnaldo to the recreant Pope Adrian. It is as +strong and fearless as was the monk himself. + + "Adrian, thou dost deceive thyself. The dread + Of Roman thunderbolts is growing faint, + And Reason slacks the bonds thou'dst have eternal. + She'll break them; yet she is not well awake. + Already human thought so far rebels, + That tame it thou canst not: Christ cries to it, + As to the sick of old, '_Arise and walk!_' + 'T will trample thee, if thou precede it not: + The world has other truths than of the altar, + Nor will endure a church which hideth Heaven. + Thou wast a shepherd,--be a father: men + Are tired at last of being called a flock; + Too long have they stood trembling in the path + Smit by your pastoral staff. Why in the name + Of Heaven dost trample on the race of man, + The latest offspring of the Thought Divine?" + +It is not strange that the emancipated Florentines grow wild with +delight when Rossi declaimed such heresy as this. + +Mrs. Trollope's later translations of the patriotic poems of Dall' +Ongaro, the clever Venetian, are very spirited; nor is she unknown as an +original poet. "Baby Beatrice," a poem inscribed to her own fairy child, +that appeared several years ago in "Household Words," is exceedingly +charming; and one of her fugitive pieces, having naturally transformed +itself into "_la lingua del sì_," has ever been attributed to her friend +Niccolini. + +It was as a poet that Mrs. Trollope, then Miss Garrow, began to +write,--and indeed she may be called a _protégée_ of Walter Savage +Landor, for through his encouragement and instrumentality she first made +her appearance in print as a contributor to Lady Blessington's "Book of +Beauty." There are few who remember the old lion-poet's lines to Miss +Garrow, and their insertion here cannot be considered _mal-à-propos_. + +"TO THEODOSIA GARROW. + + "Unworthy are these poems of the lights + That now run over them, nor brief the doubt + In my own breast if such should interrupt + (Or follow so irreverently) the voice + Of Attic men, of women such as thou, + Of sages no less sage than heretofore, + Of pleaders no less eloquent, of souls + Tender no less, or tuneful, or devout. + Unvalued, even by myself, are they,-- + Myself, who reared them; but a high command + Marshalled them in their station; here they are; + Look round; see what supports these parasites. + Stinted in growth and destitute of odor, + They grow where young Ternissa held her guide, + Where Solon awed the ruler; there they grow, + Weak as they are, on cliffs that few can climb. + None to thy steps are inaccessible, + Theodosia! wakening Italy with song + Deeper than Filicaia's, or than his, + The triple deity of plastic art. + Mindful of Italy and thee, fair maid! + I lay this sear, frail garland at thy feet." + +Mrs. Trollope is still a young woman, and it is sincerely to be hoped +that improved health will give her the proper momentum for renewed +exertions in a field where nobly sowing she may nobly reap. + +Ah, this Villino Trollope is quaintly fascinating, with its marble +pillars, its grim men in armor, starting like sentinels from the walls, +and its curiosities greeting you at every step. The antiquary revels in +its _majolica_, its old Florentine bridal chests and carved furniture, +its beautiful terra-cotta of the Virgin and Child by Orgagna, its +hundred _oggetti_ of the Cinque Cento. The bibliopole grows silently +ecstatic, as he sinks quietly into a mediaeval chair and feasts his eyes +on a model library, bubbling over with five thousand rare books, many +wonderfully illuminated and enriched by costly engravings. To those who +prefer (and who does not?) an earnest talk with the host and hostess on +politics, art, religion, or the last new book, there is the cozy +_laisser-faire_ study where Miss Puss and Bran, the honest dog, lie side +by side on Christian terms, and where the sunbeam Beatrice, when _very_ +beaming, will sing to you the _canti popolari_ of Tuscany, like a young +nightingale in voice, though with more than youthful expression. Here +Anthony Trollope is to be found, when he visits Florence; and it is no +ordinary pleasure to enjoy simultaneously the philosophic reasoning of +Thomas Trollope,--looking half Socrates and half Galileo,--whom Mrs. +Browning was wont to call "Aristides the Just," and the almost boyish +enthusiasm and impulsive argumentation of Anthony Trollope, who is a +noble specimen of a thoroughly frank and loyal Englishman. The unity of +affection existing between these brothers is as charming as it is rare. + +Then in spring, when the soft winds kiss the budding foliage and warm it +into bloom, the beautiful terrace of Villino Trollope is transformed +into a reception-room. Opening upon a garden, with its lofty pillars, +its tessellated marble floor, its walls inlaid with terra-cotta, +bas-reliefs, inscriptions, and coats-of-arms, with here and there a +niche devoted to some antique Madonna, the terrace has all the charm of +a _campo santo_ without the chill of the grave upon it; or were a few +cowled monks to walk with folded arms along its space, one might fancy +it the cloister of a monastery. And here of a summer's night, burning no +other lights than the stars, and sipping iced lemonade, one of the +specialties of the place, the intimates of Villino Trollope sit and talk +of Italy's future, the last _mot_ from Paris, and the last allocution at +Rome. + +Many charming persons have we met at the Villino, the recollection of +whom is as bright and sunny to us as a June day,--persons whose lives +and motive-power have fully convinced us that the world is not quite as +hollow as it is represented, and that all is not vanity of vanities. In +one corner we have melodiously wrangled, in a _tempo_ decidedly _allegro +vivace_, with enthusiastic Mazzinians, who would say clever, sharp, +cruel things of Cavour, the man of all men to our way of thinking, "the +one man of three men in all Europe," according to Louis Napoleon. +Gesticulation grew as rampant at the mention of the French Emperor, who +was familiarly known as "_quel volpone_," (that fox,) as it becomes +to-day in America at the mention of Wendell Phillip's name to one of the +"Chivalry." Politics ran high in Italy in these days of the +_Renaissance_, and to have a pair of stout fists shaken in one's face in +a drawing-room for a difference of opinion is not as much "out of order" +as it would be on this more phlegmatic side of the Atlantic, where fists +have a deep significance not dreamed of by expansive Italians. In +another corner we have had many a _tête-à-tête_ with Dall' Ongaro, the +poet, who is as quick at an _impromptu_ as at a malediction against "_il +Papa_," and whose spirited recitations of his own patriotic poems have +inspired his private audiences with a like enthusiasm for Italian +liberty. Not unlike Garibaldi in appearance, he is a Mazzini-Garibaldian +at heart, and always knowing in the ways of that mysterious prophet of +the "Reds" who we verily believe fancies himself author not only of the +phrase "_Dio ed il Popolo_," but of the reality as well. When Mazzini +was denied entrance into Tuscany under pain of imprisonment, and yet, in +spite of Governor Ricasoli's decree, came to Florence _incognito_, it +was Dall' Ongaro who knew his hiding-place, and who conferred with him +much to the disgust and mortification of the Governor and his police, +who were outwitted by the astute republican. Mazzini is an incarnation +of the _Sub Rosa_, and we doubt whether he could live an hour, were it +possible to fulminate a bull for the abolition of intrigue and secret +societies. Dall' Ongaro was a co-laborer of Mazzini's in Rome in '48; +and when the downfall of the Republic forced its partisans to seek +safety in exile, he travelled about Europe with an American passport. "I +could not be an Italian," he said to us, "and I became, ostensibly, the +next best thing, a citizen of the United States. I sought shelter under +a republican flag." + +It was at Villino Trollope that we first shook hands with Colonel +Peard,--"_l'Inglese con Garibaldi_," as the Italians used to call +him,--about whose exploits in sharp-shooting the newspapers manufactured +such marvellous stories. Colonel Peard assured us that he never _did_ +keep a written account of the men he killed, for we were particular in +our inquiries on this interesting subject; but we know that as a +volunteer he fought under Garibaldi throughout the Lombard campaign and +followed his General into Sicily, where, facing the enemy most manfully, +Garibaldi promoted him from the rank of Captain to that of +Lieutenant-Colonel. It is good to meet a person like Colonel Peard,--to +see a man between fifty and sixty years of age, with noble head and gray +hair and a beard that any patriarch might envy surmounting a figure of +fine proportions endowed with all the robustness of healthy +maturity,--to see intelligence and years and fine appearance allied to +great amiability and a youthful enthusiasm for noble deeds, an +enthusiasm which was ready to give blood and treasure to the cause it +espoused from love. Such a reality is most exhilarating and delightful, +a fact that makes us take a much more hopeful view of humanity. We value +our photograph of Colonel Peard almost as highly as though the +picturesque _poncho_ and its owner had seen service in America instead +of Italy. His battle-cry is ours,--"Liberty!" + +There, too, we met Frances Power Cobbe, author of that admirable book, +"Intuitive Morals." In her preface to the English edition of Theodore +Parker's works, of which she is the editor, Miss Cobbe has shown herself +as large by the heart as she is by the head. That sunny day in Florence, +when she, one of a chosen band, followed the great Crusader to his +grave, is a sad remembrance to us, and it seemed providentially ordained +that the apostle who had loved the man's _soul_ for so many years should +be brought face to face with the _man_ before that soul put on +immortality. Great was Miss Cobbe's interest in the bust of Theodore +Parker executed by the younger Robert Hart from photographs and casts, +and which is without doubt the best likeness of Parker that has yet been +taken. Its merits as a portrait-bust have never been appreciated, and +the artist, whose sad death occurred two years ago, did not live to +realize his hope of putting it into marble. The clay model still remains +in Florence. + +Miss Cobbe is the embodiment of genial philanthropy, as delightful a +companion as she is heroic in her great work of social reform. A true +daughter of Erin, she excels as a _raconteur_, nor does her philanthropy +confine itself to the human race. Italian maltreatment of animals has +almost reduced itself to a proverb, and often have we been witness to +her righteous indignation at flagrant cruelty to dumb beasts. Upon +expostulating one day with a coachman who was beating his poor straw-fed +horse most unmercifully, the man replied, with a look of wonderment, +"_Ma, che vole, Signora? non è Cristiano!_" (But what would you have, +Signora? he is not a Christian!) Not belonging to the Church, and having +no soul to save, why should a horse be spared the whip? The reasoning is +not logical to our way of thinking, yet it is Italian, and was delivered +in good faith. It will require many Miss Cobbes to lead the Italians out +of their Egypt of ignorance. + +It was at Villino Trollope that we first saw the wonderfully clever +author, George Eliot. She is a woman of forty, perhaps, of large frame +and fair Saxon coloring. In heaviness of jaw and height of cheek-bone +she greatly resembles a German; nor are her features unlike those of +Wordsworth, judging from his pictures. The expression of her face is +gentle and amiable, while her manner is particularly timid and retiring. +In conversation Mrs. Lewes is most entertaining, and her interest in +young writers is a trait which immediately takes captive all persons of +this class. We shall not forget with what kindness and earnestness she +addressed a young girl who had just begun to handle a pen, how frankly +she related her own literary experience, and how gently she _suggested_ +advice. True genius is always allied to humility, and in seeing Mrs. +Lewes do the work of a good Samaritan so unobtrusively, we learned to +respect the woman as much as we had ever admired the writer. "For +years," said she to us, "I wrote reviews because I knew too little of +humanity." In the maturity of her wisdom this gifted woman has startled +the world with such novels as "Scenes from Clerical Life," "Adam Bede," +"Mill on the Floss," and "Silas Marner," making an era in English +fiction, and raising herself above rivalry. Experience has been much to +her: her men are men, her women women, and long did English readers rack +their brains to discover the sex of George Eliot. We do not aver that +Mrs. Lewes has actually encountered the characters so vividly portrayed +by her. Genius looks upon Nature, and then creates. The scene in the +pot-house in "Silas Marner" is as perfect as a Dutch painting, yet the +author never entered a pot-house. Her strong _physique_ has enabled her +to brush against the world, and in thus brushing she has gathered up the +dust, fine and coarse, out of which human beings great and small are +made. It is a powerful argument in the "Woman Question," that--without +going to France for George Sand--"Adam Bede" and the wonderfully unique +conception "Paul Ferroll" are women's work and yet real. Men cannot know +women by knowing men; and a discriminating public will soon admit, if it +has not done so already, that women are quite as capable of drawing male +portraits as men are of drawing female. Half a century ago a woman +maintained that genius had no sex;--the dawn of this truth is only now +flashing upon the world. + +We know not whether George Eliot visited Florence _con intenzione_, yet +it almost seems as though "Romola" were the product of that fortnight's +sojourn. It could scarce have been written by one whose eye was +unfamiliar with the _tone_ of Florentine localities. As a novel, +"Romola" is not likely to be popular, however extensively it may be +read; but viewed as a sketch of Savonarola and his times, it is most +interesting and valuable. The deep research and knowledge of mediaeval +life and manners displayed are cause of wonderment to erudite +Florentines, who have lived to learn from a foreigner. "_Son +rimasti_" to use their own phraseology. The _couleur locale_ is +marvellous;--nothing could be more delightfully real, for example, than +the scenes which transpire in Nello's barber's-shop. Her _dramatis +personæ_ are not English men and women in fancy-dress, but true Tuscans +who express themselves after the manner of natives. It would be +difficult to find a greater contrast than exists between "Romola" and +the previous novels of George Eliot: they have little in common but +genius; and genius, we begin to think, has not only no sex, but no +nationality. "Romola" has peopled the streets of Florence still more +densely to our memory. + +It would seem as though the newly revived interest in Savonarola, after +centuries of apathy, were a sign of the times. Uprisings of peoples and +wars for "ideas" have made such a market for martyrs as was never known +before. Could we jest upon what is a most encouraging trait in present +humanity, we should say that martyrs were fashionable; for even +Toussaint L'Ouverture has found a biographer, and _Frenchmen_ are +writing Lives of Jesus. Yet Orthodoxy stigmatizes this age of John +Browns as irreligious:--rather do we think it the dawn of the true +faith. It is to another _habitué_ of Villino Trollope, Pasquale Villari, +Professor of History at Pisa, that we owe in great part the revival of +Savonarola's memory; and it must have been no ordinary love for his +noble aspirations that led the young Neopolitan exile to bury the ten +best years of his life in old Florentine libraries, collecting material +for a full life of the friar of San Marco. So faithfully has he done his +work, that future writers upon Savonarola will go to Villari, and not to +Florentine manuscripts for their facts. This history was published in +1859, and it may be that "Romola" is the flower of the sombre Southern +plant. Genius requires but a suggestion to create,--though, indeed, Mr. +Lewes, who is a wonderfully clever man, _au fait_ in all things, from +acting to languages, living and dead, and from languages to natural +history, may have anticipated Villari in that suggestion. + +Villino Trollope introduced us to "Owen Meredith," the poet from +melody,--one far older in experience than in years, looking like his +poetry, just so polished and graceful, just so sweetly in tune, just so +Gallic in taste, and--shall we say it?--just so _blasé_! We doubt +whether Robert Lytton, the diplomate, will ever realize the best +aspirations of "Owen Meredith," the poet. Good came out of Nazareth, but +it is not in our faith to believe that foreign courts can bear the rare +fruit of ideal truth and beauty.--Then there was Blumenthal, the +composer, who talked Buckle in admirable English, and played his own +Reveries most daintily,--Reveries that are all languor, sighs, and +tears, whose fitting home is the boudoirs of French marquises. +Blumenthal is a Thalberg in small.--We have pleasant recollections of +certain clever Oxonians, "Double-Firsts," potential in the classics and +mathematics. A "Double-First" is the incarnation of Oxford, a +masterpiece of Art. All that he knows he knows profoundly, nor does it +require an Artesian bore to bring that knowledge bubbling to the +surface. His mastery over his intellect is as great as that of Liszt +over the piano-forte,--it is a slave to do his bidding. He is the result +of a thousand years of culture. A "Double-First" never gives way to +enthusiasms; his heart never gets into his head. Impulse is snubbed as +though it were a poor relation; and argument is carried on by clear, +acute reason, independent of feeling. Woe unto the American who loses +his temper while duelling mentally with a "Double-First"! Oxford phlegm +will triumph. Of course a "Double-First" is conservative; he disbelieves +in republics and universal suffrage, attends the Established Church, and +won't publicly deny the Thirty-Nine Articles, whatever maybe his _very_ +private opinion of them. He writes brilliant articles for the "Saturday +Review," (familiarly known among Liberals as the "Saturday Reviler,") +and ends by being a learned and successful barrister, or a Gladstone, or +both. Genius will rarely subscribe to the Thirty-Nine Articles. With all +his conservatism and want of what the French call _effusion_, a +"Double-First" can be a delightful companion and charming man,--even to +a democratic American. + +We well remember with what admiring curiosity the Italians regarded Mrs. +Stowe one evening that she passed at Villino Trollope. "_È +la Signora Stowe?_"--"_Davvero?_"--"_L'autrice di 'Uncle +Tom'?_"--"_Possibile?_"--were their oft-repeated exclamations; for +"Uncle Tom's Cabin" is the one American book in which Italians are +deeply read. To most of them, Byron and "Uncle Tom" comprehend the whole +of English literature. However poorly informed an Italian may be as +regards America in other respects, he has a very definite idea of +slavery, thanks to Mrs. Stowe. To read "Uncle Tom's Cabin" aloud in +Italian to an Italian audience is productive of queer sensations. This +office an American woman took upon herself for the enlightenment of some +_contadine_ of Fiesole with whom she was staying. She appealed to a +thoroughly impartial jury. The verdict would have been balm of Gilead to +long-suffering Abolitionists. So admirable an idea of justice had these +acute peasant-women, so exalted was their opinion of America, which they +believed to be a model republic where all men were born free and equal, +that it was long before the reader could impress upon her audience the +fact of the existence of slavery there. When this fact _did_ take root +in their simple minds, their righteous indignation knew no bounds, and, +unlike the orator of the Bird o' Freedom, they thanked God that they +were _not_ Americans. + +Then----But our recollections are too numerous for the patience of those +who do not know Villino Trollope; and we shut up in our thoughts many +"pictures beautiful that hang on Memory's walls," turning their faces so +that we, at least, may see and enjoy them. + +But ere turning away, we pause before one face, now no longer of the +living, that of Mrs. Frances Trollope. Knowing how thoroughly erroneous +an estimate has been put upon Mrs. Trollope's character in this country, +we desire to give a glimpse of the real woman, now that her death has +removed the seal of silence. + +Frances Trollope, daughter of the Reverend William Milton, a fellow of +New College, Oxford, was born at Stapleton, near Bristol, where her +father had a curacy. She died in Florence, on the sixth of October, +1863, at the advanced age of eighty-three. In 1809 she married Thomas +Anthony Trollope, barrister-at-law, by whom she had six children: Thomas +Adolphus, now of Florence,--Henry, who died unmarried at Bruges, in +Flanders, in 1834,--Arthur, who died under age,--Anthony, the well-known +novelist,--Cecilia, who married John Tilley, Assistant-Secretary of the +General Post-Office, London,--and Emily, who died under age. + +Mr. Thomas Anthony Trollope married and became the father of a family as +presumptive heir to the good estate of an uncle. The latter, however, on +becoming a widower, unexpectedly married a second time, and in his old +age was himself a father. The sudden change thus caused in the position +and fortune of Mr. Trollope so materially deranged his affairs as to +necessitate the breaking-up of his establishment at Harrow-on-the-Hill, +near London. It was at this time that Miss Fanny Wright (whom Mr. and +Mrs. Trollope met at the country-house of Lafayette, when visiting the +General in France) persuaded Mrs. Trollope to proceed to America with +the hope of providing a career for her second son, Henry. Miss Wright +was then bent on founding an establishment, in accordance with her +cherished principles, at Nashaba, near Memphis, and the career marked +out for Henry Trollope was in connection with this scheme, the fruit of +which was disappointment to all the parties concerned. Mrs. Trollope +afterwards endeavored to establish her son in Cincinnati; but these +attempts were ill managed, and consequently proved futile. Both mother +and son then returned to England, the former taking with her a mass of +memoranda and notes which she had made during her residence in the +United States. These were shown to Captain Basil Hall, whose then recent +work on America had encountered bitterly hostile criticism and denial +with respect to many of its statements. Finding that Mrs. Trollope's +account of various matters was corroborative of his own, Basil Hall for +this reason, as also from friendly motives, urged Mrs. Trollope to bring +out a work on America. "The Domestic Manners of the Americans" was the +result, and so immense was its success that at the age of fifty Mrs. +Trollope adopted literature as a profession. + +In the eyes of the patriots of thirty years ago Mrs. Trollope committed +the unpardonable sin, when she published her book on America; and +certainly no country ever rendered itself more ridiculous than did ours, +when it made the welkin ring with cries of indignation. The sensible +American of to-day reads this same book and wonders how his countrymen +lashed themselves into such a violent rage. In her comments upon America +Mrs. Trollope is certainly frequently at fault, but unintentionally. She +firmly believed all that she wrote, and did _not_ romance, as Americans +were wont to declare. When she finds fault with the disgusting practice +of tobacco-chewing, assails the too common custom of dram-drinking, and +complains of a want of refinement in some parts of the country, she +certainly has the right on her side. When she speaks of Jefferson's +_dictum_, "All men are born free and equal," as a phrase of mischievous +sophistry, and refers to his posthumous works as a mass of mighty +mischiefs,--when she accuses us of being drearily cold and lacking +enthusiasm, and regards the American women as the most beautiful in the +world, but the least attractive,--we may naturally differ from her, but +we have no right to tyrannize over her convictions. That she bore us no +malice is the verdict of every one who knew her ever so slightly; and +her sons, who were greatly subjected to her influence, entertain the +kindest and most friendly sentiments towards the United States. + +Mrs. Trollope's works, beginning with the "Domestic Manners of the +Americans," published in 1832, and ending with "Paris and London," which +appeared in 1856, amount to _one hundred and fourteen_ volumes, all, be +it remembered, written after her fiftieth year. Of her novels perhaps +the most successful and widely known were the "Vicar of Wrexhill," a +violent satire on the Evangelical religionists, published in +1837,--"Widow Barnaby," in 1839,--and "The Ward of Thorpe Combe," in +1847. "Michael Armstrong," printed in 1840, was written with a view to +assist the movement in favor of protection to the factory-operatives, +which resulted in the famous "Ten-Hour Bill." The descriptions were the +fruits of a personal visit to the principal seats of factory-labor. At +the time, this book created considerable sensation. + +Two works of travel and social sketches, "Paris and the Parisians," and +"Vienna and the Austrians," were also very extensively read. With regard +to the second we deem it proper to observe that Mrs. Trollope suffered +herself to be so far dazzled by the very remarkable cordiality of her +reception in the exclusive society of Vienna, and by the flattering +intimacy with which she was honored by Prince Metternich and his circle, +as to have been led to regard the then dominant Austrian political and +social system in a more favorable light than was consistent with the +generally liberal tone of her sentiments and opinions. + +Though late in becoming an author, Mrs. Trollope had at all periods of +her life been inclined to literary pursuits, and in early youth enjoyed +the friendship of many distinguished men, among whom were Mathias, the +well-known author of the "Pursuits of Literature," Dr. Nott, the Italian +scholar, one of the few foreigners who have been members of the Della +Crusca,--General Pepe, the celebrated defender of Venice, whom she knew +intimately for many years,--General Lafayette,--and others. + +Both before and after she achieved literary celebrity, Mrs. Trollope was +very popular in society, for the pleasures of which she was especially +fitted by her talents. In Florence she gathered around her persons of +eminence, both foreign and native, and her interest in men and things +remained undiminished until within a very few years of her death. Even +at an advanced age her mind was ready to receive new ideas and to deal +with them candidly. We have in our possession letters written by her in +'54 and '55 on the much-abused subject of Spiritualism, which was then +in its infancy. They are addressed to an American literary gentleman +then resident in Florence, and give so admirable an idea of Mrs. +Trollope's clearness of mental vision and the universally inquisitive +tendency of her mind that we insert them at large.--Dec. 21st, 1854, +Mrs. Trollope writes: "I am afraid, my dear Sir, that I am about to take +an unwarrantable liberty by thus intruding on your time, but I must +trust to your indulgence for pardon. During the few minutes that I had +the pleasure of speaking with you, the other evening, on the subject of +spiritual visitations, there was in your conversation a tone so equally +removed from enthusiasm on one side and incredulity on the other that I +felt more satisfaction in listening to you than I have ever done when +this subject has been the theme. That so many thousands of educated and +intelligent people should yield their belief to so bold a delusion as +this must be, if there be _no_ occult cause at work, is inconceivable. +By _occult_ cause I mean, of course, nothing at all analogous to hidden +_trickery_, but to the interference of some power with which the earth +has been hitherto unacquainted. If it were not taking too great a +liberty, I would ask you to call upon me,... that I might have the +pleasure and advantage of having your opinion more at length upon one or +two points connected with this most curious subject." The desired +interview took place, and a week later Mrs. Trollope returned a pamphlet +on spiritual manifestations with the following note: "Many thanks, my +dear Sir, for your kindness in permitting me a leisurely perusal of the +inclosed. It is a very curious and interesting document, and I think it +would be impossible to read it without arriving at the conviction that +the writer deserves to be listened to with great attention and great +confidence. But as yet I feel that we have no sure ground under our +feet. The only idea that suggests itself to me is that the medium is in +a mesmeric condition; and after giving considerable time and attention +to these mysterious mesmeric symptoms, I am persuaded that a patient +liable to such influence is in a diseased state. It has often appeared +to me that the soul was _partially_, as it were, disentangled from the +body. I have watched the ---- sisters (the well-known patients of Dr. +Elliotson) for more than a year, during which interval they were +perfectly, as to the mind, in an abnormal state,--not recognizing +father, mother, or brothers, or remembering _anything_ connected with +the year preceding their mesmeric condition. They learned everything +which was submitted to their _intellect_ during this interval with +something very like _supernatural_ intelligence. Emma, another +well-known patient of Dr. Elliotson, constantly described herself, when +in a mesmeric state, as 'greatly better than well,' and this was always +said with a countenance expressive of very sublime happiness,--but as if +her hearers were not capable of comprehending it. I shall feel very +anxious to hear the results of your own experience; for it appears to me +that you are in a state of mind equally unlikely to mistake truth for +falsehood, or falsehood for truth." Upon receiving a second pamphlet +treating on the same subject, Mrs. Trollope wrote as follows: "The +document you have sent me, my dear Sir, is indeed full of interest. Had +it been less so, I should not have retained it so long. In speaking of a +state of mesmerism as being one of disease, I by no means infer that the +mesmeric influence is either the cause or effect of disease, but that +only diseased persons are liable to it. I have listened to statements +from more than one physician in great practice tending very clearly to +show that the manifestations of this semi-spiritual state are never +observed in perfectly healthy persons. One gentleman in large practice +told me that he had almost constantly perceived in the last stage of +pulmonary consumption a manifest brightening of the intellect; and +children, at the moment of passing from this state to that which follows +it, will often (as I well know) speak with a degree of high intelligence +that strongly suggests the idea that _there are moments when the two +conditions touch_. That the region next above us is occupied by the +souls of men about to be made perfect, I have not the shadow of a doubt. +The puzzling part of the present question is this,--Why do we get a dark +and uncertain peep at this stage of existence, when philosophy has so +long been excluded from it? and I am inclined to say in reply, 'Be +patient and be watchful, and we shall all know more anon.'"--Such is the +character of notes that Mrs. Trollope wrote at the age of seventy-five. + +Mrs. Trollope realized from her writings the large sum of one hundred +thousand dollars; but generous tastes and a numerous family created as +large a demand as there was supply, and kept her pen constantly busy. +She wrote with a rapidity which seems to have been inherited by both her +sons, more particularly by Anthony Trollope. One of her novels was +written in three weeks; another she wrote at the bedside of a son dying +of consumption, she being bound by contract to finish the work at a +given time. Acting day and night as nurse, the overtasked mother was +obliged to stimulate her nervous system by a constant use of strong +coffee, and betweenwhiles would turn to the unfinished novel and write +of fictitious joys and sorrows while her own heart was bleeding for the +beloved son dying beside her. It was no doubt owing to this constant +taxation of the brain that her intellect was but a wreck of its former +self during the last four years of her life. During this time her +condition was but a living death, though she was physically well. She +was watched over and cared for with the most unselfish devotion by her +son Thomas Adolphus and his wife, who gave up all pleasures away from +home to be near their mother. The favorite reading in these last days +was her son Anthony's novels. + +And Thomas Trollope, writing of his mother's death, says: "Though we +have been so long prepared for it, and though my poor dear mother has +been in fact dead to us for many months past, and though her life, free +from suffering as it was, was such as those who loved her could not have +wished prolonged, yet for all this the last separation brings a pang +with it. She was as good and dear a mother as ever man had; and few sons +have passed so large a portion of their lives in such intimate +association with their mother as I have for more than thirty years." + +This is a noble record for both mother and son. To her children Mrs. +Trollope was a providence and support in all time of sorrow or +trouble,--a cause of prosperity, a confidant, a friend, and a companion. + +A grateful American makes this humble offering to her memory in the name +of justice. + +There is a villa too, near Florence, "on the link of Bellosguardo," as +dear from association as Villino Trollope. It has for a neighbor the +Villa Mont' Auto, where Hawthorne lived, and which he transformed by the +magic of his pen into the Monte Bene of the "Marble Faun." Not far off +is the "tower" wherein Aurora Leigh sought peace,--and found it. The +inmate of this villa was a little lady with blue-black hair and +sparkling jet eyes, a writer whose dawn is one of promise, a chosen +friend of the noblest and best, and on her terrace the Brownings, Walter +Savage Landor, and many choice spirits have sipped tea while their eyes +drank in such a vision of beauty as Nature and Art have never equalled +elsewhere. + + "No sun could die, nor yet be born, unseen + By dwellers at my villa: morn and eve + Were magnified before us in the pure + Illimitable space and pause of sky, + Intense as angels' garments blanched with God, + Less blue than radiant. From the outer wall + Of the garden dropped the mystic floating gray + Of olive-trees, (with interruptions green + From maize and vine,) until 't was caught and torn + On that abrupt line of dark cypresses + Which signed the way to Florence. Beautiful + The city lay along the ample vale,-- + Cathedral, tower and palace, piazza and street; + The river trailing like a silver cord + Through all, and curling loosely, both before + And after, over the whole stretch of land, + Sown whitely up and down its opposite slopes + With farms and villas." + +What Aurora Leigh saw from her tower is almost a counterpart of what +Mrs. Browning gazed upon so often from the terrace of Villa Brichieri. + +Florence without the Trollopes and our Lady of Bellosguardo would be +like bread without salt. A blessing, then, upon houses which have been +spiritual asylums to many forlorn Americans!--a blessing upon their +inmates, whose hearts are as large and whose hands are as open as their +minds are broad and catholic! + + + + +A TOBACCONALIAN ODE. + + + O plant divine! + Not to the tuneful Nine, + Who sit where purple sunlight longest lingers, + Twining the bay, weaving with busy fingers + The amaranth eterne and sprays of vine, + Do I appeal. Ah, worthier brows than mine + Shall wear those wreaths! But thou, O potent plant, + Of thy broad fronds but furnish me a crown, + Let others sing the yellow corn, the vine, + And others for the laurel-garland pant, + Content with my rich meed, I'll sit me down, + Nor ask for fame, nor heroes' high renown, + Nor wine. + And ye, ye airy sprites, + Born of the Morning's womb, sired of the Sun, + Who cull with nice acumen, one by one, + All gentle influences from the air, + And from within the earth what most delights + The tender roots of springing plants, whose care + Distils from gross material its spirit + To paint the flower and give the fruit its merit, + Apply to my dull sense your subtile art! + When ye, with nicest, finest skill, had wrought + This chiefest work, the choicest blessings brought + And stored them at its roots, prepared each part, + Matured the bud, painted the dainty bloom, + Ye stood and gazed until the fruit should come. + Ah, foolish elves! + Look ye that yon frail flower should be sublimed + To fruit commensurate with all your power + And cunning art? Was it for such ye climbed + The slanting sunbeams, coaxing many a shower + From the coy clouds? Ye did exceed yourselves; + And as ye stand and gaze, lo, instantly + The whole etherealized ye see: + From topmost golden spray to lowest root, + The whole is fruit. + Well have ye wrought, + And in your honor now shall incense rise. + The oaken chair, the cheerful blaze, invite + Calm meditation, while the flickering light + Casts strange, fantastic shadows on the wall, + Where goodly tomes, with ample lading fraught + Of gold of wit and gems of fancy rare, + Poet and sage, mute witnesses of all, + Smile gently on me, as, with sober care, + I reach the pipe and thoughtfully prepare + The sacrifice. + + O fragile clay! + Erst white as e'er a lily of old Nile, + But now imbrowned and ambered o'er and through + With richest tints and ever-deepening hue, + Quintessence of rare essences the while + Uphoarding, as thou farest day by day, + Thou mind'st me of a genial face I knew. + At first it was but fair, nought but a face; + But as I read and learned it, wondrous grace + And beauty marvellous did grow and grow, + Till every hue of the sweet soul did show + Most beautiful from brow and lip and eye. + And thus, O clay, + Child of the sea-foam, nursed amid the spray, + Thy visage changes, ever grows more fair + As the fine spirit works expression there! + Blest be the tide that rapt thee from the roar + And cast thee on the far Danubian shore, + And blest the art that shaped thee daintily! + And thou, O fragrant tube attenuate! + No more in the sweet-blooming cherry-grove, + Where the shy bulbul plaintive mourns her love, + Shalt thou uplift thy blossoms to the sky, + Or wave them o'er the waters rippling by; + No more thy fruit shall stud with jewels red + The leafy crown thou fashionedst for thy head. + Not this thy fate. + When the swart damsel from thy parent tree + Did lop thee with thy fellows, and did strip + From off thee, bleeding, leaf and bud and blossom, + And bind the odorous fagot carefully, + And bear thee in to whom should fashion thee + And set new fruit of amber on thy tip, + More grateful than the old to eye and lip, + Ambrosial odors thou didst then exhale, + Leaving thy fragrance in her tawny bosom. + Thou still dost hold it. Nothing may avail + To rob thee of the odorous memory + Thou sweetly bearest of the cherry-grove, + Where blossoms bloom and lovers tell their love. + Bright amber, fragrant wood, enamelled clay, + Help me to burn the incense worthily! + Thou fire, assist! Promethean fire, unbound, + The azure clouds go wreathing round and round, + Float slowly up, then gently melt away; + And in their circling wreaths I dimly spy + Full many a fleeting vision's fantasy. + Alas! alas! + How bright soe'er before my view they pass, + Whether it be that Memory, pointing back, + Doth show each flower along the devious track + By which I came forth from the fields of youth,-- + Or bright-robed Hope doth deck the sober truth + With many-colored garments, pointing on + To lighter days and envied honors won,-- + Or Fancy, taking many a meaner thing, + Doth gild it o'er with bright imagining,-- + Alas! alas! + Light as the circling smoke, they fade and pass, + What time the last thin wreath hath faintly sped + Up from the embers dying, dying, dead! + So earth's best blessings fade and fleet away,-- + Nought left but ashes, smoke, and empty clay. + + Awake, my soul! 't is time thou wert awaking! + For radiant spirits, innocent and fair, + Walking beside thee, hovering in the air + Adown the past, thronging thy future way, + Wait but thy calling and the thraldom's breaking, + Which, all unworthily, to sense hath bound thee, + To bless thy days and make the night around thee + As bright and beautiful and fair as day. + Call thou on these, my soul, and fix thee there! + Name nought divine which hath not godlike in it; + And if thou burnest incense, let it be + That of the heart, enkindled thankfully; + And if thine eye offend thee, pluck it out, + Nor let it poison all thy sight forever; + Whate'er thou hast to do of worth, begin it, + Nor leave the issue free to any doubt, + Forgetting never what thou art, and never + Whither thou goest, to the far Forever. + And then shall gentle Memory, pointing back, + Show blessings scattered all along thy track; + And bright-robed Hope, shaming thy dreams of youth, + Shall lead thee up from dreaming to the truth; + And Fancy, leaving every meaner thing, + Shall see fulfilled each bright imagining. + Then shall the ashes of thy musing be + Only the ashes of thy naughtiness; + The smoke, the remnant of thy vanity + And thorny passions, which entangled thee + Till thou didst pray deliverance; the clay, + That empty clay e'en, hath a power to bless,-- + Empty for that a gem hath passed away, + To shine forever in eternal day. + + + + +HALCYON DAYS. + + "Peace and good-will." + + +Who hath enchanted Goliath? He sleeps with a smile on his face, but his +secret is hid from the charmer. The treacherous will looks abashed on +the calm of his slumber, and laments, "The thing that I would I do not!" + +Now while the halcyon broods through the Sabbath-days of winter, and, +looking from her nest, sees the waves of a summer calm and +brightness,--now while she meditates, with the eggs under her wings, of +a fast-approaching time when she shall teach her song to the little +flock that's coming,--let us also dream. The thing that hath been shall +be. Contentment, peace, and love! Fairy folk shall not personate this +blessedness for us. Who is your next-door neighbor? One face shines +serenely before me, and says, "The world is redeemed!" One voice, +sounding clear through all discords, has an echo, fine, true, and +eternal, in the midst of the Seraphim's praise. + +Therefore, thou blue-winged halcyon, shall I sit beneath the dead +sycamore in whose topmost branches thy great nest is built,--finding +death crowned here, as everywhere, with life; here shall be told the +Christmas tale of contentment, peace, and love. + +No tremulous tale of sorrow, of wrong endured and avenged; no report of +that Orthodox anguish which, renouncing the present, hopes only by the +hereafter; no story of desperate heroic achievement, or of +long-suffering patience, or even of martyrdom's glory. The sea is calm, +and the halcyon broods, and only love is eternal. + +Let us not stint thee, as selfishness must; nor shame thee with praise +inadequate; nor walk with shod feet, as the base-bred, into thy palaces; +nor as the weak, nor as the wise, who so often profane thee, but as the +loving who love thee, holy Love, may we take thy name on our lips, and +lay our gift on thine altar! It is a Christmas offering, fashioned, +however rudely, from an absolute truth. If thou deem the ointment +precious, when I break the unjewelled box, I pour it on thy feet. Let +others crown, I would only refresh thee. + +Children play on this white, shining, sandy beach, under the leafless +sycamore; they look for no shade, they would find no shade; there is +neither rock, nor shrub, nor evergreen-tree,--nothing but the white +sand, and the dead sycamore, and in the topmost branches the halcyon's +great nest. + +Is it not a place for children? A little flourish of imagination, and we +see them,--Silas, who beats the drum, and Columbia, who carries the +flag, manifest leaders of the wild little company, mermen and mermaids +all; and the music is fit for the Siren, and the beauty would shame not +Venus. + +Suppose we stroll home to their fathers, like respectable earth-keeping +creatures: the depths of human hearts have sometimes proved full of +mystery as the sea; and human faces sometimes glisten with a majesty of +feeling or of thought that reduces ocean-splendor to the subordinate +part of a similitude. + +There is Andrew, father of Silas,--Andrew Swift, says the sign. He +dwells in Salt Lane, you perceive, and he deals in ship-stores,--a +husband and father by no means living on sea-weed. A yellow-haired +little man, shrewd, and a ready reckoner. Of a serious turn of mind. +Deficient in self-esteem; his anticipations of the most humble +character. A sinner, because fearful and unbelieving: for what right has +a man to be such a man as to inspire himself with misgiving? But his +offences offset each other: for, if he doubted, Andrew was also +obstinate. And obstinacy alone led him into ventures whose failure he +expected: as when he laid out the savings of years in the purchase of +goods, wherewith he opened those ship-stores in Salt Lane. Ship-stores! +that sounds well. One might suppose I referred to blocks of marble-faced +buildings, instead of three shelves, three barrels, and their contents! +The obstinacy of Andrew Swift was the foundation of his fortune. Men +have built on worse. + +His opposite neighbor was one Silas Dexter, a flag- and banner-maker, +who went into business in Salt Lane sometime during that memorable year +of Andrew's venture. Apparently this young man was no better off than +Swift, between whom and himself a friendly intercourse was at once +established; but he had the advantage of a quick imagination and a +sanguine temperament; also the manly courage to look at Fortune with +respectful recognition, as we all look at royalty,--even as though he +had sometime been presented,--not with a snobbish conceit which would +seem to defy her Highness. + +Indeed, he was such a man as would find exhilaration of spirit even in +the uncertainties of his position. The sight of his banners waving from +the sign-post, showing all sorts of devices, the flags flowing round the +walls of his shop, enlivening the little dark place with their many +gorgeous colors, sufficed for his encouragement. Utter ruin could not +have ruined the man. He could not have failed with failure. Some sense +of this fact he had, and he lived like one who has had his life insured. + +Not a creature looked upon him but was free to the good he might derive. +The sparkling eyes, quick smile, and manly voice, the active limbs and +generous heart, seemed at the service of every soul that breathed. +Trashy thought and base utterance could not cheat his soul of her +integrity; the vileness of Salt Lane had nothing to do with him. + +And I cannot account for this by bringing his wife forward. For how came +he by this wife, except by the excellence and soundness of the virtue +which preferred her to the world, and made him preferred of her? Still, +you see the ripe cherry, one half full, beautiful, luscious, the other a +patch of skin stretched over the pit, worthless and sad to view. This, +but for his choice and hers, might have served as an emblem of Dexter. + +She was her husband's partner in a twofold sense: for it was DEXTER & +CO. on the sign-board, and Jessie was represented by the Company. Of +that woman I cannot refrain from saying what was so gracefully said of +"the fair and happy milkmaid,"--"All the excellences stand in her so +silently, as if they had stolen upon her without her knowledge." + +The effect of these diverse influences, his wife Jessie in the house, +and his neighbor Andrew to the opposite, kept the spirit of Silas Dexter +at work like a ploughing Pegasus. He was full of pranks as a boy, but +malice found poor encouragement of him. Andrew was his garden, and he +was Andrew's sun: he shone across the lane with a brightness and a +warmth sufficient to quicken the poorest earth; and the crops he +perfected were various, all of the kind that flourish in heavy soil, but +various and good. Do you think the good Samaritan could take the +leprosy? + +The sort of connection a man is bound to make between the everlasting +spirit-world and this transient mortal state Dexter proved in his humble +way. I doubt if spiritualists would have accepted his service as a +medium. He was neither profane nor imbecile; but he sat at the foot of a +ladder the pure ones could not fail to see, and by which they would not +disdain to descend. If they chose to come his way, the white robes would +take no taint. + +Success attended Dexter with a modest grace, and Swift shared in the +good fortune. I do not say the profits of either shop were forty +millions a year. "Keep the best of everything," said Silas to Andrew; +"don't be too hard on 'em; they'll come after they've found your way." +And Swift proved the wisdom of such counsel, and tried to get the better +of his grim countenance while waiting on the customers Dexter directed +to his side: gradually succeeding,--proving down there in Salt Lane the +truth of that ancient saying, "Art is the perfection of Nature." + +So these two men lived like brothers; and if it was a pleasant thing to +listen to Dexter's jokes and laughter, scarcely less profitable was it +to hear Swift praise the flag- and banner-maker when he was out of +sight. + +Dexter's popularity had a varied character. Sea-captains and +ship-builders, circus-men, aëronauts, politicians, engineers, +target-companies, firemen, the military, deputies of all sorts, looked +over his goods, consulted his taste, left their orders. His interest in +the several occupations represented by the men who frequented his shop, +his ingenuity in devising designs, his skill and expedition in supplying +orders, his cheerful speech, and love of talk, and fun, gave the shopman +troops of "friends." He could read the common mass of men at a glance, +and he was justifiable in the devices he made use of in order to bring +his customers into the buying mood: for what he said was true,--they +could satisfy themselves in his store, if anywhere. + +Dexter understood himself, and Jessie understood him: such folk make no +pretences; they are ineffably real. + +"Principles, not Men," was the banner-maker's motto. You might have seen +the flag on which it was painted with a mighty flourish (and very poor +result) in his old shop in the old time. That painting was his first +great effort, that flag his first possession; he could not have parted +with it, so he _said_, and so he believed, for any sum whatever. + +"Principles, not Men": he studied that sentiment in all his graver +moments, when he chanced to be alone in his shop,--you may guess with +what result, moral and philosophical. + +Andrew Swift used to say to his wife, that, when Dexter was studying his +thoughts, it was better to hear him than the minister: and verily he did +put time-serving to shame by the distinct integrity of his warm speech, +and his eloquence of action. + +Dexter married Jessie the day before he opened his flag-shop. She had +long been employed by his employer, and when she promised to be his, she +drew her earnings from the bank, and invested all with him. This was not +prudence, certainly, but it was love. Dexter might have failed in +business the first year,--might have died, you know, in six months, or +even in three, as men do sometimes. It was not prudence; but +Jessie--young lady determined on settlements!--Jessie was looking for +life and prosperity, as the honest and earnest and young have a right to +look in a world God created and governs. And if failure and death had in +fact choked the path that promised so fair, clear of regret, free of +reproaches, glad even of the losses that proved how love had once +blessed her, she would have buried the dead, and worked for the +retrieval of fortune. + +They began their housekeeping-romance back of the shop in two little +rooms. Do you require the actual measurement? There have been wider +walls that could contain greatly less. + + "How big was Alexander, pa? + The people called him _great_." + +They considered the sixpences of their outlay and income with a purpose +and a spirit that made a miser of neither. But there was no delusion +indulged about the business. Jessie never mistook the hilarity of Silas +for an indication of incalculable prosperity. Silas never understood her +gravity for that of discontent and envy. They never spent in any week +more than they earned. They counted the cost of living, and were +therefore free and rich. "She was never alone," as Sir Thomas Overbury +said of that happy milkmaid, "but still accompanied with old songs, +honest thoughts, and prayers, but short ones." And Dexter loved her with +a valiant constancy that spoke volumes for both. + +His days were spent, according to the promise advertised, in endeavors +to please the public; but, oh, if the public that traded with and liked +to patronize him, if the young lads and the old boys who hung about his +counters, could have seen him when he shut his shop-door behind him, and +went into the back-room where Jessie and he devised the patterns, where +she embroidered and lived, where she cooked and washed and ironed, where +she nursed Columbia, their daughter, one glance at all this, made with +the heart and the understanding, would--ah! _might_, have been to some +of them worth more than all Dexter's pleasant stones, and all the +contents of the shop, and all the profits the flag-maker would ever make +by trading. + +For I can hardly believe, though this story be but of "_common_ life," +when I take up the newspapers and glance along the items I am +constrained to doubt, that such people as Silas and Jessie live in every +house, in every alley, lane, and street, in every square and avenue, on +every farm, wherever walls inclose those divine temples of which +Apostles talked as belonging to God, which temples, said they, are holy! +I can hardly believe that Love, void of fear and of selfishness, speaks +through all our domestic policy, and devises those curious arrangements, +political, theological, social, whose result has approval and praise, it +may be, in the regions of outer darkness. + +Dark faces, whose sleekness hides a gulf of waters more dead than those +of the dreadful Dead Sea, rise between me and the honest, brave face of +Silas,--dreary flats, whose wastes are not figured in utter barrenness +by the awful African deserts, where ranks upon ranks of women, like +Jessie at least in love and fidelity, must stand, or--"where is the +promise of His coming?" + +The daughter of Silas and Jessie was called Columbia in honor of some +valiant enterprise, nautical or other, which charmed the patriotic +spirit of the father; and as he was not a fighting man or a speaking +man, he offered this modest comment on the brilliant event by way of +showing his appreciation. + +Columbia Dexter was a great favorite with the children of Salt Lane for +various reasons, and among them this, that in all parades and +processions she supplied the banners. Columbia's friend of friends was +Silas, son of Andrew Swift,--and thus we come among the children of the +neighbors. + +They were not dependent on Salt Lane for a play-ground. They had the +Long Wharf. Ships from the most distant foreign shores deposited their +loads of freightage there, and the children were free to read the +foreign brands, to guess the contents, and to watch the sailors,--free +to all brain-puzzling calculations, and to clothes-soiling, +clothes-rending feats, among the treasures of the ship-hold and the +wharf: no mean privileges, with the roar of ocean in their ears, and +great ships with their towering masts before their eyes. They had the +wharf for bustle, confusion, excitement,--and for this they loved it; +but the beach that stretched beyond they had for quiet, and there, for +miles and miles, curious shells and pretty pebbles, fish-bones and crabs +and sand, sea-weed fine and fair, and the old sycamores, the old dead +trees, in the tops of whose white branches the halcyon built its nest. +Well the children knew the winter days, so bright and mild, when the +brave birds were breeding. Well they knew when the young kingfisher +would begin to make his royal progress, with such safe dignity +descending, branch by branch, until he could no longer resist Nature, +but must dash out in a "fine frenzy" for the bounding waves! + +Silas Swift, Dexter's namesake, was a grave, sturdy, somewhat +heavy-looking fellow, whose brain teemed with thoughts and projects of +which his slow-moving body offered no suggestion. Whoever prophesied of +them did so at his hazard. Let him play at his will, and the children +even were amazed. But this could not happen every day. Set him at work, +and the sanguine were in despair. This was because, when work must be +done, he deliberated, and did the thing that must be; so that, while +misapprehension fretted gently sometimes because of his dulness, he was +preparing for that which was not hoped. Celerity enough when he had come +to a decision, but no sign or token till he had come to that. + +The first exercise of his imagination trusted to the inspection of +others was in behalf of Columbia Dexter, with intent to moderate her +grief over a dead kitten which they buried in the sand under the +sycamore-tree, the procession carrying banners furled and decorated with +badges of mourning. Silas made a monument then and there in the high +noon of a halcyon day: carved on a pine board which had served for a +bier was the face of Tabby, surrounded with devices intended to +represent the duration of her virtues. His work consoled Columbia, and +inspired him to a more ambitious enterprise, namely, the carving of the +same in a block of gypsum, which work of art Dexter obtaining sight of +declared that it would have done credit to an artist, and set it on his +mantel-shelf between two precious household cards lettered in gilt as +follows "_Union is Strength_," and "_Principles, not Men_." + +I suppose no children ever led a happier life,--the special joy of +childhood being in sport, and food, and liberty, and the love of those +who own them. They basked in the sun; they were busy with sport, fretted +by no cares; kind words directed them. They lived in the midst of +illusions, like princes, or fairies, or spirits,--like _children_. They +followed about with processions, training in the rear of every +train-band, keeping time with the march of the happy Sunday-schools, +when they had their celebrations. Young Silas could be trusted with the +care of Columbia, and hand in hand, like brother and sister, they went. +Especially were they proud, if the procession carried one of Dexter's +flags. Silas, no doubt, had suggested a point of the device, or Columbia +had worked a corner. + +When Dexter would go on board ship, or to some lodge, with the flags +which had been ordered of him, in anticipation of voyages and +processions, the children often accompanied him. I see them walking +shyly in the rear, and looking up to the father of the little girl with +the reverence he deserved. By-and-by would they grow wise and feel +ashamed of this? Will you see the fair Columbia, whom the captain pats +so kindly on the head, smiling broadly when he hears her name, will you +see her, a woman grown, attending her father on such errands? And if you +see her not, will the reason be such as proves her worthy to be old +Dexter's daughter? Will you hear her saying to her friends, as now, +"Guess who worked those flowers," while the target-shooters march past, +carrying their blue silk banner, royal with red roses? She and Silas +often run panting in the wake of great processions; they would not for +the world miss seeing the wide, fluttering folds of the Stars and +Stripes, or it might be the conquering St. George, or the transparencies +they were all so busy over a day or two ago. Their speed will soon +abate, and why? + +Human beings are not children forever. Maturity must not manifest itself +as childhood does. Ah, but "Principles, not Men"! Is any truth involved +in that beyond what Silas recognizes in his trade? Is there another +reason which shall have power to make Columbia some day stand coolly on +the sidewalk, while her heart is beating fast,--which shall induce her +to point out the mottoes on the banners, and the various devices, to +another, without trembling in the voice or tears in the eye? If ever she +shall glide along the streets, she whose early race-course was Salt +Lane, if ever like a lady she shall walk there, will it be at the price +of forgetfulness of all this humble sport and joy,--as a sustainer of +feeble "social fictions," and a violator of the great covenant? + +To the boy and girl it was not a question whether all their lives these +relations should continue, and this play go on; but even to them, as +children, a question that seriously concerned them, and in whose +discussion they bore serious part, arose. + +The old building Dexter occupied was becoming unfit for tenants. It had +been patched over and over, until it was no longer safe, and agents +refused to insure it. The proprietor accordingly determined to pull it +down. + +A change to a better locality had often been suggested to Dexter; but +his invariable reply was, that "people shouldn't try to run before they +were able to walk,--he was satisfied with Salt Lane and his neighbors": +though of late he had made such replies with gravity, thinking of his +daughter. + +And now that the necessity was facing him, he met it like a man. He +talked the matter over with his wife, and the claim of their child was +urgent in the heart of each while they talked, and it could not have +surprised either when suddenly their hopes met in her benediction. For +Columbia's sake they must find a pleasant place for the new nest, some +nook where beauty would be welcome, and gentle grace, and quiet, and +light, and fair colors, and sweet odors would be possible; so pure and +fair a child she seemed to father Dexter, so did the mother's heart +desire to protect her from all odious influences and surroundings, that, +when the prospect of change was before them, it was in reference to her, +as well as trade, that the Company would make it. + +Swift was taken into their confidence, and he walked with the pair +around the streets one evening to see the shop Dexter's eyes had fixed +on. It was a modest tenement in a crowded quarter, on whose door and +windows "_To Let_" was posted. Silas had been out house-hunting in the +afternoon, and this place appeared to meet his wishes; he had inquired +about the rent, it did not seem too high for a house so comfortable, and +it was probable that by to-morrow night the family would, after a +fashion, be settled within those walls. + +They sat down on the door-step and talked about the change with serious +gravity, mindful that the old tenement they were about to leave had +sheltered them since their marriage-day, that they had prospered in Salt +Lane, and that the change they were about to make would be attended with +some risk. Andrew Swift sighed dolefully while Jessie or Silas Dexter +alluded to these matters of past experience: it was no easy matter to +talk him into a cheerful mood again; but the brave pair accomplished it +on their way home, when certainly either of them had as much need of a +comforter as he. + +To have heard them, one might have supposed that no tears would be shed +when the tenement so long occupied by the flag-maker should come down. +Old Mortality will not be hindered in his thinking. + +Andrew offered his son Silas to assist his neighbors in the labor of +removal, and his wife came with her service; and the rest of Salt Lane +was ready at the door to lend a helping hand, when it was understood +that the life and soul of the lane was going away to High Street. + +Dexter's face was unusually bright while the work of packing went on. He +knew that for everybody's sake more light than usual must be diffused by +him that day. You know how it is that the brave win the notable +victories, when their troops have fallen back in despair, and would fain +beat a retreat. It is the living voice and the flashing eye, the courage +and the will. What is he, indeed, that he should surrender,--above all, +in the worst extremity? + +How is death even swallowed up in victory, when the beleaguered spirit +dashes across the breach, and, unarmed, possesses life! + +Dexter told Andrew Swift that Silas was worth a dozen draymen, and in +truth he was, that day; for he, and every one, were animated by the +spirit of the leader. Courage! at least for that day, though they dared +not look beyond it. + +Thus these people went to High Street: into the house with many rooms, +four at least; into the rooms with many windows, and high ceilings, +which you could _not_ touch with your uplifted hand,--rooms whose walls +were papered, and whose floors should have carpets, for Dexter said the +house was leased for ten years, and they would make their home +comfortable. What ample scope they had! Many a fancy they had checked +before it became a wish in the old quarters, they were so cramped there, +though never in danger of suffocation, Heaven knows. Grandly the great +arch lifted over the old moss-grown roof. But now they need stifle no +fancy of all that should come to them; there was room in the house, and +behind it,--yes, a strip of ground in the rear, and against the brick +wall an apricot-tree and a grape-vine! Very Garden of Eden: was it big +enough for the Serpent? + +It was a sight to see the happy family while they talked over their +possessions. + +Over the shop, fronting the street, was a large apartment, by common +consent to be used for parlor and show-room: young Swift was to decorate +this, Dexter said, Columbia should be his helper, and he and his wife +would criticize the result. Dexter talked with a purpose when he made +these arrangements, but he kept the purpose secret until the work was +done. + +In the three windows ornamental flags were hung, which should serve for +signs from the street: this was young Swift's design. In the middle +window, Columbia responded, should be the George Washington flag. Yes, +and to the left Lafayette, with Franklin for the right. Even so. Then +above the middle window they secured the gilded American eagle. Oh, the +harmony that prevailed among the young decorators! + +Then "_Principles, not Men_" remained to be disposed of. They did it in +such a way that the gilded motto shone on the white wall. The mantel was +a masterpiece of arrangement, and solely after Columbia's suggestions. +There was the monumental cat for a centre-piece, with the more recent +creations of Silas Swift for immediate surroundings, and a banner at +either end floating from the shelf. + +You can imagine, if your imagination is genial and kindly, how very +queer and fanciful the room looked with these decorations; and the +gentle heart will understand the loving humility, the pleasure, with +which Jessie surveyed all, when the children's work was done. + +It was a pretty scene when Dexter came up, sent by Silas for an opinion, +while the latter kept the shop. At first he laughed a little, and +exclaimed, while he walked about; then Jessie turned away, and gave him +an opportunity to brush the tears from his eyes unobserved; but +presently she began to circle round him, unconsciously it seemed, till +she stood close beside him; then he took her hand and held it, and she +knew what he was thinking, and that he was proud and happy. + +"It beats all!" he said more than once. And Columbia was talking of +Silas, showing his work, and repeating his words, till Dexter broke +out,-- + +"We must keep Silas! We can't get along without Silas! He mustn't go +back to Salt Lane. I'll teach him business in High Street." + +And the father did not seem to notice when his child slipped away down +the stairs, to the shop, to the lad, who was thinking rather sadly, +that, now his work was done, there was no more chance for him here: she +had come to make him smile as much by her own delight as by his +satisfaction. + +But all this excitement must pass off. And in spite of the general +gladness and gratulation, probably a more lonely, homesick party could +not have been easily found than the Dexter family in their new home. + +Dexter could not reproach himself for his removal, as he thought the +matter seriously over. It was a forced removal, and certainly he would +have been without excuse, had he gone into worse quarters instead of +better, since better he could afford. It was not extravagance, but +homesickness, that tormented him. + +He was too generous, when all was done, to torment his wife with such +misgivings as he had; and erelong the trouble, for want of nursing, +died, as most of this life's troubles will, after their shabby fashion. +But, indeed, how can they help it? that, too, is the will of Nature. + +And was not Dexter himself, in the new neighborhood as in the old? His +customers were still of the same class. But his surroundings were of a +superior character,--there was a better atmosphere prevailing in High +Street, and more light in his house. He did not love darkness better. + +Pretty and well-dressed women were to be seen in High Street, and they +never, except by mistake or disaster, wandered through Salt Lane. +Standing in his door, and observing them according to his thoughtful +fashion, Dexter remembered that his daughter was growing rapidly into a +tall, handsome girl, and foresaw that she could not always be a child. +He saw young misses going past with their school-books in their hands, +and if he followed them with his eyes as far as eyes could follow, it +was not for any reason save such as should have made them love and trust +the man. He was thinking so seriously about his daughter, up-stairs at +work with her mother, embroidering scarfs and banners. + +He had only Columbia. She learned fast, when she went with Silas Swift +to the school in Salt Lane,--so they all said, and he knew she was fond +of her book. He had no ambition to make a lady of Columbia,--oh, no! But +he was looking forward, according to his nature, and--who could tell +what future might wait on her? He based his expectations for his child +on his own experience. Neither he nor Jessie had ever looked for such +good fortune as they had; and a step farther, must it not be a step +higher, and accordingly new prospects? + +Prophecy is unceasing. In what does the prescience of love differ from +inspiration? + +One morning Dexter was sent for by the principal of the seminary of the +town, to assist in the decoration of her school-room preparatory to the +examination and exhibition of her pupils. + +While at work there, aided by Silas Swift, who was now his assistant in +business, and notable for his skill as a designer and painter and +painter of transparencies, and whatsoever in that line was desired for +public festivities, processions, illuminations, and general jubilation +of any character,--while at work in the great school-room, Mr. Dexter +was unusually silent. + +This was no occasion for, there was no need of, much speaking or of +merriment. It was not expected of him. He was not dealing with, while he +worked for, others now, but he was dealt with constantly, to an extent +that confounded and embarrassed him. He did not make the demonstrations +people sometimes do in such a case, but was silent, and half sad. +Everything that passed before him he saw, it made an impression rapid +and deep on his mind. The pictures drawn and painted by the pupils, and +hung around the walls for exhibition, the pupils themselves, passing in +and out,--girls of all ages, ladies to look at, all of them,--suggested +anew the question, Why should his daughter be shut off from the +privileges of these? He felt ashamed when he asked. Yet the question +would be answered; and without palliation, self-excusing, or retort, he +meditated. + +Finally he said to Silas Swift, who worked with him in silence broken +only by question and answer that referred merely to their business,-- + +"Look!"--and his eyes followed a young girl who had been hunting for +several minutes among the desks for a book. + +The youth obeyed,--he looked, but seemed not to understand the +flag-maker as quickly or as clearly as was expected of him. + +"Columby," said Dexter, with a wink and a nod, that to his mind +expressed everything. + +"Oh, yes," said Silas, as if he understood. + +His penetration was not put to further proof. The mere supposition of +his apprehension satisfied his employer, who could now go on without +embarrassment. + +"She ought to come to school," said Dexter. + +"Oh!" exclaimed Silas, with surprise sufficient to convince the father +that the young man had not attempted to practise a deceit. + +"Yes," said Dexter, "she ought, she's old enough,"--as if that were all +he had been waiting for. + +"I think so," answered Silas Swift, with a decision encouraging to hear, +and final as to influence. + +"You do? Yes, I ought to afford it, if I lived on a crust to manage the +bills. Why not? What's the difference 'twixt her and the rest, I'd like +to know?" + +"She could beat the whole batch at her books," said Silas, not doubting +that he spoke with moderation. + +"Pretty quick, wasn't she?" said the pleased father. "Yes, I know +Columby!" + +"And she deserves it." + +"Deserves! You don't think I've been waiting to find that out! Well, +Sir, put it that way, I say, Yes, she does deserve it." + +Dexter and young Swift, having spoken thus far, thought on in their +several directions, with serious, steady, strong, far-reaching looks +into the future. + +Thus it was that Columbia Dexter took her place in the great school, +where girls, it was said, were regarded and taught as responsible human +beings. + +Silas Swift looked so grave, whenever the families mentioned Dexter's +resolution, that Columbia, who had made him repeat already many times +his reflections and observations in the school-room that day when he and +her father were employed in its decoration, said to him one morning, +when they happened to be alone together,-- + +"I'm afraid you don't think well of what we're going to do." + +Whereupon he, somewhat proudly for him, answered,-- + +"I told your father, when he asked me, what I thought, before he had +made up his mind." + +"What did you say?" she asked,--though she could have guessed correctly, +had he insisted upon it, but Silas was not in the mood. + +"I said it should be done," he answered, seriously. + +"I should go to school?" + +"Yes, it is but right." + +"Then why do you look so solemn?" + +"You're going away from us." + +Her hand was lying quietly in his, when she answered,-- + +"Going away? I shall see you three times every day. What do you mean?" + +"When there was your father and mother and me, 'us four, and no more,' +there were not dozens to think about. You'll have dozens now." + +"I hope they will be pleasant," she said, looking away, that he should +not see how bright her eyes were, when his were so grave. + +"I hope they will. And I'm sure of it. Never fear. I suppose, too, they +must make you like themselves, some ways. I'd be glad, if I thought +you'd make any of them like you." + +"How's that?" she asked, half laughing, but she trembled as well. What +would honest Silas say next, he was making such a very grave business +out of this school-going? + +"True,--modest,--sensible,--respectful,--a lady, ten times more than +those they make up so fine," said he, slowly. And still he held her hand +as quietly as if it did not thrill with quickening pulses; and his +speech and composure showed what power of self-control the young man +had,--for he was fearful when he looked forward, anticipating the change +this year might bring to pass in and for Columbia Dexter. + +But Dexter and Company looked forward with no forebodings, when they +bought the needful school-books, and saw their daughter fairly occupied +with them. They had not been ashamed to reveal their hopes and fears to +the principal. She really listened in a way that made them love her, you +will know how,--as if she had the interest of the girl at heart,--as +though she would not deal so sacrilegiously with their dear child as to +paste a few flashing ornaments upon her, worthless as dead fish-scales, +and swear she was covered with pearls. Honest and loving sponsors! +virtuous, confiding parents! they were ready to promise for Columbia; +she went from their hands a pure, industrious, obedient girl, only +fourteen; they were sure she would take pride in making good all +deficiencies of her past education. And the woman promised in +turn,--chiefly thinking, I infer, that here at least were responsible +paymasters. Why not? She taught for a living. Only we never like to +suppose that poets sing merely for money, or that kings reign for the +sake of the crown; we do not imagine a statesman delights in his +martyrdom for eight dollars a day. I know one woman who teaches because +it is her vocation; she loves the work God allows her. But even the +worst school that's used as a hot-bed could not have ruined a plant like +this bearing the Dexter label. + +Thus this great fact of the flag-makers' married life transpired,--their +child went to school with the children of gentlemen. Dexter could tell +that figure among dozens of girls; under one modest bonnet was a young +face with brown eyes and brown hair, a fair, sweet countenance, which he +loved with a love we will not dwell upon. In the sacred narrative, as in +the sacred temple, is always a place hid from the eyes and the feet of +the congregation. We may be all Gentiles here. + +Like responsible sentinels, Dexter and Jessie stood at their post. Like +debtors to the great universe, they made their calling sure. They were +living thus peacefully while nations went to war, while panics taught +the people it was not beneath their wisdom to look to the foundations +they built their pride upon,--thus, while great world-events were going +on that must concern every soul under the whole heaven. But never shall +the man be lost in the multitude; and was it not, is it not, of +incalculable importance that mortals by their own firesides should learn +to believe in peace and good-will,--else how shall come the universal +harmony? + +Therefore I dwell thus on Dexter's humble fortunes. Let us not fear too +much reverence, too patient observation; every living creature is one +other evidence, speaking his yea or nay,--by joy or sorrow, shame or +honor, testifying to the eternal laws of God. + +Sometime during the last six months of Columbia's second year at the +seminary among the books and new associates, Silas Swift had some +strange secret experiences, which came to their inevitable expression +when he told Mr. Dexter that he must leave his service. He perceived, he +said, that he could not spend life in a shop,--he must have other +employment. He hinted about the sea, but on that subject was not clear; +but he was clear in this,--tired of his life, sick, and knew not the +physician. Was a serpent distilling poison under the apricot-tree? + +Dexter was amazed. Silas anticipated everything he said,--was prepared +to answer all; and he answered in a manner that showed the flag-maker +something instant and effective must be done. He talked the matter over +accordingly with Andrew Swift, and the two men were at their wits' end; +they did not understand, and knew not what to prescribe for the case, so +desperate it seemed. But Jessie said, "Take him in for a partner, Silas. +Let _him_ stand for Company. You and I are one; so the sign, as it goes, +is a fib, you know." + +The two men looked at Jessie as if she had been an oracle. This very +promotion of their son had long seemed to Swift and his wife the most +desirable issue, of all their expectations; but they had not thought to +look for it these many years. However, Andrew was ready to pay down, any +day, whatever sum Silas Dexter should specify in order that his son +might be admitted to equal partnership. + +So they waited together till young Swift came into the little room back +of the shop, where they were all looking for him. They laid their plan +before him. What could he do? Neither explain himself, nor yet defy them +all. He surrendered; and the next day the old sign, DEXTER & CO., meant +what it had not meant the day before. The word of any one of these +people was as good as a bond to the others; therefore no papers of +agreement were made out, but Andrew paid down the money, because that +was his way of satisfying himself,--and son Silas was now a partner. + +Everybody concerned was so well pleased with this arrangement, that he +whose pleasure in it was specially desired had not the heart to speak +his mind, or to resolve further than that he would do his duty. Indeed, +he soon began to believe that he was satisfied. + +Young Silas thought he saw good reason for bringing forward his +partner's motto into fresh conspicuity in these days: he believed in +that motto, he purposed to work by it, but it was not merely his policy +to give his faith manifestation. He made several efforts, after his own +odd, original style, to impress the pretty Columbia with the +significance of that sentiment. Often his talk with the young lady had +the gravity and weight of a moral essay, and she took it well,--was not +impatient,--would answer him as a child, "I know it is so, Silas,"--did +not imagine how much these very lectures cost him, or that he delivered +them with as much inward composure as an orator might be supposed to +feel on the brink of a precipice, where the awful rocks and depths gave +echo to his utterance. + +Why should he so much disturb himself on her account?--she was so +studious, so blameless, what great need of this oversight he was +exercising continually? + +Young Alexander, now Midshipman Alexander, once a cabin-boy, promoted +step by step on the score of actual merit and brave service +performed,--Midshipman Alexander, son of an old sailor's old widow, who +lived in Salt Lane, to whom Andrew Swift and Silas Dexter and other +well-disposed men had lent a helping hand when poverty had brought her +to some desperate strait,--this young Alexander, who had been coming +home once in every three years since his twelfth birthday, and who in +the course of many years of voyages came to look on Dexter's house as +his home on land, after his mother died,--he interfered with the peace +of Silas Swift. + +He returned from service, after every voyage, a taller, stronger, +nobler, wiser, handsomer man. He had a career open before him; he could +not fail of honorable fortune. Every inch a hero Alexander looked, and +was; nobody ever tired of hearing his adventures; no one grew +unbelieving, when he spoke of the future,--all things seemed so possible +to him; and then he was really not possessed of the demon of vanity, the +ill-shaped evil monster, but was straightforward, and earnest, and +determined, and capable. + +And Dexter, any one could see, was growing dreadfully proud of his +Columbia. + +Silas Swift felt the sands moving under his feet. He dared not build on +a foundation so insecure. But, oh, he wished himself away from High +Street, ten thousand, thousand miles! He fell into dreaming moods that +did not leave him satisfied and cheerful. Surely, other quarters of the +globe had other circumstances than these which kept him to a life so +dull, under skies so leaden. Alas! the waving of the banners did not any +more uplift him, leading him on as a good soldier to battles and +victories. He tried to get the better of himself,--after the last visit +of this Alexander, he was tolerably successful; he studied hard, +ambitious to keep at least on an equality of learning with +Columbia,--and he went far ahead of her, for certain desperate reasons. +But when Dexter began to treat him with profound respect, as a man of +learning should be treated, according to his notions, the poor young +fellow, mortified and miserable, put away his books, and loathed his +false position. + +The old time to which through all prosperity Silas clung with fond +fears, the dear old time was all over, he said to himself one day, when +Columbia called him up into the parlor, clapping her hands ever +suspecting that the theme might please another less,--there was but one +for him as if he had been a slave, a signal he well understood, and was +proud to understand,--when she asked him to bring the step-ladder, and +to help her, for the curtains must come down from the show-room, it was +going to be a parlor now, and no show-room again forever. With heavy +misgivings, with a feeling that they were hard on to "the parting of the +ways," Silas obeyed her. + +Even so, according to her will was it that the drapery, the flags rich +in patriotic portraiture, the Washington, the Franklin, and the +Lafayette, must come down. Some pictures she had painted, some sketches +she had made, were to take their place: her father had insisted on +having them framed, and now they should hang on the walls. + +He assisted Columbia without a word of comment. Now the room, she said, +would no longer look hot and uncomfortable. There would be less dust to +distract one on the walls. But Silas, the stickler for old things, +thought jealously, "There's always a reason ready to excuse every +change. It's pride that's to pay now,--she's getting ashamed of the +shop." + +And he remembered the queer look Alexander had cast around him the last +time he entered that room; and he knew that this same Alexander was now +expected home daily. + +This was the rock, then, against which the sturdy craft of Silas was +destined to strike and go to pieces! This was the whirlpool which should +uproot the fairest tree and swing it to final ingulfing! Dark +foreboding! sad fear! his heart was so concerned about Columbia Dexter. +Alas for the halcyon days! it was winter indeed, but a winter worthy of +Labrador. + +So much she rejoiced in this midshipman's advancement, so proud of it +she seemed,--she was so bold in prophecy where he was concerned, so +manifestly fitted to appreciate a hero's career,--she could talk so long +about him without every suspecting that the theme might please another +less,--there was but one end likely, or desirable, for all this. + +Then Alexander came. And his popularity waxed, instead of waning. So +Silas at last gravely said to himself, after his sensible, moderate +manner of dealing with that unhappy person, "If she and the young man +were only married and settled, there the business would end; _he_ should +no longer be distracted, as he did not deny he had long been, on her +account." That admission was fatal. It compelled him to ask himself +sharply why he should be distracted. "What business was this of his? Did +he not, above all things, desire that Columbia should be happy? Must she +not be the best judge of what could make her happiness?" He tried to +deal honestly with himself. + +This endeavor led him to remark one morning to Columbia,-- + +"You and Alexander seem to be getting on finely." + +"Oh, yes," said she,--"of course." + +"I hope you always will," he continued, with a tragic vehemence of wish. + +"Thank you, Silas; we shall, I think," she replied, with such an excess +of gratitude, so he deemed it, that the poor fellow attempted no more. + +All that day he thought and thought; and at night Silas Swift looked +back from a corner of High Street at a building over whose door a flag +was waving, and said to himself, "I was born as free as others,"--and he +walked on silently, with himself for his dismal company. + +It made no difference to him where he went, which path he took, he said; +but he passed Salt Lane, and crossed Long Wharf, and walked down the +beach, under the old sycamores, and wandered on. There was another +seaport-town some miles down the coast; he was walking in that +direction, but he did not acknowledge a purpose. + +How splendid was the night! a night of magnificent constellations, of +flashing auroras, of many meteors; and he saw the comet, which he and +Columbia had looked for since its first announcement. But the heavens +might as well have been "hung in black." Chilled by more than the wintry +wind, he went his way. When the sun rose, he was still wandering on. +Light, heaven-deep, shone on land and sea. He sat down to rest, and to +order himself for future movements: for the town was now in sight; in an +hour or two he should come to the busy streets; already he could discern +the lofty spires, and the tall masts of the great vessels. + +Yes,--he would find a situation on one of those ships. He would go out +as supercargo to China, or India, or Spain. He could get a situation +without difficulty, for he was well known in the town. Then, after he +had sailed, word could go back to his father and mother. + +So, then, he should go to sea? Of course. It was now arranged,--to +foreign ports. He should see foreign people, and visit ancient places. +The strange would have advantage over the familiar. He did not desire +death. He had not that weakness, not being worn out by sickness, and +having never used this life as abusing it. The friends he loved were +living; his affections were strong. No, he could not think of death +without a shudder, for Love was on the earth. Yet--what had he to do +with Love? By her own election _she_ was no more to him than a hundred +others as good and fair might prove. Must he be so weak as to go through +life regretting? Not he, Silas Swift! + +By-and-by he rose up from the sand. I think his face must have +resembled, then, the face of Elijah when the Lord inquied, with the +still, small voice, "What dost thou here?" For, as he arose, he looked +back on the waste by which he came,--his face turned homewards. Ay, and +his steps likewise; and not with indecision, as though fearing when he +surrendered to himself and One mightier. + +Do they tell us filial reverence is a forgotten virtue? Silas was going +home. Child, do you call him coward? Perhaps he was that,--no, not even +yesterday, for the yesterday was capable of to-day! Do you, then, say, +with a doubting smile, "Love! Love!" Yea, verily, Love! The mount of God +takes up your word, so feebly and falsely spoken, and the echo is like +thunder whose fire can destroy. Yea, _Love_! Two old faces, wrinkled, +anxious. Eyes not so bright as once, dimmer to-day for tears; hair +sprinkled with gray. Prayers broken by sobbing; trust disappointed; +confidence violated. Ay, hearts that loved him first, and would surely +love him always. Smiles first recognized of all he has ever seen, that +could not change to frowns. They call him with tremulous tenderness, and +the heart of Silas breaks with hearing. Bleed, poor heart, but let not +those old hearts bleed! + +The music of the inviting waves is not so soft as the sound of those +feeble voices,--the freedom they promise is not powerful to tempt him; +behold the arms that hang powerless yonder, and the hearts whose tides +are more wondrous than those of the sea! The halcyon days shall never +break through eternal ages on him, if he will walk on now in darkness. + +"I will arise and go to my father." + +The everlasting gates lift up their heads. The full-grown man reënters. +Love drove him forth with stripes; there may have been who rejoiced and +thought of fainting Ishmael. But against no man should this youth's hand +be lifted. No son of the bond-woman he. Isaac, not Ishmael. + +Love drove him forth with stripes; but a holier drew him home. By his +past life's integrity the man was bound,--by the honor of a good name, +that waited to be justified. + +He went home to ask forgiveness of LOVE. Not of Youth and Beauty, but of +Age and Trust. + +He went home to souls which had proved themselves, each one, before the +divine messenger in the hours of his absence. + +Back, once more to break on a little circle gathered in an obscure +corner of the town, talking his case over with distressed perplexity: to +women disturbed with fears incredible to them,--to three, save one who +did not seem distracted, and who looked around her with something like +triumph, as a prophet might gaze when his word was verified. She was the +youngest and the fairest of them all. How many times she had said, "He +can explain. He will come soon. How can you fear for Silas?" + +He went back to the dead silence that fell with his appearing. His +mother was first to break it. With a faltering voice she spoke, but with +the authority of maternal love and faith,--through sobs, but with +authority. + +"There! there! I told you! Now speak, Silas! quick! Did you find +him?"--and, half fainting, she threw her arms about her son. + +The father would fain speak with severity, but he failed in the attempt; +he could no longer harbor his cruel fear, with the lad there before him. + +"Silas, what do you mean, Sir? Here's Mr. Dexter's shop broke in, and +his till robbed, and you off, and the Devil to pay! But Columby, there, +said you had gone in search of the thief. Oh! oh!" + +"Of course!" cried Dexter, the words rolling out as a cloud of smoke +from a conspicuous safety-valve,--"I knew 't was all right. I'd expect +the world to bu'st up as quick as for you to cheat us. I said it, I did, +fifty times." And there Dexter choked, and was silent. + +Ay, time for him to return! "Glory to God!" said Silas, and he looked +around him, scanning every face, as a man might scan the faces of +accusers. + +More than any said or thought he saw in Columbia's eyes. Silent, pale, +she merely sat gazing at him steadfastly. Oh, powers of speech, +surrender! It was a gaze that made the young fellow turn from all, that +the spasm of joy might pass, and leave him breath to declare himself +like a man in the hearing of those present. + +The words he spoke might not disturb the dreaming halcyon, but they must +have brought angels nearer,--so near that not one there in the little +back-room could escape the heavenly atmosphere. + +Was Love born in a stable? Is Nature changed since, that a little room +back of a shop should not be heaven itself, and the inmates kings and +priests, though without the ermine and ephod? + +Shall we sing the halcyon's song? + + + + +ON TRANSLATING THE DIVINA COMMEDIA. + + + Oft have I seen at some cathedral-door + A laborer, pausing in the dust and heat, + Lay down his burden, and with reverent feet + Enter, and cross himself, and on the floor + Kneel to repeat his pater-noster o'er; + Far off the noises of the world retreat; + The loud vociferations of the street + Become an undistinguishable roar. + So, as I enter here from day to day, + And leave my burden at this minster-gate, + Kneeling in prayer, and not ashamed to pray, + The tumult of the time disconsolate + To inarticulate murmurs dies away, + While the eternal ages watch and wait. + + + + +HOUSE AND HOME PAPERS. + +BY CHRISTOPHER CROWFIELD. + + +XI. + +My wife and I were sitting at the open bow-window of my study, watching +the tuft of bright red leaves on our favorite maple, which warned us +that summer was over. I was solacing myself, like all the world in our +days, with reading the "Schönberg Cotta Family," when my wife made her +voice heard through the enchanted distance, and dispersed the pretty +vision of German cottage-life. + +"Chris!" + +"Well, my dear." + +"Do you know the day of the month?" + +Now my wife knows this is a thing that I never do know, that I can't +know, and, in fact, that there is no need I should trouble myself about, +since she always knows, and what is more, always tells me. In fact, the +question, when asked by her, meant more than met the ear. It was a +delicate way of admonishing me that another paper for the "Atlantic" +ought to be in train; and so I answered, not to the external form, but +to the internal intention. + +"Well, you see, my dear, I haven't made up my mind what my next paper +shall be about." + +"Suppose, then, you let me give you a subject." + +"Sovereign lady, speak on! Your slave hears!" + +"Well, then, take _Cookery_. It may seem a vulgar subject, but I think +more of health and happiness depends on that than on any other one +thing. You may make houses enchantingly beautiful, hang them with +pictures, have them clean and airy and convenient; but if the stomach is +fed with sour bread and burnt coffee, it will raise such rebellions that +the eyes will see no beauty anywhere. Now in the little tour that you +and I have been taking this summer, I have been thinking of the great +abundance of splendid material we have in America, compared with the +poor cooking. How often, in our stoppings, we have sat down to tables +loaded with material, originally of the very best kind, which had been +so spoiled in the treatment that there was really nothing to eat! Green +biscuit with acrid spots of alkali,--sour yeast-bread,--meat slowly +simmered in fat till it seemed like grease itself, and slowly congealing +in cold grease,--and above all, that unpardonable enormity, strong +butter! How often I have longed to show people what might have been done +with the raw material out of which all these monstrosities were +concocted!" + +"My dear," said I, "you are driving me upon delicate ground. Would you +have your husband appear in public with that most opprobrious badge of +the domestic furies, a dish-cloth pinned to his coat-tail? It is coming +to exactly the point I have always predicted, Mrs. Crowfield: you must +write, yourself. I always told you that you could write far better than +I, if you would only try. Only sit down and write as you sometimes talk +to me, and I might hang up my pen by the side of 'Uncle Ned's' fiddle +and bow." + +"Oh, nonsense!" said my wife. "I never could write. I know what ought to +be said, and I could _say_ it to any one; but my ideas freeze in the +pen, cramp in my fingers, and make my brain seem like heavy bread. I was +born for extemporary speaking. Besides, I think the best things on all +subjects in this world of ours are said not by the practical workers, +but by the careful observers." + +"Mrs. Crowfield, that remark is as good as if I had made it myself," +said I. + +"It is true that I have been all my life a speculator and observer in +all domestic matters, having them so confidentially under my eye in our +own household; and so, if I write on a pure woman's matter, it must be +understood that I am only your pen and mouth-piece,--only giving +tangible form to wisdom which I have derived from you." + +So down I sat and scribbled, while my sovereign lady quietly stitched by +my side. And here I tell my reader that I write on such a subject under +protest,--declaring again my conviction, that, if my wife only believed +in herself as firmly as I do, she would write so that nobody would ever +want to listen to me again. + + +COOKERY. + +We in America have the raw material of provision in greater abundance +than any other nation. There is no country where an ample, +well-furnished table is more easily spread, and for that reason, +perhaps, none where the bounties of Providence are more generally +neglected. I do not mean to say that the traveller through the length +and breadth of our land could not, on the whole, find an average of +comfortable subsistence; yet, considering that our resources are greater +than those of any other civilized people, our results are comparatively +poorer. + +It is said, that, a list of the summer vegetables which are exhibited on +New-York hotel-tables being shown to a French _artiste_, he declared +that to serve such a dinner properly would take till midnight. I +recollect how I was once struck with our national plenteousness, on +returning from a Continental tour, and going directly from the ship to a +New-York hotel, in the bounteous season of autumn. For months I had been +habituated to my neat little bits of chop or poultry garnished with the +inevitable cauliflower or potato, which seemed to be the sole +possibility after the reign of green-peas was over; now I sat down all +at once to a carnival of vegetables: ripe, juicy tomatoes, raw or +cooked; cucumbers in brittle slices; rich, yellow sweet-potatoes; broad +Lima-beans, and beans of other and various names; tempting ears of +Indian-corn steaming in enormous piles, and great smoking tureens of the +savory succotash, an Indian gift to the table for which civilization +need not blush; sliced egg-plant in delicate fritters; and +marrow-squashes, of creamy pulp and sweetness: a rich variety, +embarrassing to the appetite, and perplexing to the choice. Verily, the +thought has often impressed itself on my mind that the vegetarian +doctrine preached in America left a man quite as much as he had capacity +to eat or enjoy, and that in the midst of such tantalizing abundance he +really lost the apology which elsewhere bears him out in preying upon +his less gifted and accomplished animal neighbors. + +But with all this, the American table, taken as a whole, is inferior to +that of England or France. It presents a fine abundance of material, +carelessly and poorly treated. The management of food is nowhere in the +world, perhaps, more slovenly and wasteful. Everything betokens that +want of care that waits on abundance; there are great capabilities and +poor execution. A tourist through England can seldom fail, at the +quietest country-inn, of finding himself served with the essentials of +English table-comfort,--his mutton-chop done to a turn, his steaming +little private apparatus for concocting his own tea, his choice pot of +marmalade or slice of cold ham, and his delicate rolls and creamy +butter, all served with care and neatness. In France, one never asks in +vain for delicious _café-au-lait_, good bread and butter, a nice omelet, +or some savory little portion of meat with a French name. But to a +tourist taking like chance in American country-fare what is the +prospect? What is the coffee? what the tea? and the meat? and above all, +the butter? + +In lecturing on cookery, as on house-building, I divide the subject into +not four, but five grand elements: first, Bread; second, Butter; third, +Meat; fourth, Vegetables; and fifth, Tea,--by which I mean, generically, +all sorts of warm, comfortable drinks served out in teacups, whether +they be called tea, coffee, chocolate, broma, or what not. + +I affirm, that, if these five departments are all perfect, the great +ends of domestic cookery are answered, so far as the comfort and +well-being of life are concerned. I am aware that there exists another +department, which is often regarded by culinary amateurs and young +aspirants as the higher branch and very collegiate course of practical +cookery, to wit, Confectionery,--by which I mean to designate all +pleasing and complicated compounds of sweets and spices, devised not for +health or nourishment, and strongly suspected of interfering with +both,--mere tolerated gratifications of the palate, which we eat, not +with the expectation of being benefited, but only with the hope of not +being injured by them. In this large department rank all sorts of cakes, +pies, preserves, ices, etc. I shall have a word or two to say under this +head before I have done. I only remark now, that in my tours about the +country I have often had a virulent ill-will excited towards these works +of culinary supererogation, because I thought their excellence was +attained by treading under foot and disregarding the five grand +essentials. I have sat at many a table garnished with three or four +kinds of well-made cake, compounded with citron and spices and all +imaginable good things, where the meat was tough and greasy, the bread +some hot preparation of flour, lard, saleratus, and acid, and the butter +unutterably detestable. At such tables I have thought, that, if the +mistress of the feast had given the care, time, and labor to preparing +the simple items of bread, butter, and meat that she evidently had given +to the preparation of these extras, the lot of a traveller might be much +more comfortable. Evidently, she never had thought of these common +articles as constituting a good table. So long as she had puff pastry, +rich black cake, clear jelly, and preserves, she seemed to consider that +such unimportant matters as bread, butter, and meat could take care of +themselves. It is the same inattention to common things as that which +leads people to build houses with stone fronts and window-caps and +expensive front-door trimmings, without bathing-rooms or fireplaces or +ventilators. + +Those who go into the country looking for summer board in farm-houses +know perfectly well that a table where the butter is always fresh, the +tea and coffee of the best kinds and well made, and the meats properly +kept, dressed, and served, is the one table of a hundred, the fabulous +enchanted island. It seems impossible to get the idea into the minds of +people that what is called common food, carefully prepared, becomes, in +virtue of that very care and attention, a delicacy, superseding the +necessity of artificially compounded dainties. + +To begin, then, with the very foundation of a good table,--_Bread:_ What +ought it to be? It should be light, sweet, and tender. + +This matter of lightness is the distinctive line between savage and +civilized bread. The savage mixes simple flour and water into balls of +paste, which he throws into boiling water, and which come out solid, +glutinous masses, of which his common saying is, "Man eat dis, he no +die,"--which a facetious traveller who was obliged to subsist on it +interpreted to mean, "Dis no kill you, nothing will." In short, it +requires the stomach of a wild animal or of a savage to digest this +primitive form of bread, and of course more or less attention in all +civilized modes of bread-making is given to producing lightness. By +lightness is meant simply that the particles are to be separated from +each other by little holes or air-cells, and all the different methods +of making light bread are neither more nor less than the formation in +bread of these air-cells. + +So far as we know, there are four practicable methods of aërating bread, +namely--by fermentation,--by effervescence of an acid and an +alkali,--by aërated egg, or egg which has been filled with air by the +process of beating,--and lastly, by pressure of some gaseous substance +into the paste, by a process much resembling the impregnation of water +in a soda-fountain. All these have one and the same object,--to give us +the cooked particles of our flour separated by such permanent air-cells +as will enable the stomach more readily to digest them. + +A very common mode of aërating bread, in America, is by the +effervescence of an acid and an alkali in the flour. The carbonic acid +gas thus formed produces minute air-cells in the bread, or, as the cook +says, makes it light. When this process is performed with exact +attention to chemical laws, so that the acid and alkali completely +neutralize each other, leaving no overplus of either, the result is +often very palatable. The difficulty is, that this is a happy +conjunction of circumstances which seldom occurs. The acid most commonly +employed is that of sour milk, and, as milk has many degrees of +sourness, the rule of a certain quantity of alkali to the pint must +necessarily produce very different results at different times. As an +actual fact, where this mode of making bread prevails, as we lament to +say it does to a great extent in this country, one finds five cases of +failure to one of success. It is a woful thing that the daughters of New +England have abandoned the old respectable mode of yeast-brewing and +bread-raising for this specious substitute, so easily made, and so +seldom well made. The green, clammy, acrid substance, called biscuit, +which many of our worthy republicans are obliged to eat in these days, +is wholly unworthy of the men and women of the Republic. Good patriots +ought not to be put off in that way,--they deserve better fare. + +As an occasional variety, as a household convenience for obtaining bread +or biscuit at a moment's notice, the process we earnestly entreat +American housekeepers, in Scriptural language, to stand in the way and +ask for the old paths, and return to the good yeast-bread of their +sainted grandmothers. + +If acid and alkali must be used, by all means let them be mixed in due +proportions. No cook should be left to guess and judge for herself about +this matter. There is an article, called "Preston's Infallible +Yeast-Powder," which is made by chemical rule, and produces very perfect +results. The use of this obviates the worst dangers in making bread by +effervescence. + +Of all processes of aëration in bread-making, the oldest and most +time-honored is by fermentation. That this was known in the days of our +Saviour is evident from the forcible simile in which he compares the +silent permeating force of truth in human society to the very familiar +household process of raising bread by a little yeast. + +There is, however, one species of yeast, much used in some parts of the +country, against which I have to enter my protest. It is called +salt-risings, or milk-risings, and is made by mixing flour, milk, and a +little salt together, and leaving them to ferment. The bread thus +produced is often very attractive, when new and made with great care. It +is white and delicate, with fine, even air-cells. It has, however, when +kept, some characteristics which remind us of the terms in which our old +English Bible describes the effect of keeping the manna of the ancient +Israelites, which we are informed, in words more explicit than +agreeable, "stank, and bred worms." If salt-rising bread does not fulfil +the whole of this unpleasant description, it certainly does emphatically +a part of it. The smell which it has in baking, and when more than a day +old, suggests the inquiry, whether it is the saccharine or the putrid +fermentation with which it is raised. Whoever breaks a piece of it after +a day or two will often see minute filaments or clammy strings drawing +out from the fragments, which, with the unmistakable smell, will cause +him to pause before consummating a nearer acquaintance. + +The fermentation of flour by means of brewer's or distiller's yeast +produces, if rightly managed, results far more palatable and wholesome. +The only requisites for success in it are, first, good materials, and, +second, great care in a few small things. There are certain low-priced +or damaged kinds of flour which can never by any kind of domestic +chemistry be made into good bread; and to those persons whose stomachs +forbid them to eat gummy, glutinous paste, under the name of bread, +there is no economy in buying these poor brands, even at half the price +of good flour. + +But good flour and good yeast being supposed, with a temperature +favorable to the development of fermentation, the whole success of the +process depends on the thorough diffusion of the proper proportion of +yeast through the whole mass, and on stopping the subsequent +fermentation at the precise and fortunate point. The true housewife +makes her bread the sovereign of her kitchen,--its behests must be +attended to in all critical points and moments, no matter what else be +postponed. She who attends to her bread when she has done this, and +arranged that, and performed the other, very often finds that the forces +of Nature will not wait for her. The snowy mass, perfectly mixed, +kneaded with care and strength, rises in its beautiful perfection till +the moment comes for fixing the air-cells by baking. A few minutes now, +and the acetous fermentation will begin, and the whole result be +spoiled. Many bread-makers pass in utter carelessness over this sacred +and mysterious boundary. Their oven has cake in it, or they are skimming +jelly, or attending to some other of the so-called higher branches of +cookery, while the bread is quickly passing into the acetous stage. At +last, when they are ready to attend to it, they find that it has been +going its own way,--it is so sour that the pungent smell is plainly +perceptible. Now the saleratus-bottle is handed down, and a quantity of +the dissolved alkali mixed with the paste,--an expedient sometimes +making itself too manifest by greenish streaks or small acrid spots in +the bread. As the result, we have a beautiful article spoiled,--bread +without sweetness, if not absolutely sour. + +In the view of many, lightness is the only property required in this +article. The delicate, refined sweetness which exists in carefully +kneaded bread, baked just before it passes to the extreme point of +fermentation, is something of which they have no conception, and thus +they will even regard this process of spoiling the paste by the acetous +fermentation, and then rectifying that acid by effervescence with an +alkali, as something positively meritorious. How else can they value and +relish bakers' loaves, such as some are, drugged with ammonia and other +disagreeable things, light indeed, so light that they seem to have +neither weight nor substance, but with no move sweetness or taste than +so much white cotton? + +Some persons prepare bread for the oven by simply mixing it in the mass, +without kneading, pouring it into pans, and suffering it to rise there. +The air-cells in bread thus prepared are coarse and uneven; the bread is +as inferior in delicacy and nicety to that which is well kneaded as a +raw Irish servant to a perfectly educated and refined lady. The process +of kneading seems to impart an evenness to the minute air-cells, a +fineness of texture, and a tenderness and pliability to the whole +substance, that can be gained in no other way. + +The divine principle of beauty has its reign over bread as well as over +all other things; it has its laws of aesthetics; and that bread which is +so prepared that it can be formed into separate and well-proportioned +loaves, each one carefully worked and moulded, will develop the most +beautiful results. After being moulded, the loaves should stand a little +while, just long enough to allow the fermentation going on in them to +expand each little air-cell to the point at which it stood before it was +worked down, and then they should be immediately put into the oven. + +Many a good thing, however, is spoiled in the oven. We cannot but +regret, for the sake of bread, that our old steady brick ovens have been +almost universally superseded by those of ranges and cooking-stoves, +which are infinite in their caprices, and forbid all general rules. One +thing, however, may be borne in mind as a principle,--that the +excellence of bread in all its varieties, plain or sweetened, depends on +the perfection of its air-cells, whether produced by yeast, egg, or +effervescence, that one of the objects of baking is to fix these +air-cells, and that the quicker this can be done through the whole mass +the better will the result be. When cake or bread is made heavy by +baking too quickly, it is because the immediate formation of the top +crust hinders the exhaling of the moisture in the centre, and prevents +the air-cells from cooking. The weight also of the crust pressing down +on the doughy air-cells below destroys them, producing that horror of +good cooks, a heavy streak. The problem in baking, then, is the quick +application of heat rather below than above the loaf, and its steady +continuance till all the air-cells are thoroughly dried into permanent +consistency. Every housewife must watch her own oven to know how this +can be best accomplished. + +Bread-making can be cultivated to any extent as a fine art,--and the +various kinds of biscuit, tea-rusks, twists, rolls, into which bread may +be made, are much better worth a housekeeper's ambition than the +getting-up of rich and expensive cake or confections. There are also +varieties of material which are rich in good effects. Unbolted flour, +altogether more wholesome than the fine wheat, and when properly +prepared more palatable,--rye-flour and corn-meal, each affording a +thousand attractive possibilities,--each and all of these come under the +general laws of bread-stuffs, and are worth a careful attention. + +A peculiarity of our American table, particularly in the Southern and +Western States, is the constant exhibition of various preparations of +hot bread. In many families of the South and West, bread in loaves to be +eaten cold is an article quite unknown. The effect of this kind of diet +upon the health has formed a frequent subject of remark among +travellers; but only those know the full mischiefs of it who have been +compelled to sojourn for a length of time in families where it is +maintained. The unknown horrors of dyspepsia from bad bread are a topic +over which we willingly draw a veil. + + * * * * * + +Next to Bread comes _Butter_,--on which we have to say, that, when we +remember what butter is in civilized Europe, and compare it with what it +is in America, we wonder at the forbearance and lenity of travellers in +their strictures on our national commissariat. + +Butter, in England, France, and Italy, is simply solidified cream, with +all the sweetness of the cream in its taste, freshly churned each day, +and unadulterated by salt. At the present moment, when salt is five +cents a pound and butter fifty, we Americans are paying, I should judge +from the taste, for about one pound of salt to every ten of butter, and +those of us who have eaten the butter of France and England do this with +rueful recollections. + +There is, it is true, an article of butter made in the American style +with salt, which, in its own kind and way, has a merit not inferior to +that of England and France. Many prefer it, and it certainly takes a +rank equally respectable with the other. It is yellow, hard, and worked +so perfectly free from every particle of buttermilk that it might make +the voyage of the world without spoiling. It is salted, but salted with +care and delicacy, so that it may be a question whether even a +fastidious Englishman might not prefer its golden solidity to the white, +creamy freshness of his own. Now I am not for universal imitation of +foreign customs, and where I find this butter made perfectly, I call it +our American style, and am not ashamed of it. I only regret that this +article is the exception, and not the rule, on our tables. When I +reflect on the possibilities which beset the delicate stomach in this +line, I do not wonder that my venerated friend Dr. Mussey used to close +his counsels to invalids with the direction, "And don't eat grease on +your bread." + +America must, I think, have the credit of manufacturing and putting into +market more bad butter than all that is made in all the rest of the +world together. The varieties of bad tastes and smells which prevail in +it are quite a study. This has a cheesy taste, that a mouldy,--this is +flavored with cabbage, and that again with turnip, and another has the +strong, sharp savor of rancid animal fat. These varieties, I presume, +come from the practice of churning only at long intervals, and keeping +the cream meanwhile in unventilated cellars or dairies, the air of which +is loaded with the effluvia of vegetable substances. No domestic +articles are so sympathetic as those of the milk tribe: they readily +take on the smell and taste of any neighboring substance, and hence the +infinite variety of flavors on which one mournfully muses who has late +in autumn to taste twenty firkins of butter in hopes of finding one +which will simply not be intolerable on his winter table. + +A matter for despair as regards bad butter is that at the tables where +it is used it stands sentinel at the door to bar your way to every other +kind of food. You turn from your dreadful half-slice of bread, which +fills your mouth with bitterness, to your beefsteak, which proves +virulent with the same poison; you think to take refuge in vegetable +diet, and find the butter in the string-beans, and polluting the +innocence of early peas,--it is in the corn, in the succotash, in the +squash,--the beets swim in it, the onions have it poured over them. +Hungry and miserable, you think to solace yourself at the dessert,--but +the pastry is cursed, the cake is acrid with the same plague. You are +ready to howl with despair, and your misery is great upon +you,--especially if this is a table where you have taken board for three +months with your delicate wife and four small children. Your case is +dreadful,--and it is hopeless, because long usage and habit have +rendered your host perfectly incapable of discovering what is the +matter. "Don't like the butter, Sir? I assure you I paid an extra price +for it, and it's the very best in the market. I looked over as many as a +hundred tubs, and picked out this one." You are dumb, but not less +despairing. + +Yet the process of making good butter is a very simple one. To keep the +cream in a perfectly pure, cool atmosphere, to churn while it is yet +sweet, to work out the buttermilk thoroughly, and to add salt with such +discretion as not to ruin the fine, delicate flavor of the fresh +cream,--all this is quite simple, so simple that one wonders at +thousands and millions of pounds of butter yearly manufactured which are +merely a hobgoblin-bewitchment of cream into foul and loathsome poisons. + + * * * * * + +The third head of my discourse is that of _Meat_, of which America +furnishes, in the gross material, enough to spread our tables royally, +were it well cared for and served. + +The faults in the meat generally furnished to us are, first, that it is +too new. A beefsteak, which three or four days of keeping might render +practicable, is served up to us palpitating with freshness, with all the +toughness of animal muscle yet warm. In the Western country, the +traveller, on approaching a hotel, is often saluted by the last shrieks +of the chickens which half an hour afterward are presented to him _à la_ +spread-eagle for his dinner. The example of the Father of the Faithful, +most wholesome to be followed in so many respects, is imitated only in +the celerity with which the young calf, tender and good, was transformed +into an edible dish for hospitable purposes. But what might be good +housekeeping in a nomadic Emir, in days when refrigerators were yet in +the future, ought not to be so closely imitated as it often is in our +own land. + +In the next place, there is a woful lack of nicety in the butcher's work +of cutting and preparing meat. Who that remembers the neatly trimmed +mutton-chop of an English inn, or the artistic little circle of +lamb-chop fried in bread-crumbs coiled around a tempting centre of +spinach which can always be found in France, can recognize any +family-resemblance to these dapper civilized preparations in those +coarse, roughly hacked strips of bone, gristle, and meat which are +commonly called mutton-chop in America? There seems to be a large dish +of something resembling meat, in which each fragment has about two or +three edible morsels, the rest being composed of dry and burnt skin, +fat, and ragged bone. + +Is it not time that civilization should learn to demand somewhat more +care and nicety in the modes of preparing what is to be cooked and +eaten? Might not some of the refinement and trimness which characterize +the preparations of the European market be with advantage introduced +into our own? The housekeeper who wishes to garnish her table with some +of those nice things is stopped in the outset by the butcher. Except in +our large cities, where some foreign travel may have created the demand, +it seems impossible to get much in this line that is properly prepared. + +I am aware, that, if this is urged on the score of aesthetics, the ready +reply will be,--"Oh, we can't give time here in America to go into +niceties and French whim-whams!" But the French mode of doing almost all +practical things is based on that true philosophy and utilitarian good +sense which characterize that seemingly thoughtless people. Nowhere is +economy a more careful study, and their market is artistically arranged +to this end. The rule is so to cut their meats that no portion designed +to be cooked in a certain manner shall have wasteful appendages which +that mode of cooking will spoil. The French soup-kettle stands ever +ready to receive the bones, the thin fibrous flaps, the sinewy and +gristly portions, which are so often included in our roasts or +broilings, which fill our plates with unsightly _débris_, and finally +make an amount of blank waste for which we pay our butcher the same +price that we pay for what we have eaten. + +The dead waste of our clumsy, coarse way of cutting meats is immense. +For example, at the beginning of the present season, the part of a lamb +denominated leg and loin, or hind-quarter, sold for thirty cents a +pound. Now this includes, besides the thick, fleshy portions, a quantity +of bone, sinew, and thin fibrous substance, constituting full one-third +of the whole weight. If we put it into the oven entire, in the usual +manner, we have the thin parts overdone, and the skinny and fibrous +parts utterly dried up, by the application of the amount of heat +necessary to cook the thick portion. Supposing the joint to weigh six +pounds, at thirty cents, and that one-third of the weight is so treated +as to become perfectly useless, we throw away sixty cents. Of a piece of +beef at twenty-five cents a pound, fifty cents' worth is often lost in +bone, fat, and burnt skin. + +The fact is, this way of selling and cooking meat in large, gross +portions is of English origin, and belongs to a country where all the +customs of society spring from a class who have no particular occasion +for economy. The practice of minute and delicate division comes from a +nation which acknowledges the need of economy, and has made it a study. +A quarter of lamb in this mode of division would be sold in three nicely +prepared portions. The thick part would be sold by itself, for a neat, +compact little roast; the rib-bones would be artistically separated, and +all the edible matters scraped away would form those delicate dishes of +lamb-chop, which, fried in bread-crumbs to a golden brown, are so +ornamental and so palatable a side-dish; the trimmings which remain +after this division would be destined to the soup-kettle or stew-pan. In +a French market is a little portion for every purse, and the far-famed +and delicately flavored soups and stews which have arisen out of French +economy are a study worth a housekeeper's attention. Not one atom of +food is wasted in the French modes of preparation; even tough animal +cartilages and sinews, instead of appearing burned and blackened in +company with the roast meat to which they happen to be related, are +treated according to their own laws, and come out either in savory +soups, or those fine, clear meat-jellies which form a garnish no less +agreeable to the eye than palatable to the taste. + +Whether this careful, economical, practical style of meat-cooking can +ever to any great extent be introduced into our kitchens now is a +question. Our butchers are against it; our servants are wedded to the +old wholesale wasteful ways, which seem to them easier because they are +accustomed to them. A cook who will keep and properly tend a soup-kettle +which shall receive and utilize all that the coarse preparations of the +butcher would require her to trim away, who understands the art of +making the most of all these remains, is a treasure scarcely to be hoped +for. If such things are to be done, it must be primarily through the +educated brain of cultivated women who do not scorn to turn their +culture and refinement upon domestic problems. + +When meats have been properly divided, so that each portion can receive +its own appropriate style of treatment, next comes the consideration of +the modes of cooking. These may be divided into two great general +classes: those where it is desired to keep the juices within the meat, +as in baking, broiling, and frying,--and those whose object is to +extract the juice and dissolve the fibre, as in the making of soups and +stews. In the first class of operations, the process must be as rapid as +may consist with the thorough cooking of all the particles. In this +branch of cookery, doing quickly is doing well. The fire must be brisk, +the attention, alert. The introduction of cooking-stoves offers to +careless domestics facilities for gradually drying-up meats, and +despoiling them of all flavor and nutriment,--facilities which appear to +be very generally laid hold of. They have almost banished the genuine, +old-fashioned roast-meat from our tables, and left in its stead dried +meats with their most precious and nutritive juices evaporated. How few +cooks, unassisted, are competent to the simple process of broiling a +beefsteak or mutton-chop! how very generally one has to choose between +these meats gradually dried away, or burned on the outside and raw +within! Yet in England these articles _never_ come on table done amiss; +their perfect cooking is as absolute a certainty as the rising of the +sun. + +No one of these rapid processes of cooking, however, is so generally +abused as frying. The frying-pan has awful sins to answer for. What +untold horrors of dyspepsia have arisen from its smoky depths, like the +ghosts from witches' caldrons! The fizzle of frying meat is as a warning +knell on many an ear, saying, "Touch not, taste not, if you would not +burn and writhe!" + +Yet those who have travelled abroad remember that some of the lightest, +most palatable, and most digestible preparations of meat have come from +this dangerous source. But we fancy quite other rites and ceremonies +inaugurated the process, and quite other hands performed its offices, +than those known to our kitchens. Probably the delicate _côtelletes_ of +France are not flopped down into half-melted grease, there gradually to +warm and soak and fizzle, while Biddy goes in and out on her other +ministrations, till finally, when thoroughly saturated, and dinner-hour +impends, she bethinks herself, and crowds the fire below to a roaring +heat, and finishes the process by a smart burn, involving the kitchen +and surrounding precincts in volumes of Stygian gloom. + +From such preparations has arisen the very current medical opinion that +fried meats are indigestible. They are indigestible, if they are greasy; +but French cooks have taught us that a thing has no more need to be +greasy because emerging from grease than Venus had to be salt because +she rose from the sea. + +There are two ways of frying employed by the French cook. One is, to +immerse the article to be cooked in _boiling_ fat, with an emphasis on +the present participle,--and the philosophical principle is, so +immediately to crisp every pore, at the first moment or two of +immersion, as effectually to seal the interior against the intrusion of +greasy particles; it can then remain as long as may be necessary +thoroughly to cook it, without imbibing any more of the boiling fluid +than if it were inclosed in an eggshell. The other method is to rub a +perfectly smooth iron surface with just enough of some oily substance to +prevent the meat from adhering, and cook it with a quick heat, as cakes +are baked on a griddle. In both these cases there must be the most rapid +application of heat that can be made without burning, and by the +adroitness shown in working out this problem the skill of the cook is +tested. Any one whose cook attains this important secret will find fried +things quite as digestible and often more palatable than any other. + +In the second department of meat-cookery, to wit, the slow and gradual +application of heat for the softening and dissolution of its fibre and +the extraction of its juices, common cooks are equally untrained. Where +is the so-called cook who understands how to prepare soups and stews? +These are precisely the articles in which a French kitchen excels. The +soup-kettle, made with a double bottom, to prevent burning, is a +permanent, ever-present institution, and the coarsest and most +impracticable meats distilled through that alembic come out again in +soups, jellies, or savory stews. The toughest cartilage, even the bones, +being first cracked, are here made to give forth their hidden virtues, +and to rise in delicate and appetizing forms. One great law governs all +these preparations: the application of heat must be gradual, steady, +long protracted, never reaching the point of active boiling. Hours of +quiet simmering dissolve all dissoluble parts, soften the sternest +fibre, and unlock every minute cell in which Nature has stored away her +treasures of nourishment. This careful and protracted application of +heat and the skilful use of flavors constitute the two main points in +all those nice preparations of meat for which the French have so many +names,--processes by which a delicacy can be imparted to the coarsest +and cheapest food superior to that of the finest articles under less +philosophic treatment. + +French soups and stews are a study,--and they would not be an +unprofitable one to any person who wishes to live with comfort and even +elegance on small means. + +John Bull looks down from the sublime of ten thousand a year on French +kickshaws, as he calls them:--"Give me my meat cooked so I may know what +it is!" An ox roasted whole is dear to John's soul, and his +kitchen-arrangements are Titanic. What magnificent rounds and sirloins +of beef, revolving on self-regulating spits, with a rich click of +satisfaction, before grates piled with roaring fires! Let us do justice +to the royal cheer. Nowhere are the charms of pure, unadulterated animal +food set forth in more imposing style. For John is rich, and what does +he care for odds and ends and parings? Has he not all the beasts of the +forest, and the cattle on a thousand hills? What does he want of +economy? But his brother Jean has not ten thousand pounds a +year,--nothing like it; but he makes up for the slenderness of his purse +by boundless fertility of invention and delicacy of practice. John began +sneering at Jean's soups and ragouts, but all John's modern sons and +daughters send to Jean for their cooks, and the sirloins of England rise +up and do obeisance to this Joseph with a white apron who comes to rule +in their kitchens. + +There is no animal fibre that will not yield itself up to +long-continued, steady heat. But the difficulty with almost any of the +common servants who call themselves cooks is that they have not the +smallest notion of the philosophy of the application of heat. Such a one +will complacently tell you concerning certain meats, that the harder you +boil them the harder they grow,--an obvious fact, which, under her mode +of treatment, by an indiscriminate galloping boil, has frequently come +under her personal observation. If you tell her that such meat must +stand for six hours in a heat just below the boiling-point, she will +probably answer, "Yes, Ma'am," and go on her own way. Or she will let it +stand till it burns to the bottom of the kettle,--a most common +termination of the experiment. The only way to make sure of the matter +is either to import a French kettle, or to fit into an ordinary kettle a +false bottom, such as any tinman may make, that shall leave a space of +an inch or two between the meat and the fire. This kettle may be +maintained as a constant _habitué_ of the range, and into it the cook +may be instructed to throw all the fibrous trimmings of meat, all the +gristle, tendons, and bones, having previously broken up these last with +a mallet. + +Such a kettle will furnish the basis for clear, rich soups or other +palatable dishes. Clear soup consists of the dissolved juices of the +meat and gelatine of the bones, cleared from the fat and fibrous +portions by straining when cold. The grease, which rises to the top of +the fluid, may thus be easily removed. In a stew, on the contrary, you +boil down this soup till it permeates the fibre which long exposure to +heat has softened. All that remains, after the proper preparation of the +fibre and juices, is the flavoring, and it is in this, particularly, +that French soups excel those of America and England and all the world. + +English and American soups are often heavy and hot with spices. There +are appreciable tastes in them. They burn your mouth with cayenne or +clove or allspice. You can tell at once what is in them, oftentimes to +your sorrow. But a French soup has a flavor which one recognizes at once +as delicious, yet not to be characterized as due to any single +condiment; it is the just blending of many things. The same remark +applies to all their stews, ragouts, and other delicate preparations. No +cook will ever study these flavors; but perhaps many cooks' mistresses +may, and thus be able to impart delicacy and comfort to economy. + +As to those things called hashes, commonly manufactured by unwatched, +untaught cooks, out of the remains of yesterday's repast, let us not +dwell too closely on their memory,--compounds of meat, gristle, skin, +fat, and burnt fibre, with a handful of pepper and salt flung at them, +dredged with lumpy flour, watered from the spout of the tea-kettle, and +left to simmer at the cook's convenience while she is otherwise +occupied. Such are the best performances a housekeeper can hope for from +an untrained cook. + +But the cunningly devised minces, the artful preparations choicely +flavored, which may be made of yesterday's repast,--by these is the true +domestic artist known. No cook untaught by an educated brain ever makes +these, and yet economy is a great gainer by them. + + * * * * * + +As regards the department of _Vegetables_, their number and variety in +America are so great that a table might almost be furnished by these +alone. Generally speaking, their cooking is a more simple art, and +therefore more likely to be found satisfactorily performed, than that of +meats. If only they are not drenched with rancid butter, their own +native excellence makes itself known in most of the ordinary modes of +preparation. + +There is, however, one exception. + +Our stanch old friend, the potato, is to other vegetables what bread is +on the table. Like bread, it is held as a sort of _sine-qua-non_; like +that, it may be made invariably palatable by a little care in a few +plain particulars, through neglect of which it often becomes +intolerable. The soggy, waxy, indigestible viand that often appears in +the potato-dish is a downright sacrifice of the better nature of this +vegetable. + +The potato, nutritive and harmless as it appears, belongs to a family +suspected of very dangerous traits. It is a family-connection of the +deadly-nightshade and other ill-reputed gentry, and sometimes shows +strange proclivities to evil,--now breaking out uproariously, as in the +noted potato-rot, and now more covertly in various evil affections. For +this reason scientific directors bid us beware of the water in which +potatoes are boiled,--into which, it appears, the evil principle is +drawn off; and they caution us not to shred them into stews without +previously suffering the slices to lie for an hour or so in salt and +water. These cautions are worth attention. + +The most usual modes of preparing the potato for the table are by +roasting or boiling. These processes are so simple that it is commonly +supposed every cook understands them without special directions; and yet +there is scarcely an uninstructed cook who can boil or roast a potato. + +A good roasted potato is a delicacy worth a dozen compositions of the +cook-book; yet when we ask for it, what burnt, shrivelled abortions are +presented to us! Biddy rushes to her potato-basket and pours out two +dozen of different sizes, some having in them three times the amount of +matter of others. These being washed, she tumbles them into her oven at +a leisure interval, and there lets them lie till it is time to serve +breakfast, whenever that may be. As a result, if the largest are cooked, +the smallest are presented in cinders, and the intermediate sizes are +withered and watery. Nothing is so utterly ruined by a few moments of +overdoing. That which at the right moment was plump with mealy richness, +a quarter of an hour later shrivels and becomes watery,--and it is in +this state that roast potatoes are most frequently served. + +In the same manner we have seen boiled potatoes from an untaught cook +coming upon the table like lumps of yellow wax,--and the same article, +the day after, under the directions of a skilful mistress, appearing in +snowy balls of powdery lightness. In the one case, they were thrown in +their skins into water, and suffered to soak or boil, as the case might +be, at the cook's leisure, and after they were boiled to stand in the +water till she was ready to peel them. In the other case, the potatoes +being first peeled were boiled as quickly as possible in salted water, +which the moment they were done was drained off, and then they were +gently shaken for a minute or two over the fire to dry them still more +thoroughly. We have never yet seen the potato so depraved and given over +to evil that could not be reclaimed by this mode of treatment. + +As to fried potatoes, who that remembers the crisp, golden slices of the +French restaurant, thin as wafers and light as snow-flakes, does not +speak respectfully of them? What cousinship with these have those +coarse, greasy masses of sliced potato, wholly soggy and partly burnt, +to which we are treated under the name of fried potatoes _à la_ America? +In our cities the restaurants are introducing the French article to +great acceptance, and to the vindication of the fair fame of this queen +of vegetables. + + * * * * * + +Finally, I arrive at the last great head of my subject, to wit, +TEA,--meaning thereby, as before observed, what our Hibernian friend did +in the inquiry, "Will y'r Honor take 'tay tay' or coffee tay?" + +I am not about to enter into the merits of the great tea-and-coffee +controversy, or say whether these substances are or are not wholesome. I +treat of them as actual existences, and speak only of the modes of +making the most of them. + +The French coffee is reputed the best in the world; and a thousand +voices have asked, What is it about the French coffee? + +In the first place, then, the French coffee is coffee, and not chiccory, +or rye, or beans, or peas. In the second place, it is freshly roasted, +whenever made,--roasted with great care and evenness in a little +revolving cylinder which makes part of the furniture of every kitchen, +and which keeps in the aroma of the berry. It is never overdone, so as +to destroy the coffee-flavor, which is in nine cases out of ten the +fault of the coffee we meet with. Then it is ground, and placed in a +coffee-pot with a filter, through which it percolates in clear drops, +the coffee-pot standing on a heated stove to maintain the temperature. +The nose of the coffee-pot is stopped up to prevent the escape of the +aroma during this process. The extract thus obtained is a perfectly +clear, dark fluid, known as _café noir_, or black coffee. It is black +only because of its strength, being in fact almost the very essential +oil of coffee. A table-spoonful of this in boiled milk would make what +is ordinarily called a strong cup of coffee. The boiled milk is prepared +with no less care. It must be fresh and new, not merely warmed or even +brought to the boiling-point, but slowly simmered till it attains a +thick, creamy richness. The coffee mixed with this, and sweetened with +that sparkling beet-root sugar which ornaments a French table, is the +celebrated _café-au-lait_, the name of which has gone round the world. + +As we look to France for the best coffee, so we must look to England for +the perfection of tea. The tea-kettle is as much an English institution +as aristocracy or the Prayer-Book; and when one wants to know exactly +how tea should be made, one has only to ask how a fine old English +housekeeper makes it. + +The first article of her faith is that the water must not merely be hot, +not merely _have boiled_ a few moments since, but be actually _boiling_ +at the moment it touches the tea. Hence, though servants in England are +vastly better trained than with us, this delicate mystery is seldom left +to their hands. Tea-making belongs to the drawing-room, and high-born +ladies preside at "the bubbling and loud-hissing urn," and see that all +due rites and solemnities are properly performed,--that the cups are +hot, and that the infused tea waits the exact time before the libations +commence. Oh, ye dear old English tea-tables, resorts of the +kindest-hearted hospitality in the world! we still cherish your memory, +even though you do not say pleasant things of us there. One of these +days you will think better of us. Of late, the introduction of English +breakfast-tea has raised a new sect among the tea-drinkers, reversing +some of the old canons. Breakfast-tea must be boiled! Unlike the +delicate article of olden time, which required only a momentary infusion +to develop its richness, this requires a longer and severer treatment to +bring out its strength,--thus confusing all the established usages, and +throwing the work into the hands of the cook in the kitchen. + +The faults of tea, as too commonly found at our hotels and +boarding-houses, are that it is made in every way the reverse of what it +should be. The water is hot, perhaps, but not boiling; the tea has a +general flat, stale, smoky taste, devoid of life or spirit; and it is +served, usually, with thin milk, instead of cream. Cream is as essential +to the richness of tea as of coffee. We could wish that the English +fashion might generally prevail, of giving the traveller his own kettle +of boiling water and his own tea-chest, and letting him make tea for +himself. At all events, he would then be sure of one merit in his +tea,--it would be hot, a very simple and obvious virtue, but one very +seldom obtained. + +Chocolate is a French and Spanish article, and one seldom served on +American tables. We, in America, however, make an article every way +equal to any which can be imported from Paris, and he who buys Baker's +best vanilla-chocolate may rest assured that no foreign land can +furnish anything better. A very rich and delicious beverage may be made +by dissolving this in milk slowly boiled down after the French fashion. + + * * * * * + +I have now gone over all the ground I laid out, as comprising the great +first principles of cookery; and I would here modestly offer the opinion +that a table where all these principles are carefully observed would +need few dainties. The struggle after so-called delicacies comes from +the poorness of common things. Perfect bread and butter would soon drive +cake out of the field: it has done so in many families. Nevertheless, I +have a word to say under the head of _Confectionery_, meaning by this +the whole range of ornamental cookery,--or pastry, ices, jellies, +preserves, etc. The art of making all these very perfectly is far better +understood in America than the art of common cooking. + +There are more women who know how to make good cake than good +bread,--more who can furnish you with a good ice-cream than a +well-cooked mutton-chop; a fair charlotte-russe is easier to come by +than a perfect cup of coffee, and you shall find a sparkling jelly to +your dessert where you sighed in vain for so simple a luxury as a +well-cooked potato. + +Our fair countrywomen might rest upon their laurels in these higher +fields, and turn their great energy and ingenuity to the study of +essentials. To do common things perfectly is far better worth our +endeavor than to do uncommon things respectably. We Americans in many +things as yet have been a little inclined to begin making our shirt at +the ruffle; but, nevertheless, when we set about it, we can make the +shirt as nicely as anybody,--it needs only that we turn our attention to +it, resolved, that, ruffle or no ruffle, the shirt we will have. + +I have also a few words to say as to the prevalent ideas in respect to +French cookery. Having heard much of it, with no very distinct idea what +it is, our people have somehow fallen into the notion that its forte +lies in high spicing,--and so, when our cooks put a great abundance of +clove, mace, nutmeg, and cinnamon into their preparations, they fancy +that they are growing up to be French cooks. But the fact is, that the +Americans and English are far more given to spicing than the French. +Spices in our made dishes are abundant, and their taste is strongly +pronounced. In living a year in France I forgot the taste of nutmeg, +clove, and allspice, which had met me in so many dishes in America. + +The thing may be briefly defined. The English and Americans deal in +_spices_, the French in _flavors_,--flavors many and subtile, imitating +often in their delicacy those subtile blendings which Nature produces in +high-flavored fruits. The recipes of our cookery-books are most of them +of English origin, coming down from the times of our phlegmatic +ancestors, when the solid, burly, beefy growth of the foggy island +required the heat of fiery condiments, and could digest heavy sweets. +Witness the national recipe for plum-pudding, which may be +rendered,--Take a pound of every indigestible substance you can think +of, boil into a cannonball, and serve in flaming brandy. So of the +Christmas mince-pie and many other national dishes. But in America, +owing to our brighter skies and more fervid climate, we have developed +an acute, nervous delicacy of temperament far more akin to that of +France than of England. + +Half of the recipes in our cook-books are mere murder to such +constitutions and stomachs as we grow here. We require to ponder these +things, and think how we in our climate and under our circumstances +ought to live, and in doing so, we may, without accusation of foreign +foppery, take some leaves from many foreign books. + + * * * * * + +But Christopher has prosed long enough. I must now read this to my wife, +and see what she says. + + + + +ON THE COLUMBIA RIVER. + + +I have never known, nor seen any person who did know, why Portland, the +metropolis of Oregon, was founded on the Willamette River. I am unaware +why the accent is on the penult, and not on the ultimate of Willamette. +These thoughts perplexed me more than a well man would have suffered +them, all the way from the Callapooya Mountains to Portland. I had been +laid up in the backwoods of Oregon, in a district known as the Long-Tom +Country,--(and certainly a longer or more tedious Tom never existed +since the days of him additionally hight Aquinas,)--by a violent attack +of pneumonia, which came near terminating my earthly with my Oregon +pilgrimage. I had been saved by the indefatigable nursing of the best +friend I ever travelled with,--by wet compresses, and the impossibility +of sending for any doctor in the region. I had lived to pay +San-Francisco hotel-prices for squatter-cabin accommodations in the +rural residence of an Oregon landholder, whose tender mercies I fell +into from my saddle when the disease had reached its height, and who +explained his unusual charges on the ground that his wife had felt for +me like a mother. In the Long-Tom Country maternal tenderness is a +highly estimated virtue. It cost Bierstadt and myself sixty dollars, +besides the reasonable charge for five days' board and attendance to a +man who ate nothing and was not waited on, with the same amount against +his well companion. We had suffered enough extortion before that to +exhaust all our native grumblery. So we paid the bill, and entered on +our notebooks the following + +_Mem._ "In stopping with anybody in the Long-Tom Country, make a special +contract for maternal tenderness, as it will invariably be included in +the bill." + +I had ridden on a straw-bed in the wagon of the man whose wife +cultivated the maternal virtues, until I was once more able to go along +by myself,--paying, you may be sure, maternal-virtue fare for my +carriage. During the period that I jolted on the straw, I diversified +the intervals between pulmonary spasms with a sick glance at the pages +of Bulwer's "Devereux" and Lever's "Day's Ride." The nature of these +works did not fail to attract the attention of my driver. It aroused in +him serious concern for my spiritual welfare. He addressed me with +gentle firmness,-- + +"D' ye think it's exackly the way for an immortal creatur' to be +spendin' his time, to read them _novels_?" + +"Why is it particularly out of the way for an immortal creature?" + +"Because his higher interests don't give him no time for sich follies." + +"How can an immortal creature be pressed for time?" + +"Wal, you'll find out some day. G' lang, Jennie." + +I thought I had left this excellent man in a metaphysical bog. But he +had not discharged his duty, so he scrambled out and took new ground. + +"Now say,--d' _you_ think it's exackly a Christian way of spendin' time, +yourself?" + +"I know a worse way." + +"Eh? What's that?" + +"In the house of a Long-Tom settler who charges five dollars a day extra +because his wife feels like a mother." + +He did not continue the conversation. I myself did not close it in +anger, but solely to avoid an extra charge, which in the light of +experience seemed imminent, for concern about my spiritual welfare. On +the maternal-tenderness scale of prices, an indulgence in this luxury +would have cleaned out Bierstadt and myself before we effected junction +with our drawers of exchange, and I was discourteous as a matter of +economy. + +We had enjoyed, from the summit of a hill twenty miles south of Salem, +one of the most magnificent views in all earthly scenery. Within a +single sweep of vision were seven snow-peaks, the Three Sisters, Mount +Jefferson, Mount Hood, Mount Adams, and Mount St. Helen's, with the dim +suggestion of an eighth colossal mass, which might be Rainier. All these +rose along an arc of not quite half the horizon, measured between ten +and eighteen thousand feet in height, were nearly conical, and +absolutely covered with snow from base to pinnacle. The Three Sisters, a +triplet of sharp, close-set needles, and the grand masses of Hood and +Jefferson, showed mountainesque and earthly; it was at least possible to +imagine them of us and anchored to the ground we trod on. Not so with +the others. They were beautiful, yet awful ghosts,--spirits of dead +mountains buried in old-world cataclysms, returning to make on the +brilliant azure of noonday blots of still more brilliant white. I cannot +express their vague, yet vast and intense splendor, by any other word +than incandescence. It was as if the sky had suddenly grown white-hot in +patches. When we first looked, we thought St. Helen's an illusion,--an +aurora, or a purer kind of cloud. Presently we detected the luminous +chromatic border,--a band of refracted light with a predominant +orange-tint, which outlines the higher snow-peaks seen at long +range,--traced it down, and grasped the entire conception of the mighty +cone. No man of enthusiasm, who reflects what this whole sight must have +been, will wonder that my friend and I clasped each other's hands before +it, and thanked God we had lived to this day. + +We had followed down the beautiful valley of the Willamette to Portland, +finding everywhere glimpses of autumnal scenery as delicious as the +hills and meadows of the Housatonic. Putting up in Portland at the +Dennison House, we found the comforts of civilization for the first time +since leaving Sisson's, and a great many kind friends warmly interested +in furthering our enterprise. I have said that I do not know why +Portland was built on the Willamette. The point of the promontory +between the Willamette and the Columbia seems the proper place for the +chief commercial city of the State; and Portland is a dozen miles south +of this, up the tributary stream. But Portland does very well as it +is,--growing rapidly in business-importance, and destined, when the +proper railway-communications are established, to be a sort of Glasgow +to the London of San Francisco. When we were there, there was crying +need of a telegraph to the latter place. That need has now been +supplied, and the construction of the no less desirable railroad must +follow speedily. The country between Shasta Peak and Salem is at present +virtually without an outlet to market. No richer fruit and grain region +exists on the Pacific slope of the continent. No one who has not +travelled through it can imagine the exhaustless fertility which will be +stimulated and the results which will be brought forth, when a +continuous line of railroad unites Sacramento or even Tehama with the +metropolis of Oregon. + +Among the friends who welcomed us to Portland were Messrs. Ainsworth and +Thompson, of the Oregon Steamship Company. By their courtesy we were +afforded a trip up the Columbia River, in the pleasantest quarters and +under the most favorable circumstances. + +We left Portland the evening before their steamer sailed, taking a boat +belonging to a different line, that we might pass a night at Fort +Vancouver, and board the Company's boat when it touched at that place +the next morning. We recognized our return from rudimentary society to +civilized surroundings and a cultivated interest in art and literature, +when the captain of the little steamer Vancouver refused to let either +of us buy a ticket, because he had seen Bierstadt on the upper deck at +work with his sketch-book, and me by his side engaged with my journal. + +The banks of the Willamette below Portland are low and cut up by small +tributaries or communicating lagoons which divide them into islands. The +largest of these, measuring its longest border, has an extent of twenty +miles, and is called Sauveur's. Another, called "Nigger Tom's," was +famous as the seigniory of a blind African nobleman so named, living in +great affluence of salmon and whiskey with three or four devoted Indian +wives, who had with equal fervor embraced the doctrine of Mormonism and +the profession of day's-washing to keep their liege in luxury due his +rank. The land along the shore of the river was usually well timbered, +and in the level openings looked as fertile as might be expected of an +alluvial first-bottom frequently overflowed. At its junction with the +Columbia the Willamette is about three-quarters of a mile in width, and +the Columbia may be half a mile wider, though at first sight the +difference seems more than that from the tributary's entering the main +river at an acute angle and giving a diagonal view to the opposite +shore. Before we passed into the Columbia, we had from the upper deck a +magnificent glimpse to the eastward of Hood's spotless snow-cone rosied +with the reflection of the dying sunset. Short and hurried as it was, +this view of Mount Hood was unsurpassed for beauty by any which we got +in its closer vicinity and afterward, though nearness added rugged +grandeur to the sight. + +Six miles' sail between low and uninteresting shores brought us from the +mouth of the Willamette to Fort Vancouver, on the Washington-Territory +side of the river. Here we debarked for the night, making our way, in an +ambulance sent for us from the post, a distance of two minutes' ride, to +the quarters of General Alvord, the commandant. Under his hospitable +roof we experienced, for the first time in several months and many +hundred miles, the delicious sensation of a family-dinner, with a +refined lady at the head of the table and well-bred children about the +sides. A very interesting guest of General Alvord's was Major Lugenbeel, +who had spent his life in the topographical service of the United +States, and combined the culture of a student with an amount of +information concerning the wildest portions of our continent which I +have never seen surpassed nor heard communicated in style more +fascinating. He had lately come from the John-Day, Boisé, and +Snake-River Mines, where the Government was surveying routes of +emigration, and pronounced the wealth of the region exhaustless. + +After a pleasant evening and a good night's rest, we took the Oregon +Company's steamer, Wilson G. Hunt, and proceeded up the river, leaving +Fort Vancouver about seven A.M. To our surprise, the Hunt proved an old +acquaintance. She will be remembered by most people who during the last +twelve years have been familiar with the steamers hailing from New York +Bay. Though originally built for river-service such as now employs her, +she came around from the Hudson to the Columbia by way of Cape Horn. By +lessening her top-hamper and getting new stanchions for her perilous +voyage, she performed it without accident. + +Such a vivid souvenir of the Hudson reminded me of an assertion I had +often heard, that the Columbia resembles it. There is some ground for +the comparison. Each of the rivers breaks through a noble +mountain-system in its passage to the sea, and the walls of its avenue +are correspondingly grand. In point of variety the banks of the Hudson +far surpass those of the Columbia,--trap, sandstone, granite, limestone, +and slate succeeding each other with a rapidity which presents ever new +outlines to the eye of the tourist. The scenery of the Columbia, between +Fort Vancouver and the Dalles, is a sublime monotone. Its banks are +basaltic crags or mist-wrapt domes, averaging below the cataract from +twelve to fifteen hundred feet in height, and thence decreasing to the +Dalles, where the escarpments, washed by the river, are low trap bluffs +on a level with the steamer's walking-beam, and the mountains have +retired, bare and brown, like those of the great continental basin +farther south, toward Mount Hood in that direction, and Mount Adams on +the north. If the Palisades were quintupled in height, domed instead of +level on their upper surfaces, extended up the whole navigable course of +the Hudson, and were thickly clad with evergreens wherever they were not +absolutely precipitous, the Hudson would much more closely resemble the +Columbia. + +I was reminded of another Eastern river, which I had never heard +mentioned, in the same company. As we ascended toward the cataract, the +Columbia water assumed a green tint as deep and positive as that of the +Niagara between the Falls and Lake Ontario. Save that its surface was +not so perturbed with eddies and marbled with foam, it resembled the +Niagara perfectly. + +We boarded the Hunt in a dense fog, and went immediately to breakfast. +With our last cup of coffee the fog cleared away and showed us a sunny +vista up the river, bordered by the columnar and mural trap formations +above mentioned, with an occasional bold promontory jutting out beyond +the general face of the precipice, its shaggy fell of pines and firs all +aflood with sunshine to the very crown. The finest of these promontories +was called Cape Horn, the river bending around it to the northeast. The +channel kept mid-stream with considerable uniformity,--but now and then, +as in the highland region of the Hudson, made a _détour_ to avoid some +bare, rocky island. Several of these islands were quite columnar,--being +evidently the emerged capitals of basaltic prisms, like the other +uplifts on the banks. A fine instance of this formation was the stately +and perpendicular "Rooster Rock" on the Oregon side, but not far from +Cape Horn. Still another was called "Lone Rock," and rose from the +middle of the river. These came upon our view within the first hour +after breakfast, in company with a slender, but graceful stream, which +fell into the river over a sheer wall of basalt seven hundred feet in +height. This little cascade reminded us of Po-ho-nó, or The Bridal Veil, +near the lower entrance of the Great Yo-Semite. + +As the steamer rounded a point into each new stretch of silent, green, +and sunny river, we sent a flock of geese or ducks hurrying cloudward or +shoreward. Here, too, for the first time in a state of absolute Nature, +I saw that royal bird, the swan, escorting his mate and cygnets on an +airing or a luncheon-tour. It was a beautiful sight, though I must +confess that his Majesty and all the royal family are improved by +civilization. One of the great benefits of civilization is, that it +restricts its subjects to doing what they can do best. Park-swans seldom +fly,--and flying is something that swans should never attempt, unless +they wish to be taken for geese. I felt actually _désillusionné_, when a +princely _cortége_, which had been rippling their snowy necks in the +sunshine, clumsily lifted themselves out of the water and slanted into +the clouds, stretching those necks straight as a gun-barrel. Every line +of grace seemed wire-drawn out of them in a moment. Song is as little +their forte as flight,--barring the poetic license open to moribund +members of their family,--and I must confess, that, if this privilege +indicate approaching dissolution, the most intimate friends of the +specimens we heard have no cause for apprehension. An Adirondack loon +fortifying his utterance by a cracked fish-horn is the nearest approach +to a healthy swan-song. On the whole, the wild swan cannot afford to +"pause in his cloud" for all the encomiums of Mr. Tennyson, and had +better come down immediately to the dreamy water-level where he floats +dream within dream, like a stable vapor in a tangible sky. Anywhere else +he seems a court-beauty wandering into metaphysics. + +Alternating with these swimmers came occasional flocks of shag, a bird +belonging to the cormorant tribe, and here and there a gull, though +these last grew rarer as we increased our distance from the sea. I was +surprised to notice a fine seal playing in the channel, twenty miles +above Fort Vancouver, but learned that it was not unusual for these +animals to ascend nearly to the cataract. Both the whites and Indians +scattered along the river-banks kill them for their skin and +blubber,--going out in boats for the purpose. My informant's boat had on +one occasion taken an old seal nursing her calf. When the dam was towed +to shore, the young one followed her, occasionally putting its +fore-flippers on the gunwale to rest, like a Newfoundland dog, and +behaving with such innocent familiarity that malice was disarmed. It +came ashore with the boat's-crew and the body of its parent; no one had +the heart to drive it away; so it stayed and was a pet of the camp from +that time forward. After a while the party moved its position a +distance of several miles while Jack was away in the river on a +fishing-excursion, but there was no eluding him. The morning after the +shift he came wagging into camp, a faithful and much-overjoyed, but +exceedingly battered and used-up seal. He had evidently sought his +friends by rock and flood the entire night preceding. + +Occasionally the lonely river-stretches caught a sudden human interest +in some gracefully modelled canoe gliding out with a crew of Chinook +Indians from the shadow of a giant promontory, propelled by a square +sail learned of the whites. Knowing the natural, ingrained laziness of +Indians, one can imagine the delight with which they comprehended that +substitute for the paddle. After all, this may perhaps be an ill-natured +thing to say. Who does like to drudge when he can help it? Is not this +very Wilson G. Hunt a triumph of human laziness, vindicating its claim +to be the lord of matter by an ingenuity doing labor's utmost without +sweat? After all, nobody but a fool drudges for other reason than that +he may presently stop drudging. + +At short intervals along the narrow strip of shore under the more +gradual steeps, on the lower ledges of the basaltic precipices, and on +little rock-islands in the river, appeared rude-looking stacks and +scaffoldings where the Indians had packed their salmon. They left it in +the open air without guard, as fearless of robbers as if the fish did +not constitute their almost entire subsistence for the winter. And +within their own tribes they have justification for this fearlessness. +Their standard of honor is in most respects curiously adjustable,--but +here virtue is defended by the necessities of life. + +In the immediate vicinity of the cured article (I say "cured," though +the process is a mere drying without smoke or salt) maybe seen the +apparatus contrived for getting it in the fresh state. This is the +scaffolding from which the salmon are caught. It is a horizontal +platform shaped like a capital A, erected upon a similarly framed, but +perpendicular set of braces, with a projection of several feet over the +river-brink at a place where the water runs rapidly close in-shore. If +practicable, the constructor modifies his current artificially, banking +it inward with large stones, so as to form a sort of sluice in which +passing fish will be more completely at his mercy. At the season of +their periodic ascent, salmon swarm in all the rivers of our Pacific +coast; the Columbia and Willamette are alive with them for a long +distance above the cascades of the one and the Oregon-City fall of the +other. The fisherman stands, nearly or quite naked, at the edge of his +scaffolding, armed with a net extended at the end of a long pole, and so +ingeniously contrived that the weight of the salmon and a little +dexterous management draw its mouth shut on the captive like a purse as +soon as he has entered. A helper stands behind the fisherman to assist +in raising the haul,--to give the fish a tap on the nose, which kills +him instantly,--and finally to carry him ashore to be split and dried, +without any danger of his throwing himself back into the water from the +hands of his captors, as might easily happen by omitting the +_coup-de-grace_. Another method of catching salmon, much in vogue among +the Sacramento and Pitt-River tribes, but apparently less employed by +the Indians of the Columbia, is harpooning with a very clever instrument +constructed after this wise. A hard-wood shaft is neatly, but not +tightly, fitted into the socket of a sharp-barbed spear-head carved from +bone. Through a hole drilled in the spear-head a stout cord of +deer-sinew is fastened by one end, its other being secured to the shaft +near its insertion. The salmon is struck by this weapon in the manner of +the ordinary fish-spear; the head slips off the shaft as soon as the +barbs lodge, and the harpoon virtually becomes a fishing-rod, with the +sinew for a line. This arrangement is much more manageable than the +common spear, as it greatly diminishes the chances of losing fish and +breaking shafts. + +There can scarcely be a more sculpturesque sight than that of a finely +formed, well-grown young Indian struggling on his scaffold with an +unusually powerful fish. Every muscle of his wiry frame stands out in +its turn in unveiled relief, and you see in him attitudes of grace and +power which will not let you regret the Apollo Belvedere or the +Gladiator. The only pity is that this ideal Indian is a rare being. The +Indians of this coast and river are divided into two broad classes,--the +Fish Indians, and the Meat Indians. The latter, _ceteris paribus_, are +much the finer race, derive the greater portion of their subsistence +from the chase, and possess the athletic mind and body which result from +active methods of winning a livelihood. The former are, to a great +extent, victims of that generic and hereditary _tabes mesenterica_ which +produces the peculiar pot-bellied and spindle-shanked type of savage; +their manners are milder; their virtues and vices are done in +water-color, as comports with their source of supply. There are some +tribes which partake of the habits of both classes, living in +mountain-fastnesses part of the year by the bow and arrow, but coming +down to the river in the salmon-season for an addition to their winter +bill-of-fare. Anywhere rather than among the pure Fish Indians is the +place to look for savage beauty. Still these tribes have fortified their +feebleness by such a cultivation of their ingenuity as surprises one +seeing for the first time their well-adapted tools, comfortable lodges, +and, in some cases, really beautiful canoes. In the last respect, +however, the Indians nearer the coast surpass those up the +Columbia,--some of their carved and painted canoes equalling the +"crackest" of shell-boats in elegance of line and beauty of ornament. + +In a former article devoted to the Great Yo-Semite I had occasion to +remark that Indian legend, like all ancient poetry, often contains a +scientific truth embalmed in the spices of metaphor,--or, to vary the +figure, that Mudjekeewis stands holding the lantern for Agassiz and Dana +to dig by. + +Coming to the Falls of the Columbia, we find a case in point. Nearly +equidistant from the longitudes of Fort Vancouver and Mount Hood, the +entire Columbia River falls twenty feet over a perpendicular wall of +basalt, extending, with minor deviations from the right angle, entirely +between-shores, a breadth of about a mile. The height of Niagara and the +close compression of its vast volume make it a grander sight than the +Falls of the Columbia,--but no other cataract known to me on this +continent rivals it for an instant. The great American Falls of Snake +are much loftier and more savage than either, but their volume is so +much less as to counterbalance those advantages. Taking the Falls of the +Columbia all in all,--including their upper and lower rapids,--it must +be confessed that they exhibit every phase of tormented water in its +beauty of color or grace of form, its wrath or its whim. + +The Indians have a tradition that the river once followed a uniform +level from the Dalles to the sea. This tradition states that Mounts Hood +and St. Helen's are husband and wife,--whereby is intended that their +tutelar divinities stand in that mutual relation; that in comparatively +recent times there existed a rocky bridge across the Columbia at the +present site of the cataract, and that across this bridge Hood and St. +Helen's were wont to pass for interchange of visits; that, while this +bridge existed, there was a free subterraneous passage under it for the +river and the canoes of the tribes (indeed, this tradition is so +universally credited as to stagger the skeptic by a mere calculation of +chances); that, on a certain occasion, the mountainous pair, like others +not mountainous, came to high words, and during their altercation broke +the bridge down; falling into the river, this colossal Rialto became a +dam, and ever since that day the upper river has been backed to its +present level, submerging vast tracts of country far above its original +bed. + +I notice that excellent geological authorities are willing to treat this +legend respectfully, as containing in symbols the probable key to the +natural phenomena. Whether the original course of the Columbia at this +place was through a narrow _cañon_ or under an actual roof of rock, the +adjacent material has been at no very remote date toppled into it to +make the cataract and alter the bed to its present level. Both Hood and +St. Helen's are volcanic cones. The latter has been seen to smoke within +the last twelve years. It is not unlikely that during the last few +centuries some intestine disturbance may have occurred along the axis +between the two, sufficient to account for the precipitation of that +mass of rock which now forms the dam. That we cannot refer the cataclysm +to a very ancient date seems to be argued by the state of preservation +in which we still find the stumps of the celebrated "submerged forest," +extending a long distance up the river above the Falls. + +At the foot of the cataract we landed from the steamer on the Washington +side of the river, and found a railroad-train waiting to do our portage. +It was a strange feeling, that of whirling along by steam where so few +years before the Indian and the trader had toiled through the virgin +forest, bending under the weight of their canoes. And this is one of the +characteristic surprises of American scenery everywhere. You cannot +isolate yourself from the national civilization. In a Swiss _châlet_ you +may escape from all memories of Geneva; among the Grampians you find an +entirely different set of ideas from those of Edinburgh: but the same +enterprise which makes itself felt in New York and Boston starts up for +your astonishment out of all the fastnesses of the continent. Virgin +Nature wooes our civilization to wed her, and no obstacles can conquer +the American fascination. In our journey through the wildest parts of +this country, we were perpetually finding patent washing-machines among +the _chaparral_,--canned fruit in the desert,--Voigtlander's +field-glasses on the snow-peak,--lemon-soda in the _cañon_,--men who +were sure a railroad would be run by their cabin within ten years, in +every spot where such a surprise was most remarkable. + +The portage-road is six miles in length, leading nearly all the way +close along the edge of the North Bluff, which, owing to a recession of +the mountains, seems here only from fifty to eighty feet in height. From +the windows of the train we enjoyed an almost uninterrupted view of the +rapids, which are only less grand and forceful in their impression than +those above Niagara. They are broken up into narrow channels by numerous +bold and naked islands of trap. Through these the water roars, boils, +and, striking projections, spouts upward in jets whose plumy top blows +off in sheets of spray. It is tormented into whirlpools; it is combed +into fine threads, and strays whitely over a rugged ledge like old men's +hair; it takes all curves of grace and arrow-flights of force; it is +water doing all that water can do or be made to do. The painter who +spent a year in making studies of it would not throw his time away; when +he had finished, he could not misrepresent water under any phases. + +At the upper end of the portage-road we found another and smaller +steamer awaiting us, with equally kind provision for our comfort made by +the Company and the captain. In both steamers we were accorded +excellent opportunities for drawing and observation, getting seats in +the pilot-house. + +Above the rapids the river-banks were bold and rocky. The stream changed +from its recent Niagara green to a brown like that of the Hudson; and +under its waters, as we hugged the Oregon side, could be seen a +submerged alluvial plateau, studded thick with drowned stumps, here and +there lifting their splintered tops above the water, and measuring from +the diameter of a sapling to that of a trunk which might once have been +one hundred feet high. + +Between Fort Vancouver and the cataract the banks of the river seem +nearly as wild as on the day they were discovered by the whites. On +neither the Oregon nor the Washington side is there any settlement +visible,--a small wood-wharf, or the temporary hut of a salmon-fisher, +being the only sign of human possession. At the Falls we noticed a +single white house standing in a commanding position high up on the +wooded ledges of the Oregon shore; and the taste shown in placing and +constructing it was worthy of a Hudson-River landholder. This is, +perhaps, the first attempt at a distinct country-residence made in +Oregon, and belongs to a Mr. Olmstead, who was one of the earliest +settlers and projectors of public improvements in the State. He was +actively engaged in the building of the first portage-railroad, which +ran on the Oregon side. The entire interests of both have, I believe, +been concentrated in the newer one, and the Oregon road, after building +itself by feats of business-energy and ingenuity known only to American +pioneer enterprise, has fallen into entire or comparative disuse. + +Above the Falls we found as unsettled a river-margin as below. +Occasionally, some bright spot of color attracted us, relieved against +the walls of trap or glacis of evergreen, and this upon nearer approach +or by the glass was resolved into a group of river Indians,--part with +the curiously compressed foreheads of the Flat-head tribe, their serene +nakedness draped with blankets of every variety of hue, from fresh +flaming red to weather-beaten army-blue, and adorned as to their cheeks +with smutches of the cinnabar-rouge which from time immemorial has been +a prime article of import among the fashionable native circles of the +Columbia,--the other part round-headed, and (I have no doubt it appears +a perfect _sequitur_ to the Flat-head conservatives) therefore slaves. +The captive in battle seems more economically treated among these +savages than is common anywhere else in the Indian regions we traversed, +(though I suppose slavery is to some extent universal throughout the +tribes,)--the captors properly arguing, that, so long as they can make a +man fish and boil pot for them, it is a very foolish waste of material +to kill him. + +At intervals above the Falls we passed several small islands of especial +interest as being the cemeteries of river-tribes. The principal, called +"Mimitus," was sacred as the resting-place of a very noted chief. I have +forgotten his name, but I doubt whether his friends see the "Atlantic" +regularly; so that oversight is of less consequence. The deceased is +entombed like a person of quality, in a wooden mausoleum having +something the appearance of a log-cabin upon which pains have been +expended, and containing, with the human remains, robes, weapons, +baskets, canoes, and all the furniture of Indian _ménage_, to an extent +which among the tribes amounts to a fortune. This sepulchral idea is a +clear-headed one, and worthy of Eastern adoption. Old ladies with lace +and nieces, old gentlemen with cellars and nephews, might be certain +that the solace which they received in life's decline was purely +disinterested, if about middle age they should announce that their Point +and their Port were going to Mount Auburn with them. + +The river grew narrower, its banks becoming low, perpendicular walls of +basalt, water-worn at the base, squarely cut and castellated at the top, +and bare everywhere as any pile of masonry. The hills beyond became +naked, or covered only with short grass of the _grama_ kind and +dusty-gray sage-brush. Simultaneously they lost some of their previous +basaltic characteristics, running into more convex outlines, which +receded from the river. We could not fail to recognize the fact that we +had crossed one of the great thresholds of the continent,--were once +more east of the Sierra-Nevada axis, and in the great central plateau +which a few months previous, and several hundred miles farther south, we +had crossed amid so many pains and perils by the Desert route to Washoe. +From the grizzly mountains before us to the sources of the Snake Fork +stretched an almost uninterrupted wilderness of sage. The change in +passing to this region from the fertile and timbered tracts of the +Cascades and the coast is more abrupt than can be imagined by one +familiar with our delicately modulated Eastern scenery. This sharpness +of definition seems to characterize the entire border of the plateau. +Five hours of travel between Washoe and Sacramento carry one out of the +nakedest stone heap into the grandest forest of the continent. + +As we emerged from the confinement of the nearer ranges, Mount Hood, +hitherto visible only through occasional rifts, loomed broadly into +sight almost from base to peak, covered with a mantle of perennial snow +scarcely less complete to our near inspection than it had seemed from +our observatory south of Salem. Only here and there toward its lower rim +a tatter in it revealed the giant's rugged brown muscle of volcanic +rock. The top of the mountain, like that of Shasta, in direct sunlight +is an opal. So far above the line of thaw, the snow seems to have +accumulated until by its own weight it has condensed into a more +compactly crystalline structure than ice itself, and the reflections +from it, as I stated of Shasta, seem rather emanations from some +interior source of light. The look is distinctly opaline, or, as a poet +has called the opal, like "a pearl with a soul in it." + +About five o'clock in the afternoon we reached the Oregon town and +mining-depot of Dalles City. A glance at any good War-Department map of +Oregon and Washington Territories will explain the importance of this +place, where considerably previous to the foundation of the present +large and growing settlement there existed a fort and trading-post of +the same name. It stands, as we have said, at the entrance to the great +pass by which the Columbia breaks through the mountains to the sea. Just +west of it occurs an interruption to the navigation of the river, +practically as formidable as the first cataract. This is the upper +rapids and "the Dalles" proper,--presently to be described in detail. +The position of the town, at one end of a principal portage, and at the +easiest door to the Pacific, renders it a natural entrepot between the +latter and the great central plateau of the continent. This it must have +been in any case for fur-traders and emigrants, but its business has +been vastly increased by the discovery of that immense mining-area +distributed along the Snake River and its tributaries as far east as the +Rocky Mountains. The John-Day, Boisé, and numerous other tracts both in +Washington and Idaho Territories draw most of their supplies from this +entrepot, and their gold comes down to it either for direct use in the +outfit-market, or to be passed down the river to Portland and the +San-Francisco mint. + +In a late article upon the Pacific Railroad, I laid no particular stress +upon the mines of Washington and Idaho as sources of profit to the +enterprise. This was for the reason that the Snake River seems the +proper outlet to much of the auriferous region, and this route may be +susceptible of improvement by an alternation of portages, roads, and +water-levels, which for a long time to come will form a means of +communication more economical and rapid than a branch to the Pacific +Road. The northern mines east of the Rocky range will find themselves +occupying somewhat similar relations to the Missouri River, which +rises, as one might almost say, out of the same spring as the +Snake,--certainly out of the same ridge of the Rocky Mountains. + +"The Dalles" is a town of one street, built close along the edge of a +bluff of trap thirty or forty feet high, perfectly perpendicular, level +on the top as if it had been graded for a city, and with depth of water +at its base for the heaviest draught boats on the river. In fact, the +whole water-front is a natural quay,--which wants nothing but time to +make it alive with steam-elevators, warehouses, and derricks. To +Portland and the Columbia it stands much as St. Louis to New Orleans and +the Mississippi. There is no reason why it should not some day have a +corresponding business, for whose wharfage-accommodation it has even +greater natural advantages. + +Architecturally, the Dalles cannot be said to lean very heavily on the +side of beauty. The houses are mostly two-story structures of wood, +occupied by all the trades and professions which flock to a new +mining-entrepot. Outfit-merchants, blacksmiths, printing-office, (for +there is really a very well-conducted daily at the Dalles,) are cheek by +jowl with doctors, tailors, and Cheap Johns,--the latter being only less +merry and thrifty over their incredible sacrifices in everything, from +pins to corduroy, than that predominant class of all, the bar-keepers +themselves. The town was in a state of bustle when our steamer touched +the wharf; it bustled more and more from there to the Umatilla House, +where we stopped; the hotel was one organized bustle in bar and +dining-room; and bed-time brought no hush. The Dalles, like the +Irishman, seemed sitting up all night to be fresh for an early start in +the morning. + +We found everybody interested in gold. Crowds of listeners, with looks +of incredulity or enthusiasm, were gathered around the party in the +bar-room which had last come in from the newest of the new mines, and a +man who had seen the late Fort-Hall discoveries was "treated" to that +extent that he might have become intoxicated a dozen times without +expense to himself. The charms of the interior were still further +suggested by placards posted on every wall, offering rewards for the +capture of a person who on the great gold route had lately committed +some of the grimmest murders and most talented robberies known in any +branch of Newgate enterprise. I had for supper a very good omelet, +(considering its distance from the culinary centres of the universe,) +and a Dalles editorial debating the claims of several noted cut-throats +to the credit of the operations ascribed to them,--feeling that in the +_ensemble_ I was enjoying both the exotic and the indigenous luxuries of +our virgin soil. + +After supper and a stroll I returned to the ladies' parlor of the +Umatilla House, rubbed my eyes in vain to dispel the illusion of a piano +and a carpet at this jumping-off place of civilization, and sat down at +a handsome centre-table to write up my journal. I had reviewed my way +from Portland as far as Fort Vancouver, when another illusion happened +to me in the shape of a party of gentlemen and ladies, in ball-dresses, +dress-coats, white kids, and elaborate hair, who entered the parlor to +wait for further accessions from the hotel. They were on their way with +a band of music to give some popular citizen a surprise-party. The +popular citizen never got the fine edge of that surprise. I took it off +for him. If it were not too much like a little Cockney on Vancouver's +Island who used the phrase on all occasions, from stubbing his toe to +the death of a Cabinet Lord, I should say, "I never was more astonished +in me life!" + +None of them had ever seen me before,--and with my books and maps about +me, I may have looked like some public, yet mysterious character. I felt +a pleasant sensation of having interest taken in me, and, wishing to +make an ingenuous return, looked up with a casual smile at one of the +party. Again to my surprise, this proved to be a very charming young +lady, and I timidly became aware that the others were equally pretty in +their several styles. Not knowing what else to do under the +circumstances, I smiled again, still more casually. An equal uncertainty +as to alternative set the ladies smiling quite across the row, and then, +to my relief, the gentlemen joined them, making it pleasant for us all. +A moment later we were engaged in general conversation,--starting from +the bold hypothesis, thrown out by one of the gentlemen, that perhaps I +was going to Boisé, and proceeding, by a process of elimination, to the +accurate knowledge of what I was going to do, if it wasn't that. I +enjoyed one of the most cheerful bits of social relaxation I had found +since crossing the Missouri, and nothing but my duty to my journal +prevented me, when my surprise-party left, from accompanying them, by +invitation, under the brevet title of Professor, to the house of the +popular citizen, who, I was assured, would be glad to see me. I +certainly should have been glad to see him, if he was anything like +those guests of his who had so ingenuously cultivated me in a far land +of strangers, where a man might have been glad to form the acquaintance +of his mother-in-law. This is not the way people form acquaintances in +New York; but if I had wanted that, why not have stayed there? As a +cosmopolite, and on general principles of being, I prefer the Dalles +way. I have no doubt I should have found in that circle of spontaneous +recognitions quite as many people who stood wear and improved on +intimacy as were ever vouchsafed to me by social indorsement from +somebody else. We are perpetually blaming our heads of Government +Bureaus for their poor knowledge of character,--their subordinates, we +say, are never pegs in the right holes. If we understood our civilized +system of introductions, we could not rationally expect anything else. +The great mass of polite mankind are trained _not_ to know character, +but to take somebody else's voucher for it. Their acquaintances, most of +their friendships, come to them through a succession of indorsers, none +of whom may have known anything of the goodness of the paper. A sensible +man, conventionally introduced to his fellow, must always wonder why the +latter does not turn him around to look for signatures in chalk down the +back of his coat; for he knows that Brown indorsed him over to Jones, +and Jones negotiated him with Robinson, through a succession in which +perhaps two out of a hundred took pains to know whether he represented +metal. You do not find the people of new countries making mistakes in +character. Every man is his own guaranty,--and if he has no just cause +to suspect himself bogus, there will be true pleasure in a frank opening +of himself to the examination and his eyes for the study of others. Not +to be accused of intruding radical reform under the guise of +belles-lettres, let me say that I have no intention of introducing this +innovation at the East. + +After a night's rest, Bierstadt spent nearly the entire morning in +making studies of Hood from an admirable post of observation at the top +of one of the highest foot-hills,--a point several miles southwest of +the town, which he reached under guidance of an old Indian interpreter +and trapper. His work upon this mountain was in some respects the best +he ever accomplished, being done with a loving faithfulness hardly +called out by Hood's only rival, the Peak of Shasta. The result of his +Hood studies, as seen in the nearly completed painting, has a +superiority corresponding to that of the studies themselves, possessing +excellences not included even in the well-known "Lander's Peak." + +In the afternoon, we were provided, by the courtesy of the Company, with +a special train on the portage-railroad connecting Dalles City with a +station known as Celilo. This road had but recently come into full +operation, and was now doing an immense freight-business between the two +river-levels separated by the intervening "Dalles." It seemed somewhat +longer than the road around the Falls. Its exact length has escaped me, +but I think it about eight or nine miles. + +With several officers of the road, who vied in giving us opportunities +of comfort and information, we set out, about three P.M., from a station +on the water-front below the town, whence we trundled through the long +main street, and were presently shot forth upon a wilderness of sand. An +occasional trap uplift rose on our right, but, as we were on the same +bluff-level as Dalles City, we met no lofty precipices. We were +constantly in view of the river, separated from its Oregon brink at the +farthest by about half a mile of the dreariest dunes of shifting sand +ever seen by an amateur in deserts. The most arid tracts along the +Platte could not rival this. The wind was violent when we left Dalles +City, and possessed the novel faculty of blowing simultaneously from all +points of the compass. It increased with every mile of advance, both in +force and faculty, until at Celilo we found it a hurricane. The +gentlemen of the Company who attended us told us, as seemed very +credible, that the highest winds blowing here (compared with which the +present might be styled a zephyr) banked the track so completely out of +sight with sand that a large force of men had to be steadily employed in +shovelling out trains that had been brought to a dead halt, and clearing +a way for the slow advance of others. I observed that the sides of some +of the worst sand-cuts had been planked over to prevent their sliding +down upon the road. Occasionally, the sand blew in such tempests as to +sift through every cranny of the cars, and hide the river-glimpses like +a momentary fog. But this discomfort was abundantly compensated by the +wonderfully interesting scenery on the Columbia side of our train. + +The river for the whole distance of the portage is a succession of +magnificent rapids, low cataracts, and narrow, sinuous channels,--the +last known to the old French traders as "_Dales_" or "Troughs," and to +us by the very natural corruption of "Dalles." The alternation between +these phases is wonderfully abrupt. At one point, about half-way between +Dalles City and Celilo, the entire volume of the Columbia River (and how +vast that is may be better understood by following up on the map the +river itself and all its tributaries) is crowded over upon the Oregon +shore through a passage not more than fifty yards in width, between +perfectly naked and perpendicular precipices of basalt. Just beyond this +mighty mill-race, where one of the grandest floods of the continent is +sliding in olive-green light and umber shadow, smoothly and resistlessly +as time, the river is a mile wide, and plunges over a ragged wall of +trap blocks, reaching, as at the lower cataract, from shore to shore. In +other neighboring places it attains even a greater width, but up to +Celilo is never out of torment from the obstructions of its bed. Not +even the rapids of Niagara can vie with these in their impression of +power, and only the Columbia itself can describe the lines of grace made +by its water, rasped to spray, churned to froth, tired into languid +sheets that flow like sliding glass, or shot up in fountains frayed away +to rainbows on their edges, as it strikes some basalt hexagon rising in +mid-stream. The Dalles and the Upper Cataracts are still another region +where the artist might stay for a year's University-course in +water-painting. + +At Celilo we found several steamers, in register resembling our second +of the day previous. They measured on the average about three hundred +tons. One of them had just got down from Walla Walla, with a large party +of miners from gold-tracts still farther off, taking down five hundred +thousand dollars in dust to Portland and San Francisco. We were very +anxious to accept the Company's extended invitation, and push our +investigations to or even up the Snake River. But the expectation that +the San-Francisco steamer would reach Portland in a day or two, and that +we should immediately return by her to California, turned us most +reluctantly down the river after Bierstadt and I had made the fullest +notes and sketches attainable. Bad weather on the coast falsified our +expectations. For a week we were rain-bound in Portland, unable to leave +our hotel for an hour at a time without being drenched by the floods +which just now set in for the winter season, and regretting the lack of +that prescience which would have enabled us to accomplish one of the +most interesting side-trips in our whole plan of travel. While this +pleasure still awaited us, and none in particular of any kind seemed +present, save the in-door courtesies of our Portland friends, it was +still among the memories of a lifetime to have seen the Columbia in its +Cataracts and its Dalles. + + + + +OUR LAST DAY IN DIXIE. + + +It was not far from eleven o'clock at night when we took leave of the +Rebel President, and, arm in arm with Judge Ould, made our way through +the silent, deserted streets to our elevated quarters in the Spotswood +Hotel at Richmond. As we climbed the long, rickety stairs which led to +our room in the fourth story, one of us said to our companion,-- + +"We can accomplish nothing more by remaining here. Suppose we shake the +sacred soil from our feet to-morrow?" + +"Very well. At what hour will you start?" he replied. + +"The earlier, the better. As near daybreak as may be,--to avoid the +sun." + +"We can't be ready before ten o'clock. The mules are quartered six miles +out of town." + +That sounded strange, for Jack, our ebony Jehu, had said to me only the +day before, "Dem _is_ mighty foine mules, Massa. I 'tends ter dem mules +myself; _we keeps 'em right round de corner_." Taken together, the +statements of the two officials had a bad look; but Mr. Davis had just +given me a message to his niece, and Mr. Benjamin had just intrusted +Colonel Jaquess with a letter--contraband, because three pages long--for +delivery within the limits of the "United States"; therefore the +discrepancy did not alarm me, for the latter facts seemed to assure our +safe deliverance from Dixie. Merely saying, "Very well,--ten o'clock, +then, let it be,--we'll be ready,"--we bade the Judge good-night at the +landing, and entered our apartment. + +We found the guard, Mr. Javins, stretched at full length on his bed, and +snoring like the Seven Sleepers. Day and night, from the moment of our +first entrance into the Rebel dominions, that worthy, with a revolver in +his sleeve, our door-key in his pocket, and a Yankee in each one of his +eyes, had implicitly observed his instructions,--"Keep a constant watch +upon them"; but overtasked nature had at last got the better of his +vigilance, and he was slumbering at his post. Not caring to disturb him, +we bolted the door, slid the key under his pillow, and followed him to +the land of dreams. + +It was a little after two o'clock, and the round, ruddy moon was looking +pleasantly in at my window, when a noise outside awoke me. Lifting the +sash, I listened. There was a sound of hurrying feet in the neighboring +street, and a prolonged cry of murder! It seemed the wild, strangled +shriek of a woman. Springing to the floor, I threw on my clothes, and +shook Javins. + +"Wake up! Give me the key! They're murdering a woman in the street!" I +shouted, loud enough to be heard in the next world. + +But he did not wake, and the Colonel, too, slept on, those despairing +cries in his ears, as peacefully as if his great dream of peace had been +realized. Still those dreadful shrieks, mingled now with curses hot from +the bottomless pit, came up through the window. No time was to be +lost,--so, giving another and a desperate tug at Javins, I thrust my +hand under his pillow, drew out his revolver and the door-key, and, +three steps at a time, bounded down the stairways. At the outer entrance +a half-drunken barkeeper was rubbing his eyes, and asking, "What's the +row?"--but not another soul was stirring. Giving no heed to him, I +hurried into the street. I had not gone twenty paces, however, before a +gruff voice from the shadow of the building called out,-- + +"Halt! Who goes thar'?" + +"A friend," I answered. + +"Advance, friend, and give the countersign." + +"I don't know it." + +"Then ye carn't pass. Orders is strict." + +"What is this disturbance? I heard a woman crying murder." + +The stifled shrieks had died away, but low moans, and sounds like +hysterical weeping, still came up from around the corner. + +"Oh! nothin',--jest some nigger fellers on a time. Thet's all." + +"And you stood by and saw it done!" I exclaimed, with mingled contempt +and indignation. + +"Sor it? How cud _I_ holp it? I hes my orders,--ter keep my eye on thet +'ar' door; 'sides, thar' war' nigh a dozen on 'em, and these Richmond +nigs, now thet the white folks is away, is more lawless nor old Bragg +himself. My life 'ou'dn't ha' been wuth a hill o' beans among 'em." + +By this time I had gradually drawn the sentinel to the corner of the +building, and looking down the dimly lighted street whence the sounds +proceeded, I saw that it was empty. + +"They are gone now," I said, "and the woman may be dying. Come, go down +there with me." + +"Carn't, Cunnel. I 'ou'dn't do it fur all the women in Richmond." + +"Was your mother a woman?" + +"I reckon, and a right peart 'un,--ye mought bet yer pile on thet." + +"I'll bet my pile she'd disown you, if she knew you turned your back on +a woman." + +He gave me a wistful, undecided look, and then, muttering something +about "orders," which I did not stop to bear, followed me, as I hurried +down the street. + +Not three hundred yards away, in a narrow recess between two buildings, +we found the woman. She lay at full length on the pavement, her neat +muslin gown torn to shreds, and her simple lace bonnet crushed into a +shapeless mass beside her. Her thick, dishevelled hair only +half-concealed her open bosom, and from the corners of her mouth the +blood was flowing freely. She was not dead,--for she still moaned +pitifully,--but she seemed to be dying. Lifting her head as tenderly as +I could, I said to her,-- + +"Are you much hurt? Can't you speak to me?" + +She opened her eyes, and staring at the sentinel with a wild, crazed +look, only moaned,-- + +"Oh! don't! Don't,--any more! Let me die! Oh! let me die!" + +"Not yet. You are too young to die yet. Come, see if you can't sit up." + +Something, it may have been the tone of my voice, seemed to bring her to +her senses, for she again opened her eyes, and, with a sudden effort, +rose nearly to her feet. In a moment, however, she staggered back, and +would have fallen, had not the sentinel caught her. + +"There, don't try again. Rest awhile. Take some of this,--it will give +you strength"; and I emptied my brandy-flask into her mouth. "Our +General" had filled it the morning we set out from his camp; but two +days' acquaintance with the Judge, who declared "_such_ brandy +contraband of war," had reduced its contents to a low ebb. Still, there +was enough to do that poor girl a world of good. She shortly revived, +and sitting up, her head against the sentinel's shoulder, told us her +story. She was a white woman, and served as nursery-maid in a family +that lived hard by. All of its male members being away with the array, +she had been sent out at that late hour to procure medicine for a sick +child, and, waylaid by a gang of black fiends, had been gagged and +outraged in the very heart of Richmond! And this is Southern +civilization under Jefferson I.! + +At the end of a long hour, I returned to the hotel. The sentry was +pacing to and fro before it, and, seating myself on the door-step, I +drew him into conversation. + +"Do such things often happen in Richmond?" I asked him. + +"Often! Ye's strange yere, I reckon," he replied. + +"No,--I've been here forty times, but not lately. Things must be in a +bad way here, now." + +"Wai, they is! Thar' 's nary night but thair' 's lots o' sech doin's. Ye +see, thar' ha'n't more 'n a corporal's-guard o' white men in the hull +place, so the nigs they hes the'r own way, and ye'd better b'lieve they +raise the Devil, and break things, ginerally." + +"I've seen no other able-bodied soldier about town; how is it that you +are here?" + +"I ha'n't able-bodied," he replied, holding up the stump of his left +arm, from which the sleeve was dangling. "I lost thet more 'n a y'ar +ago. I b'long ter the calvary,--Fust Alabama,--and bein' as I carn't +manage a nag now, they 's detailed me fur provost-duty." + +"First Alabama? I know Captains Webb and Finnan of that regiment." + +"Ye does? What! old man Webb, as lives down on Coosa?" + +"Yes, at Gadsden, in Cherokee County. Streight burnt his house, and both +of his mills', on his big raid, and the old man has lost both of his +sons in the war. It has wellnigh done him up." + +"I reckon. Stands ter natur' it sh'u'd. The Yankees is all-fired fiends. +The old man use' ter hate 'em loike----. I reckon he hates 'em wuss 'n +ever now." + +"No, he don't. His troubles seem to have softened him. When he told me +of them, he cried like a child. He reckoned the Lord had brought them on +him because he'd fought against the Union." + +"Wal, I doan't know. This war's a bad business, anyhow. When d'ye see +old Webb last?" + +"About a year ago,--down in Tennessee, nigh to Tullahoma." + +"Was he 'long o' the rigiment?" + +That was a home question, for I had met Captain Webb while he was a +prisoner, in the Court-House at Murfreesboro'. However, I promptly +replied,-- + +"No,--he'd just left it." + +"Wal, I doan't blame him. Pears loike, ef sech things sh'u'd come onter +me, I'd let the war and the kentry go ter the Devil tergether." + +My acquaintance with Captain Webb naturally won me the confidence of the +soldier; and for nearly an hour, almost unquestioned, he poured into my +ear information that would have been of incalculable value to our +generals. Two days later I would have given my right hand for liberty to +whisper to General Grant some things that he said; but honor and honesty +forbade it. + +A neighboring clock struck four when I rose to go. As I did so, I said +to the sentinel,-- + +"I saw no other sentry in the streets; why are you guarding this hotel?" + +"Wal, ye knows old Brown's a-raisin' Cain down thar' in Georgy. Two o' +his men bes come up yere ter see Jeff, and things ha'n't quite +satisfactory, so we's orders ter keep 'em tighter 'n a bull's-eye in +fly-time." + +So, not content with placing a guard in our very bedchamber, the +oily-tongued despot over the way had fastened a padlock over the +key-hole of our outside-door! What _would_ happen, if he should hear +that I had picked the padlock, and prowled about Richmond for an hour +after midnight! The very thought gave my throat a preliminary choke, and +my neck an uneasy sensation. It was high time I sought the embrace of +that hard mattress in the fourth story. But my fears were groundless. +When I crept noiselessly to bed, Javins was sleeping as soundly and +snoring as sweetly as if his sins were all forgiven. + +When I awoke in the morning, breakfast was already laid on the +centre-table, and an army of newsboys were shouting under our windows, +"'Ere's the 'En'quirer' and _the_ 'Dis'patch.' Great news from the +front. Gin'ral Grant mortally killed,--shot with a cannon." Rising, and +beginning my toilet, I said to Javins, in a tone of deep concern,-- + +"When did that happen?" + +"Why, o' Saturday. I hearn of it afore we left the lines. 'Twas all over +town yesterday," he replied, with infinite composure. + +"And you didn't tell us! That was unkind of you, Javins,--very unkind. +How _could_ you do it?" + +"It's ag'in' orders to talk news with you;--besides, I thought you +knowed it." + +"How should we know it?" + +"Why, your boat was only just ahead of his'n, comin' up the river. He +got shot runnin' that battery. Hit in the arm, and died when they +amputated him." + +"Amputated him! Did they cut off his head to save his arm?" + +Whether he saw a quiet twinkle in my eye, or knew that the news was +false, I know not. Whichever it was, he replied,-- + +"I reckon. Then you don't b'lieve it?" + +"Why should I doubt it? Don't your papers always tell the truth?" + +"No, they never do; lyin' 's their trade." + +"Then you suppose they're whistling now to keep up their courage? But +let us see what they say. Oblige me with some of your currency." + +He kindly gave me three dollars for one, and ringing the bell, I soon +had the five dingy half-sheets which every morning, "Sundays excepted," +hold up this busy world, "its fluctuations and its vast concerns," to +the wondering view of beleaguered Richmond. + +"Dey's fifty cents apiece, Massa," said the darky, handing me the +papers, and looking wistfully on the poor specimen of lithography which +remained after the purchase; "what shill I do wid dis?" + +"Oh! keep it. I'd give you more, but that's all the lawful money I have +about me." + +He hesitated, as if unwilling to take my last half-dollar; but self soon +got the better of him. He pocketed the shin-plaster, and said nothing; +but "Poor gentleman! I's sorry for _you_! Libin' at do Spotswood, and no +money about you!" was legible all over his face. + +We opened the papers, and, sure enough, General Grant _was_ dead, and +laid out in dingy sheets, with a big gun firing great volleys over him! +The cannon which that morning thundered Glory! Hallelujah! through the +columns of the "Whig" and the "Examiner" no doubt brought him to life +again. No such jubilation, I believe, disgraced our Northern journals +when Stonewall Jackson fell. + +Breakfast over, the Colonel and I packed our portmanteaus, and sat down +to the intellectual repast. It was a feast, and we enjoyed it. I always +have enjoyed the Richmond editorials. If I were a poet, I should study +them for epithets. Exhausting the dictionary, their authors ransack +heaven, earth, and the other place, and into one expression throw such a +concentration of scorn, hate, fury, or exultation as is absolutely +stunning to a man of ordinary nerves. Talk of their being bridled! They +never had a bit in their mouths. Before the war they ran wild, and now +they ride rough-shod over decorum, decency, and Davis himself. But the +dictator endures it like a philosopher. "He lets it pass," said Judge +Ould to me, "like the idle wind, which it is." + +At last, ten o'clock--the hour when we were to set out from +Dixie--struck from a neighboring steeple, and I laid down the paper, and +listened for the tread of the Judge on the stairs. I had heard it often, +and it had always been welcome, for he is a most agreeable companion, +but I had not _listened_ for it till then. Then I waited for it as "they +that watch for the morning," for he was to deliver us from the "den of +lions,"--from "the hold of every foul and unclean thing." Ten, twenty, +thirty minutes I waited, but he did not come! Why was he late, that +prompt man, who was always "on time,"--who put us through the streets of +Richmond the night before on a trot, lest we should be a second late at +our appointment? Did he mean to bake us brown with the mid-day sun? or +had the mules overslept themselves, or moved their quarters still +farther out of town? Well, I didn't know, and it was useless to +speculate, so I took up the paper, and went to reading again. But the +stinging editorials had lost their sting, and the pointed paragraphs, +though sharper than a meat-axe, fell on me as harmless as if I had been +encased in a suit of mail. + +At length eleven o'clock sounded, and I took out my watch to +count the minutes. One, two, three,--how slow they went! Four, +five,--ten,--fifteen,--twenty! What was the matter with the watch? Even +at this day I could affirm on oath that it took five hours for that +hour-hand to get round to twelve. But at last it got there, and +then--each second seeming a minute, each minute an hour--it crept slowly +on to one; but still no Judge appeared! Why did he not come? The reason +was obvious. The mules were "quartered six miles out of town," because +he had to see Mr. Davis before letting us go. And Davis had heard of my +nocturnal rambling, and concluded we had come as spies. Or he had, from +my cross-questioning the night before, detected _my_ main object in +coming to Dixie. Either way _my_ doom was sealed. If we were taken as +spies, it was hanging. If held on other grounds, it was imprisonment; +and ten days of Castle Thunder, in my then state of health, would have +ended my mortal career. + +I had looked at this alternative before setting out. But then I saw it +afar off; now I stood face to face with it, and--I thought of home,--of +the brave boy who had said to me, "Father, I think you ought to go. If I +was only a man, _I_'d go. If you never come back, _I_'ll take care of +the children." + +These thoughts passing in my mind, I rose and paced the room for a few +moments,--then, turning to Javins, said,-- + +"Will you oblige me by stepping into the hall? My friend and I would +have a few words together." + +As he passed out, I said to the Colonel,-- + +"Ould is more than three hours late! What does it mean?" + +All this while he had sat, his spectacles on his nose, and his chair +canted against the window-sill, absorbed in the newspapers. Occasionally +he would look up to comment on something he was reading; but not a +movement of his face, nor a glance of his eye, had betrayed that he was +conscious of Ould's delay, or of my extreme restlessness. When I said +this, he took off his spectacles, and, quietly rubbing the glasses with +his handkerchief, replied,-- + +"It looks badly, but--_I_ ask no odds of them. We may have to show we +are men. We have tried to serve the country. That is enough. Let them +hang us, if they like." + +"Colonel," I exclaimed, with a strong inclination to hug him, "you are a +trump! the bravest man I ever knew!" + +"I trust in God,--that is all," was his reply. + +This was all he said,--but his words convey no idea of the sublime +courage which shone in his eye and lighted up his every feature. I felt +rebuked, and turned away to hide my emotion. As I did so, my attention +was arrested by a singular spectacle in a neighboring street. Coming +down the hill, hand in hand with a colored woman, were two little boys +of about eight or nine years, one white, the other black. As they neared +the opposite corner, the white lad drew back and struck the black boy a +heavy blow with his foot. The ebony juvenile doubled up his fist, and, +planting it behind the other's ear, felled him to the sidewalk. But the +white lad was on his feet again in an instant, and showering on the +black a perfect storm of kicks and blows. The latter parried the assault +coolly, and, watching his opportunity, planted another blow behind the +white boy's ear, which sent him reeling to the ground again. Meanwhile +the colored nurse stood by, enjoying the scene, and a score or more of +negroes of all ages and sizes gathered around, urging the young ebony on +with cheers and other expressions of encouragement. I watched the combat +till the white lad had gone down a third time, when a rap came at the +door, and Judge Ould entered. + +"Good evening," he said. + +"Good evening," we replied. + +"Well, Gentlemen, if you are ready, we'll walk round to the Libby," he +added, with a hardness of tone I had not observed in his voice before. + +My worst fears were realized! We were prisoners! A cold tremor passed +over me, and my tongue refused its office. A drooping plant turns to the +sun; so, being just then a drooping plant, I turned to the Colonel. He +stood, drawn up to his full height, looking at Ould. Not a feature of +his fine face moved, but his large gray eye was beaming with a sort of +triumph. I have met brave men,--men who have faced death a hundred times +without quailing; but I never met a man who had the moral grandeur of +that man. His look inspired me, for I turned to Ould, and, with a +coolness that amazed myself, said,-- + +"Very well. We are ready. But here is an instructive spectacle"; and I +pointed to the conflict going on in the street. "That is what you are +coming to. Fight us another year, and that scene will be enacted, by +larger children, all over the South." + +"To prevent that is why we are fighting you at all," he replied, dryly. + +We shook Javins by the hand, and took up our portmanteaus to go. Then +our hotel-bill occurred to me, and I said to Ould,-- + +"You cautioned us against offering greenbacks. We have nothing else. +Will you give us some Confederate money in exchange?" + +"Certainly. But what do you want of money?" he asked, resuming the free +and easy manner he had shown in our previous intercourse. + +"To pay our hotel-bill." + +"You have no bill here. It will be settled by the Confederacy." + +"We can't allow that. We are not here as the guests of your Government." + +"Yes, you are, and you can't help yourselves," he rejoined, laughing +pleasantly. "If you offer the landlord greenbacks, he'll have you +jugged, certain,--for it's against the law." + +"That's nothing to us. We are jugged already." + +"So you are!" and he laughed again, rather boisterously. + +His manner half convinced me that he had been playing on our +sensibilities; but I said nothing, and we followed him down the stairs. + +At the outer door stood Jack and the ambulance! Their presence assured +us a safe exit from Dixie, and my feelings found expression somewhat as +follows:-- + +"How are you, Jack? You're the best-looking darky I ever saw." + +"I's bery well, Massa, bery well. Hope you's well," replied Jack, +grinning until he made himself uglier than Nature intended. "I's glad +you tinks I's good-lookin'." + +"Good-looking! You're better-looking than any man, black or white, I +ever met." + +"You've odd notions of beauty," said the Judge, smiling. "That accounts +for your being an Abolitionist." + +"No, it don't." And I added, in a tone too low for Jack to hear, "It +only implies, that, until I saw that darky, I doubted our getting out of +Dixie." + +The Judge gave a low whistle. + +"So you smelt a rat?" + +"Yes, a very big one. Tell us, why were you so long behind time?" + +"I'll tell you when the war is over. Now I'll take you to Libby and the +hospitals, if you'd like to go." + +We said we would, and, ordering Jack to follow with the ambulance, the +Judge led us down the principal thoroughfare. A few shops were open, a +few negro women were passing in and out among them, and a few wounded +soldiers were limping along the sidewalks; but scarcely an able-bodied +man was to be seen anywhere. A poor soldier, who had lost both legs and +a hand, was seated at a street-corner, asking alms of the colored women +as they passed. Pointing to him, the Judge said,-- + +"There is one of our arguments against reunion. If you will walk two +squares, I'll show you a thousand." + +"All asking alms of black women? That is another indication of what you +are coming to." + +He made no reply. After a while, scanning our faces as if he would +detect our hidden thoughts, he said, in an abrupt, pointed way,-- + +"Grant was to have attacked us yesterday. Why didn't he do it?" + +"How should we know?" + +"You came from Foster's only the day before. That's where the attack was +to have been made." + +"Why wasn't it made?" + +"_I_ don't know. Some think it was because you came in, and were +_expected out_ that way." + +"Oh! That accounts for your being so late! You think we are spies, sent +in to survey, and report on the route?" + +"No, I do not. I think you are honest men, and I've _said so_." + +And I have no doubt it was because he "said so" that we got out of +Richmond. + +By this time we had reached a dingy brick building, from one corner of +which protruded a small sign, bearing, in black letters on a white +ground, the words,-- + + LIBBY AND SON, + + _SHIP-CHANDLERS AND GROCERS._ + +It was three stories high, and, I was told, eighty feet in width and a +hundred and ten in depth. In front, the first story was on a level with +the street, allowing space for a tier of dungeons under the sidewalk; +but in the rear the land sloped away till the basement-floor rose +above-ground. Its unpainted walls were scorched to a rusty brown, and +its sunken doors and low windows, filled here and there with a dusky +pane, were cobwebbed and weather-stained, giving the whole building a +most uninviting and desolate appearance. A flaxen-haired boy, in ragged +"butternuts" and a Union cap, and an old man, in gray regimentals, with +a bent body and a limping gait, were pacing to and fro before it, with +muskets on their shoulders; but no other soldiers were in sight. + +"If Ben Butler knew that Richmond was defended by only such men, how +long would it be before he took it?" I said, turning to the Judge. + +"Several years. When these men give out, our women will fall in. Let +Butler try it!" + +Opening a door at the right, he led us into a large, high-studded +apartment, with a bare floor, and greasy brown walls hung round with +battle-scenes and cheap lithographs of the Rebel leaders. Several +officers in "Secession gray" were lounging about this room, and one of +them, a short, slightly-built, youthful-looking man, rose as we entered, +and, in a half-pompous, half-obsequious way, said to Judge Ould,-- + +"Ah! Colonel Ould, I am very glad to see you." + +The Judge returned the greeting with a stateliness that was in striking +contrast with his usual frank and cordial manner, and then introduced +the officer to us as "Major Turner, Keeper of the Libby." I had heard of +him, and it was with some reluctance that I took his proffered hand. +However, I did take it, and at the same time inquired,-- + +"Are you related to Dr. Turner, of Fayetteville?" + +"No, Sir. I am of the old Virginia family." (I never met a negro-whipper +nor a negro-trader who did not belong to that family.) "Are you a +North-Carolinian?" + +"No, Sir"-- + +Before I could add another word, the Judge said,-- + +"No, Major; these gentlemen hail from Georgia. They are strangers here, +and I'd thank you to show them over the prison." + +"Certainly, Colonel, most certainly. I'll do it with great pleasure." + +And the little man bustled about, put on his cap, gave a few orders to +his subordinates, and then led us, through another outside-door, into +the prison. He was a few rods in advance with Colonel Jaquess, when +Judge Ould said to me,-- + +"Your prisoners have belied Turner. You see he's not the hyena they've +represented." + +"I'm not so sure of that," I replied. "These cringing, mild-mannered men +are the worst sort of tyrants, when they have the power." + +"But you don't think _him_ a tyrant?" + +"I do. He's a coward and a bully, or I can't read English. It is written +all over his face." + +The Judge laughed boisterously, and called out to Turner,-- + +"I say, Major, our friend here is painting your portrait." + +"I hope he is making a handsome man of me," said Turner, in a +sycophantic way. + +"No, he isn't. He's drawing you to the life,--as if he'd known you for +half a century." + +We had entered a room about forty feet wide and a hundred feet deep, +with bare brick walls, a rough plank floor, and narrow, dingy windows, +to whose sash only a few broken panes were clinging. A row of tin +wash-basins, and a wooden trough which served as a bathing-tub, were at +one end of it, and half a dozen cheap stools and hard-bottomed chairs +were littered about the floor, but it had no other furniture. And this +room, with five others of similar size and appointments, and two +basements floored with earth and filled with _débris_, compose the +famous Libby Prison, in which, for months together, thousands of the +best and bravest men that ever went to battle have been allowed to rot +and to starve. + +At the date of our visit, not more than a hundred prisoners were in the +Libby, its contents having recently been emptied into a worse sink in +Georgia; but almost constantly since the war began, twelve and sometimes +thirteen hundred of our officers have been hived within those half-dozen +desolate rooms and filthy cellars, with a space of only ten feet by two +allotted to each for all the purposes of living! + +Overrun with vermin, perishing with cold, breathing a stifled, tainted +atmosphere, no space allowed them for rest by day, and lying down at +night "wormed and dovetailed together like fish in a basket,"--their +daily rations only two ounces of stale beef and a small lump of hard +corn-bread, and their lives the forfeit, if they caught but one streak +of God's blue sky through those filthy windows,--they have endured there +all the horrors of the middle-passage. My soul sickened as I looked on +the scene of their wretchedness. If the liberty we are fighting for were +not worth even so terrible a price,--if it were not cheaply purchased +even with the blood and agony of the many brave and true souls who have +gone into that foul den only to die, or to come out the shadows of +men,--living ghosts, condemned to walk the night and to fade away before +the breaking of the great day that is coming,--who would not cry out +for peace, for peace on any terms? + +And while these thoughts were in my mind, the cringing, foul-mouthed, +brutal, contemptible ruffian who had caused all this misery stood within +two paces of me! I could have reached out my hand, and, with half an +effort, have crushed him, and--I did not do it! Some invisible Power +held my arm, for murder was in my heart. + +"This is where that Yankee devil Streight, that raised hell so among you +down in Georgia, got out," said Turner, pausing before a jut in the wall +of the room. "A flue was here, you see, but we've bricked it up. They +took up the hearth, let themselves down into the basement, and then dug +through the wall, and eighty feet underground into the yard of a +deserted building over the way. If you'd like to see the place, step +down with me." + +"We would, Major. We'd be right glad ter," I replied, adopting, at a +hint from the Judge, the Georgia dialect. + +We descended a rough plank stairway, and entered the basement. It was a +damp, mouldy, dismal place, and even then--in hot July weather--as cold +as an ice-house. What must it have been in midwinter! + +The keeper led us along the wall to where Streight and his party had +broken out, and then said,-- + +"It's three feet thick, but they went through it, and all the way under +the street, with only a few case-knives and a dust-pan." + +"Wal, they _war_ smart. But, keeper, whar' wus yer eyes all o' thet +time? Down our way, ef a man couldn't see twenty Yankees a-wuckin' so +fur six weeks, by daylight, in a clar place like this yere, we'd reckon +he warn't fit ter 'tend a pen o' niggers." + +The Judge whispered, "You're overdoing it. Hold in." Turner winced like +a struck hound, but, smothering his wrath, smilingly replied,-- + +"The place wasn't clear then. It was filled with straw and rubbish. The +Yankees covered the opening with it, and hid away among it when any one +was coming. I caught two of them down here one day, but they pulled the +wool over my eyes, and I let them off with a few days in a dungeon. But +that fellow Streight would outwit the Devil. He was the most unruly +customer I've had in the twenty months I've been here. I put him in +keep, time and again, but I never could cool him down." + +"Whar' is the keeps?" I asked. "Ye's got lots o' them, ha'n't ye?" + +"No,--only six. Step this way, and I'll show you." + +"Talk better English," said the Judge, as we fell a few paces behind +Turner on our way to the front of the building. "There are some +schoolmasters in Georgia." + +"Wal, thar' ha'n't,--not in the part I come from." + +The dungeons were low, close, dismal apartments, about twelve feet +square, boarded off from the remainder of the cellar, and lighted only +by a narrow grating under the sidewalk. Their floors were incrusted with +filth, and their walls stained and damp with the rain, which, in wet +weather, had dripped down from the street. + +"And how many does ye commonly lodge yere, when yer hotel's full?" I +asked. + +"I have had twenty in each, but fifteen is about as many as they +comfortably hold." + +"I reckon! And then the comfut moughtn't be much ter brag on." + +The keeper soon invited us to walk into the adjoining basement. I was a +few steps in advance of him, taking a straight course to the entrance, +when a sentinel, pacing to and fro in the middle of the apartment, +levelled his musket so as to bar my way, saying, as he did so,-- + +"Ye carn't pass yere, Sir. Ye must gwo round by the wall." + +This drew my attention to the spot, and I noticed that a space, about +fifteen feet square, in the centre of the room, and directly in front +of the sentinel, had been recently dug up with a spade. While in all +other places the ground was trodden to the hardness and color of +granite, this spot seemed to be soft, and had the reddish-yellow hue of +the "sacred soil." Another sentry was pacing to and fro on its other +side, so that the place was completely surrounded! Why were they +guarding it so closely? The reason flashed upon me, and I said to +Turner;-- + +"I say, how many barr'ls hes ye in thar'?" + +"Enough to blow this shanty to ----," he answered, curtly. + +"I reckon! Put 'em thar' when thet feller Dahlgreen wus a-gwine ter +rescue 'em,--the Yankees?" + +"I reckon." + +He said no more, but that was enough to reveal the black, seething hell +the Rebellion has brewed. Can there be any peace with miscreants who +thus deliberately plan the murder, at one swoop, of hundreds of unarmed +and innocent men? + +In this room, seated on the ground, or leaning idly against the walls, +were about a dozen poor fellows who the Judge told me were hostages, +held for a similar number under sentence of death by our Government. +Their dejected, homesick look, and weary, listless manner disclosed some +of the horrors of imprisonment. + +"Let us go," I said to the Colonel; "I have had enough of this." + +"No,--you must see the up-stairs," said Turner. "It a'n't so gloomy up +there." + +It was not so gloomy, for some little sunlight did come in through the +dingy windows; but the few prisoners in the upper rooms wore the same +sad, disconsolate look as those in the lower story. + +"It is not hard fare, or close quarters, that kills men," said Judge +Ould to me; "it is homesickness; and the strongest and the bravest +succumb to it first." + +In the sill of an attic-window I found a Minié-ball. Prying it out with +my knife, and holding it up to Turner, I said,-- + +"So ye keeps this room fur a shootin'-gallery, does ye?" + +"Yes," he replied, laughing. "The boys practise once in a while on the +Yankees. You see, the rules forbid their coming within three feet of the +windows. Sometimes they do, and then the boys take a pop at them." + +"And sometimes hit 'em? Hit many on 'em?" + +"Yes, a heap." + +We passed a long hour in the Libby, and then visited Castle Thunder and +the hospitals for our wounded. I should be glad to describe what I saw +in those "institutions," but the limits of my paper forbid it. + +It was five o'clock when we bade the Judge a friendly good-bye, and took +our seats in the ambulance. As we did so, he said to us,-- + +"I have not taken your parole, Gentlemen. I shall trust to your honor +not to disclose anything you have seen or heard that might operate +against us in a military way." + +"You may rely upon us, Judge; and, some day, give us a chance to return +the courtesy and kindness you have shown to us. We shall not forget it." + +We arrived near the Union lines just as the sun was going down. Captain +Hatch, who had accompanied us, waved his flag as we halted near a grove +of trees, and a young officer rode over to us from the nearest +picket-station. We despatched him to General Foster for a pair of +horses, and in half an hour entered the General's tent. He pressed us to +remain to dinner, proposing to kill the fatted calf,--"for these my sons +were dead and are alive again, were lost and are found." + +We let him kill it, (it tasted wonderfully like salt pork,) and in half +an hour were on our way to General Butler's head-quarters. + + * * * * * + +Here ended our last day in Dixie, and here, perhaps, should end this +article; but the time has come when I can disclose my real purpose in +seeking an audience of the Rebel leader; and as such a disclosure may +relieve me, in the minds of candid men, from some of the aspersions cast +upon my motives by Rebel sympathizers, I willingly make it. In making +it, however, I wish to be understood as speaking only for myself. My +companion, Colonel Jaquess, while he fully shared in my motives, and +rightly estimated the objects I sought to accomplish, had other, and, it +may be, higher aims. And I wish also to say, that to him attaches +whatever credit is due to any one for the conception and execution of +this "mission." While I love my country as well as any man, and in this +enterprise cheerfully perilled my life to serve it, I was only his +co-worker: I should not have undertaken it alone. + +No reader of this magazine is so young as not to remember, that, between +the first of June and the first of August last, a Peace simoom swept +over the country, throwing dust into the people's eyes, and threatening +to bury the nation in disunion. All at once the North grew tired of the +war. It began to count the money and the blood it had cost, and to +overlook the great principles for which it was waged. Men of all shades +of political opinion--radical Republicans, as well as honest +Democrats--cried out for concession, compromise, armistice,--for +anything to end the war,--anything but disunion. To that the North would +not consent, and peace I knew could not be had without it, I knew that, +because on the sixteenth of June, Jeff. Davis had said to a prominent +Southerner that he would negotiate only on the basis of Southern +Independence, and that declaration had come to me only five days after +it was made. + +The people, therefore, were under a delusion. They were crying out for +peace when there was no peace,--when there _could_ be no peace +consistent with the interest and security of the country. The result of +this delusion, were it not dispelled, would be that the Chicago +Convention, or some other convention, would nominate a man pledged to +peace, but willing to concede Southern independence, and on that tide of +popular frenzy he would sail into the Presidency. Then the deluded +people would learn, too late, that peace meant only disunion. They would +learn it too late, because power would then be in the hands of a Peace +Congress and a Peace President, and it required no spirit of prophecy to +predict what such an Administration would do. It would make peace on the +best terms it could get; and the best terms it could get were Disunion +and Southern Independence. + +The Peace epidemic could be stayed, and the consequent danger to the +country averted, it seemed to me, only by securing in a tangible form, +and before a trustworthy witness, the ultimatum of the Rebel President. +That ultimatum, spread far and wide, would convince every honest +Northern man that war was the only road to lasting peace. + +To get that ultimatum, and to give it to the four winds of heaven, were +my real objects in going to Richmond. + +I did not shut my eyes to the possibility of our paving the way for +negotiations that might end in peace, nor my ears to the blessings a +grateful nation would shower on us, if our visit had such a result; but +I did not _expect_ these things. I expected to be smeared from head to +foot with Copperhead slime, to be called a knight-errant, a seeker after +notoriety, an abortive negotiator, and a meddlesome volunteer +diplomatist; but I expected also, if a good Providence spared our lives, +and my pen did not forget the English language, to be able to tell the +North the truth; and I knew that the _Truth_ would stay the Peace +epidemic, and kill the Peace party. And by the blessing of God, and the +help of the Devil, it did do that. The Devil helped, for he inspired Mr. +Benjamin's circular, and that forced home the bolt we had driven, and +shivered the Peace party into a million of fragments, every fragment now +a good War man until the old flag shall float again all over the +country. + +If we accomplished this, "the scoffer need not laugh, nor the judicious +grieve," for our mountain did not bring forth a mouse,--our "mission to +Richmond" was not a failure. + +It was a difficult enterprise. At the outset it seemed wellnigh +impossible to gain access to Mr. Davis; but we finally did gain it, and +we gained it without official aid. Mr. Lincoln did not assist us. He +gave us a pass through the army-lines, stated on what terms he would +grant amnesty to the Rebels, and said, "Good-bye, good luck to you," +when we went away; and that is all he did. + +It was also a hazardous enterprise,--no holiday adventure, no pastime +for boys. It was sober, serious, dangerous _work_,--and work for _men_, +for cool, earnest, fearless, determined men, who relied on God, who +thought more of their object than of their lives, and who, for truth and +their country, were ready to meet the prison or the scaffold. + +If any one doubts this, let him call to mind what we had to accomplish. +We had to penetrate an enemy's lines, to enter a besieged city, to tell +home truths to the desperate, unscrupulous leaders of the foulest +rebellion the world has ever known, and to draw from those leaders, +deep, adroit, and wary as they are, their real plans and purposes. And +all this we had to do without any official safeguard, while entirely in +their power, and while known to be their earnest and active enemies. One +false step, one unguarded word, one untoward event would have consigned +us to Castle Thunder, or the gallows. + +Can any one believe that men who undertake such work are mere lovers of +adventure, or seekers of notoriety? If any one does believe it, let him +pardon me, if I say that he knows little of human nature, and nothing of +human history. + +I am goaded to these remarks by the strictures of the Copperhead press, +but I make them in no spirit of boasting. God forbid that I should boast +of anything we did! For _we_ did nothing. Unseen influences prompted us, +unseen friends strengthened us, unseen powers were all about our way. We +felt their presence as if they had been living men; and had we been +atheists, our experience would have convinced us that there is a GOD, +and that He means that all men, everywhere, shall be free. + + + + +THE VANISHERS. + + + Sweetest of all childlike dreams + In the simple Indian lore + Still to me the legend seems + Of the Elves who flit before. + + Flitting, passing, seen and gone, + Never reached nor found at rest, + Baffling search, but beckoning on + To the Sunset of the Blest. + + From the clefts of mountain rocks, + Through the dark of lowland firs, + Flash the eyes and flow the locks + Of the mystic Vanishers! + + And the fisher in his skiff, + And the hunter on the moss, + Hear their call from cape and cliff, + See their hands the birch-leaves toss. + + Wistful, longing, through the green + Twilight of the clustered pines, + In their faces rarely seen + Beauty more than mortal shines. + + Fringed with gold their mantles flow + On the slopes of westering knolls; + In the wind they whisper low + Of the Sunset Land of Souls. + + Doubt who may, O friend of mine! + Thou and I have seen them too; + On before with beck and sign + Still they glide, and we pursue. + + More than clouds of purple trail + In the gold of setting day; + More than gleams of wing or sail + Beckon from the sea-mist gray. + + Glimpses of immortal youth, + Gleams and glories seen and lost, + Far-heard voices sweet with truth + As the tongues of Pentecost,-- + + Beauty that eludes our grasp, + Sweetness that transcends our taste, + Loving hands we may not clasp, + Shining feet that mock our haste,-- + + Gentle eyes we closed below, + Tender voices heard once more, + Smile and call us, as they go + On and onward, still before. + + Guided thus, O friend of mine! + Let us walk our little way, + Knowing by each beckoning sign + That we are not quite astray. + + Chase we still with baffled feet + Smiling eye and waving hand, + Sought and seeker soon shall meet, + Lost and found, in Sunset Land! + + + + +ICE AND ESQUIMAUX. + + +CHAPTER I. + +OFF. + +Good bye, Boston! Good bye to State-House and Common, to the "Atlantic +Monthly" and Governor Andrew, memorable institutions all,--to you also, +true Heart of the Commonwealth, and to republican and Saxon America, the +land where a man's a man even in the most inconvenient paucity of pounds +sterling. Still yours, I am weary of work and of war, weary of spinning +out ten yards of strength-fibre to twenty yards' length. And so when an +angel in moustache comes to me out of unknown space, with a card from +the "Atlantic Monthly," on a corner of which is written a mysterious +"Go, if you can," and says, "Come with me to Labrador," what can I do +but accept the omen? Therefore, after due delay, and due warning from +dear friends, and due consultations of the connubial Delphi, not +forgetting to advise with Dr. Oramel, the discreet lip obeys the instant +indiscreet wish, and says, "I go." + + +_June 5, 1864._ Provincetown. Came in here to get cheated in buying a +boat, and succeeded admirably! It was taken on board, not quite breaking +beneath its own weight; the anchor soon followed; we were away. Past the +long spit of sand on the north and west; past the new batteries, over +which floated the flag that for months would not again gladden our eyes, +save at the mast-head of some wandering ship; then, with change of +course, past the long curving neck of the desert cape; and so out upon +the open ocean we sped, with a free wind, a crested wave, and a white +wake. The land grew a low, blue cloud in the west, then melted into the +horizon. But before it faded, the heart of one man clung to it, +regretful, penitent, saying, "It was not well to go; it were better to +have stayed and suffered, as you, O Land, must suffer." + +But when it was gone; then the Before built to itself also a cloudland +and drew me on. The mystic North reached forth the wand by which it had +fascinated me so often, and renewed its spell. Who has not felt it? +Thoreau wrote of "The Wild" as he alone could write; but only in the +North do you find it,--unless you make it, as he did, by your +imagination. And even he could in this but partially succeed. Talk of +finding it in a ten-acre swamp! Why, man, you are just from a cornfield, +the echoes of your sister's piano are still in your ears, and you called +at the post-office for a letter as you came! Verdure and a mild heaven +are above; _clunking_ frogs and plants that keep company with man are +beneath. But in the North Nature herself is wild. Of man she has never +so much as heard. She has seen, perchance, a biped atomy creeping +through her snows; but he is not Man, lording it in power of thought and +performance; he is a muffled imbecility, that can do nothing but hug and +hide its existence, lest some careless breath of hers should blow it +out; his pin-head taper must be kept under a bushel, or cease to be even +the covert pettiness it is. The wildness of the North is not scenic and +pictorial merely, but goes to the very heart of things, immeasurable, +immitigable, infinite; deaf and blind to all but itself and its own, it +prevails, it is, and it is all. + +The desert and the sea are indeed untamable, but the North is more. They +hold their own, and Civilization is but a Mrs. Partington, trying to +sweep _in_ at their doors. But Commerce, though it cannot subdue, +stretches its arms across them; while Culture and Travel go and come, +still wearing their plumes, still redolent with odors of civilized +lands. The North reigns more absolutely. Commerce is but a surf on its +shores. Travel creeps guardedly, fearfully in, only to turn and creep +still more fearfully out. + +We, indeed, are feeble even in our purposes of travel. Not Kanes, +Parrys, Franklins, not intrepid to brave the presence of the Arctic +Czar, and look on his very face, with its half-year lights and +shades,--we go only to see the skirts of his robe, blown southward by +summer-seeking winds. But even the hope of this fills the Before with +enchantment, and lures us like a charm. + +Lures the ship, too, one would think: for how she flies! Fair wind and +fog we had, where clear skies were looked for,--fair wind and clear +skies, where we had expected to plough fog; Cape Sable forbears for once +to hide itself; the shores of Nova Scotia are seen through an atmosphere +of crystal and under an azure without stain, and on the third day the +Gut of Canso is reached, and anchor cast in the little harbor of a +little, dirty, bluenose villagette, ycleped "Port Mulgrave." + +Port Mulgrave? Port Filth, Port Rum, Port Dirk-Knife, Port Prostitution, +Port Fish-Gurry, Port everything unsavory and unconscionable! + +"What news from the war?" asks Bradford of the first man, on landing. + +Answer prompt. "Good news! Grant has been beaten, lost seventeen +thousand men, and is making for Washington as fast as he can run!" + +Respondent's visage questionable, however,--too dirty, and too happy. +Hence further researches; and at last a man is found who (under +prospects of trade) can contrive to tell the truth; and he acknowledges +that even the Canadian telegraph has told no such story. + +In the evening, as some of us go on shore, there is a drunken fight. +Knives are drawn, great gashes given, blood runs like rain; the +combatants tumble together into a shallow dock, stab in the mud and +water, creep out and clench and roll over and over in the ooze, stabbing +still, with beast-like, unintelligible yells, and half-intelligible +curses. A great, nasty mob huddles round,--doing what, think you? +Roaring with laughter, and hooting their fish-gurry happiness up to the +welkin! Suddenly there is a surging among them; then Smith, our young +parson, ploughs through, springs upon the fighters, who owe to nothing +but extreme drunkenness their escape from the crime of murder. He +clutches them,--jerks one this way, the other that, heedless of the +still plunging knives,--fastens upon the worst hurt of the two, and +drags him off. Are the lookers-on abashed? Never think it! They +remonstrate! Smith jets at them fine sentences of fiery, rebuking +eloquence. "Bah!" they say, "this is nothing; we are used to it!" It was +their customary theatricals, their Spanish bull-fight; and they were +little inclined to be robbed of their show. + +"Smith, you ran great risk of your life," said one, as the intrepid man +stepped on board, with a great gout of blood on his sleeve; "and your +life is surely worth more by many times than that of the creatures you +rescued." + +"I know nothing about that; I only know that they have immortal souls, +and are not fit to die." + +"Nor to live either, unhappily," said another. + +There was cod- and cunner-fishing while here. Trout, also, were caught +in a pond a little inland,--good trout, too, though nothing, of course, +to what we shall find in Labrador! Enjoy, while ye may, short pleasures, +O trouters! for long tramps--and faces--are to succeed! + + +_June 11._ After prolonged northeast rain a bright day, and with it the +setting of sail, a many-handed seesaw at the windlass, and departure. + +"Well rid of that vile hole!" says one and another. + +"Oh, but you'll be glad enough to see it three months hence," answers +the experienced Bradford. + +And we were! + +The wind blew briskly down the Gut; the tide also, which, especially on +the ebb, runs with force, helping to carry off the waters of the St. +Lawrence, was against us; and the deer-footed schooner made haste slowly +toward the west. Slower vessels failed, and were swept down by the tide; +we crept on, crept past the noble Porcupine Head, which rises abruptly +six hundred and forty feet from the sea, and at last, ceasing to tack, +made a straight line out into the Gulf of St. Lawrence, beautiful, most +beautiful, this day, if never before. It was a sweet sail we had across +that gulf, well-named and ill-reputed. The sun shone like southern +summer; the summer breeze blew mild; the rising shores and rich red soil +of Cape-Breton Isle, patched here and there with dark evergreen-forests, +and elsewhere by the lighter green of deciduous woods, lay on the +starboard side, warm-looking and welcome to the eyes. This shore, as +then seen, reminded me more than any other ever did of the Spanish coast +on the approach to Gibraltar,--the spruce woods answering in hue to +olive-groves, the other to the green of vines. Meanwhile, the +palpitating sheen on the land, the star-sprinkled blueness of the sea, +together with the softness of the delicious day, brought vividly to mind +those days in the Aegean when not even the disabilities of an invalid +could prevent his leaping over and swimming along by the ship's side. + +It was a great surprise, this climate and scene. I had expected chill +skies and bleak shores: I found the perfect pleasantness of summer in +the air, and a coast-scenery with which that of New England in general +cannot vie. + +Cape-Breton Isle is worthy of respect. With a population, if I remember +rightly, of some thirty thousand, and an area of more than three +thousand square miles, embracing an inland sea, or salt lake, deep +enough for ships-of-the-line, it has, in addition to its great mineral +wealth, a soil capable of large crops. Wheat and corn do not thrive, but +barley, oats, potatoes, and many root-crops grow abundantly. And I may +add, in passing, that Nova Scotia, over which I travelled on my return, +is worthy of a better repute. On the ocean side there is, indeed, a +strip from twenty to forty miles wide which is barren as the "Secesh" +heart of Halifax. The rock here is metamorphic, the soil worthless, the +scenery rugged, yet mean. Gold is found,--in such quantities that the +labor of each man yields a _gross_ result of two hundred and fifty-six +dollars a year! Deduct the cost of crushing the quartz, (for it is found +only in quartz,) and there is left--how much? But the Gulf-coast, and +the side of the province next the Bay of Fundy, have a carboniferous and +red-sandstone formation, with a soil often deep and rich, faultless +meads and river-intervals, and a tender shore-scenery, relieved by ruddy +cliffs, and high, broken, burnt-umber islands. + +But we are sailing up the Gulf. And while the day shines and wanes, and +the shades of evening, suffused with tender color, fall gently, and the +Gulf to the west is deeply touched with veiled, but glowing crimson, +when the sun is down, and on the other hand Cape-Breton Isle puts forth, +close to our course, two small representative islands, red sandstone, +charmingly ruddy under the sunset light,--while a mild wind, sinking, +but not ceasing, bears us on through daylight, twilight, starlight, each +perfect of its kind,--let me introduce our voyagers severally to the +reader. + +First, the ship, surely a voyager as much as any of us! + +"Benjamin S. Wright," fore-and-aft schooner, one hundred and thirty-six +tons, built by McKay, and worthy of him,--deep, sharp, broad of beam, a +fine seaboat, swift as the wind, a little long-masted for regular +sea-voyaging, but, with this partial exception, faultless. + +Next will naturally come the responsible originator and operator of the +expedition. + +William Bradford, artist,--slight in stature, delicate, though marked, +in feature,--sensitive, pious, ardent, absorbed,--not of distinguished +mental power, though of active mind, aside from his profusion, but +within it a proper man of genius, with no superior, so far as I know, +but Turner, and no equal but Stanfield, in his power to render the sea +in action. + +The passengers were twelve in number; but with them I include two +others, who have a claim to that company. Here they are. + +A----, "the Colonel,"--a lieutenant in the regular army, retired on +account of illness,--brave, intelligent, cultivated, a Churchman +undeveloped in spiritual sense, rough in his sports, proud as a Roman, +his whole being, indeed, built up on manly, Roman pride,--a Greenland +voyager, and better read than any man I have met in the literature of +Northern travel. + +H----, "the Judge,"--cool-headed, warm-hearted, compassionate, +irascible, liberal, witty, easy speaker and fine conversationist, with +an inexhaustible fund of sense, anecdote, candor, and good heart. + +L----, navy-surgeon,--also retired on account of extreme illness,--a +sensible, quiet, good man and gentleman. + +A. S. Packard, Jr., _Magister Artium_, scientist,--devoting his +attention chiefly to Insecta, Mollusca, and Radiata, but giving +penetrating glances at geology and physical geography,--attracted to the +North, where he had been before,--imperturbable, equal in humor and +good-humor, companionable, a boon to the party, and richly meriting the +thanks I here offer him. + +M----, ornithologist,--young, unripe, inattentive to his person, but +very intelligent, and bound to be a man of mark. + +S----, "the Parson,"--Episcopal, twenty-five years old, active in mind, +naturally eloquent, pious, social, genial, generous, and frank as the +day. + +P----, graduate of college and law-school,--handsome, companionable, +fluent in writing or talk, and excellent at trolling a stave. + +L----, quietest mouse in the world, but seen at once to be a gentleman, +and found afterwards to be a man of thought and culture. + +C----, with the gravest, maturest, most thoughtful and balanced mind, +and one of the happiest appetites I ever found in a boy of fourteen, +singularly ingenuous and high-minded, a rare spirit. + +P----, photographer, skilful, and a good fellow. + +W----, whose wife is enviable among women. + +Captain H----, employed by Bradford, not as master, but as general +ally,--old whaler, one of Nature's noblemen, to whom experience has been +a university and the world a book, strong as the strongest of men, +tender as the tenderest of women. + +Ph----, fine Greek and Latin scholar, rich as Croesus and simple in +his habits as Ochiltree,--passionately fond of travel,--as well read, I +will undertake to say, in the literature of travel in Egypt, Arabia, +Syria, and Turkey, as any other man twenty-five years old in Europe or +America,--full of facts, strong in mind, deep In heart, religious, +candid, sincere, courageous, at once frank and reticent,--a thoroughly +large and profound nature, whom it was worth going to Labrador to meet. + +Finally, your humble servant, "the Elder," who trusts that the reader +remembers meeting him before, and has somewhat, at least, of his own +pleasure in renewing the acquaintance. + + * * * * * + +The morning of June twelfth, our second Sunday on board, was one to +remain memorable among mornings for beauty,--for these were halcyon +days, and Nature could not change for a moment from her mood. It was +nowise odd or strange, no Nubian of Thibetan beauty, no three-faced +Hindoo divinity, but a regular Grecian-featured Apollo, amber in +forehead, fitly arrayed, coming to a world worthy of him. Cape-Breton +Isle was a strip of denser sky on the southeast horizon; on the west, +far away, rose Entry Island, one of the Magdalen group, deliciously +ruddy and Mediterranean-looking, seen through the lovely, ethereal, +purple haze; while others of the group appeared farther away, one of +them, long and low, an island of absolute gold, polished gold, splendid +as gold under sunshine can be. The light wind bore us on so serenely as +to give the sense of calm more than calm itself; while the music of our +motion through the water, that incomparable barytone, rendered this calm +into sound. + +It was the very Sabbath and Sunday of Nature,--her Sabbath of rest, and +her Sunday of joy. I was surprised to find myself not surprised by this +wonderful morning. It seemed not new nor foreign, but suggested some +divine old-time familiarity and fellowship. It looked me in the eyes out +of its immortal hilarity and peace, took me by the hand, and said, +"Forever!" And in that "Forever" spoke to me an infinite remembrance and +an infinite hope. + +At eleven A. M. we drew near to Gannet Rocks. These are three in number, +all high, one quite small and conical, a second somewhat larger, the +third, which is the home of gannets, several acres in extent. They were +all ruddy, being of red sandstone; and the smallest, in that warm light, +was actual carmine. The largest rises with precipitous sides, which in +parts beetle far over the sea, to a height of four hundred feet, having +above a surface nearly level, but sloping gently to the south. By zigzag +scrambling one may at a particular point climb to this surface; but it +is a hard climb, and a landing can be effected only in extreme calm. + +At the distance of two miles or more, on our approach, the surface was +visible, owing to its slight southward slope. It had precisely the +appearance of being deeply covered with snow, save in one part, about a +fourth of its area, where it was bright green. We knew that this snow +was no other than the female gannets, crowded together in the act of +sitting on their eggs; but by no inspection with powerful glasses could +we discern a single point where the rock appeared between them. They +were literally _packed_ together, every inch of room being used. Six or +eight acres of them! + +But where are the males? There is no apparent room for them on the rock. +Just as this question occurred to me, some one cried out, "Look in the +air! look in the air above the rock!" I lifted my glass, and there they +were, a veritable _cloud_. They reminded me, saving the color, of a +cloud of midges which astonished me one summer evening when I was a +boy,--so thick that you could not see through them. Whether these ever +alight I cannot say. One thing is certain: they cannot all, nor any +considerable portion of them, alight on this rock together,--unless, +indeed, one should roost on another's back. + +But the gannet is not particular about alighting. It is just as cheap +flying, he thinks. His true home, like that of the frigate-bird and one +or two others, is the air. This is indicated in his structure. The skin +is not, as in most animals, strictly connected with the flesh, but is +attached by separate elastic fibres; and, like the frigate-bird, it can +force in under the skin, and into various cellular passages in the body, +air which is rarefied by its animal heat, and contributes greatly to its +buoyancy. + +The gannet is a handsome bird, larger by measurement, though not +heavier, than the largest gulls,--snow-white, save the outer third of +the wing, which is jet-black,--his wings long and sharp,--his motion in +the air not rapid, but singularly home-like and easy. He is unable to +rise from level ground, but must launch himself from a height, probably +owing to his shortness and inelasticity of leg and length of wing; nor, +indeed, can he rise from the water, unless somewhat assisted by its +motion. And this suggests a beautiful provision of Nature: the wings of +all true swimmers and divers are short and-round, to facilitate their +ascent from the water. + +If surprised on land, the gannet neither attempts to fly nor offers +resistance, conscious of helplessness; but when attacked in the water, +where he is more at home, he will fight fiercely. Nuttall, with grange +contradiction, says, that, though web-footed, they do not swim,--yet +elsewhere speaks of looking down from a cliff and seeing them "swimming +and chasing their prey." I cannot testify. + +After lingering an hour or two, "breaking the Sabbath," the schooner +proceeded,--the wind freshening during the afternoon, and the Gulf +growing choppy, as if it could not quite suffer us to pass without +exhibiting somewhat of that peevish quality for which it has an evil +renown. It was but a passing wrinkle of ill-humor, however,--a feeble +hint of what it could do, if it chose. + +And when we recrossed it, two and a half months later, it chose! + + * * * * * + +_June 14._ "Land ho! Labrador!" + +"Where? Where is it?" cry a chorus of voices. + +"There, a little on the larboard bow." + +A long, silent, rather disconcerted gaze. + +"I don't see it," says one. + +"Nor I." + +"There,--there,"--pointing,--"close down to the sea." + +"You don't mean that cloud?" + +"I mean that land." + +"Humph!" + +There is something occult about this art of seeing land. The landsman's +eyesight is good; he prides himself a little upon it. He looks; and for +him the land isn't there. The seaman's eyesight is no better; he looks, +and for him the land is so plainly in view that he cannot understand +your failure to see it. He is secretly pleased, though,--and may pretend +impatience in order to conceal his pleasure. I have sailed in all, +perhaps, a distance equal to that around the earth, a good proportion of +it along-shore; and I see as far as most men. But once on this very +voyage, during a storm, I had occasion to be convinced that nautical +optics will assert their advantage. Land was pointed out; it had been +some time seen, and we were avoiding it, the weather being thick and our +position uncertain. I did my best to descry it, ready to quarrel with my +eyes for not doing so, and a little annoyed to find myself but a +landsman after all. But see it I couldn't. I did indeed, after a while, +make out to fancy that I perceived an infinitesimal densening of the +mist there; but the illusion was one difficult to sustain. + +At four o'clock in the afternoon we cast anchor in Sleupe Harbor, named +for one Admiral Sleupe, of whom I know just this, that a harbor in +Labrador, Lat. 51°, is named for him. This region, however, is named +generally from Little Mecatina Island, which lies about six miles to the +southwest, considerable in size, and a most wild-looking land, tossed, +tumbled, twisted, and contorted in every conceivable and inconceivable +way. The harbor, too, a snug little hole between islands, was worthy of +Labrador. Its shores were all of gray, unbroken rock, not rising in +cliffs, but sloping to the sea, and dipping under it in regular decline, +like a shore of sand; while not a tree, not a shrub, not a grass-blade, +was to be seen. I never beheld a scene so bleak, bare, and hard. Nor did +I ever see a shore that seemed so completely "master of the situation." +The mightiest cliff confesses the power which it resists. Grand, +enduring, awful, it may be; but many a scar on its face and many a +fragment at its feet tells of what it endures. But this scarless gray +rock, thrusting its hand in a matter-of-course way under the sea, and +seeming to hold it as in a cup, suggested a quality so comfortably +immitigable that one's eyes grew cold in looking at it. + +Suddenly, "I see an inhabitant!" cries one. + +Yes, there he was, moving over the rock. Can you imagine how far away +and foreign he looked? The gray granite beneath him, the gray cloud +above him, seemed nearer akin. Instinctively, one thought of hastening +to a book of natural history for some description of the creature. Then +came the counter-thought, "This is a man!" And the attempt to realize +that fact put him yet farther, put him infinitely away. It was like +rebounding from a wall. No form is so foreign as the human, if a bar be +placed to the sympathy of him who regards it; and for the time this waif +of humanity walked in the circle of an unconquerable strangeness. + +He came on board,--another with him; for their hut was near by. +Canadian French they proved to be; could tatter English a little; and +with the passage of speech the flow of sympathy began, and we felt them +to be human. Through the Word the worlds were made! + +A wilderness of desert islands lies at this point along the coast, +extending out, I judged, not less than fifteen miles. Excepting Little +Mecatina, which is a number of miles in length, and must be some fifteen +hundred feet high, they are not very considerable either in area or +elevation,--from five to five hundred acres in extent, and from thirty +to two hundred feet in height. They are swardless and treeless, though +in two places I found a few blades of coarse, tawny-green grass; and +patches of sombre shrubbery, two and a half feet high, were not wanting. +Little lichen grows on the rock, though in the depressions and on many +of the slopes grows, or at least exists, a boggy greenish-gray moss, +over which it breaks your knees--if, indeed, your spine do not choose to +monopolize that enjoyment--to travel long. The rock is pale granite, +disposed in layers, which vary from two to ten or twelve feet in +thickness. These incline at an angle of from ten to twenty degrees, +giving to the islands, as a predominant characteristic, a regular slope +on one side and a cliff-like aspect on the other; though not a few are +bent up in the middle, perhaps exhibiting there some sharp ridge or +vertical wall, while from this they decline to either side. + +As beheld on the day of our arrival, this scenery was of an incomparable +desolation. Above was the coldest gray sky I remember to have seen; the +sea lay all in pallid, deathly gray beneath; islands in all shades of +grimmer and grimmest gray checkered it; vast drifts of gray old snow +filled the deeper hollows; and a heartless atmosphere pushed in the +sense of this grayness to the very marrow. It was as if all the ruddy +and verdurous juices had died in the veins of the world, and from core +to surface only gray remained. To credit fully the impression of the +scene, one would say that Existence was dead, and that we stood looking +on its corpse, which even in death could never decay. Eternal +Desolation,--Labrador! + +But extremes meet. + + + + +THE PROCESS OF SCULPTURE. + + +I have heard so much, lately, about artists who do not do their own +work, that I feel disposed to raise the veil upon the mysteries of the +studio, and enable those who are interested in the subject to form a +just conception of the amount of assistance to which a sculptor is +fairly entitled, as well as to correct the false, but very general +impression, that the artist, beginning with the crude block, and guided +by his imagination only, hews out his statue with his own hands. + +So far from this being the case, the first labor of the sculptor is upon +a small clay model; in which he carefully studies the composition of his +statue, the proportions, and the general arrangement of the drapery, +without regard to very careful finish of parts. This being accomplished, +and the small model cast in plaster, he employs some one to enlarge his +work to any size which he may require; and this is done by scale, and +with almost as much precision as the full-size and perfectly finished +model is afterwards copied in marble. + +The first step in this process is to form a skeleton of iron, the size +and strength of the iron rods corresponding to the size of the figure to +be modelled; and here, not only strong hands and arms are requisite, +but the blacksmith with his forge, many of the irons requiring to be +heated and bent upon the anvil to the desired angle. This solid +framework being prepared, and the various irons of which it is composed +firmly wired and welded together, the next thing is to hang thereon a +series of crosses, often several hundred in number, formed by two bits +of wood, two or three inches in length, fastened together by wire, one +end of which is attached to the framework. All this is necessary for the +support of the clay, which would otherwise fall by its own weight. (I +speak here of Roman clay,--the clay obtained in many parts of England +and America being more properly potter's clay, and consequently more +tenacious.) The clay is then pressed firmly around and upon the irons +and crosses with strong hands and a wooden mallet, until, from a clumsy +and shapeless mass, it acquires some resemblance to the human form. When +the clay is properly prepared, and the work advanced as far as the +artist desires, his own work is resumed, and he then laboriously studies +every part, corrects his ideal by comparison with living models, copies +his drapery from actual drapery arranged upon the lay-figure, and gives +to his statue the last refinement of beauty. + +It will thus be seen that there is an intermediate stage, even in the +clay, when the work passes completely out of the sculptor's hands and is +carried forward by his assistant,--the work on which the latter is +employed, however, obviously requiring not the least exercise of +creative power, which is essentially the attribute of the artist. To +perform the part assigned him, it is not necessary that the assistant, +should be a man of imagination or refined taste,--it is sufficient that +he have simply the skill, with the aid of accurate measurements, to +construct the framework of iron and to copy the small model before him. +But in _originating_ that small model, when the artist had nothing to +work from but the image existing in his own brain, imagination, refined +feeling, and a sense of grace were essential, and were called into +constant exercise. So, again, when the clay model returns into the +sculptor's hands, and the work approaches completion, often after the +labor of many months, it is he alone who infuses into the clay that +refinement and individuality of beauty which constitute his "style," and +which are the test of the greater or less degree of refinement of his +mind, as the force and originality of the conception are the test of his +intellectual power. + +The clay model having at last been rendered as perfect as possible, the +sculptor's work upon the statue is virtually ended; for it is then cast +in plaster and given into the hands of the marble-workers, by whom, +almost entirely, it is completed, the sculptor merely directing and +correcting the work as it proceeds. This disclosure, I am aware, will +shock the many, who often ingeniously discover traces of the sculptor's +hand where they do not exist. It is true, that, in some cases, the +finishing touches are introduced by the artist himself; but I suspect +that few who have accomplished and competent workmen give much of their +time to the mallet or the chisel, preferring to occupy themselves with +some new creation, or considering that these implements may be more +advantageously wielded by those who devote themselves exclusively to +their use. It is also true, that, although the process of transferring +the statue from plaster to marble is reduced to a science so perfect +that to err is almost impossible, yet much depends upon the workmen to +whom this operation is intrusted. Still, their position in the studio is +a subordinate one. They translate the original thought of the sculptor, +written in clay, into the language of marble. The translator may do his +work well or ill,--he may appreciate and preserve the delicacy of +sentiment and grace which were stamped upon the clay, or he may render +the artist's meaning coarsely and unintelligibly. Then it is that the +sculptor himself must reproduce his ideal in the marble, and breathe +into it that vitality which, many contend, only the artist can inspire. +But, whether skilful or not, the relation of these workmen to the artist +is precisely the same as that of the mere linguist to the author who, in +another tongue, has given to the world some striking fancy or original +thought. + +But the question when the clay _is_ "properly prepared" forms the +debatable ground, and has already furnished a convenient basis for the +charge that it is never "properly prepared" for women-artists until it +is ready for the caster. I affirm, from personal knowledge, that this +charge is utterly without foundation,--and as it would be affectation in +me to ignore what has been so freely circulating upon this subject in +print, I take this opportunity of stating that I have never yet allowed +a statue to leave my studio, upon the clay model of which I had not +worked during a period of from four to eight months,--and further, that +I should choose to refer all those desirous of ascertaining the truth to +Mr. Nucci, who "prepares" my clay for me, rather than to my +brother-sculptor, in the _Via Margutta_, who originated the report that +I was an impostor. So far, however, as my designs are concerned, I +believe even he has not, as yet, found occasion to accuse me of drawing +upon other brains than my own. + +We women-artists have no objection to its being known that we employ +assistants; we merely object to its being supposed that it is a system +peculiar to _ourselves_. When Thorwaldsen was called upon to execute his +twelve statues of the Apostles, he designed and furnished the small +models, and gave them into the hands of his pupils and assistants, by +whom, almost exclusively, they were copied in their present colossal +dimensions. The great master rarely put his own hand to the clay; yet we +never hear them spoken of except as "Thorwaldsen's statues." When +Vogelberg accepted the commission to model his colossal equestrian +statue of Gustavus Adolphus, physical infirmity prevented the artist +from even mounting the scaffolding; but he made the small model, and +directed the several workmen employed upon the full-size statue in clay, +and we never heard it intimated that Vogelberg was not the sculptor of +that great work. Even Crawford, than whom none ever possessed a more +rapid or facile hand, could never have accomplished half the immense +amount of work which pressed upon him in his later years, had he not had +more than one pair of hands to aid him in giving outward form to the +images in his fertile brain. Nay, not to refer solely to artists who are +no longer among us, I could name many studios, both in Rome and England, +belonging to our brothers in Art, in which the assistant-modeller forms +as necessary a part of studio-"property" as the living model or the +marble-workers,--and many more, on a smaller scale, in which he lends a +helping hand whenever required. If there are a few instances in which +the sculptor himself conducts his clay model through every stage, it is +usually because pecuniary considerations prevent his employing a +professional modeller. + +I do not wish it to be supposed that Thorwaldsen's general practice was +such as I have described in the particular case referred to: probably no +artist ever studied or worked more carefully upon the clay model than +he. What I have stated was only with the view of showing to what extent +he felt himself justified in employing assistance. I am quite persuaded, +however, that, had Thorwaldsen and Vogelberg been women, and employed +one-half the amount of assistance they did in the cases mentioned, we +should long since have heard the great merit of their works attributed +to the skill of their workmen. + +Nor should we forget--to draw for examples upon a kindred art--how +largely the painters of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries relied +upon the mechanical skill of their pupils to assist them in producing +the great works which bear their names. All the painters of note of that +time, like many of the present day, had their pupils, to whom was +intrusted much of the laborious portion of their work, the master +furnishing the design and superintending its execution. Raphael, for +instance, could never have left one half the treasures of Art which +adorn the Vatican and enrich other galleries, had he depended solely +upon the rapidity of his own hand; and of the many frescos which exist +in the Farnese Palace, and are called "Raphael's frescos," there are but +two in which are to be traced the master's hand,--the Galatea, and one +of the compartments in the series representing the story of Cupid and +Psyche. + +It will thus be seen how large a portion of the manual labor which is +supposed to devolve entirely upon the artist is, and has always been, +really performed by other hands than his own. I do not state this fact +in a whisper, as if it were a great disclosure which involved the honor +of the artist; it is no secret, and there is no reason why it should be +so. The disclosure, it is true, will be received by all who regard +sculpture as simply a mechanical art with a feeling of disappointment. +They will brand the artist who cannot lay claim to the entire +manipulation of his statue, whether in clay or marble, as an +impostor,--nor will they resign the idea that the truly conscientious +sculptor will carve every ornament upon his sandals and polish every +button upon his drapery. But those who look upon sculpture as an +intellectual art, requiring the exercise of taste, imagination, and +delicate feeling, will never identify the artist who conceives, +composes, and completes the design with the workman who simply relieves +him from great physical labor, however delicate some portion of that +labor may be. It should be a recognized fact, that the sculptor is as +fairly entitled to avail himself of mechanical aid in the execution of +his work as the architect to call into requisition the services of the +stone-mason in the erection of his edifice, or the poet to employ the +printer to give his thoughts to the world. Probably the sturdy mason +never thinks much about proportion, nor the type-setter much about +harmony; but the master-minds which inspire the strong arm and cunning +finger with motion think about and study both. It is high time that some +distinction should be made between the labor of the hand and the labor +of the brain. It is high time, in short, that the public should +understand in what the sculptor's work properly consists, and thus +render less pernicious the representations of those who, either from +thoughtlessness or malice, dwelling upon the fact that assistance has +been employed in certain cases, without defining the limits of that +assistance, imply the guilt of imposture in the artists, and deprive +them, and more particularly women-artists, of the credit to which, by +talent or conscientious labor, they are justly entitled. + + HARRIET HOSMER. + + + + +BRYANT'S SEVENTIETH BIRTHDAY. + + + O even-handed Nature! we confess + This life that men so honor, love, and bless + Has filled thine olden measure. Not the less + + We count the precious seasons that remain; + Strike not the level of the golden grain, + But heap it high with years, that earth may gain + + What heaven can lose,--for heaven is rich in song: + Do not all poets, dying, still prolong + Their broken chants amid the seraph throng, + + Where, blind no more, Ionia's bard is seen, + And England's heavenly minstrel sits between + The Mantuan and the wan-cheeked Florentine? + + This was the first sweet singer in the cage + Of our close-woven life. A new-born age + Claims in his vesper song its heritage: + + Spare us, oh, spare us long our heart's desire! + Moloch, who calls our children through the fire, + Leaves us the gentle master of the lyre. + + We count not on the dial of the sun + The hours, the minutes, that his sands have run; + Rather, as on those flowers that one by one + + From earliest dawn their ordered bloom display + Till evening's planet with her guiding ray + Leads in the blind old mother of the day, + + We reckon by his songs, each song a flower, + The long, long daylight, numbering hour by hour, + Each breathing sweetness like a bridal bower. + + His morning glory shall we e'er forget? + His noontide's full-blown lily coronet? + His evening primrose has not opened yet; + + Nay, even if creeping Time should hide the skies + In midnight from his century-laden eyes, + Darkened like his who sang of Paradise, + + Would not some hidden song-bud open bright + As the resplendent cactus of the night + That floods the gloom with fragrance and with light? + + How can we praise the verse whose music flows + With solemn cadence and majestic close, + Pure as the dew that filters through the rose? + + How shall we thank him that in evil days + He faltered never,--nor for blame, nor praise, + Nor hire, nor party, shamed his earlier lays? + + But as his boyhood was of manliest hue, + So to his youth his manly years were true, + All dyed in royal purple through and through! + + He for whose touch the lyre of Heaven is strung + Needs not the flattering toil of mortal tongue: + Let not the singer grieve to die unsung! + + Marbles forget their message to mankind: + In his own verse the poet still we find, + In his own page his memory lives enshrined, + + As in their amber sweets the smothered bees,-- + As the fair cedar, fallen before the breeze, + Lies self-embalmed amidst the mouldering trees. + + Poets, like youngest children, never grow + Out of their mother's fondness. Nature so + Holds their soft hands, and will not let them go, + + Till at the last they track with even feet + Her rhythmic footsteps, and their pulses beat + Twinned with her pulses, and their lips repeat + + The secrets she has told them, as their own: + Thus is the inmost soul of Nature known, + And the rapt minstrel shares her awful throne! + + O lover of her mountains and her woods, + Her bridal chamber's leafy solitudes, + Where Love himself with tremulous step intrudes, + + Her snows fall harmless on thy sacred fire: + Far be the day that claims thy sounding lyre + To join the music of the angel choir! + + Yet, since life's amplest measure must be filled, + Since throbbing hearts must be forever stilled, + And all must fade that evening sunsets gild, + + Grant, Father, ere he close the mortal eyes + That see a Nation's reeking sacrifice, + Its smoke may vanish from these blackened skies! + + Then, when his summons comes, since come it must, + And, looking heavenward with unfaltering trust, + He wraps his drapery round him for the dust, + + His last fond glance will show him o'er his head + The Northern fires beyond the zenith spread + In lambent glory, blue and white and red,-- + + The Southern cross without its bleeding load, + The milky way of peace all freshly strowed, + And every white-throned star fixed in its lost abode! + +NOVEMBER 3, 1864. + + + + +LEAVES FROM AN OFFICER'S JOURNAL. + + +II. + + CAMP SAXTON, near Beaufort, S.C. + _December 11, 1862._ + +Haroun Alrashid, wandering in disguise through his imperial streets, +scarcely happened upon a greater variety of groups than I, in my evening +strolls among our own camp-fires. + +Beside some of these fires, the men are cleaning their guns or +rehearsing their drill,--beside others, smoking in silence their very +scanty supply of the beloved tobacco,--beside others, telling stories +and shouting with laughter over the broadest mimicry, in which they +excel, and in which the officers come in for a full share. The +everlasting "shout" is always within hearing, with its mixture of piety +and polka, and its castanet-like clapping of the hands. Then there are +quieter prayer-meetings, with pious invocations, and slow psalms, +"deaconed out" from memory by the leader, two lines at a time, in a sort +of wailing chant. Elsewhere, there are _conversazioni_ around fires, +with a woman for queen of the circle,--her Nubian face, gay head-dress, +gilt necklace, and white teeth, all resplendent in the glowing light. +Sometimes the woman is spelling slow monosyllables out of a primer, a +feat which always commands all ears,--they rightly recognizing a mighty +spell, equal to the overthrowing of monarchs, in the magic assonance of +_cat_, _hat_, _pat_, _bat_, and the rest of it. Elsewhere, it is some +solitary old cook, some aged Uncle Tiff, with enormous spectacles, who +is perusing a hymn-book by the light of a pine splinter, in his deserted +cooking-booth of palmetto-leaves. By another fire there is an +actual dance, red-legged soldiers doing right-and-left, and +"now-lead-de-lady-ober," to the music of a violin which is rather +artistically played, and which may have guided the steps, in other days, +of Barnwells and Hugers. And yonder is a stump-orator perched on his +barrel, pouring out his exhortations to fidelity in war and in religion. +To-night for the first time I have heard an harangue in a different +strain, quite saucy, skeptical, and defiant, appealing to them in a sort +of French materialistic style, and claiming some personal experience of +warfare. "You don't know notin' about it, boys. You tink you's brave +enough; how you tink, if you stan' clar in de open field,--here you, an' +dar de Secesh? You's got to hab de right ting inside o' you. You must +hab it 'served [preserved] in you, like dese yer sour plums dey 'serve +in de barr'l; you's got to harden it down inside o' you, or it's +notin'." Then he hit hard at the religionists:--"When a man's got de +sperit ob de Lord in him, it weakens him all out, can't hoe de corn." He +had a great deal of broad sense in his speech; but presently some others +began praying vociferously close by, as if to drown this free-thinker, +when at last he exclaimed, "I mean to fight de war through, an' die a +good sojer wid de last kick,--dat's _my_ prayer!" and suddenly jumped +off the barrel. I was quite interested at discovering this reverse side +of the temperament, the devotional side preponderates so enormously, and +the greatest scamps kneel and groan in their prayer-meetings with such +entire zest. It shows that there is some individuality developed among +them, and that they will not become too exclusively pietistic. + +Their love of the spelling-book is perfectly inexhaustible,--they +stumbling on by themselves, or the blind leading the blind, with the +same pathetic patience which they carry into everything. The chaplain is +getting up a school-house, where he will soon teach them as regularly as +he can. But the alphabet must always be a very incidental business in a +camp. + + * * * * * + + _December 14._ + +Passages from prayers in the camp:-- + +"Let me so lib dat when I die I shall _hab manners_, dat I shall know +what to say when I see my Heabenly Lord." + +"Let me lib wid de musket in one hand, an' de Bible in de oder,--dat if +I die at de muzzle ob de musket, die in de water, die on de land, I may +know I hab de bressed Jesus in my hand, an' hab no fear." + +"I hab lef' my wife in de land o' bondage; my little ones dey say eb'ry +night, Whar is my fader? But when I die, when de bressed mornin' rises, +when I shall stan' in de glory, wid one foot on de water an' one foot on +de land, den, O Lord, I shall see my wife an' my little chil'en once +more." + +These sentences I noted down, as best I could, beside the glimmering +camp-fire last night. The same person was the hero of a singular little +_contre-temps_ at a funeral in the afternoon. It was our first funeral. +The man had died in hospital, and we had chosen a picturesque +burial-place above the river, near the old church, and beside a little +nameless cemetery, used by generations of slaves. It was a regular +military funeral, the coffin being draped with the American flag, the +escort marching behind, and three volleys fired over the grave. During +the services there was singing, the chaplain deaconing out the hymn in +their favorite way. This ended, he announced his text,--"This poor man +cried, and the Lord heard him, and delivered him out of all his +trouble." Instantly, to my great amazement, the cracked voice of the +chorister was uplifted, intoning the text, as if it were the first verse +of another hymn. So calmly was it done, so imperturbable were all the +black countenances, that I half began to conjecture that the chaplain +himself intended it for a hymn, though I could imagine no prospective +rhyme for _trouble_, unless it were approximated by _debbil_,--which is, +indeed, a favorite reference, both with the men and with his Reverence. +But the chaplain, peacefully awaiting, gently repeated his text after +the chant, and to my great relief the old chorister waived all further +recitative and let the funeral discourse proceed. + +Their memories are a vast bewildered chaos of Jewish history and +biography; and most of the great events of the past, down to the period +of the American Revolution, they instinctively attribute to Moses. There +is a fine bold confidence in all their citations, however, and the +record never loses piquancy in their hands, though strict accuracy may +suffer. Thus, one of my captains, last Sunday, heard a colored exhorter +at Beaufort proclaim, "Paul may plant, _and may polish wid water_, but +it won't do," in which the sainted Apollos would hardly have recognized +himself. + +Just now one of the soldiers came to me to say that he was about to be +married to a girl in Beaufort, and would I lend him a dollar and +seventy-five cents to buy the wedding outfit? It seemed as if matrimony +on such moderate terms ought to be encouraged, in these days; and so I +responded to the appeal. + + * * * * * + + _December 16._ + +To-day a young recruit appeared here, who had been the slave of Colonel +Sammis, one of the leading Florida refugees. Two white companions came +with him, who also appeared to be retainers of the Colonel, and I asked +them to dine. Being likewise refugees, they had stories to tell, and +were quite agreeable: one was English-born, the other Floridian, a dark, +sallow Southerner, very well-bred. After they had gone, the Colonel +himself appeared. I told him that I had been entertaining his white +friends, and after a while he quietly let out the remark,-- + +"Yes, one of those white friends of whom you speak is a boy raised on +one of my plantations; he has travelled with me to the North and passed +for white, and he always keeps away from the negroes." + +Certainly no such suspicion had ever crossed my mind. + +I have noticed one man in the regiment who would easily pass for +white,--a little sickly drummer, aged fifty at least, with brown eyes +and reddish hair, who is said to be the son of one of our commodores. I +have seen perhaps a dozen persons as fair or fairer, among fugitive +slaves, but they were usually young children. It touched me far more to +see this man, who had spent more than half a lifetime in this low +estate, and for whom it now seemed too late to be anything but a +"nigger." This offensive word, by the way, is almost as common with them +as at the North, and far more common than with well-bred slave-holders. +They have meekly accepted it. "Want to go out to de nigger-houses, Sah," +is the universal impulse of sociability, when they wish to cross the +lines. "He hab twenty house-servants, an' two hundred head o' nigger," +is a still more degrading form of phrase, in which the epithet is +limited to the field-hands, and they estimated like so many cattle. This +want of self-respect of course interferes with the authority of the +non-commissioned officers, which is always difficult to sustain, even in +white regiments. "He needn't try to play de white man ober me," was the +protest of a soldier against his corporal the other day. To counteract +this, I have often to remind them that they do not obey their officers +because they are white, but because they are their officers; and +guard-duty is an admirable school for this, because they readily +understand that the sergeant or corporal of the guard has for the time +more authority than any commissioned officer who is not on duty. It is +necessary also for their superiors to treat the non-commissioned +officers with careful courtesy, and I often caution the line-officers +never to call them "Sam" or "Will," nor omit the proper handle to their +names. The value of the habitual courtesies of the regular army is +exceedingly apparent with these men: an officer of polished manners can +wind them round his finger, while white soldiers seem rather to prefer a +certain roughness. The demeanor of my men to each other is very +courteous, and yet I see none of that sort of upstart conceit which is +sometimes offensive among free negroes at the North, the dandy-barber +strut. This is an agreeable surprise, for I feared that freedom and +regimentals would produce precisely that. + +They seem the world's perpetual children, docile, gay, and lovable, in +the midst of this war for freedom on which they have intelligently +entered. Last night, before "taps," there was the greatest noise in camp +that I had ever heard, and I feared some riot. On going out, I found the +most tumultuous sham-fight proceeding in total darkness, two +companies playing like boys, beating tin cups for drums. When some +of them saw me they seemed a little dismayed, and came and said, +beseechingly,--"Cunnel, Sah, you hab no objection to we playin', +Sah?"--which objection I disclaimed; but soon they all subsided, rather +to my regret, and scattered merrily. Afterward I found that some other +officer had told them that I considered the affair too noisy, so that I +felt a mild self-reproach when one said, "Cunnel, wish you had let we +play a little longer, Sah." Still I was not sorry, on the whole; for +these sham-fights between companies would in some regiments lead to real +ones, and there is a latent jealousy here between the Florida and +South-Carolina men, which sometimes makes me anxious. + +The officers are more kind and patient with the men than I should +expect, since the former are mostly young, and drilling tries the +temper; but they are aided by hearty satisfaction in the results already +attained. I have never yet heard a doubt expressed among the officers as +to the _superiority_ of these men to white troops in aptitude for drill +and discipline, because of their imitativeness and docility, and the +pride they take in the service. One captain said to me to-day, "I have +this afternoon taught my men to load-in-nine-times, and they do it +better than we did it in my former company in three months." I can +personally testify that one of our best lieutenants, an Englishman, +taught a part of his company the essential movements of the "school for +skirmishers" in a single lesson of two hours, so that they did them very +passably, though I feel bound to discourage such haste. However, I +"formed square" on the third battalion-drill. Three-fourths of drill +consist of attention, imitation, and a good ear for time; in the other +fourth, which consists of the application of principles, as, for +instance, performing by the left flank some movement before learned by +the right, they are perhaps slower than better-educated men. Having +belonged to five different drill-clubs before entering the army, I +certainly ought to know something of the resources of human awkwardness, +and I can honestly say that they astonish me by the facility with which +they do things. I expected much harder work in this respect. + +The habit of carrying burdens on the head gives them erectness of +figure, even where physically disabled. I have seen a woman, with a +brimming water-pail balanced on her head,--or perhaps a cup, saucer, and +spoon,--stop suddenly, turn round, stoop to pick up a missile, rise +again, fling it, light a pipe, and go through many evolutions with +either hand or both, without spilling a drop. The pipe, by the way, +gives an odd look to a well-dressed young girl on Sunday, but one often +sees that spectacle. The passion for tobacco among our men continues +quite absorbing, and I have piteous appeals for some arrangement by +which they can buy it on credit, as we have yet no sutler. Their +imploring, "Cunnel, we can't _lib_ widout it, Sah," goes to my heart; +and as they cannot read, I cannot even have the melancholy satisfaction +of supplying them with the excellent anti-tobacco tracts of Mr. Trask. + + * * * * * + + _December 19._ + +Last night the water froze in the adjutant's tent, but not in mine. +To-day has been mild and beautiful. The blacks say they do not feel the +cold so much as the white officers do, and perhaps it is so, though +their health evidently suffers more from dampness. On the other hand, +while drilling on very warm days, they have seemed to suffer more from +heat than their officers. But they dearly love fire, and at night will +always have it, if possible, even on the minutest scale,--a mere handful +of splinters, that seems hardly more efficacious than a friction-match. +Probably this is a natural habit for the short-lived coolness of an +out-door country; and then there is something delightful in this rich +pine, which burns like a tar-barrel. It was perhaps encouraged by the +masters, as the only cheap luxury the slaves had at hand. + +As one grows more acquainted with the men, their individualities emerge; +and I find first their faces, then their characters, to be as distinct +as those of whites. It is very interesting the desire they show to do +their duty and to improve as soldiers; they evidently think about it, +and see the importance of the thing; they say to me that we white men +cannot stay and be their leaders always, and that they must learn to +depend on themselves, or else relapse into their former condition. + +Beside the superb branch of uneatable bitter oranges which decks my +tent-pole, I have to-day hung up a long bough of finger-sponge, which +floated to the riverbank. As winter advances, butterflies gradually +disappear: one species (a _Vanessa_) lingers; three others have vanished +since I came. Mocking-birds are abundant, but rarely sing; once or twice +they have reminded me of the red thrush, but are inferior, as I have +always thought. The colored people all say that it will be much cooler; +but my officers do not think so, perhaps because last winter was so +unusually mild,--with only one frost, they say. + + * * * * * + + _December 20._ + +Philoprogenitiveness is an important organ for an officer of colored +troops; and I happen to be well provided with it. It seems to be the +theory of all military usages, in fact, that soldiers are to be treated +like children; and these singular persons, who never know their own age +till they are past middle life, and then choose a birthday with such +precision,--"Fifty year old, Sah, de fus' last April,"--prolong the +privilege of childhood. + +I am perplexed nightly for counter-signs,--their range of proper names +is so distressingly limited, and they make such amazing work of every +new one. At first, to be sure, they did not quite recognize the need of +any variation: one night some officer asked a sentinel whether he had +the countersign yet, and was indignantly answered,--"Should tink I hab +'em, hab 'em for a fortnight"; which seems a long epoch for that magic +word to hold out. To-night I thought I would have "Fredericksburg," in +honor of Burnside's reported victory, using the rumor quickly, for fear +of a contradiction. Later, in comes a captain, gets the countersign for +his own use, but presently returns, the sentinel having pronounced it +incorrect. On inquiry, it appears that the sergeant of the guard, being +weak in geography, thought best to substitute the more familiar word, +"Crockery-ware"; which was, with perfect gravity, confided to all the +sentinels, and accepted without question. O life! what is the fun of +fiction beside thee? + +I should think they would suffer and complain, these cold nights; but +they say nothing, though there is a good deal of coughing. I should +fancy that the scarlet trousers must do something to keep them warm, and +wonder that they dislike them so much, when they are so much like their +beloved fires. They certainly multiply fire-light, in any case. I often +notice that an infinitesimal flame, with one soldier standing by it, +looks like quite a respectable conflagration, and it seems as if a group +of them must dispel dampness. + + * * * * * + + _December 21._ + +To a regimental commander no book can be so fascinating as the +consolidated Morning Report, which is ready about nine, and tells how +many in each company are sick, absent, on duty, and so on. It is one's +newspaper and daily mail; I never grow tired of it. If a single recruit +has come in, I am always eager to see how he looks on paper. + +To-night the officers are rather depressed by rumors of Burnside's being +defeated, after all. I am fortunately equable and undepressible; and it +is very convenient that the men know too little of the events of the war +to feel excitement or fear. They know General Saxton and me,--"de +General" and "de Cunnel,"--and seem to ask no further questions. We are +the war. It saves a great deal of trouble, while it lasts, this +childlike confidence; nevertheless, it is our business to educate them +to manhood, and I see as yet no obstacle. As for the rumor, the world +will no doubt roll round, whether Burnside is defeated or succeeds. + + * * * * * + + _Christmas Day._ + + "We'll fight for liberty + Till de Lord shall call us home; + We'll soon be free + Till de Lord shall call us home." + +This is the hymn which the slaves at Georgetown, South Carolina, were +whipped for singing when President Lincoln was elected. So said a little +drummer-boy, as he sat at my tent's edge last night and told me his +story; and he showed all his white teeth as he added,--"Dey tink '_de +Lord_' meant for say de Yankees." + +Last night, at dress-parade, the adjutant read General Saxton's +Proclamation for the New-Year's Celebration. I think they understood it, +for there was cheering in all the company-streets afterwards. Christmas +is the great festival of the year for this people; but, with New-Year's +coming after, we could have no adequate programme for to-day, and so +celebrated Christmas Eve with pattern simplicity. We omitted, namely, +the mystic curfew which we call "taps," and let them sit up and burn +their fires and have their little prayer-meetings as late as they +desired; and all night, as I waked at intervals, I could hear them +praying and "shouting" and clattering with hands and heels. It seemed to +make them very happy, and appeared to be at least an innocent Christmas +dissipation, as compared with some of the convivialities of the +"superior race" hereabouts. + + * * * * * + + _December 26._ + +The day passed with no greater excitement for the men than +target-shooting, which they enjoyed. I had the private delight of the +arrival of our much-desired surgeon and his nephew, the captain, with +letters and news from home. They also bring the good tidings that +General Saxton is not to be removed, as had been reported. + +Two different stands of colors have arrived for us, and will be +presented at New-Year's,--one from friends in New York, and the other +from a lady in Connecticut. I see that "Frank Leslie's Illustrated +Weekly" of December twentieth has a highly imaginative picture of the +muster-in of our first company, and also of a skirmish on the late +expedition. + +I must not forget the prayer overheard last night by one of the +captains:--"O Lord! when I tink ob dis Kismas and las' year de Kismas. +Las' Kismas he in de Secesh, and notin' to eat but grits, and no salt in +'em. Dis year in de camp, and too much victual!" This "too much" is a +favorite phrase out of their grateful hearts, and did not in this case +denote an excess of dinner,--as might be supposed,--but of thanksgiving. + + * * * * * + + _December 29._ + +Our new surgeon has begun his work most efficiently: he and the chaplain +have converted an old gin-house into a comfortable hospital, with ten +nice beds and straw pallets. He is now, with a hearty professional +faith, looking round for somebody to put into it. I am afraid the +regiment will accommodate him; for, although he declares that these men +do not sham sickness, as he expected, their catarrh is an unpleasant +reality. They feel the dampness very much, and make such a coughing at +dress-parade that I have urged him to administer a dose of +cough-mixture, all round, just before that pageant. Are the colored race +_tough_? is my present anxiety; and it is odd that physical +insufficiency, the only discouragement not thrown in our way by the +newspapers, is the only discouragement which finds any place in our +minds. They are used to sleeping in-doors in winter, herded before +fires, and so they feel the change. Still, the regiment is as healthy as +the average, and experience will teach us something.[B] + + * * * * * + + _December 30._ + +On the first of January we are to have a slight collation, ten oxen or +so, barbecued,--or not properly barbecued, but roasted whole. Touching +the length of time required to "do" an ox, no two housekeepers appear to +agree. Accounts vary from two hours to twenty-four. We shall happily +have enough to try all gradations of roasting, and suit all tastes, from +Miss A.'s to mine. But fancy me proffering a spare-rib, well done, to +some fair lady! What ever are we to do for spoons and forks and plates? +Each soldier has his own, and is sternly held responsible for it by +"Army Regulations." But how provide for the multitude? Is it customary, +I ask you, to help to tenderloin with one's fingers? Fortunately, the +Major is to see to that department. Great are the advantages of military +discipline: for anything perplexing, detail a subordinate. + + * * * * * + + _New-Year's Eve._ + +My housekeeping at home is not, perhaps, on any very extravagant scale. +Buying beefsteak, I usually go to the extent of two or three pounds. Yet +when, this morning at daybreak, the quartermaster called to inquire how +many cattle I would have killed for roasting, I turned over in bed, and +answered composedly, "Ten,--and keep three to be fatted." + +Fatted, quotha! Not one of the beasts at present appears to possess an +ounce of superfluous flesh. Never were seen such lean kine. As they +swing on vast spits, composed of young trees, the fire-light glimmers +through their ribs, as if they were great lanterns. But no matter, they +are cooking,--nay, they are cooked. + +One at least is taken off to cool, and will be replaced to-morrow to +warm up. It was roasted three hours, and well done, for I tasted it. It +is so long since I tasted fresh beef that forgetfulness is possible; but +I fancied this to be successful. I tried to imagine that I liked the +Homeric repast, and certainly the whole thing has been far more +agreeable than was to be expected. The doubt now is, whether I have made +a sufficient provision for my household. I should have roughly guessed +that ten beeves would feed as many million people, it has such a +stupendous sound; but General Saxton predicts a small social party of +five thousand, and we fear that meat will run short, unless they prefer +bone. One of the cattle is so small, we are hoping it may turn out veal. + +For drink, we aim at the simple luxury of molasses-and-water, a barrel +per company, ten in all. Liberal housekeepers may like to know that for +a barrel of water we allow three gallons of molasses, half a pound of +ginger, and a quart of vinegar,--this last being a new ingredient for my +untutored palate, though all the rest are amazed at my ignorance. Hard +bread, with more molasses, and a dessert of tobacco, complete the +festive repast, destined to cheer, but not inebriate. + +On this last point, of inebriation, this is certainly a wonderful camp. +For us, it is absolutely omitted from the list of vices. I have never +heard of a glass of liquor in the camp, nor of any effort either to +bring it in or to keep it out. A total absence of the circulating-medium +might explain the abstinence,--not that it seems to have that effect +with white soldiers,--but it would not explain the silence. The craving +for tobacco is constant and not to be allayed, like that of a mother for +her children; but I have never heard whiskey even wished for, save on +Christmas Day, and then only by one man, and he spoke with a hopeless +ideal sighing, as one alludes to the Golden Age. I am amazed at this +total omission of the most inconvenient of all camp-appetites. It +certainly is not the result of exhortation, for there has been no +occasion for any, and even the pledge would scarcely seem efficacious +where hardly anybody can write. + +I do not think there is a great visible eagerness for to-morrow's +festival: it is not their way to be very jubilant over anything this +side of the New Jerusalem. They know also that those in this Department +are nominally free already, and that the practical freedom has to be +maintained, in any event, by military success. But they will enjoy it +greatly, and we shall have a multitude of people. + + * * * * * + + _January 1, 1863_ (evening). + +A happy New-Year to civilized, people,--mere white folks. Our festival +has come and gone, with perfect success, and our good General has been +altogether satisfied. Last night the great fires were kept smouldering +in the pits, and the beeves were cooked more or less, chiefly +more,--during which time they had to be carefully watched, and the great +spits turned by main force. Happy were the merry fellows who were +permitted to sit up all night, and watch the glimmering flames that +threw a thousand fantastic shadows among the great gnarled oaks. And +such a chattering as I was sure to hear, whenever I awoke, that night! + +My first greeting to-day was from one of the most stylish sergeants, who +approached me with the following little speech, evidently the result of +some elaboration:-- + +"I tink myself happy, dis New-Year's Day, for salute my own Cunnel. Dis +day las' year I was servant to a Cunnel ob Secesh; but now I hab de +privilege for salute my own Cunnel." + +That officer, with the utmost sincerity, reciprocated the sentiment. + +About ten o'clock the people began to collect by land, and also by +water,--in steamers sent by General Saxton for the purpose; and from +that time all the avenues of approach were thronged. The multitude were +chiefly colored women, with gay handkerchiefs on their heads, and a +sprinkling of men, with that peculiarly respectable look which these +people always have on Sundays and holidays. There were many white +visitors also,--ladies on horseback and in carriages, superintendents +and teachers, officers and cavalry-men. Our companies were marched to +the neighborhood of the platform, and allowed to sit or stand, as at the +Sunday services; the platform was occupied by ladies and dignitaries, +and by the band of the Eighth Maine, which kindly volunteered for the +occasion; the colored people filled up all the vacant openings in the +beautiful grove around, and there was a cordon of mounted visitors +beyond. Above, the great live-oak branches and their trailing moss; +beyond the people, a glimpse of the blue river. + +The services began at half-past eleven o'clock, with prayer by our +chaplain, Mr. Fowler, who is always, on such occasions, simple, +reverential, and impressive. Then the President's Proclamation was read +by Dr. W. H. Brisbane, a thing infinitely appropriate, a +South-Carolinian addressing South-Carolinians; for he was reared among +these very islands, and here long since emancipated his own slaves. Then +the colors were presented to us by the Rev. Mr. French, a chaplain who +brought them from the donors in New York. All this was according to the +programme. Then followed an incident so simple, so touching, so utterly +unexpected and startling, that I can scarcely believe it on recalling, +though it gave the key-note to the whole day. The very moment the +speaker had ceased, and just as I took and waved the flag, which now for +the first time meant anything to these poor people, there suddenly +arose, close beside the platform, a strong male voice, (but rather +cracked and elderly,) into which two women's voices instantly blended, +singing, as if by an impulse that could no more be repressed than the +morning note of the song-sparrow,-- + + "My Country, 'tis of thee, + Sweet land of liberty, + Of thee I sing!" + +People looked at each other, and then at us on the platform, to see +whence came, this interruption, not set down in the bills. Firmly and +irrepressibly the quavering voices sang on, verse after verse; others of +the colored people joined in; some whites on the platform began, but I +motioned them to silence. I never saw anything so electric; it made all +other words cheap; it seemed the choked voice of a race at last +unloosed. Nothing could be more wonderfully unconscious; art could not +have dreamed of a tribute to the day of jubilee that should be so +affecting; history will not believe it; and when I came to speak of it, +after it was ended, tears were everywhere. If you could have heard how +quaint and innocent it was! Old Tiff and his children might have sung +it; and close before me was a little slave-boy, almost white, who seemed +to belong to the party, and even he must join in. Just think of it!--the +first day they had ever had a country, the first flag they had ever seen +which promised anything to their people, and here, while mere spectators +stood in silence, waiting for my stupid words, these simple souls burst +out in their lay, as if they were by their own hearths at home! When +they stopped, there was nothing to do for it but to speak, and I went +on; but the life of the whole day was in those unknown people's song. + +Receiving the flags, I gave them into the hands of two fine-looking men, +jet-black, as color-guard, and they also spoke, and very +effectively,--Sergeant Prince Rivers and Corporal Robert Sutton. The +regiment sang "Marching Along," and then General Saxton spoke, in his +own simple, manly way, and Mrs. Frances D. Gage spoke very sensibly to +the women, and Judge Stickney, from Florida, added something; then some +gentlemen sang an ode, and the regiment the John Brown song, and then +they went to their beef and molasses. Everything was very orderly, and +they seemed to have a very gay time. Most of the visitors had far to go, +and so dispersed before dress-parade, though the band stayed to enliven +it. In the evening we had letters from home, and General Saxton had a +reception at his house, from which I excused myself; and so ended one of +the most enthusiastic and happy gatherings I ever knew. The day was +perfect, and there was nothing but success. + +I forgot to say, that, in the midst, of the services, it was announced +that General Fremont was appointed Commander-in-Chief,--an announcement +which was received with immense cheering, as would have been almost +anything else, I verily believe, at that moment of high-tide. It was +shouted across by the pickets above,--a way in which we often receive +news, but not always trustworthy. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[B] A second winter's experience removed all this solicitude, for they +learned to take care of themselves. During the first February the +sick-list averaged about ninety, during the second about thirty,--this +being the worst month in the year, for blacks. Charity ought, perhaps, +to withhold the information that during the first winter we had three +surgeons, and during the second only one. + + + + +ENGLAND AND AMERICA. + + +I came to America to see and hear, not to lecture. But when I was +invited by the Boston "Fraternity" to lecture in their course, and +permitted to take the relations between England and America as my +subject, I did not feel at liberty to decline the invitation. England is +my country. To America, though an alien by birth, I am, as an English +Liberal, no alien in heart. I deeply share the desire of all my +political friends in England and of the leaders of my party to banish +ill-feeling and promote good-will between the two kindred nations. My +heart would be cold, if that desire were not increased by the welcome +which I have met with here. More than once, when called upon to speak, +(a task little suited to my habits and powers,) I have tried to make it +understood that the feelings of England as a nation towards you in your +great struggle had not been truly represented by a portion of our press. +Some of my present hearers may, perhaps, have seen very imperfect +reports of those speeches. I hope to say what I have to say with a +little more clearness now. + +There was between England and America the memory of ancient quarrels, +which your national pride did not suffer to sleep, and which sometimes +galled a haughty nation little patient of defeat. In more recent times +there had been a number of disputes, the more angry because they were +between brethren. There had been disputes about boundaries, in which +England believed herself to have been overreached by your negotiators, +or, what was still more irritating, to have been overborne because her +main power was not here. There had been disputes about the Right of +Search, in which we had to taste the bitterness, now not unknown to you, +of those whose sincerity in a good cause is doubted, when, in fact, they +are perfectly sincere. You had alarmed and exasperated us by your Ostend +manifesto and your scheme for the annexation of Cuba. In these +discussions some of your statesmen had shown towards us the spirit which +Slavery does not fail to engender in the domestic tyrant; while, +perhaps, some of our statesmen had been too ready to presume bad +intentions and anticipate wrong. In our war with Russia your sympathies +had been, as we supposed, strongly on the Russian side; and we--even +those among us who least approved the war--had been scandalized at +seeing the American Republic in the arms of a despotism which had just +crushed Hungary, and which stood avowed as the arch-enemy of liberty in +Europe. In the course of that war an English envoy committed a fault by +being privy to recruiting in your territories. The fault was +acknowledged; but the matter was pressed by your Government in a temper +which we thought showed a desire to humiliate, and a want of that +readiness to accept satisfaction, when frankly tendered, which renders +the reparation of an unintentional offence easy and painless between men +of honor. These wounds had been inflamed by the unfriendly criticism of +English writers, who visited a new country without the spirit of +philosophic inquiry, and who in collecting materials for the amusement +of their countrymen sometimes showed themselves a little wanting in +regard for the laws of hospitality, as well as in penetration and in +largeness of view. + +Yet beneath this outward estrangement there lay in the heart of England +at least a deeper feeling, an appeal to which was never unwelcome, even +in quarters where the love of American institutions least prevailed. I +will venture to repeat some words from a lecture addressed a short time +before this war to the University of Oxford, which at that time had +among its students an English Prince. "The loss of the American +Colonies," said the lecturer, speaking of your first Revolution, "was +perhaps in itself a gain to both countries. It was a gain, as it +emancipated commerce and gave free course to those reciprocal streams of +wealth which a restrictive policy had forbidden to flow. It was a gain, +as it put an end to an obsolete tutelage, which tended to prevent +America from learning betimes to walk alone, while it gave England the +puerile and somewhat dangerous pleasure of reigning over those whom she +did not and could not govern, but whom she was tempted to harass and +insult. A source of military strength colonies can scarcely be. You +prevent them from forming proper military establishments of their own, +and you drag them, into your quarrels at the price of undertaking their +defence. The inauguration of free trade was in fact the renunciation of +the only solid object for which our ancestors clung to an invidious and +perilous supremacy, and exposed the heart of England by scattering her +fleet and armies over the globe. It was not the loss of the Colonies, +but the quarrel, that was one of the greatest, perhaps the greatest +disaster that ever befell the English race. Who would not give up +Blenheim and Waterloo, if only the two Englands could have parted from +each other in kindness and in peace,--if our statesmen could have had +the wisdom, to say to the Americans generously and at the right season, +'You are Englishmen, like ourselves; be, for your own happiness and for +our honor, like ourselves, a nation'? But English statesmen, with all +their greatness, have seldom known how to anticipate necessity; too +often the sentence of history on their policy has been, that it was +wise, just, and generous, but too late. Too often have they waited for +the teaching of disaster. Time will heal this, like other wounds. In +signing away his own empire, George III. did not sign away the empire of +English liberty, of English law, of English literature, of English +religion, of English blood, or of the English tongue. But though the +wound will heal,--and that it may heal ought to be the earnest desire of +the whole English name,--history can never cancel the fatal page which +robs England of half the glory and half the happiness of being the +mother of a great nation." Such, I say, was the language addressed to +Oxford in the full confidence that it would be well received. + +And now all these clouds seemed to have fairly passed away. Your +reception of the Prince of Wales, the heir and representative of George +III., was a perfect pledge of reconciliation. It showed that beneath a +surface of estrangement there still remained the strong tie of blood. +Englishmen who loved the New England as well as the Old were for the +moment happy in the belief that the two were one again. And, believe me, +joy at this complete renewal of our amity was very deeply and widely +felt in England. It spread far even among the classes which have shown +the greatest want of sympathy for you in the present war. + +England has diplomatic connections--she has sometimes diplomatic +intrigues--with the Great Powers of Europe. For a real alliance she must +look here. Strong as is the element of aristocracy in her Government, +there is that in her, nevertheless, which makes her cordial +understandings with military despotisms little better than smothered +hate. With you she may have a league of the heart. We are united by +blood. We are united by a common allegiance to the cause of freedom. You +may think that English freedom falls far short of yours. You will allow +that it goes beyond any yet attained by the great European nations, and +that to those nations it has been and still is a light of hope. I see it +treated with contempt here. It is not treated with contempt by +Garibaldi. It is not treated with contempt by the exiles from French +despotism, who are proud to learn the English tongue, and who find in +our land, as they think, the great asylum of the free. Let England and +America quarrel. Let your weight be cast into the scale against us, when +we struggle with the great conspiracy of absolutist powers around us, +and the hope of freedom in Europe would be almost quenched. Hampden and +Washington in arms against each other! What could the Powers of Evil +desire more? When Americans talk lightly of a war with England, one +desires to ask them what they believe the effects of such a war would be +on their own country. How many more American wives do they wish to make +widows? How many more American children do they wish to make orphans? Do +they deem it wise to put a still greater strain on the already groaning +timbers of the Constitution? Do they think that the suspension of trade +and emigration, with the price of labor rising and the harvests of +Illinois excluded from their market, would help you to cope with the +financial difficulties which fill with anxiety every reflecting mind? Do +they think that four more years of war-government would render easy the +tremendous work of reconstruction? But the interests of the great +community of nations are above the private interests of America or of +England. If war were to break out between us, what would become of +Italy, abandoned without help to her Austrian enemy and her sinister +protector? What would become of the last hopes of liberty in France? +What would become of the world? + +English liberties, imperfect as they may be,--and as an English Liberal +of course thinks they are,--are the source from which your liberties +have flowed, though the river may be more abundant than the spring. +Being in America, I am in England,--not only because American +hospitality makes me feel that I am still in my own country, but because +our institutions are fundamentally the same. The great foundations of +constitutional government, legislative assemblies, parliamentary +representation, personal liberty, self-taxation, the freedom of the +press, allegiance to the law as a power above individual will,--all +these were established, not without memorable efforts and memorable +sufferings, in the land from which the fathers of your republic came. +You are living under the Great Charter, the Petition of Eight, the +Habeas Corpus Act, the Libel Act. Perhaps you have not even yet taken +from us all that, if a kindly feeling continues between us, you may find +it desirable to take. England by her eight centuries of constitutional +progress has done a great work for you, and the two nations may yet have +a great work to do together for themselves and for the world. A student +of history, knowing how the race has struggled and stumbled onwards +through the ages until now, cannot believe in the finality and +perfection of any set of institutions, not even of yours. This vast +electioneering apparatus, with its strange machinery and discordant +sounds, in the midst of which I find myself,--it may be, and I firmly +believe it is, better for its purpose than anything that has gone before +it; but is it the crowning effort of mankind? If our creed--the Liberal +creed--be true, American institutions are a great step in advance of the +Old World; but they are not a miraculous leap into a political +millennium. They are a momentous portion of that continual onward effort +of humanity which it is the highest duty of history to trace; but they +are not its final consummation. Model Republic! How many of these models +has the course of ages seen broken and flung disdainfully aside! You +have been able to do great things for the world because your forefathers +did great things for you. The generation will come which in its turn +will inherit the fruits of your efforts, add to them a little of its +own, and in the plenitude of its self-esteem repay you with ingratitude. +The time will come when the memory of the Model Republicans of the +United States, as well as that of the narrow Parliamentary Reformers of +England, will appeal to history, not in vain, to rescue it from the +injustice of posterity, and extend to it the charities of the past. + +New-comers among the nations, you desire, like the rest, to have a +history. You seek it in Indian annals, you seek it in Northern sagas. +You fondly surround an old windmill with the pomp of Scandinavian +antiquity, in your anxiety to fill up the void of your unpeopled past. +But you have a real and glorious history, if you will not reject +it,--monuments genuine and majestic, if you will acknowledge them as +your own. Yours are the palaces of the Plantagenets,--the cathedrals +which enshrined our old religion,--the illustrious hall in which the +long line of our great judges reared, by their decisions, the fabric of +our law,--the gray colleges in which our intellect and science found +their earliest home,--the graves where our heroes and sages and poets +sleep. It would as ill become you to cultivate narrow national memories +in regard to the past as it would to cultivate narrow national +prejudices at present. You have come out, as from other relics of +barbarism which still oppress Europe, so from the barbarism of jealous +nationality. You are heirs to all the wealth of the Old World, and must +owe gratitude for a part of your heritage to Germany, France, and Spain, +as well as to England. Still, it is from England that you are sprung; +from her you brought the power of self-government which was the talisman +of colonization and the pledge of your empire here. She it was, that, +having advanced by centuries of effort to the front of the Old World, +became worthy to give birth to the New. From England you are sprung; and +if the choice were given you among all the nations of the world, which +would you rather choose for a mother? + +England bore you, and bore you not without a mother's pangs. For the +real hour of your birth wag the English Revolution of the seventeenth +century, at once the saddest and the noblest period of English +history,--the noblest, whether we look to the greatness of the +principles at stake, or to the grandeur of the actors who fill the +scene. This is not the official version of your origin. The official +version makes you the children of the revolutionary spirit which was +abroad in the eighteenth century and culminated in the French +Revolution. But this robs you of a century and a half of antiquity, and +of more than a century and a half of greatness. Since 1783 you have had +a marvellous growth of population and of wealth,--things not to be +spoken of, as cynics have spoken of them, without thankfulness, since +the added myriads have been happy, and the wealth has flowed not to a +few, but to all. But before 1783 you had founded, under the name of an +English Colony, a community emancipated from feudalism; you had +abolished here and doomed to general abolition hereditary aristocracy, +and that which is the essential basis of hereditary aristocracy, +primogeniture in the inheritance of land. You had established, though +under the semblance of dependence on the English crown, a virtual +sovereignty of the people. You had created the system of common schools, +in which the sovereignty of the people has its only safe foundation. You +had proclaimed, after some misgivings and backslidings, the doctrine of +liberty of conscience, and released the Church from her long bondage to +the State. All this you had achieved while you still were, and gloried +in being, a colony of England. You have done great things, since your +quarrel with George III., for the world as well as for yourselves. But +for the world, perhaps, you had done greater things before. + +In England the Revolution of the seventeenth century failed. It failed, +at least, as an attempt to establish social equality and liberty of +conscience. The feudal past, with a feudal Europe to support it, sat too +heavy on us to be cast off. By a convulsive effort we broke loose, for a +moment, from the hereditary aristocracy and the hierarchy. For a moment +we placed a popular chief in power, though Cromwell was obliged by +circumstances, as well as impelled by his own ambition, to make himself +a king. But when Cromwell died before his hour, all was over for many a +day with the party of religious freedom and of the people. The nation +had gone a little way out of the feudal and hierarchical Egypt; but the +horrors of the unknown Wilderness, and the memory of the flesh-pots, +overpowered the hope of the Promised Land; and the people returned to +the rule of Pharaoh and his priests amidst the bonfires of the +Restoration. Something had been gained. Kings became more careful how +they cut the subject's purse; bishops, how they clipped the subject's +ears. Instead of being carried by Laud to Rome, we remained Protestants +after a sort, though without liberty of conscience. Our Parliament, such +as it was, with a narrow franchise and rotten boroughs, retained its +rights; and in time we secured the independence of the judges and the +integrity of an aristocratic law. But the great attempt had miscarried. +English society had made a supreme effort to escape from feudalism and +the hierarchy into social justice and religious freedom, and that effort +had failed. + +Failed in England, but succeeded here. The yoke which in the +mother-country we had not strength to throw off, in the colony we +escaped; and here, beyond the reach of the Restoration, Milton's vision +proved true, and a free community was founded, though in a humble and +unsuspected form, which depended on the life of no single chief, and +lived on when Cromwell died. Milton, when the night of the Restoration +closed on the brief and stormy day of his party, bated no jot of hope. +He was strong in that strength of conviction which assures spirits like +his of the future, however dark the present may appear. But, could he +have beheld it, the morning, moving westward in the track of the Puritan +emigrants, had passed from his hemisphere only to shine again in this +with no fitful ray, but with a steady brightness which will one day +reillumine the feudal darkness of the Old World. + +The Revolution failed in England. Yet in England the party of Cromwell +and Milton still lives. It still lives; and in this great crisis of your +fortunes, its heart turns to you. On your success ours depends. Now, as +in the seventeenth century, the thread of our fate is twined with the +thread of yours. An English Liberal comes here, not only to watch the +unfolding of your destiny, but to read his own. + +Even in the Revolution of 1776 Liberal England was on your side. Chatham +was your spokesman, as well as Patrick Henry. We, too, reckon Washington +among our heroes. Perhaps there may have been an excuse even for the +King. The relation of dependence which you as well as he professed to +hold sacred, and which he was bound to maintain, had long become +obsolete. It was time to break the cord which held the child to its +mother; and probably there were some on your side, from the first, or +nearly from the first, resolved to break it,--men instinct with the +revolutionary spirit, and bent on a Republic. All parties were in a +false position; and they could find no way out of it better than civil +war. Good-will, not hatred, is the law of the world; and seldom can +history--even the history of the conqueror--look back on the results of +war without regret. England, scarcely guilty of the offence of her +monarch, drank the cup of shame and disaster to the dregs. That war +ruined the French finances, which till then might have been retrieved, +past the hope of redemption, and precipitated the Revolution which +hurled France through anarchy into despotism, and sent Lafayette to a +foreign dungeon, and his master to the block. You came out victorious; +but, from the violence of the rupture, you took a political bias not +perhaps entirely for good; and the necessity of the war blended you, +under equivocal conditions, with other colonies of a wholly different +origin and character, which then "held persons to service," and are now +your half-dethroned tyrant, the Slave Power. This Revolution will lead +to a revision of many things,--perhaps to a partial revision of your +history. Meantime, let me repeat, England counts Washington among her +heroes. + +And now as to the conduct of England towards you in this civil war. It +is of want of sympathy, if of anything, on our part, not of want of +interest, that you have a right to complain. Never, within my memory, +have the hearts of Englishmen been so deeply moved by any foreign +struggle as by this civil war,--not even, if I recollect aright, by the +great European earthquake of 1848. I doubt whether they were more moved +by the Indian mutiny or by our war with Russia. It seemed that history +had brought round again the great crisis of the Thirty Years' War, when +all England throbbed with the mortal struggle waged between the powers +of Liberty and Slavery on their German battle-field; for expectation can +scarcely have been more intense when Gustavus and Tilly were approaching +each other at Leipsic than it was when Meade and Lee were approaching +each other at Gettysburg. Severed from us by the Atlantic, while other +nations are at our door, you are still nearer to us than all the world +beside. + +It is of want of sympathy, not of want of interest, that you have to +complain. And the sympathy which has been withheld is not that of the +whole nation, but that of certain classes, chiefly of the class against +whose political interest you are fighting, and to whom your victory +brings eventual defeat. The real origin of your nation is the key to the +present relations between you and the different parties in England. This +is the old battle waged again on a new field. We will not talk too much +of Puritans and Cavaliers. The soldiers of the Union are not Puritans, +neither are the planters Cavaliers, But the present civil war is a vast +episode in the same irrepressible conflict between Aristocracy and +Democracy; and the heirs of the Cavalier in England sympathize with your +enemies, the heirs of the Puritan with you. + +The feeling of our aristocracy, as of all aristocracies, is against you. +It does not follow, nor do I believe, that as a body they would desire +or urge their Government to do you a wrong, whatever spirit may be shown +by a few of the less honorable or more violent members of their order. +With all their class sentiments, they are Englishmen, trained to walk in +the paths of English policy and justice. But that their feelings should +be against you is not strange. You are fighting, not for the restoration +of the Union, not for the emancipation of the negro, but for Democracy +against Aristocracy; and this fact is thoroughly understood by both +parties throughout the Old World. As the champions of Democracy, you may +claim, and you receive, the sympathy of the Democratic party in England +and in Europe; that of the Aristocratic party you cannot claim. You must +bear it calmly, if the aristocracies mourn over your victories and +triumph over your defeats. Do the friends of Democracy conceal their joy +when a despotism or an oligarchy bites the dust? + +The members of our aristocracy bear you no personal hatred. An American +going among them even now meets with nothing but personal courtesy and +kindness. Under ordinary circumstances they are not indifferent to your +good-will, nor unconscious of the tie of blood. But to ask them entirely +to forget their order would be too much. In the success of a +commonwealth founded on social and political equality all aristocracies +must read their doom. Not by arms, but by example, you are a standing +menace to the existence of political privilege. And the thread of that +existence is frail. Feudal antiquity holds life by a precarious tenure +amidst the revolutionary tendencies of this modern world. It has gone +hard with the aristocracies throughout Europe of late years, though the +French Emperor, as the head of the Reaction, may create a mock nobility +round his upstart throne. The Roman aristocracy was an aristocracy of +arms and law. The feudal aristocracy of the Middle Ages was an +aristocracy of arms and in some measure of law; it served the cause of +political progress in its hour and after its kind; it confronted +tyrannical kings when the people were as yet too weak to confront them; +it conquered at Runnymede, as well as at Hastings. But the aristocracies +of modern Europe are aristocracies neither of arms nor of law. They are +aristocracies of social and political privilege alone. They owe, and are +half conscious that they owe, their present existence only to factitious +weaknesses of human nature, and to the antiquated terrors of communities +long kept in leading-strings and afraid to walk alone. If there were +nothing but reason to dispel them, these fears might long retain their +sway over European society. But the example of a great commonwealth +flourishing here without a privileged class, and of a popular +sovereignty combining order with progress, tends, however remotely, to +break the spell. Therefore, as a class, the English nobility cannot +desire the success of your Republic. Some of the order there are who +have hearts above their coronets, as there are some kings who have +hearts above their crowns, and who in this great crisis of humanity +forget that they are noblemen, and remember that they are men. But the +order, as a whole, has been against you, and has swayed in the same +direction all who were closely connected with it or dependent on it. It +could not fail to be against you, if it was for itself. Be charitable to +the instinct of self-preservation. It is strong, sometimes violent, in +us all. + +In truth, it is rather against the Liberals of England than against you +that the feeling of our aristocracy is directed. Liberal leaders have +made your name odious by pointing to your institutions as the +condemnation of our own. They did this too indiscriminately perhaps, +while in one respect your institutions were far below our own, inasmuch +as you were a slaveholding nation. "Look," they were always saying, "at +the Model Republic,--behold its unbroken prosperity, the harmony of its +people under the system of universal suffrage, the lightness of its +taxation,--behold, above all, its immunity from war!" All this is now +turned upon us as a taunt; but the taunt implies rather a sense of +escape on the part of those who utter it than malignity, and the answer +to it is victory. + +What has been said of our territorial aristocracy may be said of our +commercial aristocracy, which is fast blending with the territorial into +a government of wealth. This again is nothing new. History can point to +more cases than one in which the sympathies of rich men have been +regulated by their riches. The Money Power has been cold to your cause +throughout Europe,--perhaps even here. In all countries great +capitalists are apt to desire that the laborer should be docile and +contented, that popular education should not be carried dangerously +high, that the right relations between capital and labor should be +maintained. The bold doctrines of the slave-owner as to "free labor and +free schools" may not be accepted in their full strength; yet they touch +a secret chord. But we have friends of the better cause among our +English capitalists as well as among our English peers. The names of Mr. +Baring and Mr. Thomas Bayley Potter are not unknown here. The course +taken by such men at this crisis is an earnest of the essential unity of +interest which underlies all class-divisions,--which, in our onward +progress toward the attainment of a real community, will survive all +class-distinctions, and terminate the conflict between capital and +labor, not by making the laborer the slave of the capitalist, nor the +capitalist the slave of the laborer, but by establishing between them +mutual good-will, founded on intelligence and justice. + +And let the upper classes of England have their due. The Lancashire +operatives have been upon the other side; yet not the less have they +received ready and generous help in their distress from all ranks and +orders in the land. + +It would be most unworthy of a student of history to preach vulgar +hatred of an historic aristocracy. The aristocracy of England has been +great in its hour, probably beneficent, perhaps indispensable to the +progress of our nation, and so to the foundation of yours. Do you wish +for your revenge upon it? The road to that revenge is sure. Succeed in +your great experiment. Show by your example, by your moderation and +self-control through this war and after its close, that it is possible +for communities, duly educated, to govern themselves without the control +of an hereditary order. The progress of opinion in England will in time +do the rest. War, forced by you upon the English nation, would only +strengthen the worst part of the English aristocracy in the worst way, +by bringing our people into collision with a Democracy, and by giving +the ascendancy, as all wars not carried on for a distinct moral object +do, to military passions over political aspirations. Our war with the +French Republic threw back our internal reforms, which till then had +been advancing, for a whole generation. Even the pockets of our +land-owners would not suffer, but gain, by the war; for their rents +would be raised by the exclusion of your corn, and the price of labor +would be lowered by the stoppage of emigration. The suffering would +fall, as usual, on the people. + +The gradual effect of your example may enable European society finally +to emerge from feudalism, in a peaceful way, without violent +revolutions. Every one who has studied history must regard violent +revolutions with abhorrence. A European Liberal ought to be less +inclined to them than ever, when he has seen America, and received from +the sight, as I think he may, a complete assurance of the future. + +I have spoken of our commercial aristocracy generally. Liverpool demands +word by itself. It is the stronghold of the Southern party in England: +from it hostile acts have proceeded, while from other quarters there +have proceeded only hostile words. There are in Liverpool men who do +honor to the name of British merchant; but the city as a whole is not +the one among all our commercial cities in which moral chivalry is most +likely to be found. In Manchester, cotton-spinning though it be, there +is much that is great,--a love of Art, displayed in public +exhibitions,--a keen interest in great political and social +questions,--literature,--even religious thought,--something of that high +aspiring spirit which made commerce noble in the old English merchant, +in the Venetian and the Florentine. In Liverpool trade reigns supreme, +and its behests, whatever they may be, are pretty sure to be eagerly +obeyed. And the source of this is to be found, perhaps, partly in the +fact that Liverpool is an old centre of the Slavery interest in England, +one of the cities which have been built with the blood of the slave. As +the great cotton port, it is closely connected with the planters by +trade,--perhaps also by many personal ties and associations. It is not +so much an English city as an offset and outpost of the South, and a +counterpart to the offsets and outposts of the South in some of your +great commercial cities here. No doubt, the shame of Liverpool Alabamas +falls on England. England must own that she has produced merchants who +disgrace their calling, contaminated by intercourse with the +slave-owner, regardless of the honor and interest of their country, +ready to plunge two kindred nations into a desolating war, if they can +only secure the profits of their own trade. England must own that she +has produced such men; but does this disgrace attach to her alone? + +The clergy of the State Church, like the aristocracy, have probably been +as a body against you in this struggle. In their case too, not hatred of +America, but the love of their own institution, is the cause. If you are +a standing menace to aristocracies, you are equally a standing menace to +State Churches. A State Church rests upon the assumption that religion +would fall, if it were not supported by the State. On this ground it is +that the European nations endure the startling anomalies of their State +Churches,--the interference of irreligious politicians in religion, the +worldliness of ambitious ecclesiastics, the denial of liberty of +conscience, the denial of truth. Therefore it is that they will see the +canker of doubt slowly eating into faith beneath the outward uniformity +of a political Church, rather than risk a change, which, as they are +taught to believe, would bring faith to a sudden end. But the success of +the voluntary system here is overthrowing this assumption. Shall I +believe that Christianity deprived of State support must fall, when I +see it without State support not only standing, but advancing with the +settler into the remotest West? Will the laity of Europe long remain +under their illusion in face of this great fact? Already the State +Churches of Europe are placed in imminent peril by the controversies +which, since religious life has reawakened among us, rend them from +within, and by their manifest inability to satisfy the craving of +society for new assurance of its faith. I cannot much blame the +High-Church bishop who goes to Lord Palmerston to ask for intervention +in company with Lord Clanricarde and Mr. Spence. You express surprise +that the son of Wilberforce is not with you; but Wilberforce was not, +like his son, a bishop of the State Church. Never in the whole course of +history has the old order of things yielded without a murmur to the new. +You share the fate of all innovators: your innovations are not received +with favor by the powers which they threaten ultimately to sweep away. + +To come from our aristocracy and landed gentry to our middle class. We +subdivide the middle class into upper and lower. The upper middle class, +comprising the wealthier tradesmen, forms a sort of minor aristocracy in +itself, with a good deal of aristocratic feeling towards those beneath +it. It is not well educated, for it will not go to the common schools, +and it has few good private schools of its own; consequently, it does +not think deeply on great political questions. It is at present very +wealthy; and wealth, as you know, does not always produce high moral +sentiment. It is not above a desire to be on the genteel side. It is not +free from the worship of Aristocracy. That worship is rooted in the +lower part of our common nature. Is fibres extend beyond the soil of +England, beyond the soil of Europe. America has been much belied, if she +is entirely free from this evil, if there are not here also men careful +of class-distinctions, of a place in fashionable society, of factitious +rank which parodies the aristocracy of the Old World. There is in the +Anglo-Saxon character a strange mixture of independence and servility. +In that long course of concessions by which your politicians +strove--happily for the world and for yourselves they strove in vain--to +conciliate the slave owning aristocracy of the South, did not something +of social servility mingle with political fear? + +In the lower middle class religious Non-Conformity prevails; and the +Free Churches of our Non-Conformists are united by a strong bond of +sympathy with the Churches under the voluntary system here. They are +perfectly stanch on the subject of Slavery, and so far as this war has +been a struggle against that institution, it may, I think, be +confidently said that the hearts of this great section of our people +have been upon your side. Our Non-Conformist ministers came forward, as +you are aware, in large numbers, to join with the ministers of +Protestant Churches on the Continent in an Anti-Slavery address to your +Government and people. + +And as to the middle classes generally, upper or lower, I see no reason +to think that they are wanting in good-will to this country, much less +that they desire that any calamity should befall it. The journals which +I take to be the chief organs of the upper middle class, if they have +not been friendly, have been hostile not so much to the American people +as to the war. And in justice to all classes of Englishmen, it must be +remembered that hatred of the war is not hatred of the American people. +No one hated the war at its commencement more heartily than I did. I +hated it more heartily than ever after Bull Run, when, by the accounts +which reached England, the character of this nation seemed to have +completely broken down. I believed as fully as any one, that the task +which you had undertaken was hopeless, and that you were rushing on your +ruin. I dreaded the effect on your Constitution, fearing, as others did, +that civil war would bring you to anarchy, and anarchy to military +despotism. All historical precedents conspired to lead me to this +belief. I did not know--for there was no example to teach me--the power +of a really united people, the adamantine strength of institutions which +were truly free. Watching the course of events with an open mind, and a +deep interest, such as men at a distance can seldom be brought to feel, +in the fortunes of this country, I soon revised my opinion. Yet, many +times I desponded, and wished with all my heart that you would save the +Border States, if you could, and let the rest go. Numbers of +Englishmen,--Englishmen of all classes and parties,--who thought as I +did at the outset, remain rooted in this opinion. They still sincerely +believe that this is a hopeless war, which can lead to nothing but waste +of blood, subversion of your laws and liberties, and the destruction of +your own prosperity and that of the nations whose interests are bound up +with yours. This belief they maintain with as little of ill-feeling +towards you as men can have towards those who obstinately disregard +their advice. And, after all, though you may have found the wisest as +well as the bravest counsellors in your own hearts, he need not be your +enemy who somewhat timidly counsels you against civil war. Civil war is +a terrible thing,--terrible in the passions which it kindles, as well as +in the blood which it sheds,--terrible in its present effects, and +terrible in those which it leaves behind. It can be justified only by +the complete victory of the good cause. And Englishmen, at the +commencement of this civil war, if they were wrong in thinking the +victory of the good cause hopeless, were not wrong in thinking it +remote. They were not wrong in thinking it far more remote than you did. +Years of struggle, of fear, of agony, of desolated homes, have passed +since your statesmen declared that a few months would bring the +Rebellion to an end. In justice to our people, put the question to +yourselves,--if at the outset the veil which hid the future could have +been withdrawn, and the conflict which really awaited you, with all its +vicissitudes, its disasters, its dangers, its sacrifices, could have +been revealed to your view, would you have gone into the war? To us, +looking with anxious, but less impassioned eyes, the veil was half +withdrawn, and we shrank back from the prospect which was revealed. It +was well for the world, perhaps, that you were blind; but it was +pardonable in us to see. + +We now come to the working-men of England, the main body of our people, +whose sympathy you would not the less prize, and whom you would not the +less shrink from assailing without a cause, because at present the +greater part of them are without political power,--at least of a direct +kind. I will not speak of the opinions of our peasantry, for they have +none. Their thoughts are never turned to a political question. They +never read a newspaper. They are absorbed in the struggle for daily +bread, of which they have barely enough for themselves and their +children. Their condition, in spite of all the benevolent effort that is +abroad among us, is the great blot of our social system. Perhaps, if the +relation between the two countries remains kindly, the door of hope may +be opened to them here; and hands now folded helplessly in English +poor-houses may joyfully reap the harvests of Iowa and Wisconsin. +Assuredly, they bear you no ill-will. If they could comprehend the +meaning of this struggle, their hearts as well as their interests would +be upon your side. But it is not in them, it is in the working-men of +our cities, that the intelligence of the class resides. And the sympathy +of the working-men of our cities, from the moment when the great issue +between Free Labor and Slavery was fairly set before them, has been +shown in no doubtful form. They have followed your wavering fortunes +with eyes almost as keen and hearts almost as anxious as your own. They +have thronged the meetings held by the Union and Emancipation Societies +of London and Manchester to protest before the nation in favor of your +cause. Early in the contest they filled to overflowing Exeter Hall, the +largest place of meeting in London. I was present at another immense +meeting of them, held by their Trades Unions in London, where they were +addressed by Mr. Bright; and had you witnessed the intelligence and +enthusiasm with which they followed the exposition of your case by their +great orator, you would have known that you were not without sympathy in +England,--not without sympathy such as those who look rather to the +worth of a friend than to his rank may most dearly prize. Again I was +present at a great meeting called in the Free-Trade Hall at Manchester +to protest against the attacks upon your commerce, and saw the same +enthusiasm displayed by the working-men of the North. But Mr. Ward +Beecher must have brought back with him abundant assurance of the +feelings of our working-men. Our opponents have tried to rival us in +these demonstrations. They have tried with great resources of personal +influence and wealth. But, in spite of their personal influence and the +distress caused by the cotton famine, they have on the whole signally +failed. Their consolation has been to call the friends of the Federal +cause obscurities and nobodies. And true it is that the friends of the +Federal cause are obscurities and nobodies. They are the untitled and +undistinguished mass of the English people. + +The leaders of our working-men, the popular chiefs of the day, the men +who represent the feelings and interests of the masses, and whose names +are received with ringing cheers wherever the masses are assembled, are +Cobden and Bright. And Cobden and Bright have not left you in doubt of +the fact that they and all they represent are on your side. + +I need not say,--for you have shown that you know it well,--that, as +regards the working-men of our cotton-factories, this sympathy was an +offering to your cause as costly as it was sincere. Your civil war +paralyzed their industry, brought ruin into their houses, deprived them +and their families not only of bread, but, so far as their vision +extended, of the hope of bread. Yet they have not wavered in their +allegiance to the Right. Your slave-owning aristocracy had made up their +minds that chivalry was confined to aristocracies, and that over the +vulgar souls of the common people Cotton must be King. The working-man +of Manchester, though he lives not like a Southern gentleman by the +sweat of another's brow, but like a plebeian by the sweat of his own, +has shown that chivalry is not confined to aristocracies, and that even +over vulgar souls Cotton is not always King. I heard one of your +statesmen the other day, after speaking indignantly of those who had +fitted out the Alabama, pray God to bless the working-men of England. +Our nation, like yours, is not a single body animated by the same +political sentiments, but a mixed mass of contending interests and +parties. Beware how you fire into that mass, or your shot may strike a +friend. + +When England in the mass is spoken of as your enemy on this occasion, +the London "Times" is taken for the voice of the country. The "Times" +was in former days a great popular organ. It led vehemently and even +violently the struggle for Parliamentary Reform. In that way it made its +fortune; and having made its fortune, it takes part with the rich. Its +proprietor in those days was a man with many faults, but he was a man of +the people. Aristocratic society disliked and excluded him; he lived at +war with it to the end. Affronted by the Whigs, he became in a certain +sense a Tory; but he united his Toryism with Chartism, and was sent to +Parliament for Nottingham by Tories and Chartists combined. The +opposition of his journal to our New Poor-Law evinced, though in a +perverse way, his feeling for the people. But his heir, the present +proprietor, was born in the purple. He is a wealthy landed gentleman. He +sits in Parliament for a constituency of landlords. He is thought to +have been marked out for a peerage. It is accusing him of no crime to +suppose, that, so far as he controls the "Times," it takes the bias of +his class, and that its voice, if it speaks his sentiments, is not that +of the English people, but of a rich conservative squire. + +The editor is distinct from the proprietor, but his connections are +perhaps still more aristocratic. A good deal has been said among us of +late about his position. Before his time our journalism was not only +anonymous, but impersonal. The journalist wore the mask not only to +those whom he criticized, but to all the world. The present editor of +the "Times" wears the mask to the objects of his criticism, but drops +it, as has been remarked in Parliament, in "the gilded saloons" of rank +and power. Not content to remain in the privacy which protected the +independence of his predecessors, he has come forth in his own person to +receive the homage of the great world. That homage has been paid in no +stinted measure, and, as the British public has been apprised in rather +a startling manner, with a somewhat intoxicating effect. The lords of +the Money Power, the thrones and dominions of Usury, have shown +themselves as assiduous as ministers and peers; and these potentates +happen, like the aristocracy, to be unfriendly to your cause. Caressed +by peers and millionnaires, the editor of the "Times" could hardly fail +to express the feelings of peers and millionnaires towards a Republic in +distress. We may be permitted to think that he has rather overacted his +part. English peers, after all, are English gentlemen; and no English +gentleman would deliberately sanction the torrent of calumny and insult +which the "Times" has poured upon this nation. There are penalties for +common offenders: there are none for those who scatter firebrands among +nations. But the "Times" will not come off unscathed. It must veer with +victory. And its readers will be not only prejudiced, but idiotic, if it +does not in the process leave the last remnant of its authority behind. + +Two things will suffice to mark the real political position of the +"Times." You saw that a personal controversy was going on the other day +between its editor and Mr. Cobden. That controversy arose out of a +speech made by Mr. Bright, obliquely impugning the aristocratic law of +inheritance, which is fast accumulating the land of England in a few +hands, and disinheriting the English people of the English soil. For +this offence Mr. Bright was assailed by the "Times" with calumnies so +outrageous that Mr. Cobden could not help springing forward to vindicate +his friend. The institution which the "Times" so fiercely defended on +this occasion against a look which threatened it with alteration is +vital and sacred in the eyes of the aristocracy, but is not vital or +sacred in the eyes of the whole English nation. Again, the "Times" hates +Garibaldi; and its hatred, generally half smothered, broke out in a loud +cry of exultation when the hero fell, as it hoped forever, at +Aspromonte. But the English people idolize Garibaldi, and receive him +with a burst of enthusiasm unexampled in fervor. The English people love +Garibaldi, and Garibaldi's name is equally dear to all American hearts. +Is not this--let me ask in passing--a proof that there is a bond of +sympathy, after all, between the English people and you, and that, if as +a nation we are divided from you, it is not by a radical estrangement, +but by some cloud of error which will in time pass away? + +The wealth of the "Times," the high position which it has held since +the period when it was the great Liberal journal, the clever writing and +the early intelligence which its money and its secret connections with +public men enable it to command, give it a circulation and an influence +beyond the class whose interests it represents. But it has been thrust +from a large part of its dominion by the cheap London and local press. +It is exceeded in circulation more than twofold by the London +"Telegraph," a journal which, though it has been against the war, has, I +think, by no means shown in its leading articles the same spirit of +hostility to the American people. The London "Star," which is strongly +Federal, is also a journal of wide circulation. The "Daily News" is a +high-priced paper, circulating among the same class as the "Times"; its +circulation is comparatively small, but it is on the increase, and the +journal, I have reason to believe, is prosperous. The Manchester +"Examiner and Times," again,--a great local paper of the North of +England,--nearly equals the London "Times" in circulation, and is +favorable to your cause. I live under the dominion of the London +"Times," and I will not deny that it is a great power of evil. It will +be a great power of evil indeed, if it succeeds in producing a fatal +estrangement between two kindred nations. But no one who knows England, +especially the northern part of England, in which Liberalism prevails, +would imagine the voice of the "Times" to be that of the English people. + +Of the part taken by the writers of England it would be rash to speak in +general terms, Stuart Mill and Cairns have supported your cause as +heartily as Cobden and Bright. I am not aware that any political or +economical writer of equal eminence has taken the other side. The +leading reviews and periodicals have exhibited, as might have been +expected, very various shades of opinion; but, with the exception of the +known organs of violent Toryism, they have certainly not breathed hatred +of this nation. In those which specially represent our rising intellect, +the intellect which will probably govern us ten years hence, I should +say the preponderance of the writing had been on the Federal side. In +the University of Oxford the sympathies of the High-Church clergy and of +the young Tory gentry are with the South; but there is a good deal of +Northern sentiment among the young fellows of our more liberal colleges, +and generally in the more active minds. At the University Debating Club, +when the question between the North and the South was debated, the vote, +though I believe in a thin house, was in favor of the North. Four +Professors are members of the Union and Emancipation Society. And if +intellect generally has been somewhat coldly critical, I am not sure +that it has departed from its true function. I am conscious myself that +I may be somewhat under the dominion of my feelings, that I may be even +something of a fanatic in this matter. There may be evil as well as good +in the cause which, as the good preponderates, claims and receives the +allegiance of my heart. In that case, intellect, in pointing out the +evil, only does its duty. + +One English writer has certainly raised his voice against you with +characteristic vehemence and rudeness. As an historical painter and a +humorist Carlyle has scarcely an equal: a new intellectual region seemed +to open to me when I read his "French Revolution." But his philosophy, +in its essential principle, is false. He teaches that the mass of +mankind are fools,--that the hero alone is wise,--that the hero, +therefore, is the destined master of his fellow-men, and that their only +salvation lies in blind submission to his rule,--and this without +distinction of time or circumstance, in the most advanced as well as in +the most primitive ages of the world. The hero-despot can do no wrong. +He is a king, with scarcely even a God above him; and if the moral law +happens to come into collision with his actions, so much the worse for +the moral law. On this theory, a Commonwealth such as yours ought not +to exist; and you must not be surprised, if, in a fit of spleen, the +great cynic grasps his club and knocks your cause on the head, as he +thinks, with a single blow. Here is the end of an unsound, though +brilliant theory,--a theory which had always latent in it the worship of +force and fraud, and which has now displayed its tendency at once in the +portentous defence of the robber-policy of Frederic the Great and in the +portentous defence of the Slave Power. An opposite theory of human +society is, in fact, finding its confirmation in these events,--that +which tells us that we all have need of each other, and that the goal +towards which society actually moves is not an heroic despotism, but a +real community, in which each member shall contribute his gifts and +faculties to the common store, and the common government shall become +the work of all. For, if the victory in this struggle has been won, it +has been won, not by a man, but by the nation; and that it has been won +not by a man, but by the nation, is your glory and the pledge of your +salvation. We have called for a Cromwell, and he has not come; he has +not come, partly because Cromwells are scarce, partly, perhaps, because +the personal Cromwell belonged to a different age, and the Cromwell of +this age is an intelligent, resolute, and united people. + +I might mention other eccentricities of opinion quite distinct from the +general temper of the English nation, such as that of the +ultra-scientific school, which thinks it unscientific philanthropy to +ascribe the attributes of humanity to the negro,--a school some of the +more rampant absurdities of which had, just before I left England, +called down the rebuke of real science in the person of Mr. Huxley. And +I might note, if the time would allow, many fluctuations and +oscillations which have taken place among our organs of opinion as the +struggle went on. But I must say on the whole, both with reference to +our different classes and with reference to our literature, that, +considering the complexity of the case, the distance from which our +people viewed it, and the changes which it has undergone since the war +broke out, I do not think there is much room for disappointment as to +the sympathies of our people. Parties have been divided on this question +much as they are on great questions among ourselves, and much as they +were in the time of Charles I., when this long strife began. The England +of Charles and Laud has been against you: the England of Hampden, +Milton, and Cromwell has in the main been on your side. + +I say there has not been much ground for disappointment: I do not say +there has been none. England at present is not in her noblest mood. She +is laboring under a reaction which extends over France and great part of +Europe, and which furnishes the key at this moment to the state of +European affairs. This movement, like all great movements, reactionary +or progressive, is complex in its nature. In the political sphere it +presents itself as the lassitude and despondency which, as usual, have +ensued after great political efforts, such as were made by the +Continental nations in the abortive revolutions of 1848, and by England +in a less degree in the struggle for Parliamentary Reform. In the +religious sphere it presents itself in an analogous shape: there, +lassitude and despondency have succeeded to the efforts of the religious +intellect to escape from the decaying creeds of the old State Churches +and push forward to a more enduring faith; and the priest as well as the +despot has for a moment resumed his sway--though not his uncontested +sway--over our weariness and our fears. The moral sentiment, after high +tension, has undergone a corresponding relaxation. All liberal measures +are for the time at a discount. The Bill for the Abolition of +Church-Rates, once carried in the House of Commons by large majorities, +is now lost. The nominal leaders of the Liberal party themselves have +let their principles fall into abeyance, and almost coalesced with their +Tory opponents. The Whig nobles who carried the Reform Bill have owned +once more the bias of their order, and become determined, though covert, +enemies of Reform. The ancient altars are sought again for the sake of +peace by fainting spirits and perplexed minds; and again, as after our +Reformation, as after our great Revolution, we see a number of +conversions to the Church of Rome. On the other hand, strange physical +superstitions, such as mesmerism and spirit-rapping, have crept, like +astrology under the Roman Empire, into the void left by religious faith. +Wealth has been pouring into England, and luxury with wealth. Our public +journals proclaim, as you may perhaps have seen, that the society of our +capital is unusually corrupt. The comic as well as the serious signs of +the reaction appear everywhere. A tone of affected cynicism pervades a +portion of our high intellect; and a pretended passion for +prize-fighting shows that men of culture are weary of civilization, and +wish to go back to barbarism for a while. The present head of the +Government in England is not only the confederate, but the counterpart, +of the head of the French Empire; and the rule of each denotes the +temporary ascendancy of the same class of motives in their respective +nations. An English Liberal is tempted to despond, when he compares the +public life of England in the time of Pym and Hampden with our public +life now. But there is greatness still in the heart of the English +nation. + +And you, too, have you not known in the course of your history a +slack-tide of faith, a less aspiring hour? Have not you, too, known a +temporary ascendancy of material over spiritual interests, a lowering of +the moral tone, a readiness, for the sake of ease and peace and secure +enjoyment, to compromise with evil? Have not you, too, felt the tyranny +of wealth, putting the higher motives for a moment under its feet? What +else has brought these calamities upon you? What else bowed your necks +to the yoke which you are now breaking at so great a cost? Often and +long in the life of every nation, though the tide is still advancing, +the wave recedes. Often and long the fears of man overcome his hopes; +but in the end the hopes of man overcome his fears. Your regeneration, +when it is achieved, will set forward the regeneration of the European +nations. It is the function which all nations, which all men, in their +wavering progress towards perfection, perform in turn for each other. + +This temporary lowering of the moral tone in English society has +extended to the question of Slavery. It has deadened our feelings on +that subject, though I hope without shaking our principles. You ask +whether England can have been sincere in her enmity to Slavery, when she +refuses sympathy to you in your struggle with the Slave Power. +Talleyrand, cynic as he was, knew that she was sincere, though he said +that not a man in France thought so but himself. She redeemed her own +slaves with a great price. She sacrificed her West-Indian interest. She +counts that achievement higher than her victories. She spends annually +much money and many lives and risks much enmity in her crusade against +the slave-trade. When your Southern statesmen have tried to tamper with +her, they have found her true. If they had bid us choose between a +concession to their designs and war, all aristocratic as we are, we +should have chosen war. Every Englishman who takes the Southern side is +compelled by public opinion to preface his advocacy with a disclaimer of +all sympathy with Slavery. The agent of the slave-owners in England, Mr. +Spence, pleads their cause to the English people on the ground of +gradual emancipation. Once the "Times" ventured to speak in defence of +Slavery, and the attempt was never made again. The principle, I say, +holds firm among the mass of the people; but on this, as on other moral +questions, we are not in our noblest mood. + +In justice to my country, however, let me remind you that you did +not--perhaps you could not--set the issue between Freedom and Slavery +plainly before us at the outset; you did not--perhaps you could +not--set it plainly before yourselves. With the progress of the struggle +your convictions have been strengthened, and the fetters of legal +restriction have been smitten off by the hammer of war. But your rulers +began with disclaimers of Anti-Slavery designs. You cannot be surprised, +if our people took your rulers at their word, or if, notwithstanding +your change,--a change which they imagined to be wrought merely by +expediency,--they retained their first impression as to the object of +the war, an impression which the advocates of the South used every art +to perpetuate in their minds. That the opponents of Slavery in England +should desire the restoration of the Union with Slavery, and with +Slavery strengthened, as they expected it would be, by new concessions, +was what you could not reasonably expect. And remember--I say it not +with any desire to trench on American politics or to pass judgment on +American parties--that the restoration of the Union with Slavery is what +a large section of your people, and one of the candidates for your +Presidency, are in fact ready to embrace now. + +Had you been able to say plainly at the outset that you were fighting +against Slavery, the English people would scarcely have given ear to the +cunning fiction of Mr. Spence. It would scarcely have been brought to +believe that this great contest was only about a Tariff. It would have +seen that the Southern planter, if he was a Free-Trader, was a +Free-Trader not from enlightenment, but because from the degradation of +labor in his dominions he had no manufactures to support; and that he +was in fact a protectionist of his only home production which feared +competition,--the home-bred slave. I have heard Mr. Spence's book called +the most successful lie in history. Very successful it certainly was, +and its influence in misleading England ought not to be overlooked. It +was written with great skill, and it came out just at the right time, +before people had formed their opinions, and when they were glad to have +a theory presented to their minds. But its success would have been +short-lived, had it not received what seemed authoritative confirmation +from the language of statesmen here. + +I might mention many other things which have influenced opinion in the +wrong way: the admiration felt by our people, and, to your honor, +equally felt by you, for the valor and self-devotion which have been +shown by the Southerners, and which, when they have submitted to the +law, will entitle them to be the fellow-citizens of freemen; a careless, +but not ungenerous, sympathy for that which, by men ignorant of the +tremendous strength of a Slave Power, was taken to be the weaker side; +the doubt really, and, considering the conflict of opinion here, not +unpardonably, entertained as to the question of State Sovereignty and +the right of Secession. All these motives, though they operate against +your cause, are different from hatred of you. But there are two points +to which in justice to my country I must especially call attention. + +The first is this,--that you have not yourselves been of one mind in +this matter, nor has the voice of your own people been unanimous. No +English speaker or journal has denounced the war or reviled the conduct +of your Government more bitterly than a portion of American politicians +and a section of the American press. The worst things said in England of +your statesmen, of your generals, of your armies, of your contractors, +of your social state and character as a people, have been but the echo +of things which have been said here. If the New-York correspondents of +some English journals have been virulent and calumnious, their virulence +and their calumnies have been drawn, to a great extent, from the +American circles in which they have lived. No slanders poured by English +ignorance or malevolence on American society have been so foul as those +which came from a renegade American writing in one of our Tory journals +under the name of "Manhattan." No lamentations over the subversion of +the Constitution and the destruction of personal liberty have been +louder than those of your own Opposition. The chief enemies of your +honor have been those of your own household. The crime of a great mass +of our people against you has, in fact, consisted in believing +statements about America made by men whom they knew to be Americans, and +did not know to be disloyal to the cause of their country. I have seen +your soldiers described in an extract from one of your own journals as +jail-birds, vagabonds, and foreigners. I have seen your President +accused of wishing to provoke riots in New York that he might have a +pretence for exercising military power. I have seen him accused of +sending to the front, to be thinned, a regiment which was likely to vote +against him. I have seen him accused of decoying his political opponents +into forging soldiers' votes in order to discredit them. What could the +"Times" itself say more? + +The second point is this. Some of your journals did their best to +prevent our people from desiring your success by declaring that your +success would be followed by aggression on us. The drum, like strong +wine, is apt to get into weak heads, especially when they are +unaccustomed to the sound. An Englishman coming among you is soon +assured that you do not wish to attack Canada. Apart from considerations +of morality and honor, he finds every man of sense here aware that +extent of territory is your danger, if you wish to be one nation,--and +further, that freedom of development, and not procrustean +centralization, is the best thing for the New as well as for the Old +World. But the mass of our people have not been among you; nor do they +know that the hot words sedulously repeated to them by our Southern +press are not authentic expressions of your designs. They are doubly +mistaken,--mistaken both in thinking that you wish to seize Canada, and +in thinking that a division of the Union into two hostile nations, which +would compel you to keep a standing army, would render you less +dangerous to your neighbors. But your own demagogues are the authors of +the error; and the Monroe doctrine and the Ostend manifesto are still +ringing in our ears. I am an adherent of the Monroe doctrine, if it +means, as it did on the lips of Canning, that the reactionary influence +of the old European Governments is not to be allowed to mar the hopes of +man in the New World; but if it means violence, every one must be +against it who respects the rights of nations. When you contrast the +feelings of England towards you with those of other nations, Italy for +example, you must remember that Italy has no Canada. I hope Canada will +soon cease to be a cause of mistrust between us. The political dominion +of England over it, since it has had a free constitution of its own, has +dwindled to a mere thread. It is as ripe to be a nation as these +Colonies were on the eve of the American Revolution. As a dependency, it +is of no solid value to England since she has ceased to engross the +Colonial trade. It distracts her forces, and prevents her from acting +with her full weight in the affairs of her own quarter of the world. It +belongs in every sense to America, not to Europe; and its peculiar +institutions--its extended suffrage, its freedom from the hereditary +principle, its voluntary system in religion, its common schools--are +opposed to those of England, and identical with those of the neighboring +States. All this the English nation is beginning to feel; and it has +tried in the case of the Ionian Islands the policy of moderation, and +found that it raises, instead of lowering, our solid reputation and our +real power. The confederation which is now in course of formation +between the North-American Colonies tends manifestly to a further +change; it tends to a further change all the more manifestly because +such a tendency is anxiously disclaimed. Yes, Canada will soon cease to +trouble and divide us. But while it is England's, it is England's; and +to threaten her with an attack on it is to threaten a proud nation with +outrage and an assault upon its honor. + +Finally, if our people have misconstrued your acts, let me conjure you +to make due allowance for our ignorance,--an ignorance which, in many +cases, is as dark as night, but which the progress of events here begins +gloriously to dispel. We are not such a nation of travellers as you are, +and scarcely one Englishman has seen America for a hundred Americans +that have seen England. "Why does not Beauregard fly to the assistance +of Lee?" said a highly educated Englishman to an American in England. +"Because," was the reply, "the distance is as great as it is from Rome +to Paris." If these three thousand miles of ocean that lie between us +could be removed for a few days, and the two great branches of the +Anglo-Saxon race could look each other in the face, and speak their +minds to each other, there would be an end, I believe, of all these +fears. When an Englishman and an American meet, in this country or in +England, they are friends, notwithstanding all that has passed; why not +the two nations? + +I have not presumed, and shall not presume, to touch on any question +that has arisen or may arise between the Executive Government of my +country and the Executive Government of yours. In England, Liberals have +not failed to plead for justice to you, and, as we thought, at the same +time, for the maintenance of English honor. But I will venture to make, +in conclusion, one or two brief remarks as to the general temper in +which these questions should be viewed. + +In the first place, when great and terrible issues hang upon our acts, +perhaps upon our words, let us control our fancies and distinguish +realities from fictions. There hangs over every great struggle, and +especially over every civil war, a hot and hazy atmosphere of excited +feeling which is too apt to distort all objects to the view. In the +French Revolution, men were suspected of being objects of suspicion, and +sent to the guillotine for that offence. The same feverish and delirious +fancies prevailed as to the conduct of other nations. All the most +natural effects of a violent revolution--the depreciation of the +assignats, the disturbance of trade, the consequent scarcity of +food--were ascribed by frantic rhetoricians to the guineas of Pitt, +whose very limited amount of secret-service money was quite inadequate +to the performance of such wonders. When a foreign nation has given +offence, it is turned by popular imagination into a fiend, and its +fiendish influence is traced with appalling clearness in every natural +accident that occurs. I have heard England accused of having built the +Chicago Wigwam, with the building of which she had as much to do as with +the building of the Great Pyramid. I have heard it insinuated that her +policy was governed by her share in the Confederate Cotton-Loan. The +Confederate Cotton-Loan is, I believe, four millions and a half. There +is an English nobleman whose estates are reputed to be worth a larger +sum. "She is very great," says a French writer, "that odious England." +Odious she may be, but she is great,--too great to be bribed to baseness +by a paltry fee. + +In the second place, let us distinguish hostile acts, of which an +account must of course be demanded, from mere words, which great +nations, secure of their greatness, may afford to let pass. Your +President knows the virtue of silence; but silence is so little the +system on either side of the water, that in the general flux of rhetoric +some rash things are sure to be said. One of our statesmen, while +starring it in the Provinces, carelessly throws out the expression that +Jeff Davis has made the South a nation; another says that you are +fighting for Empire, and the South for Independence. Our Prime-Minister +is sometimes offensive in his personal bearing towards you,--as, to our +bitter cost, he has often been towards other nations. On the other hand, +your statesmen have said hard things of England; and one of your +ambassadors to a great Continental state published, not in his private, +but in his official capacity, language which made the Northern party in +England for a moment hang their heads with shame. A virulence, +discreditable to England, has at times broken forth in our House of +Commons,--as a virulence, not creditable to this country, has at times +broken forth in your Congress. But what has the House of Commons done? +Threatening motions were announced in favor of Recognition,--in defence +of the Confederate rams. They were all set aside by the good sense of +the House and of the nation. It ended in a solemn farce,--in the +question being put very formally to the Government whether it intended +to recognize the Confederate States, to which the Government replied +that it did not. + +And when the actions of our Government are in question, fair allowance +must be made for the bad state of International Law. The very term +itself is, in fact, as matters at present stand, a dangerous fiction. +There can be no law, in a real sense, where there is no law-giver, no +tribunal, no power of giving legal effect to a sentence,--but where the +party on whose side the law is held to be must after all be left to do +himself right with the strong hand. And one consequence is that +governments are induced to rest in narrow technicalities, and to be +ruled by formal precedents, when the question ought to be decided on the +broadest grounds of right. The decision of Lord Stowell, for example, +that it is lawful for the captor to burn an enemy's vessel at sea rather +than suffer her to escape, though really applying only to a case of +special necessity, has been supposed to cover a system of burning prizes +at sea, which is opposed to the policy and sentiment of all civilized +nations, and which Lord Stowell never could have had in view. And it +must be owned that this war, unexampled in all respects, has been +fruitful of novel questions respecting belligerent rights, on which a +Government meaning no evil might easily be led astray. Among its results +we may hope that this revolution will give birth to a better system of +International Law. Would there were reason to hope that it might lead to +the erection of some high tribunal of justice among nations to supersede +forever the dreadful and uncertain ordeal of war! Has the Government of +England, in any case where your right was clear, really done you a +wrong? If it has, I trust that the English nation, temperately and +respectfully approached, as a proud nation requires to be, will surely +constrain its Government to make the reparation which becomes its honor. + +But let it not be forgotten, that, in the worst of times, at the moment +of your lowest depression, England has refused to recognize the +Confederate States, or in any way to interfere in their behalf; and that +the steadiness of this refusal has driven the Confederate envoy, Mr. +Mason, to seek what he deems a more hospitable shore. The inducement of +cotton for our idle looms and our famishing people has been a strong one +to our statesmen as well as to our people, and the Tempter has been at +their side. Despotism, like Slavery, is necessarily propagandist. It +cannot bear the contagion, it cannot bear the moral rebuke, of +neighboring freedom. The new French satrapy in Mexico needs some more +congenial and some weaker neighbor than the United Republic, and we have +had more than one intimation that this need is felt. + +And this suggests one closing word as to our blockade-running. Nothing +done on our side, I should think, can have been more galling, as nothing +has been so injurious to your success. For myself, in common with all +who think as I do on these questions, I abhor the blockade-runners; I +heartily wish that the curse of ill-gotten gain may rest on every piece +of gold they make; and never did I feel less proud of my country than +when, on my way hither, I saw those vessels in Halifax sheltered under +English guns. But blockade-running is the law; it is the test, in fact, +of an effective blockade. And Englishmen are the blockade-runners, not +because England as a nation is your enemy, but because her merchants are +more adventurous and her seamen more daring than those of any nation but +your own. You, I suspect, would not be the least active of +blockade-runners, if we were carrying on a blockade. The nearness of our +fortresses at Halifax and Nassau to your shores, which makes them the +haunt of blockade-runners, is not the result of malice, but of +accident,--of most unhappy accident, as I believe. We have not planted +them there for this purpose. They have come down to us among the general +inheritance of an age of conquest, when aggression was thought to be +strength and glory,--when all kings and nations were alike +rapacious,--and when the prize remained with us, not because we were +below our neighbors in morality, but because we were more resolute in +council and mightier in arms. Our conquering hour was yours. You, too, +were then English citizens. You welcomed the arms of Cromwell to +Jamaica. Your hearts thrilled at the tidings of Blenheim and Ramillies, +and exulted in the thunders of Chatham. You shared the laurels and the +conquests of Wolfe. For you and with you we overthrew France and Spain +upon this continent, and made America the land of the Anglo-Saxon +race. Halifax will share the destinies of the North-American +confederation,--destinies, as I said before, not alien to yours. Nassau +is an appendage to our West-Indian possessions. Those possessions are +and have long been, and been known to every reasoning Englishman to be, +a mere burden to us. But we have been bound in honor and humanity to +protect our emancipated slaves from a danger which lay near. An ocean of +changed thought and feeling has rolled over the memory of this nation +within the last three years. You forget that but yesterday you were the +Great Slave Power. + +You, till yesterday, were the great Slave Power. And England, with all +her faults and shortcomings, was the great enemy of slavery. Therefore +the slave-owners who had gained possession of your Government hated her, +insulted her, tried to embroil you with her. They represented her, and I +trust not without truth, as restlessly conspiring against the existence +of their great institution. They labored, not in vain, to excite your +jealousy of her maritime ambition, when, in enforcing the right of +search and striving to put down the slave-trade, she was really obeying +her conscience and the conscience of mankind. They bore themselves +towards her in these controversies as they bore themselves towards +you,--as their character compels them to bear themselves towards all +whom they have to deal. Living in their own homes above law, the +proclaimed doctrines of lawless aggression which alarmed and offended +not England alone, but every civilized nation. And this, as I trust and +believe, has been the main cause of the estrangement between us, so far +as it has been an estrangement between the nations, not merely between +certain sections and classes. It is a cause which will henceforth +operate no more. A Scandinavian hero, as the Norse legend tells, waged a +terrible combat through a whole night with the dead body of his +brother-in-arms, animated by a Demon; but with the morning the Demon +fled. + +Other thoughts crowd upon my mind,--thoughts of what the two nations +have been to each other in the past, thoughts of what they may yet be to +each other in the future. But these thoughts will rise in other minds as +well as in mine, if they are not stifled by the passion of the hour. If +there is any question to be settled between us, let us settle it without +disparagement to the just claims or the honor of either party, yet, if +possible, as kindred nations. For if we do not, our posterity will curse +us. A century hence, the passions which caused the quarrel will be dead, +the black record of the quarrel will survive and be detested. Do what we +will now, we shall not cancel the tie of blood, nor prevent it from +hereafter asserting its undying power. The Englishmen of this day will +not prevent those who come after them from being proud of England's +grandest achievement, the sum of all her noblest victories,--the +foundation of this the great Commonwealth of the New World. And you will +not prevent the hearts of your children's children from turning to the +birth-place of their nation, the land of their history and of their +early greatness, the land which holds the august monuments of your +ancient race, the works of your illustrious fathers, and their graves. + + GOLDWIN SMITH. + + + + +WE ARE A NATION. + + +The great national triumph we have just achieved renders that foggy and +forlorn Second Tuesday of November the most memorable day of this most +memorable year of the war. Under the heavy curtain of mist that brooded +low over the scene, under the sombre clouds of uncertainty that hung +drizzling and oppressive above the whole land, was enacted a drama whose +grandeur has not been surpassed in history. The deep significance of +that event it is not easy for the mind to fathom. As the accumulating +majorities for the Union came rolling in, like billows succeeding +billows, heaping up the waters of victory, it was not alone the ship of +state that was lifted bodily over the bar, but all her costly freight of +human liberties and human hopes was upborne, and floated some leagues +onward towards the fair haven of the Future. + +The first uprising of the nation, when its existence was assailed, was +truly a sublime spectacle. But the last uprising of the same, to confirm +with cool deliberation the judgment it pronounced in its heat, is a +spectacle of far higher moral sublimity. That sudden wildfire-blaze of +patriotism, if it was simply a blaze, had long since had time to expire. +The Red Sea we had passed through was surely sufficient to quench any +light flame kindled merely in the leaves and brushwood of our national +character. Instead of a brisk and easy conquest of a rash rebellion, +such as seemed at first to be pretty generally anticipated, we had +closed with a powerful antagonist in a struggle which was all the more +terrible because it was unforeseen. The country had soon digested its +hot cakes of enthusiasm, and come to the tougher article, the +ostrich-diet of iron determination. If we were a race of flunkies, ample +opportunities had been afforded to have our flunky-ism whipped out of +us. If Jonathan was but another blustering Sir Andrew Aguecheek, he +would long before have elicited laughter from the world's aristocratic +dress-circle, and split the ears of the groundlings, by turning from the +foe that would fight, and bellowing forth that worthy gentleman's +sentiments:--"An I thought he had been valiant, and so cunning in fence, +I'd have seen him damned ere I'd have challenged him!" But those who +looked hopefully for this conclusion have been disappointed. Even Mr. +Carlyle may now perceive that we have something more than a foul chimney +burning itself out over here:--strange that a seer should thus mistake +the glare of a mountain-torch! We have not made war from a mere +ebullition of spite, or as an experiment, or for any base and temporary +purpose; but this is a war for humanity, and for all time. That we are +in deadly earnest, that the heart of the nation is in it, and that this +is no effervescent and fickle heart, the momentous Tuesday stands before +the world as the final proof. + +True, in that day's winnowing of the national grain, which had been +some four years threshing, plenty of chaff and grit were found. The +opposition to the Administration was made up of three classes. The +smallest, but by far the most active class, consisted of reckless +politicians,--those Northern men with Southern principles (if they have +anything that can properly be called principles) who sympathize with the +Rebels in arms,--who hold the interests of party to be supreme, and +shrink from no acts that bid fair to advance those interests. They are +the grit in the machine. The second class comprised the sheep which +those bad shepherds led,--sheep with a large proportion of swine +intermixed, and many a fanged and dangerous cur, as ignorant as they, +doing the will of his masters,--the brutish class, without enlightenment +or moral perception, goaded by prejudice, and deceived by lies so +shallow and foolish that the wonder was how anybody could be duped by +them. Side by side with these, and often mingling with them, was the +third class, the so-called "Conservatives," whose numbers and +respectability could alone have kept the warlike young Falstaff of the +expedition in countenance, and induced him to march through Coventry (or +rather into it, for he got no farther) with his motley crew of +followers. + +This last-named class, when analyzed, is found to be composed of a great +variety of elements. The downright "Hunker" Conservative, who is very +likely to pass over to and identify himself with the first class, hates +with a natural, ineradicable hate all political and spiritual +advancement. He takes material and selfish, and consequently low and +narrow views of things,--and having secured for himself and his wife, +for his son John and his wife, privilege to eat and sleep and cohabit, +he cannot see the necessity of any further progress. If he is +enterprising, it is to increase his blessings in this world; if devout, +it is to perpetuate them in the next: for sincere religion he has +none,--since religion is but another name for Love, inspiring hope, +charity, and a zeal for the welfare of all mankind.--Others are +conservative from timidity, or because they are wedded to tranquility. +"Oh yes," they say, "no doubt the cause you are fighting for is just; +but then fighting is so dreadful! Let us have peace,--peace at any +cost!" Good-hearted people as far as they go, but lacking in +constitution. To them the fiery torrents of generosity and heroism are +unknown. Numbers of these, it is true, were swept away by the flood of +enthusiasm which prevailed during the first days of the Rebellion; but +when it appeared that the insurgents were not to be overawed and put +down by noise,--that making speeches and hanging out flags would not do +the business,--they became alarmed: the thought of actual bloodshed, and +taxes, and a disturbance of trade developed the Aguecheek. "Good +heavens!" said they, picking up the hats they has tossed with cheers +into the sky, and carefully brushing down the ruffled nap to its former +respectable smoothness, "this will never do! we can't frighten 'em!" So +they concluded to be frightened themselves, and ran back to their +comfortable apron-strings of opinion held by their grandmothers. Strange +as it seems, many of these are persons of piety, taste, and culture. Yet +their culture is retrospective, their taste mere dillettanteism, and +their piety conventional: to whatever is new in theology, or vital in +literature, (at least until the cobwebs of age begin to gather upon it,) +and especially to whatever tends to overthrow or greatly modify the +ancient order of things, they are unalterably opposed. If occasionally +one of them becomes desirous of keeping up with the times, or is forced +along momentarily by the stream of events, some defect of mental or +moral constitution prevents his progress; and you are sure to find him +soon or late returning to the point from which he started, like those +bits of drift-wood which are always bobbing up and down close under the +fall or circling round and round in the eddies. The trouble is, such +sticks float too lightly on the surface of things; if they carried more +heart-ballast, and would sink deeper, the current would bear them +on.--Another variety of the Conservative is the man who is really +progressive and right-minded, but extremely slow. Give him time, and he +is certain to form a just judgment, and range himself on the right side +at last. He goes with the rest only so far as they travel his road, and +his lagging is pretty sure to be atoned for by earnest endeavor in the +end. With these are to be classed numerous other varieties: those who +are "Hunkerish" on account of some strange spiritual obtuseness, or from +misanthropy, or perverseness, or self-conceit, or a cold and sluggish +temperament, or from weak, human sympathies governed by strong political +prejudice,--together with those countless larvæ and tadpoles, the +small-fry of sons and nephews, of individuality yet undeveloped, who are +conservative because their fathers and uncles are conservative. + +Such was the Opposition, to which we have devoted so many words, +because, though signally defeated, much of its power and influence +survives. The fact that it proved to be as large as it was is by no +means discouraging: that there should have been so much flabby and +diseased flesh on the body-politic was to have been expected; and that +it would show itself chiefly in the large cities, where foul humors and +leprosy are sure to break out, if anywhere, upon slight irritation, +(contrast the corrupt vote of New York City with Missouri and Maryland +giving their voices for freedom!) was likewise foreseen. That the malady +continues, and by what curative process it is to be subdued and rendered +harmless,--this is what concerns us now. + +We have at last demonstrated, to the satisfaction of our arrogant +Southern friends, let us trust, that the despised Yankee, the +dollar-worshipper, is as prompt to fight for a principle as they for +power and a mistaken right of property,--ready to give blood and +treasure without stint, all for an idea; and that, having reluctantly +set his foot in gore, to draw back is not possible to him, for his heart +is indomitable, and his soul relentless,--in his soul sits Nemesis +herself. We have taught the slaveholding insolence the final lesson, +that there is absolutely nothing to hope from the pusillanimity it +counted upon. To the world abroad, also, that Tuesday's portentous +snow-storm of ballots, covering every vestige of treason here, to the +trail of the Copperhead, and whitening the face of the whole land with a +purer faith, will be more convincing than our victories in the field. +The bubble of Republicanism, which was to display such alacrity at +bursting, is not the childish thing it was deemed, but granitic, with a +fiery, throbbing core; its outward form no mere flashy film, blown out +of chimeras and dreams, but a creation from the solid strata of human +experience, upheaved here by the birth-throes of a new era:-- + + "With inward fires and pain, + It rose a bubble from the plain," + +secure and enduring as Monadnock or Mount Washington. + +We have proved that we are a nation equal to the task of self-discipline +and self-control,--a new thing on this planet. Hitherto, on the stage of +history, kings and princes have been the star-actors: in them all the +interest of the scene has centred: they and a few grand favorites were +everything, and all the rest supernumeraries, "a level immensity of +foolish small people," of no utility except to support them in their +pompous parts. But we have found that "Hamlet" does very well with +Hamlet left out. In place of the prince we will have a principle. +Persons are of no account: the President is of no account simply as a +man. Here, at last, Humanity has flowered; here has blossomed a new race +of men, capable of postponing persons to uses, and private preferences +to the public good, of subjecting its wildest passions to a sense of +justice,--qualities so rare, that, when they are most strikingly +manifested in us, foreign observers stand astonished and incredulous. +Accustomed to seeing other races carried away by their own frenzy the +moment they break free from despotic restraint and attempt to act for +themselves, they cannot believe that Americans actually have that +uncommon virtue, self-control. The predictions of the London "Times" +with regard to us have always proved such ludicrous failures, because +they have been based upon this false estimate of our temper. Taking for +granted that we are a mob, and that a mob is an idiot, whose speech and +actions are void of reason, "full of sound and fury, signifying +nothing," the Thunderer continues to prophesy evil of us; and when, +where madness was most confidently looked for, we exhibit the coolest +sense, it can think of nothing better to do than to denounce us for our +inconsistencies! Yet the self-control we claim for ourselves comes from +no lack of caloric: caloric we possess in abundance, though of a stiller +sort than that with which the world has been hitherto acquainted. Our +friend from the backwoods thought there was no fire in the coal-furnace, +because he could not hear it roar and crackle, and was afterwards amazed +at its steady intensity of heat. Our misguided Southern brethren had the +same opinion of Northern character, and burned their hands most +deplorably when they laid hold of it. + +They have discovered their mistake. Our Transatlantic neighbors have +also, by this time, discovered theirs. Moreover, we (and this is the +main thing) have caught a glimpse of ourselves in the glass of the last +election. Henceforth let us have faith in our destiny. Let us once more +open our maps, and, by the light of that day's revelation, look at the +grand outlines and limitless possibilities of our country. Look at the +old States and the new, and at the future States! Behold the vast plains +of Texas and the Indian Territory,--the rivers of Arizona, Dakotah, and +Utah,--Montana, Idaho, Colorado, and New Mexico, with their magnificent +mountain-chains,--Nevada, and the Pacific States,--Washington, Oregon, +and California, each alone capable of becoming another New England! What +a home is this for the nation that is to be! Let us consider well our +advantages, be true to the inspiration that is in us, put aside at once +and forever the thought of failure, and advance with firm and confident +steps to the accomplishment of the grandest mission ever yet intrusted +to any people. + +True, great humiliations may be still in store for us; for what do we +not deserve? When we consider the inhumanity, the cowardice, the stolid +selfishness, of which this people has been guilty, especially on the +subject of negro slavery, we can find no refuge from despair but in the +comforting assurance that God is a God of mercy, as well as of justice. + +Let us hasten to atone for our sins, and forward the work of national +purification, by doing our duty--our whole duty--now. One thing is +certain: we cannot look for help to other nations, nor to the amiable +disposition of a foe whose pith and pluck are consanguineous with our +own, nor to the agency of individuals. It was written in the beginning +that the people which aspired to make its own laws should also work out +its own salvation. For this reason great leaders have not been given us, +and we shall not need them. It is for a nation unstable in its purposes, +and incapable of self-moderation, that the steady hand of a strong ruler +is necessary. The first Napoleon was no more a natural product of the +first French Revolution than the present Emperor is of the last. They +might each have sat for the picture of the tyrant springing to the neck +of an unbridled Democracy, drawn by Plato in the eighth book of the +"Republic": just as his description of the excesses which necessitate +despotic rule might pass for a description of the frenzy of +'Ninety-Three:--"When a State thirsts after liberty, _and happens to +have bad cup-bearers appointed it, and gets immoderately drunk with an +unmixed draught, thereof_, it punishes even the governors." No such +inebriety has resulted from the moderate draughts of that nectar in +which this new Western race has indulged; and only the southern and +more passionate portion of it is in any danger of converting its acute +"State-Rights" distemper into chronic despotism. The nation in its +childhood needed a paternal Washington; but now it has arrived at +manhood, and it requires, not a great leader, but a magistrate willing +himself to be led. Such a man is Mr. Lincoln: an able, faithful, +hard-working citizen, overseeing the affairs of all the citizens, +accepting the guidance of Providence, and conscientiously yielding +himself to be the medium of a people's will, the agent of its destinies. +That is all we have any right to expect of him; and if we expect more, +we shall be disappointed. He cannot stretch forth his hand and save us, +although we have now twice elected him to his high place. Upon +ourselves, and upon ourselves alone, under God, success and victory +still depend. + +What outward duties are to be fulfilled it is needless to recapitulate +here,--for have they not been taught in every loyal pulpit and in every +loyal print, in sermon, story, and song, until there is not a school-boy +but knows the lesson? Treason must be defeated in the field, its armies +annihilated, its power destroyed forever. In order to accomplish this, +our own armies must be kept constantly recruited with numbers and with +confidence. As for American slavery, it perishes from the face of the +earth utterly. We have had enough of the serpent which the young +Republic warmed in its too kind bosom. Now it dies; there is no help for +it: if you object to the heel upon its head, and place your own head +there to sheild it, God pity you, my friend, for you will have need of +more than human pity! This war is to be brought to a triumphant close, +and the cause of the war extirpated, whether you like it or not. You can +accept destruction and ignominy with it, or you may live to rejoice over +the most glorious victory and reform of the age: take your choice: but +understand, once for all, that complaint is puerile, and expostulation +but an idle wind in the face of inexorable Fate. Shall we remember our +martyred heroes, our noble, our beloved, who have gone down in this +conflict, and sit gloomily content while the devouring monster survives? +Is it nothing that they have fallen, and yet such a wrong that the +fetters of the bondman should fall? Is the claim of property in man so +sacred, and the blood of our brothers so cheap? Have done with this +heartless cant,--this prating about the constitutional rights of +traitors! When the Moslem chief was marching to the chastisement of a +revolted tribe, the insurgents, seeing disaster inevitable in a fair +field, resorted to the device of elevating the Koran upon the shafts of +their spears, and bearing it before them into battle. The stratagem +succeeded. The fanatical Arabs were filled with horror on finding that +they had lifted their swords against the Book of the Holy Prophet, and +fled in confusion,--defeated, not by the foe, but by their own blind +reverence for the letter and outward symbol of the Law. Thus the first +attempt at secession from the Moslem Empire became successful; and the +decadence of that empire was the fatal fruit of that day's folly. In +like manner we have had the letter of the Constitution thrust between us +and victory. The leaders of the Opposition carried it before them, with +ostentation and loud pharisaical rant, in the late political battle. +But, much as it has embarrassed and retarded our cause, terrifying and +bewildering weak minds, the device has not availed in the past, and it +shall avail still less in the future. The spirit of the Constitution we +shall remember and obey; but the sword of justice, edged with common +sense, must cut its way through everything else, to the very heart of +the Rebellion. + +Only from ourselves have we anything to fear. Self-distrust is more to +be dreaded than foreign interference or Rebel despotism. The deportment +of Great Britain has become more and more respectful towards us as we +have shown ourselves worthy of respect; and even France has of late +grown discreetly reticent on the subject of intervention. But it is said +the Rebels will arm their slaves. Very well; if they think to save their +boat by taking the bottom out, in order to make paddles of it, they are +welcome to try the experiment. Are three or four hundred thousand negro +soldiers going to accept from their masters the boon of freedom for +themselves only, and not demand it for their race? Or think you their +gratitude towards those masters is so extraordinary, that they will take +arms against their brothers already in the field, and not be liable to +commit the slight error of passing over and fighting by their side? In +either case, Mr. Davis's proposition, if carried out, is practical +abolitionism; and we have yet to learn how a tottering edifice can be +rendered any more stable by the removal of its acknowledged +"cornerstone." The plan is violently opposed by the slave-owning +classes: for, whatever may be proclaimed to the contrary, they have +risked this war, and devoted themselves to it, believing it to be a war +for the aggrandizement of their peculiar institution; and if that +succumbs, where is the gain? Already their new Government has become to +them an object of dread and detestation, and they are beginning to look +back with regretful hearts to the beneficent Union which they were in +such rash haste to destroy. Only the leaders of the Rebellion can hope +to gain anything by so perilous an expedient; for Slavery has become +with them a secondary consideration,--no doubt Mr. Davis is sincere in +asserting this,--and they are now ready to sacrifice it to their private +ambition. They are in the position of men who, driven to extremity, will +give up everything else in order to preserve their power, and their +necks with it. But let us indulge in no useless apprehensions on this +point. Such a proposition, seriously entertained by the Richmond +Government, is of itself the strongest evidence we could have of the +exhaustion of their resources. Every other means has failed, and this is +their last resort. We are reminded of that vivid description, in one of +Cooper's novels, of an Indian in his canoe drawn into the rapids of +Niagara and swept over the falls,--who, in his wild efforts to save +himself, continued _paddling in the air_ even after he had passed the +verge of the cataract. So the Confederate craft has reached the brink of +destruction, and we may now look to see some frantic paddling in their +air. Or shall we liken it to Milton's bad angel, flying to his new +empire, but dropping into an unexpected "vast vacuity"? + + "Fluttering his pennons vain, plumb down he drops + Ten thousand fathom deep, and to this hour + Down had been falling, had not by ill chance + This strong rebuff of some tumultuous cloud + Instinct with fire and nitre hurried him + As many miles aloft." + +That "ill chance" has been averted by the last election; and no such +"tumultuous cloud" will gather again, to bear up the lost Anarch, if we +courageously act our part. The danger now is from our own weakness, not +from the enemy's strength. + +A great and most important work still remains for us. It is not enough +to perform simply the external and obvious duties of the hour. What we +would insist on here is the internal and moral work to be done. Men have +never yet given full credit to the power of an idea. With faith, ye +shall remove mountains. A pebble of truth, in the hand of the +shepherd-boy of Israel, is mightier to prevail than the spear like a +weaver's beam. How long were the little band of Abolitionists despised! +But they were the cutwater of the national ship. With their +revolutionary idea, so opposed to the universal prejudice, they +succeeded at last in moving the entire country, just as one cog-wheel +set against another overcomes its resistance and puts the whole +machinery in motion. The rills of thought, shooting from the heights of +a few pure and lofty minds, have spread out into this sea of practical +Abolitionism which now covers the whole land,--although the sea may be +inclined to deny its source. May we, then, charge the pioneers of the +Anti-Slavery sentiment with having caused this war? In the same manner +we may regard the coming of Christ as being the cause of all the wars +and persecutions of Christianity. + +If such is the force of earnest conviction, consider what we too may do. +We have gone to the polls and voted for the accomplishment of a certain +object: far more intelligently than at the beginning of the war, (for +few knew then what we were fighting for,) we have met the enemies of our +country, and defeated them at the ballot-box. But there is another and +no less important vote to be cast. The Twentieth Presidential Election +is not the last, even for this year. We are to continue casting our +ballots, every day, and day after day,--nay, year after year, if +necessary,--to the end. We have had political suffrage; but moral +suffrage is now called for. Here woman realizes her rights, so long +talked about, and so little understood; here, too, even the intelligent, +patriotic boy and girl can exert an influence. We know something of what +words can do; but how little we appreciate the power which is behind +words! By the wishes of your heart, by the aspirations of your soul, by +the energies of your mind and will, you form about you an atmosphere as +real as the air you breathe, although, like that, invisible. Not a +prayer is lost; not a throb of patriotish goes for nothing; never a wave +of impulse dies upon the ethereal deep in which we live and move and +have our being. Be filled with the truth as with life itself; let the +divine aura exhale from you wherever you move; and thus you may do more +to overcome the opposition to our cause than when you deposited your +ticket in the box. You may, perhaps, breathe the breath of life into the +nostrils of the coldest clay of conservatism you know: for true it is +that men not only catch manners, as they do diseases, one from another, +but that they catch unconscious inspiration also. Boswell, when absent +from London and his hero, acknowledged himself to be empty, vapid; and +he became somewhat only when "impregnated with the Johnsonian ether." So +the ether of your own earnest, fervent, patriotic character may +impregnate the spiritless and help to sustain the brave. Consider, +moreover, what an element may be thus generated by the combined hopes +and prayers of a whole loyal people! This is the atmosphere which is to +sustain the President and his advisers in their work: this, although we +may not know it, and although they may be unaware, is the vital breath +they need to give them wisdom and power equal to the great crisis; while +even the soldiers, in the far-off fields of conflict, shall feel the +agitations of this subtile fluid, this life-supporting oxygen, buoying +up their hopes, and wafting their banners on to victory. + + + + +REVIEWS AND LITERARY NOTICES. + + + _Dissertations and Discussions: Political, Philosophical, and + Historical._ By JOHN STUART MILL. In Three Volumes. 12mo. + Boston: W. V. Spencer. + +At a time of deep national emotion, like the present, it is impossible +that we Americans should not feel some bias of personal affection in +reading the works of those great living Englishmen who have been true to +us in the darkest hour. Were it only for his faithful friendship to +freedom and to us, Mr. Mill has a right to claim an attentive audience +for every word he has ever written; and this collection of his +miscellaneous writings, covering a period of thirty years, has a special +interest as showing the successive steps by which he has risen to this +high attitude of nobleness. + +But apart from these special ties, Mr. Mill claims attention as the most +advanced of English minds, and the ablest, all things considered, of +contemporary English writers. His detached works have long since found a +very large American audience,--larger, perhaps, than even their +home-circle of readers; and the sort of biographical interest which +attaches to a collection of shorter essays--giving, as it does, a +glimpse at the training of the writer--will more than compensate for the +want of continuity in these volumes, and for the merely local interest +which belongs to many of the subjects treated. Church-rates and the +English currency have not to us even the interest of heraldry, for that +at least can offer pictures of mermaids, and great ingenuity in Latin +puns; but, on the other hand, every discussion of the British +university-system has a positive value, in the exceedingly crude and +undeveloped condition of American collegiate methods. There is the same +disparity of interest in the different critical essays. Bentham has +hardly exerted an appreciable influence on American thought, and the +transitory authority of Coleridge is now merged in more potent agencies; +yet when the essays bearing those great names were first printed in the +periodical then edited by Mill, they made an era in contemporary English +literature, and therefore indirectly modified our own. + +Thus, in one way or another, almost all these essays have a value. The +style is always clear, always strong, sometimes pointed, seldom +brilliant, never graceful; it is the best current sample, indeed, of +that good, manly, rather colorless English which belongs naturally to +Parliamentary Speeches and Quarterly Reviews. Not being an American, the +author may use novel words without the fear of being called provincial; +so that _understandable_, _evidentiary_, _desiderate_, _leisured_, and +_inamoveability_ stalk at large within his pages. As a controversialist, +he is a trifle sharp, but never actually discourteous; and it is +pleasant to see that his chivalry makes him gentlest in dealing with the +humblest, while his lance rings against the formidable shield of a +Cambridge Professor or a Master of Trinity as did that of the disguised +Ivanhoe upon the shield of Bois-Guilbert. + +The historical essays in this collection are exceedingly admirable, +especially the defence of Pericles and the Athenians, in the second +paper on Crete's History. In reading the articles upon ethical and +philosophical questions, one finds more drawbacks. The profoundest +truths can hardly be reached, perhaps, by one who, at the end of his +life, as at the beginning, is a sensationalist in metaphysics and a +utilitarian in ethics. It is only when dealing with these themes that he +seems to show any want of thoroughness: unfairness he never shows. In +the closing tract on "Utilitarianism," which the American publishers +have added to the English collection, one feels especially this +drawback. As the theory of universal selfishness falls so soon as one +considers that a man is capable of resigning everything that looks like +happiness, and of plunging into apparent misery, because he thinks it +right,--so the theory of utilitarianism falls, when one considers that a +man is capable of abstaining from an action that would apparently be +useful to all around him, from a secret conviction that it is wrong in +itself. There are many things which are intrinsically wrong, although, +so far as one can see, they would do good to all around. To assassinate +a bad neighbor,--to rob a miser and distribute his goods,--to marry +Rochester, while his insane wife is living, (for Jane Eyre,)--to put to +death an imbecile and uncomfortable grandmother, (for a +Feegeean,)--these are actions which are indefensible, though the balance +of public advantages might seem greatly in their favor. It is probable +that at this moment a great good would be done to this nation and to the +world by the death of Jefferson Davis; yet the bare suggestion of his +assassination, in the case of Colonel Dahlgren, was received with a +universal shudder, and disavowed as an atrocious slander. But Mr. Mill +can meet such ethical problems only by reverting to that general +principle of Kant, which he elsewhere repudiates: "So act that the rule +on which thou actest would admit of being adopted as a law for all +rational beings." Mr. Mill says of such instances, "The action is of a +class which, if practised generally, would be generally injurious, and +this is the ground of the obligation to abstain from it." But under the +rule of utilitarianism, it is the injuriousness itself which should be +the principle of classification, and to prove an action innoxious is at +once to separate it from that class; so that the objection falls. By his +own principles, a murder which would benefit the community is by that +very attribute differenced from ordinary and injurious murders, nor can +any good argument be found against its commission. The possible bad +precedent is at best a possible misapprehension, to be sufficiently +averted by concealment, where concealment is practicable. + +In dealing with contemporary and practical questions, Mr. Mill shows +always pre-eminent ability, with less of the Insular traits than any +living Englishman. While there is perhaps no single passage in these +volumes so thoroughly grand as his argument for religions freedom in his +essay on Liberty,--an argument which the most heretical theologians of +either Continent could hardly have put so boldly or so well,--yet +through the whole series of essays there runs the same fine strain. He +repeatedly renews his clear and irresistible appeal for the equal +political rights of the sexes: a point on which there is coming to be +but one opinion among the most advanced minds of Europe and America,--a +unanimity which, after the more immediate problem of Slavery is disposed +of, must erelong bring about some practical application of the +principle, in our republican commonwealths. It is interesting to notice +in this connection, that Mr. Mill has included with his own essays the +celebrated article by his wife, on "The Enfranchisement of Women," and +has prefixed to it one of the noblest eulogies ever devoted to any wife +by any husband. + +He deals with strictly American subjects in the best criticism ever +written upon De Tocqueville, where he shows conclusively the error of +that great writer, in attributing to democracy, as such, many social +phenomena which are equally observable under the English monarchy. These +volumes also include--what the English edition of 1859 of course did not +contain--the later essays on "The Contest in America," "The Slave +Power," and "Non-Intervention." In treating of Slavery and of the War, +the author rarely commits an error; in dealing with other American +questions, he is sometimes misled by defective information, and cites +gravely, with the prelude, "It is admitted," or "It is understood," +statements which have their sole origin in the haste of travellers or in +the croaking of disappointed egotists. The government of the majority +does not end in tyranny: cultivated Americans are not cowards: the best +heads are not excluded from public life: free schools do not tend to +stifle free thought, but infinitely to multiply it: individuality of +character is not checked, but healthily trained, by political equality. +Six months in this country would do more to disabuse Mr. Mill, in these +matters, than years of mere reading; and it is a positive injury to his +large ideas that he should not take the opportunity of testing them on +the only soil where they are being put in practice. Whenever he shall +come, his welcome is secure. In the mean time, all that we Americans can +do to testify to his deserts is to reprint his writings beautifully, as +these are printed,--and to read them universally, as these will be read. + + + _Narrative of Privations and Sufferings of United States + Officers and Soldiers while Prisoners of War in the Hands of + the Rebel Authorities._ Being the Report of a Commission of + Inquiry, appointed by the United States Sanitary Commission. + With an Appendix, containing the Testimony. Printed by the U.S. + Sanitary Commission. Philadelphia. + +That uniform thoroughness and accuracy which have marked all that has +been done by the Sanitary Commission, not in the field alone, but in the +committee-room and the printing-office, were never better shown than in +this Report. It attempts something which, unless done thoroughly, was +not worth doing; since, on a subject which appeals so strongly to the +feelings, mere generalities and gossip do more harm than good. It is the +work of a special Commission of Inquiry, composed of three physicians, +(Drs. Mott, Delafield, and Wallace,) two lawyers, (Messrs. Wilkins and +Hare,)and one clergyman (Mr. Walden). This commission has performed a +great amount of labor, and has digested its result into a form so +systematic as to be logically irresistible. The facts on which the +statement rests are a large body of evidence, taken under oath, from +prisoners of both armies, and confirmed by the admissions, carefully +collated, of the Rebel press. The conclusion is, that, in the Southern +prisons, "tens of thousands of helpless men have been, and are now +being, disabled and destroyed by a process as certain as poison, and as +cruel as the torture or burning at the stake, because nearly as +agonizing and more prolonged." + +The next step is to fix the responsibility for all these horrors. All +theories of apology--as that the sufferings were accidental or +exceptional, or that, badly as our soldiers may have fared, the Rebel +soldiers fared little better--are taken up and conclusively refuted, the +last-named with especial thoroughness. The inevitable inference drawn by +the Commission is, that these inhumanities were "designedly inflicted on +the part of the Rebel Government," and were _not_ "due to causes which +such authorities could not control." + +The immediate preparation of this able report is understood to be due to +the Rev. Treadwell Walden, an Episcopal clergyman of Philadelphia, not +unknown to the readers of the "Atlantic." His present work will be the +permanent authority for the facts which it records, and will justify to +future generations the suggestion with which it ends, that these +cruelties are the legitimate working of a form of government which takes +human slavery for its basis. The record of such a government is fitly +written in these pages: it is as appropriate as is, for a king of +Dahomey, his funeral pyramid of skulls. + + + _Freedom of Mind in Willing_; or, Every Being that Wills a + Creative First Cause. By ROWLAND G. HAZARD. New York: D. + Appleton & Co. 12mo. pp. 455. + +The State of Rhode Island is the most metaphysically inclined of all the +sisterhood, not excepting South Carolina. A superficial observer or a +passing traveller might take just the opposite view of her tendencies. +The stranger who should complete a cycle of sumptuous suppers in +Providence, or spend but a day or two in Newport at the height of the +season, might conclude that Matter with its most substantial appliances, +or Fashion with her most fascinating excitements, had combined to +exclude all thoughts of the spiritual from the few square miles over +which this least of the States holds dominion. Should he leave the two +capitals of luxurious wealth and giddy fashion and seek for the haunts +of Philosophy among the quiet nooks which her few valleys and her +splendid sea-coast afford, he might judge that meditation had been +effectually frightened from them all, for nowhere can he escape the whir +of countless spindles and the clash of thousands of looms. + +But inferences like these may not be trusted, as history demonstrates. +The most admirable of modern treatises in the subtile science, that +masterpiece of speculation in matter and style, "The Minute Philosopher" +of Bishop Berkeley, was composed in Rhode Island, and the place is still +indicated where the musing metaphysician is said to have written the +greater portion of the work. That Berkeley's genius did not abandon the +region, when he left it, is manifest from the direction taken by the +late Judge Durfee, whose "Pan-Idea," if it cannot be accepted as in all +respects a satisfactory theory of the relations of the spiritual +universe, may be safely taken as an indication of the lofty and daring +Platonism of the ingenious author. The anonymous author of "Language by +a Heteroscian" is another thinker of somewhat similar tastes. If common +report do not greatly err, it is the same thinker who in the volume +before us solicits the attention of the philosophic world to his views +of the Will. It adds greatly to the interest of the volume itself, in +our view, and we trust will do so in the view of our readers, to know +that he is no studious recluse nor professional philosopher, but active, +shrewd, and keen-sighted, both in his mills, when at home in a fitly +named valley, and upon Change, when in Boston or New York. + +Surely Roger Williams, that boldest of idealists, did not live in vain, +in that he not only set apart the State which he founded as a place of +refuge for all persons given to free and daring speculation, but made it +a kind of Prospero's Isle, that should never cease to be haunted by some +metaphysical spell. + +The appearance of such a work from such a source is of itself most +refreshing, as an indication that a life of earnest devotion to material +pursuits is not inconsistent with an ardent appreciation of the +surpassing importance of speculative inquiries. One such example as this +is enough to refute the oft-repeated assertion that in America all +philosophy must of course give way before the absorbing interest in the +pursuit of wealth. A few years since we chanced to send a copy of an +American edition of Plato's "Phaedo" to a German Professor. "_Eine +wirkliche Erscheinung_," was his reply in acknowledgment, "to see an +edition of a work of Plato from America." What would be his amazement at +receiving a copy of a disquisition on the Will written by an American +mill-owner! + +It is still more refreshing to find the author so sincere and so earnest +an advocate of the elevating tendency of philosophical studies. There is +a charming simplicity in the words with which his Preface is +concluded:--"Whatever opinion may be formed of the success or failure of +any effort to elucidate this subject, I trust it will be admitted that +the arguments I have presented at least _tend_ to show that the +investigation may open more elevated and more elevating views of our +position and our powers, and may reveal new modes of influencing our own +intellectual and moral character, and thus have a more immediate, +direct, and practical bearing on the progress of our race in virtue and +happiness than any inquiry in physical science." Such testimony, coupled +with the impression made by his argument, is most gratifying, not only +in consideration of the source from which it comes, but also as +contrasted with the course of so much of the speculative philosophy of +the day, towards Materialism in Psychology, Necessarianism in Morals, +Naturalism in Philosophy, and Pantheism in Theology. + +The doctrine of the writer, or rather his position with respect to +theories of the Will, is distinctly indicated by the title of his +volume. It is obvious that he must be a decided asserter of Liberty as +opposed to Necessity who dares to throw down the gauntlet in support of +the thesis that "every being who wills is a creative first cause." All +his views of the soul and of its doings are entirely consistent with the +direction which is required by this audacious assertion. That the soul +is an originator in most of its activities is his perpetually asserted +theme. To maintain this he is ready almost to question the reality, as +he more than questions the necessity, of the existence of matter, +verging occasionally, on this point, upon Berkeley's views and style of +thinking. The constructive capacities of the intellect are inferred from +the variety of mathematical creations which it originates, as well as +from the more diverse and interesting structures which the never wearied +and ever aspiring fantasy is always building. Should any one question +the right of these creations to be, or seek to detract from their +importance, our author is ready to defend them to the utmost in contrast +with matter and its claims. Indeed, the author's exposition of his +doctrine of the Will is by itself an inconsiderable source of interest, +when separated from the views of all the functions of the spirit, which +are interwoven with it. In discussing the Will he is necessarily led to +treat of its relations to the other powers and functions of the spirit, +and hence by necessity to give his philosophy of the Soul. This +philosophy, briefly described, is one which regards the soul in its +nature and its acts, in its innermost structure and its outmost +energies, as capable of and destined to action. This in also its dignity +and its glory. The soul or spirit, so far from being the subject of +material forces, or the outgrowth of successive series of material +agencies, or the subtile product or potence of material laws, is herself +the conscious mistress and sovereign of them all, giving to matter and +development and law all their importance, as she condescends to use +these either as the mirror in which her own creations are reflected or +the vehicle by which her acts can be expressed. + +How the author maintains and defends this position the limits of this +brief notice will not allow us to specify. The views expressed which +have the closest pertinency to the will are those which lay especial +stress upon the soul as capable of _wants_, and as thus impelled to +action. Emotion and sensibility neither of them qualifies for action. +_Want_ must supervene, to point to the unattained future, to excite to +change; and to this want knowledge also must be added, in order to +direct the activity. Under the stimulus thus furnished, the future must +be created, as it were, by the will of the soul itself, before it is +made real in fact. + +We are not quite sure that we understand the author's doctrine of Want, +and its relations to the activities of the will, nor that, so far as we +do understand it, we should accept it. But we agree with him entirely, +that it is precisely by means of and in connection with a correct +analysis of these impelling forces that the real nature and import of +the will can be satisfactorily evolved. Mr. Hazard seems to us to make +too little difference between the power of the soul to act and its power +to will or choose. He conceives the will as the capacity which qualifies +for effort of every kind, as the conative power in general, instead of +emphasizing it as the capacity for a special kind of effort, namely, +that of moral selection. + +The second part of the volume is devoted to a criticism of Edwards, the +author on whose "steel cap," as on that of Hobbes of old, every advocate +of liberty is impelled to try the strength and temper of his weapons. +For a critical antagonist, Edwards is admirable, his use of language +being far from precise and consistent, and his definitions and +statements, through his extreme wariness, being vague and vacillating +enough to allow abundant material for comment. Of these advantages Mr. +Hazard knows how to avail himself, and shows not a little acuteness in +exposing the untenable positions and the inconsequent reasoning of the +New-England dialectician. The most ingenious of the chapters upon +Edwards is that in which he refutes the conclusions drawn from the +foreknowledge of God. His position is the following:--If we concede that +the foreknowledge of God were inconsistent with liberty, and involved +the necessity of human volitions, we may suppose the Supreme Being to +forego the exercise of foreknowledge in respect to such events. But it +would not therefore follow that God would be thereby taken by surprise +by any such volitions, or would be incompetent to regulate His own +actions or to control the issues of them in governing the universe. This +he seeks to show, very ingeniously, by asserting that the Supreme Being +must be competent to foresee not the actual volition that will be made, +but every variety that is possible; and as a consummate chess-player +provides by comprehensive forecast against every possible move which his +antagonist can make, and has ready a counter-move, so may we, on the +supposition suggested, conceive the Supreme Being as fully competent, +without the foreknowledge of the actual, by means of His foreknowledge +of the possible, to control and govern the course of the future. This +solution is certainly ingenious, and doubtless original with the author. +It has in all probability occurred to other minds; but, inasmuch as the +advocate for freedom does not usually allow that he is shut up to the +alternative of either denying the divine purpose or abandoning human +freedom, the suggestion of the author has not often, if ever, been +seriously urged before. But we have no space for critical comments. + +The style of the author is good. With some diffuseness, he is usually +clear and animated. The circumstances that he has approached the subject +in his own way, independently of the method of books and the technics of +the schools, has lent great freshness to his thoughts and illustrations. +The occasional observations which he throws in are always ingenious and +sometimes profound. He shows himself at every turn to be an acute +observer, a comprehensive thinker, and deeply imbued with the meditative +spirit. The defects incidental to his peculiar training are more than +compensated by the freshness of his manner and the directness of his +language. More interesting still is the imaginative tendency which gives +to many of his passages the charm of poetic feeling, and elevates them +to the truly Platonic rhythm. There are single sentences, and now and +then entire paragraphs, which are gems in their way, that sparkle none +the less for the plain setting of common sense and unpretending diction +by which they are relieved. + +We ought to add that the attitude of the author in respect to moral and +religious truth is truly, but not obtrusively, reverent. Though he +asserts for man the dignity that pertains to a creator, yet he never +forgets the limits under which and the materials out of which his +creations are wrought. His Theism is outspoken and sincere. + +Whatever judgment may be passed upon this volume in the schools of +philosophy or theology, all truth-loving men will agree that it brings +honor to the literature and thought of the country. No man can read a +few of the many passages of refined thought and sagacious observation +with which the volume abounds, without acknowledging the presence of +philosophic genius. No one can read the passages with which each +principal division of the work concludes, without admiring the fine +strains which indicate the presence of genius inspired by poetic feeling +and elevated by adoring reverence. We are sure that the fit, though +scanty, audience from whom the author craves a kindly judgment will +cheerfully render to him far more than this, even their unfeigned +admiration. + + + _Military Bridges:_ With Suggestions of New Expedients and + Constructions for crossing Streams and Chasms; including, also, + Designs for Trestle and Truss Bridges for Military Railroads. + Adapted especially to the Wants of the Service in the United + States. By HERMANN HAUPT, late Chief of Bureau in Charge of the + Construction and Operation of United States Military Railways, + etc. New York: D. Van Nostrand. 8vo. pp. 310. + +There is in the War Department at Washington a series of splendid +photographs, illustrative of scenes along the line of march of our +armies in Virginia, and depicting minutely the great pioneer labor of +transporting troops and ammunition, giving evidence of the greatest +engineering genius, and the illimitable resource that has been evoked by +this dreadful War of Rebellion. + +The book before us is the result of these operations reduced to form. +The author's name has for the last twenty-five years been associated +with most of the great works of internal improvement in this country, +and is familiar to every Massachusetts man as connected with the great +railroad-enterprise of the State,--the Hoosac Tunnel. + +The professional reputation of the author of "The General Theory of +Bridge-Construction" would of itself be a sufficient guaranty that a new +work from the same source would be entitled to consideration. General +Haupt does not often appear before the public as an author: his works +are few, but of rare merit. The first which appeared, "The General +Theory of Bridge-Construction," was the fruit of many years of +experiment, observation, and calculation, and at once established his +reputation in Europe and America, as unequalled in the specialty of +Bridges. This work was not only the first, but up to the present time is +the only publication in which the action of the parts in a complicated +system is explained, and the direction and intensity of each and every +strain brought within the reach of mathematical formulas, and rendered +accurately determinable. Before the appearance of this book it is +probable that not another engineer in the world could be found able to +calculate the strain upon every sort of bridge-truss, but only on +certain simple forms and combinations. Now, such calculations can be +made by any student in any institution where civil engineering is taught +thoroughly, and where "Haupt on Bridges" is used as a text-book. +Professor Gillespie, writing from Europe, remarked that the greatest +engineer of the age, Robert Stephenson, and his distinguished +associates, had spoken of this book in terms of the highest +commendation. + +After the publication of the controversial papers between Messrs. +Stephenson and Fairbairn in regard to the Britannia Bridge, it became +apparent that neither of these gentlemen, with all their calculations +and expenditures in experiments, had determined the proper distribution +of the strains, and the size and strength required for the side-plates +of tubular bridges, but only for those at the top and bottom. General +Haupt solved the problem mathematically, and sent a communication on the +subject to the American Association for the Advancement of Science, +which has been extensively copied into the scientific journals of +Europe, and has added largely to the reputation of its author. In the +Victoria Bridge at Montreal, the distribution of material in the +vertical plates conforms to the proportions given by General Haupt. + +About the year 1853, General Haupt, then Chief Engineer of the +Pennsylvania Railroad, reviewed the work of Charles Ellett on the Ohio +and Mississippi Rivers, with other plans of improvement that had been +suggested, and, in a pamphlet of about a hundred pages, proposed a +novel, bold, and simple method for the improvement of these rivers, +costing scarcely a tenth as much as the estimated expense of some of the +other methods, and promising greater durability and efficacy. The +Pittsburg Board of Trade recently appointed a scientific commission to +investigate the whole subject; and their report, which is thorough and +exhaustive, gives unanimously the preference to the plan of General +Haupt, as the only practicable mode of improving the Ohio River, so as +to insure a permanent depth of water of not less than six feet. In +passing, we would remark that one of the greatest difficulties the War +Department has had to contend with has been the lack of suitable +navigation on the Ohio River, and it is to be regretted that Government +did not at once seize upon the plans of General Haupt and carry them +into execution. + +In the spring of 1862, General Haupt was solicited to take charge of the +reconstruction of the railroad from Acquia Creek to Fredericksburg. +Without material other than that furnished by forests two miles distant, +and without skilled mechanics, but simply by the aid of common soldiers +who had no previous instruction, he erected, in nine days, a structure +eighty feet high and four hundred feet long, which for more than a year +carried the immense railroad-trains supplying the Army of the Potomac. +It was visited and critically examined by officers in the foreign +service, as a remarkable specimen of bold and successful military +engineering. + +Major-General McDowell, in his defence before the Court of Inquiry, made +the following statement in regard to the Potomac-Creek Bridge, on the +line of the Richmond, Fredericksburg, and Potomac Railroad. + + "The large railroad-bridge over the Rappahannock, some six + hundred feet long by sixty-five feet high, and the larger part + of the one over Potomac Creek, some four hundred feet long by + eighty feet high, were built from the trees cut down by the + troops in the vicinity, and this without those troops losing + their discipline or their instruction as soldiers. The work + they did excited, to a high degree, the wonder and admiration + of several distinguished foreign officers, who had never + imagined such constructions possible by such means, and in such + a way, in the time in which they were done. + + "The Potomac-Run Bridge is a most remarkable structure. When it + is considered, that, in the campaigns of Napoleon, + trestle-bridges of more than one story, even of moderate + height, were regarded as impracticable, and that, too, for + common military roads, it is not difficult to understand why + distinguished Europeans should express surprise at so bold a + specimen of American military engineering. It is a structure + which ignores all the rules and precedents of military science + as laid down in books. It is constructed chiefly of round + sticks cut from the woods, and not even divested of bark; the + legs of the trestles are braced with round poles. It is in four + stories, three of trestles and one of crib-work. The total + height from the deepest part of the stream to the rail is + nearly eighty feet. It carries daily from ten to twenty heavy + railway-trains in both directions, and has withstood several + severe freshets and storms without injury. + + "This bridge was built in May, 1862, in nine working-days, + during which time the greater part of the material was cut and + hauled. It contains more than two million feet of lumber. The + original structure, which it replaced, required as many months + as this did days. It was constructed by the common soldiers of + the Army of the Rappahannock, (command of Major-General + McDowell,) under the supervision of his aide-de-camp, Colonel, + now Brigadier-General, Hermann Haupt, Chief of Railroad + Construction and Transportation." + +A fine lithographic drawing of this bridge, taken from a photograph, +forms the frontispiece to the volume before us. + +Previous to the Battle of Chancellorsville, General Haupt received +instructions to prepare for a rapid advance of the Army of the Potomac +towards Richmond. He provided a sufficient amount of material to rebuild +all the bridges between Fredericksburg and Richmond, and adopted the +bold and novel expedient of portable railroad-bridge trusses. These +trusses were built in advance, in spans of sixty feet; they were to be +carried whole on cars to the end of the track, then dragged like logs, +with the aid of timber-wheels and oxen, to the sites of the bridges, +where they were to be raised bodily on wooden piers, and the rails laid +over them. The reverse at Chancellorsville prevented this plan from +being carried into effect; but four of these spans were used to replace +the trestle-bridge across the Acquia Creek, where they were tested in +actual use, and answered perfectly. + +When informed of the contemplated advance on Richmond, General Haupt +concluded to replace the trestle-bridge across Potomac Creek by the +military truss-bridge, which was of a more permanent character. The +trestle-bridge had performed good service for more than a year, but, as +it obstructed the water-way of the stream too much, and as the +preservation of the communications would become of even greater +importance after the advance than it had previously been, it was thought +best to take it down. General Hooker, having heard of this +determination, sent for General Haupt in much alarm, and inquired if the +report as to the proposed rebuilding of the bridge was true, and +protested against having it disturbed, saying that he needed all the +supplies that could be run forward, and could not allow a suspension of +transportation even for a day. General Haupt replied, that he was +willing to be held responsible for results, but must be permitted to +control his own means; he did not ask for a suspension of +transportation; he would take down the high bridge and build a permanent +bridge on the piers, and would not detain a single train even for an +hour. General Hooker and staff declared that they did not believe such a +feat possible; yet it was actually accomplished without any detention to +the trains whatever, and in a period of time so brief as to be almost +incredible. _In less than two days_ the trusses of the three spans were +placed in position. + +If there is any one faculty which General Haupt appears to possess in a +preëminent degree, it is _resource_. He never finds an engineering +problem so difficult that some satisfactory mode of solution does not +present itself to his mind. He seems to comprehend intuitively the +difficulties of a position, and the means of surmounting them. He never +waits; if he cannot readily obtain the material he desires, he takes +that at hand. His new work on "Military Bridges" exhibits this +power of resource in a remarkable degree; it is full of expedients, +novel, practical, and useful, among which may be mentioned +expedients for crossing streams in front of the enemy by means of +blanket-boats,--ingenious substitutes for pontoon-bridges, floats, and +floating-bridges,--plans for the _complete_ destruction of railroad +bridges and track, and for reconstructing track,--modes of defence for +lines of road, etc.: for the book, be it observed, is not limited in its +contents to the single subject indicated by its title. + +The design of the author, as stated in the Introduction, appears to have +been to give to the army a practically useful book. He has not failed to +draw from other sources where suitable material was furnished, an +indebtedness which he has gracefully acknowledged; but a great part of +the book contains new and original plans and expedients, the fruits of +the experience and observation of the author while in charge of the +construction and transportation for the armies of the Rappahannock, of +Virginia, and of the Potomac, under Generals McDowell, Pope, McClellan, +Burnside, Hooker, and Meade. It is a book no officer can afford to be +without; and to the general reader who wishes to be thoroughly versed in +the operations of the war, it will commend itself as replete with +information on this subject. + + + _Meditations on the Essence of Christianity, and on the + Religious Questions of the Day._ By M. GUIZOT. Translated from + the French under the Superintendence of the Author. London: + JOHN MURRAY. + +Whoever is familiar with religious controversies, past and present, has +not failed to notice of late an improvement in their tone, for which we +cannot be too deeply thankful. This does not arise solely from the +neglect which now prevails of the ancient and highly recommended plan of +imprisoning, torturing, and roasting such obstinate heretics as are too +obtuse or too sharp-sighted to yield to milder methods of treatment. +Such incidents in history as the exposure of Christians to hungry beasts +in the Colosseum, a Smithfield burnt-offering of persistent saints, or a +Spanish auto-da-fe, with attending civic, ecclesiastical, and sometimes +even royal functionaries, and wide-encircling half-rejoicing and +half-compassionate multitudes, were not without their charms and +compensations for victims blessed with a fervid fancy or a deathless +purpose. These cruel scenes associated such with the illustrious dead +who have held life cheaper than truth, and gave them an opportunity of +saying to countless multitudes such as no pulpit-orator could attract +and sway,--"See how Christians die!" The liability to such trials turned +away the fickle from the assembly of the faithful and attracted the +magnanimous. When grim Puritans, in our early history, broke the +stubborn necks of peace-preaching Quakers, the latter often thought it a +special favor from Providence that they were permitted to bear so +striking a testimony against religious fanaticism. They felt, like John +Brown in his Virginian prison, that the best service they could render +to the cause they had loved so well was to love it even unto death. +Indeed, martyrs in mounting the scaffold have ever felt the sentiment,-- + + "Yet that scaffold sways the future, and behind the dim unknown + Standeth God within the shadow, keeping watch above His own." + +Such heroic treatment always relieves any cause from contemptuous +neglect, the one thing which is always harder to bear than the fires of +martyrdom. Every reader of Bunyan knows that he complains far less of +his twelve years' imprisonment than he exults over the success of his +prison born, world-ranging Pilgrim. He would doubtless have preferred +lying in that "den," Bedford jail, other twelve years to being unable to +say,-- + + "My Pilgrim's book has travelled sea and land, + Yet could I never come to understand + That it was slighted or turned out of door + By any kingdom, were they rich or poor." + +The dreariest period in religious discussion commonly occurs when men +have just ceased to inflict legal penalties upon the heterodox, but have +not yet learned those amenities which lend so sweet and gentle a dignity +to debate. In looking over the dusty pamphlets which entomb so many +clerical controversies of our Colonial times, it has often seemed as +though we had lighted on some bar-room wrangle, translated out of its +original billingsgate into scholarly classical quotations and wofully +wrested tests of Holy Writ. This illusion seems all the more probable +when we remember that the potations which inspired the loose jester and +the ministerial pamphleteer of that period but too often flowed from the +same generous tap. This phase of theological dispute is best typified in +that eminent English divine who wrote,--"I say, without the least heat +whatever, that Mr. Wesley lies." The manner in which such reverend +disputants sought to force their conclusions on the reluctant has not +infrequently reminded us of sturdy old Grimshawe, the predecessor of +Bronté at Haworth, of whom Mrs. Gaskell reports, that, finding so many +of his parishioners inclined to loiter away their Sundays at the +ale-house as greatly to thin the attendance upon his ministry, he was +wont to rush in upon them armed with a heavy whip, and scourge them with +many a painful stroke to church, where, doubtless, he scourged them +again with still more painful sermons. + +But, bad as were the controversial habits of the clergy, those of their +skeptical opponents were still worse. That was surely a strange state of +things where such freethinking as the "Age of Reason" could win a wide +circulation and considerable credit. But it was not merely the vulgar +among freethinkers who then substituted sophistry and declamation for +honesty and sense. The philosophers of the Institute caught the manners +of the rabble. What a revolting scene does M. Martin sketch in his +"Essay on the Life and Works of Bernardin de Saint-Pierre"! "The +Institute had proposed this as a prize-question:--'What institutions are +best adapted to establish the morals of a nation?' Bernardin was to +offer the report. The competitors had treated the theme in the spirit of +their judges. Terrified at the perversity of their opinions, the author +of "Studies of Nature" wished to oppose to them more wholesome and +consoling ideas, and he closed his report with one of those morsels of +inspiration into which his soul poured the gentle light of the Gospel. +On the appointed day, in the assembled Institute, Bernardin read his +report. The analysis of the memoirs was heard at first with calmness; +but, at the first words of the exposition of the principles of a +theistical philosopher, a furious outcry arose from every part of the +hall. Some mocked him, asking where he had seen God, and what form He +bore. Others styled him weak, credulous, superstitious; they threatened +to expel him from the assembly of which he had proved himself unworthy; +they even pushed madness so far as to challenge him to single combat, in +order to prove, sword in hand, that there is no God. Cabanis, celebrated +by Carlyle for his dogma, 'Thought is secreted, like bile, somewhere in +the region of the small intestines,' cried out, 'I swear that there is +no God, and I demand that His name shall never be spoken in this place.' +The reporter left the members in grave dispute, not whether there is a +God, but whether the mention of His name should be permitted." + +We have fallen upon better days. The high debate which is now engaging +the attention of Christendom is conducted, for the most part, on both +sides, with distinguished courtesy. Not that the question at issue is, +or is felt to be, any less vital than former ones. The aim of modern +free-inquiry is to remove religious life from the dogmatic basis, upon +which, in Christian lands, it has hitherto stood. Denying the existence, +and sometimes the possibility, of a supernatural revelation, now +admitting, now doubting, and now rejecting the personal immortality of +the soul, our freethinkers profess a high regard for the religious +culture of the race. They would found a new scientific faith, and make +spiritual life an outgrowth of the soul's devout sensibilities. The soul +is to draw its nutriment from Nature, science, and all inspired books; +so that, if preaching is as fashionable in the new dispensation as under +the old, the future saints will be in as bad a plight as, according to +eminent theological authority, were those of a late celebrated divine:-- + + "His hearers can't tell you on Sunday beforehand, + If in that day's discourse they'll be Bibled or Koraned." + +But is such a religion possible? M. Guizot thinks not, and comes forward +in full philosophical dignity to repel recent assaults upon supernatural +religion. The chief gravity of these attacks has doubtless consisted in +exegetical and historic criticism. M. Guizot deems these matters of +minor consequence, and believes that the most important thing is to +settle certain fundamental metaphysical questions, and correct prevalent +erroneous ideas respecting the purpose of revelation. His book consists +of eight Meditations: Upon Natural Problems,--Christian Dogmas,--The +Supernatural,--The Limits of Science,--Revelation,--Inspiration of the +Scriptures,--God according to the Bible,--Jesus according to the Gospel. +These themes are presented so skilfully as to attract the interest of +the careless, while challenging the fixed attention of the trained +thinker. The reader will find himself lured on, by the freshness of the +author's method of handling, into the very heart of these profound and +difficult questions. He will be charmed to find them treated with calm +penetration and outspoken frankness. No late writer has displayed a +better comprehension of all phases of and parties to the controversy. +There is a singular absence of controversial tone, a marvellous lucidity +of statement, and a visible honesty of intention, as refreshing as they +are rare,--while a spirit of warm and tender devotion steals in through +the argumentation, like the odor of unseen flowers through a giant and +tangled wood. Yet there is no want of fidelity to personal convictions, +no effort by cunning shifts to bring about an apparent reconciliation of +opponents which the writer knows will not endure. With a firm hand he +touches the errors of contending schools of interpreters, and demands +their abandonment. To Rationalist and Hyper-Inspirationist in their +strife he says, like another Moses, "Why smitest thou thy fellow?" + +Those who have watched carefully the tendencies of these parties for +many years must sometimes have grown despondent. The progressive school +has claimed with unscientific haste the adoption, as a fundamental +principle of Biblical interpretation, of the negation of the +supernatural. Their argument is simply, that human experience disproves +the supernatural. Man, a recent comer upon the globe, who has never kept +a very accurate record of his experience, who comes forth from mystery +for a few days of troubled life, and then vanishes in darkness,--he in +his short stay upon earth has watched the play of its laws, which were +before him and will remain after him, and has learned without any +revelation that God never has changed, never will, never can change or +suspend them! Who shall assure us that our experience of these laws does +not differ from that of Peter and John, the Apostles? How much better to +say of them with Hume, Whatever the fact, we cannot believe it, or to +query with Montaigne, _Que sais-je_? Far better might we say that human +experience can never overthrow faith in the supernatural, for none can +ever say what has been the experience of the countless dead over whom +oblivion broods. Shall a few _savans_ say, Our experience outweighs the +experience of the Hebrews _plus_ one hundred generations of dead +Gentiles _plus_ one universal instinct of humanity? _Credat M. Littré, +non [Greek: hoi polloi], M. Guizot, vel Agassiz._ But the laws of Nature +are uncha----Ah! that is the very point in dispute. Why can they not +alter? Because they are invari----Tut! Well, then, b-e-c-a-u-s-e----When +you find a good argument, put it into that blank. Till then, adieu. + + "There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, + Than are dreamt of in your philosophy." + +Those who claim a plenary verbal inspiration as essential to a real +revelation are, according to M. Guizot, equally remote from a truly +scientific spirit. Errors in rhetoric and grammar, passages where the +writers speak of astronomical and geological matters in consonance with +the prevailing, but, in many cases, mistaken theories of their times, +being pointed out in the Bible, these cry out, "There can be no real +errors in an inspired book,"--and we are at once amazed and disgusted to +hear men deny the reality of things which they can but perceive, quite +as sturdily as the Port-Royalists refused to allow the presence of +sundry propositions in their books, which, notwithstanding the Pope's +infallible assertion, they had no recollection of thinking or writing, +which they supposed they had always hated and disavowed, and which they +could by no ingenuity of search discover. Sir Thomas Browne might enjoy, +could he revisit the world, the privilege of seeing many who are reduced +to defend their faith with Tertullian's desperate resolution,--"It is +certain, because it is impossible." If ever we escape from such +ineptitude, it will come about by the diffusion of a more philosophic +temper, and the use of a logic that shall refuse to exclude the facts of +human nature from fair treatment, that shall embrace and account for all +the questions involved, and that shall decline to receive as truth +errors of finite science because found in an inspired book. We welcome +this volume as an example of the right spirit and tendency in these +grave discussions, and shall look eagerly for the promised three +succeeding ones. + +This translation, though "executed under the superintendence of the +author," evidently does no justice to the original. We have not seen the +book in French, but we venture to say that M. Guizot never wrote French +which could answer to this version, awkward, careless, and sometimes +obscure. A certain picture of dull and ancient aspect, which had long +passed for an original from the hand of Leonardo da Vinci, and, despite +the raptures of sentimental people who sought to tickle their own vanity +by pretending to perceive in it the marks of its high origin, had +commonly awakened only a sigh of regret over the transitoriness of +pictorial glory, fell at length into the hands of a skilful artist. By +careful examination, this worthy person became satisfied that the +painting was indeed all that had been claimed, but that its primal +splendors had been obscured by the defacing brush of some incompetent +restorer. With loving care he removed the dimming colors, and to an +admiring world was revealed anew the Christ of the Supper. Will not +some American publisher perform a like kindly function for Guizot? + + + _History of the Anti-Slavery Measures of the Thirty-Seventh and + Thirty-Eighth United States Congress_, 1861-64. By HENRY + WILSON. Boston: Walker, Wise, & Co. 12mo. pp. 384. + +Senator Wilson is admirably qualified to record the anti-slavery +legislation in which he has borne so prominent and honorable a part. Few +but those engaged in debates can thoroughly understand their salient +points, and fix upon the precise sentences in which the position, +arguments, and animating spirit of opposite parties are stated and +condensed. The present volume is a labor-saving machine of great power +to all who desire or need a clear view of the course of Congressional +legislation on measures of emancipation, but who prefer to rest in +ignorance rather than wade through the debates as reported in the +"Congressional Globe," striving to catch, amid the waste of words, the +leading ideas or passions on which questions turn. + +The first thing which strikes the reader in Mr. Wilson's well-executed +epitome is the gradual character of this anti-slavery legislation, and +the general subordination of philanthropic to military considerations in +its conduct. The questions were not taken up in the order of their +abstract importance, but as they pressed on the practical judgment for +settlement in exigencies of the Government. When Slavery became an +obstruction to the progress of the national arms, opposition to it was +the dictate of prudence as well as of conscience, and its defenders at +once placed themselves in the position of being more interested in the +preservation of slavery than in the preservation of the nation. The +Republicans, charged heretofore with sacrificing the expedient to the +right, could now retort that their opponents were sacrificing the +expedient to the wrong. + +Senator Wilson's volume gives the history of twenty-three anti-slavery +measures, in the order of their inception and discussion. Among these +are the emancipation of slaves used for insurrectionary purposes,--the +forbidding of persons in the army to return fugitive slaves,--the +abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia,--the President's +proposition to aid States in the abolition of slavery,--the prohibition +of slavery in the Territories,--the confiscation and emancipation bill +of Senator Clark,--the appointment of diplomatic representatives to +Hayti and Liberia,--the bill for the suppression of the African +slave-trade,--the enrolment and pay of colored soldiers,--the +anti-slavery Amendment to the Constitution,--the bill to aid the States +to emancipate their slaves,--and the reconstruction of Rebel States. The +account of the introduction of these and other measures, and the debates +on them, are given by Mr. Wilson with brevity, fairness, and skill. A +great deal of the animation of the discussion, and of the clash and +conflict of individual opinions and passions, is preserved in the +epitome, so that the book has the interest which clings to all accounts +of verbal battles on whose issue great principles are staked. As the +words as well as the arguments of the debates are given, and as the +sentences chosen are those in which the characters of the speakers find +expression, the effect is often dramatic. It cannot fail to be observed, +in reading these reports, that there is a prevailing vulgarity of tone +in the declarations of the champions of Slavery. They boldly avow the +lowest and most selfish views in the coarsest languages and scout and +deride all elevation of feeling and thought in matters affecting the +rights of the poor and oppressed. Their opinions outrage civility as +well as Christianity; and while they make a boast of being gentlemen, +they hardly rise above the prejudices of boors. Principles which have +become truisms, and which it is a disgrace for an educated man not to +admit, they boldly denounce as pestilent paradoxes; and in reading Mr. +Wilson's book an occasional shock of shame must be felt by the most +imperturbable politician, at the spectacle of the legislature of "a +model republic" experiencing a fierce resistance in the attempt to +establish indisputable truths. + +Most of the questions here vehemently discussed should, it might be +supposed, be settled without discussion by the plain average sense and +conscience of any body of men deserving to live in the nineteenth +century; but so completely have the defenders of Slavery substituted +will and passion for reason and morality, and so long have they been +accustomed to have their insolent absurdities rule the politics of the +nation, that the passage of the bills whose varying fortunes Mr. Wilson +records must be considered the greatest triumph of liberty and justice +which our legislative annals afford. And in that triumph the historian +of the Anti-Slavery Measures may justly claim to have had a +distinguished part. Honest, able, industrious, intelligent, +indefatigable, zealous for his cause, yet flexible to events, gifted at +once with practical sagacity and strong convictions, and with his whole +heart and mind absorbed in the business of politics and legislation, he +has proved himself an excellent workman in that difficult task by which +facts are made to take the impress of ideas, and the principles of +equity are embodied in the laws of the land. + + + + +RECENT AMERICAN PUBLICATIONS + +RECEIVED BY THE EDITORS OF THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY. + + +A National Currency. By Sidney George Fisher, Author of "The Trial of +the Constitution," etc. Reprinted from the North American Review for +July, 1864. Philadelphia. J. B. Lippincott & Co. 16mo. paper, pp. 83. 25 +cents. + +Our World: or, First Lessons in Geography, for Children. By Mary L. +Hall. Boston. Crosby & Nichols. 12mo. pp. 177. $1.00. + +The Merchant Mechanic. A Tale of "New England Athens." By Mary A. Howe. +New York. John Bradburn. 12mo. pp. 453. $2.00. + +The American Boy's Book of Sports and Games: A Repository of In- and +Out-Door Amusements for Boys and Youth. Illustrated with over Six +Hundred Engravings, designed by White, Herrick, Wier, and Harvey, and +engraved by N. Orr. New York. Dick & Fitzgerald. 12mo. pp. 600. $3.50. + +Southern Slavery in its Present Aspects: Containing a Reply to a Late +Work of the Bishop of Vermont on Slavery. By Daniel R. Goodwin. +Philadelphia. J. B. Lippincott & Co. 16mo. pp. 343. $1.50. + +Love and Duty. By Mrs. Hubback. Philadelphia. T. B. Peterson & Brothers. +12mo, pp. 446. $2.00. + +Memoirs of Lieutenant-General Scott, LL.D. Written by Himself. In Two +Volumes. New York. Sheldon & Co. 12mo. pp. xxii., 330; iv., 323. $4.00. + +To Be or Not To Be, That is the Question. Boston. Geo. C. Rand and +Avery, Printers. 16mo. pp. 47. 38 cents. + +The Hawaiian Islands: Their Progress and Condition under Missionary +Labors. By Rufus Anderson, D.D. Boston. Gould & Lincoln. 12mo. pp. +xxii., 450. + +Uncle Nat: or, The Good Time which George and Frank had, Trapping, +Fishing, Camping-Out, etc. By Alfred Oldfellow. New York. D. Appleton & +Co. 16mo. pp. 224. $1.25. + +Lyra Anglicana; or, A Hymnal of Sacred Poetry, selected from the Best +English Writers, and arranged after the Order of the Apostles' Creed. By +Rev. George T. Rider, M.A. New York. D. Appleton & Co. 16mo. pp. xiv., +288. $2.00. + +Gunnery Catechism, as applied to the Service of Naval Ordnance. Adapted +to the Latest Official Regulations, and approved by the Bureau of +Ordnance, Navy Department. By J.D. Brandt, formerly of U.S. Navy. New +York. D. Van Nostrand. 18mo. pp. 197. $1.50. + +Ruth: A Song in the Desert. Boston. Gould & Lincoln. 16mo. pp. 64. 60 +cents. + +The Burden of the South, in Verse: or, Poems on Slavery, Grave, +Humorous, Didactic, and Satirical. By Sennoia Rubek. New York. P. +Everardus Warner. 8vo. paper. pp. 96. + +Petersons' New Cook-Book; or, Useful and Practical Receipts for the +Housewife and the Uninitiated. Philadelphia. T. B. Peterson & Brothers, +12mo. pp. 533. $2.00. + +Ancient Law: Its Connection with the Early History of Society, and its +Relation to Modern Ideas. By Henry Sumner Maine. With an Introduction by +Theodore W. Dwight. New York. Charles Scribner. 8vo. pp. lxix., 400. +$3.00. + +The Poems and Ballads of Schiller. Translated by Sir Edward Bulwer +Lytton, Bart. From the Last London Edition. New York. Clark & Maynard. +18mo. pp. 407. + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. +86, December, 1864, by Various + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ATLANTIC MONTHLY, DECEMBER 1864 *** + +***** This file should be named 29516-8.txt or 29516-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/2/9/5/1/29516/ + +Produced by Joshua Hutchinson, Josephine Paolucci and the +Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net. +(This file was produced from images generously made +available by Cornell University Digital Collections.) + + +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. 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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: The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 86, December, 1864 + +Author: Various + +Release Date: July 27, 2009 [EBook #29516] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ATLANTIC MONTHLY, DECEMBER 1864 *** + + + + +Produced by Joshua Hutchinson, Josephine Paolucci and the +Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net. +(This file was produced from images generously made +available by Cornell University Digital Collections.) + + + + + + +</pre> + + + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_649" id="Page_649">[Pg 649]</a></span></p> + +<h4>THE</h4> + +<h1>ATLANTIC MONTHLY.</h1> + +<h2>A MAGAZINE OF LITERATURE, ART, AND POLITICS.</h2> + + +<h3>VOL. XIV.—DECEMBER, 1864.—NO. LXXXVI.</h3> + +<p>Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1864, by <span class="smcap">Ticknor and +Fields</span>, in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of +Massachusetts.</p> + + +<p class="notes">Transcriber's Note: Minor typos have been corrected and footnotes moved +to the end of the article. Table of contents has been created for the HTML version.</p> + +<h2>Contents</h2> +<!-- Autogenerated TOC. Modify or delete as required. --> +<p> +<a href="#THE_HIGHLAND_LIGHT"><b>THE HIGHLAND LIGHT.</b></a><br /> +<a href="#ENGLISH_AUTHORS_IN_FLORENCE"><b>ENGLISH AUTHORS IN FLORENCE.</b></a><br /> +<a href="#A_TOBACCONALIAN_ODE"><b>A TOBACCONALIAN ODE.</b></a><br /> +<a href="#HALCYON_DAYS"><b>HALCYON DAYS.</b></a><br /> +<a href="#ON_TRANSLATING_THE_DIVINA_COMMEDIA"><b>ON TRANSLATING THE DIVINA COMMEDIA.</b></a><br /> +<a href="#HOUSE_AND_HOME_PAPERS"><b>HOUSE AND HOME PAPERS.</b></a><br /> +<a href="#ON_THE_COLUMBIA_RIVER"><b>ON THE COLUMBIA RIVER.</b></a><br /> +<a href="#OUR_LAST_DAY_IN_DIXIE"><b>OUR LAST DAY IN DIXIE.</b></a><br /> +<a href="#THE_VANISHERS"><b>THE VANISHERS.</b></a><br /> +<a href="#ICE_AND_ESQUIMAUX"><b>ICE AND ESQUIMAUX.</b></a><br /> +<a href="#THE_PROCESS_OF_SCULPTURE"><b>THE PROCESS OF SCULPTURE.</b></a><br /> +<a href="#BRYANTS_SEVENTIETH_BIRTHDAY"><b>BRYANT'S SEVENTIETH BIRTHDAY.</b></a><br /> +<a href="#LEAVES_FROM_AN_OFFICERS_JOURNAL"><b>LEAVES FROM AN OFFICER'S JOURNAL.</b></a><br /> +<a href="#ENGLAND_AND_AMERICA"><b>ENGLAND AND AMERICA.</b></a><br /> +<a href="#WE_ARE_A_NATION"><b>WE ARE A NATION.</b></a><br /> +<a href="#REVIEWS_AND_LITERARY_NOTICES"><b>REVIEWS AND LITERARY NOTICES.</b></a><br /> +<a href="#RECENT_AMERICAN_PUBLICATIONS"><b>RECENT AMERICAN PUBLICATIONS</b></a><br /> +</p> +<!-- End Autogenerated TOC. --> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THE_HIGHLAND_LIGHT" id="THE_HIGHLAND_LIGHT"></a>THE HIGHLAND LIGHT.</h2> + + +<p>This light-house, known to mariners as the Cape Cod or Highland Light, +is one of our "primary sea-coast lights," and is usually the first seen +by those approaching the entrance of Massachusetts Bay from Europe. It +is forty-three miles from Cape Ann Light, and forty-one from Boston +Light. It stands about twenty rods from the edge of the bank, which is +here formed of clay. I borrowed the plane and square, level and +dividers, of a carpenter who was shingling a barn near by, and, using +one of those shingles made of a mast, contrived a rude sort of quadrant, +with pins for sights and pivots, and got the angle of elevation of the +bank opposite the light-house, and with a couple of cod-lines the length +of its slope, and so measured its height on the shingle. It rises one +hundred and ten feet above its immediate base, or about one hundred and +twenty-three feet above mean low water. Graham, who has carefully +surveyed the extremity of the Cape, makes it one hundred and thirty +feet. The mixed sand and clay lay at an angle of forty degrees with the +horizon, where I measured it, but the clay is generally much steeper. No +cow nor hen ever gets down it. Half a mile farther south the bank is +fifteen or twenty-five feet higher, and that appeared to be the highest +land in North Truro. Even this vast clay-bank is fast wearing away. +Small streams of water trickling down it at intervals of two or three +rods have left the intermediate clay in the form of steep Gothic roofs +fifty feet high or more, the ridges as sharp and rugged-looking as +rocks; and in one place the bank is curiously eaten out in the form of a +large semicircular crater.</p> + +<p>According to the light-house keeper, the Cape is wasting here on both +sides, though most on the eastern. In some places it had lost many rods +within the last year, and erelong the light-house must be moved. We +calculated, <i>from his data</i>, how soon the Cape would be quite worn away +at this point,—"for," said he, "I can remember sixty years back." We +were even more surprised at this last announcement—that is, at the slow +waste of life and energy in our informant, for we had taken him to be +not more than forty—than at the rapid wasting of the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_650" id="Page_650">[Pg 650]</a></span> Cape, and we +thought that he stood a fair chance to outlive the former.</p> + +<p>Between this October and June of the next year I found that the bank had +lost about forty feet in one place opposite the light-house, and it was +cracked more than forty feet farther from the edge at the last date, the +shore being strewn with the recent rubbish. But I judged that generally +it was not wearing away here at the rate of more than six feet annually. +Any conclusions drawn from the observations of a few years or one +generation only are likely to prove false, and the Cape may balk +expectation by its durability. In some places even a wrecker's foot-path +down the bank lasts several years. One old inhabitant told us that when +the light-house was built, in 1798, it was calculated that it would +stand forty-five years, allowing the bank to waste one length of fence +each year, "but," said he, "there it is" (or rather another near the +same site, about twenty rods from the edge of the bank).</p> + +<p>The sea is not gaining on the Cape everywhere: for one man told me of a +vessel wrecked long ago on the north of Provincetown whose "<i>bones</i>" +(this was his word) are still visible many rods within the present line +of the beach, half buried in sand. Perchance they lie along-side the +<i>timbers</i> of a whale. The general statement of the inhabitants is, that +the Cape is wasting on both sides, but extending itself on particular +points on the south and west, as at Chatham and Monomoy Beaches, and at +Billingsgate, Long, and Race Points. James Freeman stated in his day +that above three miles had been added to Monomoy Beach during the +previous fifty years, and it is said to be still extending as fast as +ever. A writer in the "Massachusetts Magazine," in the last century, +tells us, that, "when the English first settled upon the Cape, there was +an island off Chatham, at three leagues' distance, called Webb's Island, +containing twenty acres, covered with red-cedar or savin. The +inhabitants of Nantucket used to carry wood from it"; but he adds that +in his day a large rock alone marked the spot, and the water was six +fathoms deep there. The entrance to Nauset Harbor, which was once in +Eastham, has now travelled south into Orleans. The islands in Wellfleet +Harbor once formed a continuous beach, though now small vessels pass +between them. And so of many other parts of this coast.</p> + +<p>Perhaps what the ocean takes from one part of the Cape it gives to +another,—robs Peter to pay Paul. On the eastern side the sea appears to +be everywhere encroaching on the land. Not only the land is undermined, +and its ruins carried off by currents, but the sand is blown from the +beach directly up the steep bank, where it is one hundred and fifty feet +high, and covers the original surface there many feet deep. If you sit +on the edge, you will have ocular demonstration of this by soon getting +your eyes full. Thus the bank preserves its height as fast as it is worn +away. This sand is steadily travelling westward at a rapid rate, "more +than a hundred yards," says one writer, within the memory of inhabitants +now living; so that in some places peat-meadows are buried deep under +the sand, and the peat is cut through it; and in one place a large +peat-meadow has made its appearance on the shore in the bank covered +many feet deep, and peat has been cut there. This accounts for that +great pebble of peat which we saw in the surf. The old oysterman had +told us that many years ago he lost a "crittur" by her being mired in a +swamp near the Atlantic side, east of his house, and twenty years ago he +lost the swamp itself entirely, but has since seen signs of it appearing +on the beach. He also said that he had seen cedar-stumps "as big as +cart-wheels" (!) on the bottom of the Bay, three miles off Billingsgate +Point, when leaning over the side of his boat in pleasant weather, and +that that was dry land not long ago. Another told us that a log canoe +known to have been buried many years before on the Bay side at East +Harbor in Truro, where the Cape is extremely narrow, appeared at length +on the Atlantic side, the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_651" id="Page_651">[Pg 651]</a></span> Cape having rolled over it; and an old woman +said,—"Now, you see, it is true what I told you, that the Cape is +moving."</p> + +<p>The bars along the coast shift with every storm, and in many places +there is occasionally none at all. We ourselves observed the effect of a +single storm with a high tide in the night, in July, 1855. It moved the +sand on the beach opposite the light-house to the depth of six feet, and +three rods in width as far as we could see north and south, and carried +it bodily off no one knows exactly where, laying bare in one place a +large rock five feet high which was invisible before, and narrowing the +beach to that extent. There is usually, as I have said, no bathing on +the back side of the Cape, on account of the undertow; but when we were +there last, the sea had, three months before, cast up a bar near this +light-house, two miles long and ten rods wide, over which the tide did +not flow, leaving a narrow cove, then a quarter of a mile long, between +it and the shore, which afforded excellent bathing. This cove had from +time to time been closed up as the bar travelled northward, in one +instance imprisoning four or five hundred whiting and cod, which died +there, and the water as often turned fresh and finally gave place to +sand. This bar, the inhabitants assured us, might be wholly removed, and +the water be six feet deep there in two or three days.</p> + +<p>The light-house keeper said, that, when the wind blowed strong on to the +shore, the waves ate fast into the bank, but when it blowed off, they +took no sand away; for in the former case the wind heaped up the surface +of the water next to the beach, and to preserve its equilibrium a strong +undertow immediately set back again into the sea, which carried with it +the sand and whatever else was in the way, and left the beach hard to +walk on; but in the latter case the undertow set on, and carried the +sand with it, so that it was particularly difficult for shipwrecked men +to get to land when the wind blowed on to the shore, but easier when it +blowed off. This undertow, meeting the next surface-wave on the bar +which itself has made, forms part of the dam over which the latter +breaks, as over an upright wall. The sea thus plays with the land, +holding a sand-bar in its mouth awhile before it swallows it, as a cat +plays with a mouse; but the fatal gripe is sure to come at last. The sea +sends its rapacious east-wind to rob the land, but before the former has +got far with its prey, the land sends its honest west-wind to recover +some of its own. But, according to Lieutenant Davis, the forms, extent, +and distribution of sand-bars and banks are principally determined, not +by winds and waves, but by tides.</p> + +<p>Our host said that you would be surprised, if you were on the beach when +the wind blew a hurricane directly on to it, to see that none of the +drift-wood came ashore, but all was carried directly northward and +parallel with the shore as fast as a man can walk, by the in-shore +current, which sets strongly in that direction at flood-tide. The +strongest swimmers also are carried along with it, and never gain an +inch toward the beach. Even a large rock has been moved half a mile +northward along the beach. He assured us that the sea was never still on +the back side of the Cape, but ran commonly as high as your head, so +that a great part of the time you could not launch a boat there, and +even in the calmest weather the waves run six or eight feet up the +beach, though then you could get off on a plank. Champlain and +Poitrincourt could not land here in 1606, on account of the swell, (<i>la +houlle</i>,) yet the savages came off to them in a canoe. In the Sieur de +la Borde's "Relation des Caraibes," my edition of which was published at +Amsterdam in 1711, at page 530 he says:—</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"Couroumon a Caraibe, also a star [<i>i.e.</i> a god], makes the +great <i>lames à la mer</i>, and overturns canoes. <i>Lames à la mer</i> +are the long <i>vagues</i> which are not broken (<i>entrecoupées</i>), +and such as one sees come to land all in one piece, from one +end of a beach to another, so that, however little wind there +may be, a shallop or a canoe could hardly land (<i>aborder +terre</i>) without<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_652" id="Page_652">[Pg 652]</a></span> turning over, or being filled with water."</p></div> + +<p>But on the Bay side, the water, even at its edge, is often as smooth and +still as in a pond. Commonly there are no boats used along this beach. +There was a boat belonging to the Highland Light, which the next keeper, +after he had been there a year, had not launched, though he said that +there was good fishing just off the shore. Generally the life-boats +cannot be used when needed. When the waves run very high, it is +impossible to get a boat off, however skilfully you steer it, for it +will often be completely covered by the curving edge of the approaching +breaker as by an arch, and so filled with water, or it will be lifted up +by its bows, turned directly over backwards, and all the contents +spilled out. A spar thirty feet long is served in the same way.</p> + +<p>I heard of a party who went off fishing back of Wellfleet some years +ago, in two boats, in calm weather, who, when they had laden their boats +with fish, and approached the land again, found such a swell breaking on +it, though there was no wind, that they were afraid to enter it. At +first they thought to pull for Provincetown; but night coming on, and +that was many miles distant. Their case seemed a desperate one. As often +as they approached the shore and saw the terrible breakers that +intervened, they were deterred. In short, they were thoroughly +frightened. Finally, having thrown their fish overboard, those in one +boat chose a favorable opportunity, and succeeded, by skill and good +luck, in reaching the land; but they were unwilling to take the +responsibility of telling the others when to come in, and as the other +helmsman was inexperienced, their boat was swamped at once, yet all +managed to save themselves.</p> + +<p>Much smaller waves soon make a boat "nail-sick," as the phrase is. The +keeper said that after a long and strong blow there would be three large +waves, each successively larger than the last, and then no large ones +for some time, and that, when they wished to land in a boat, they came +in on the last and largest wave. Sir Thomas Browne, (as quoted in +Brand's "Popular Antiquities," p. 372,) on the subject of the tenth wave +being "greater or more dangerous than any other," after quoting Ovid,—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Qui venit hic fluctus, fluctus supereminet omnes:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Posterior nono est, undecimoque prior,"—<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>says, "Which, notwithstanding, is evidently false; nor can it be made +out by observation either upon the shore or the ocean, as we have with +diligence explored in both. And surely in vain we expect a regularity in +the waves of the sea, or in the particular motions thereof, as we may in +its general reciprocations, whose causes are constant, and effects +therefore correspondent; whereas its fluctuations are but motions +subservient, which winds, storms, shores, shelves, and every +interjacency irregulates."</p> + +<p>We read that the Clay Pounds were so called "because vessels have had +the misfortune to be pounded against them in gales of wind," which we +regard as a doubtful derivation. There are small ponds here, upheld by +the clay, which were formerly called the Clay Pits. Perhaps this, or +Clay Ponds, is the origin of the name. Water is found in the clay quite +near the surface; but we heard of one man who had sunk a well in the +sand close by, "till he could see stars at noonday," without finding +any.</p> + +<p>Over this bare highland the wind has full sweep. Even in July it blows +the wings over the heads of the young turkeys, which do not know enough +to head against it; and in gales the doors and windows are blown in, and +you must hold on to the light-house to prevent being blown into the +Atlantic. They who merely keep out on the beach in a storm in the winter +are sometimes rewarded by the Humane Society. If you would feel the full +force of a tempest, take up your residence on the top of Mount +Washington, or at the Highland Light in Truro.</p> + +<p>It was said in 1794 that more vessels were cast away on the east shore +of Truro than anywhere in Barnstable County.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_653" id="Page_653">[Pg 653]</a></span> Notwithstanding this +light-house has since been erected, after almost every storm we read of +one or more vessels wrecked here, and sometimes more than a dozen wrecks +are visible from this point at one time. The inhabitants hear the crash +of vessels going to pieces as they sit round their hearths, and they +commonly date from some memorable shipwreck. If the history of this +beach could be written from beginning to end, it would be a thrilling +page in the history of commerce.</p> + +<p>Truro was settled in the year 1700 as <i>Dangerfield</i>. This was a very +appropriate name, for I read on a monument in the graveyard near Pamet +River the following inscription:—</p> + +<p class="center"> +Sacred<br /> +to the memory of<br /> +57 citizens of Truro,<br /> +who were lost in seven<br /> +vessels, which<br /> +foundered at sea in<br /> +the memorable gale<br /> +of Oct. 3d, 1841.<br /> +</p> + +<p>Their names and ages by families were recorded on different sides of the +stone. They are said to have been lost on George's Bank, and I was told +that only one vessel drifted ashore on the back side of the Cape, with +the boys locked into the cabin and drowned. It is said that the homes of +all were "within a circuit of two miles." Twenty-eight inhabitants of +Dennis were lost in the same gale; and I read that "in one day, +immediately after this storm, nearly or quite one hundred bodies were +taken up and buried on Cape Cod." The Truro Insurance Company failed for +want of skippers to take charge of its vessels. But the surviving +inhabitants went a-fishing again the next year as usual. I found that it +would not do to speak of shipwrecks there, for almost every family has +lost some of its members at sea. "Who lives in that house?" I inquired. +"Three widows," was the reply. The stranger and the inhabitant view the +shore with very different eyes. The former may have come to see and +admire the ocean in a storm; but the latter looks on it as the scene +where his nearest relatives were wrecked. When I remarked to an old +wrecker, partially blind, who was sitting on the edge of the bank +smoking a pipe, which he had just lit with a match of dried beach-grass, +that I supposed he liked to hear the sound of the surf, he answered, +"No, I do not like to hear the sound of the surf." He had lost at least +one son in "the memorable gale," and could tell many a tale of the +shipwrecks which he had witnessed there.</p> + +<p>In the year 1717, a noted pirate named Bellamy was led on to the bar off +Wellfleet by the captain of a snow which he had taken, to whom he had +offered his vessel again, if he would pilot him into Provincetown +Harbor. Tradition says that the latter threw over a burning tar-barrel +in the night, which drifted ashore, and the pirates followed it. A storm +coming on, their whole fleet was wrecked, and more than a hundred dead +bodies lay along the shore. Six who escaped shipwreck were executed. "At +times to this day," (1793,) says the historian of Wellfleet, "there are +King William and Queen Mary's coppers picked up, and pieces of silver +called cob-money. The violence of the seas moves the sands on the outer +bar, so that at times the iron caboose of the ship [that is, Bellamy's] +at low ebbs has been seen." Another tells us, that, "for many years +after this shipwreck, a man of a very singular and frightful aspect used +every spring and autumn to be seen travelling on the Cape, who was +supposed to have been one of Bellamy's crew. The presumption is that he +went to some place where money had been secreted by the pirates, to get +such a supply as his exigencies required. When he died, many pieces of +gold were found in a girdle which he constantly wore."</p> + +<p>As I was walking on the beach here in my last visit, looking for shells +and pebbles, just after that storm which I have mentioned as moving the +sand to a great depth, not knowing but I might find some cob-money, I +did actually pick up a French crown-piece,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_654" id="Page_654">[Pg 654]</a></span> worth about a dollar and six +cents, near high-water mark, on the still moist sand, just under the +abrupt, caving base of the bank. It was of a dark slate-color, and +looked like a flat pebble, but still bore a very distinct and handsome +head of Louis XV., and the usual legend on the reverse, "<i>Sit Nomen +Domini Benedictum</i>," (Blessed be the Name of the Lord,)—a pleasing +sentiment to read in the sands of the sea-shore, whatever it might be +stamped on,—and I also made out the date, 1741. Of course, I thought at +first that it was that same old button which I have found so many times, +but my knife soon showed the silver. Afterward, rambling on the bars at +low tide, I cheated my companion by holding up round shells (<i>Scutellæ</i>) +between my fingers, whereupon he quickly stripped and came off to me.</p> + +<p>In the Revolution, a British ship-of-war, called the Somerset, was +wrecked near the Clay Pounds, and all on board, some hundreds in number, +were taken prisoners. My informant said that he had never seen any +mention of this in the histories, but that at any rate he knew of a +silver watch, which one of those prisoners by accident left there, which +was still going to tell the story. But this event is noticed by some +writers.</p> + +<p>The next summer I saw a sloop from Chatham dragging for anchors and +chains just off this shore. She had her boats out at the work while she +shuffled about on various tacks, and, when anything was found, drew up +to hoist it on board. It is a singular employment, at which men are +regularly hired and paid for their industry, to hunt to-day in pleasant +weather for anchors which have been lost,—the sunken faith and hope of +mariners, to which they trusted in vain: now, perchance, it is the rusty +one of some old pirate's ship or Norman fisherman, whose cable parted +here two hundred years ago; and now the best bower-anchor of a Canton or +a California ship, which has gone about her business. If the roadsteads +of the spiritual ocean could be thus dragged, what rusty flukes of hope +deceived and parted chain-cables of faith might again be windlassed +aboard! enough to sink the finder's craft, or stock new navies to the +end of time. The bottom of the sea is strown with anchors, some deeper +and some shallower, and alternately covered and uncovered by the sand, +perchance with a small length of iron cable still attached,—of which +where is the other end? So many unconcluded tales to be continued +another time. So, if we had diving-bells adapted to the spiritual deeps, +we should see anchors with their cables attached, as thick as eels in +vinegar, all wriggling vainly toward their holding-ground. But that is +not treasure for us which another man has lost; rather it is for us to +seek what no other man has found or can find,—not be Chatham men, +dragging for anchors.</p> + +<p>The annals of this voracious beach! who could write them, unless it were +a shipwrecked sailor? How many who have seen it have seen it only in the +midst of danger and distress, the last strip of earth which their mortal +eyes beheld! Think of the amount of suffering which a single strand has +witnessed! The ancients would have represented it as a sea-monster with +open jaws, more terrible than Scylla and Charybdis. An inhabitant of +Truro told me that about a fortnight after the St. John was wrecked at +Cohasset he found two bodies on the shore at the Clay Pounds. They were +those of a man and a corpulent woman. The man had thick boots on, though +his head was off, but "it was along-side." It took the finder some weeks +to get over the sight. Perhaps they were man and wife, and whom God had +joined the ocean-currents had not put asunder. Yet by what slight +accidents at first may they have been associated in their drifting! Some +of the bodies of those passengers were picked up far out at sea, boxed +up and sunk; some brought ashore and buried. There are more consequences +to a shipwreck than the underwriters notice. The Gulf Stream may return +some to their native shores, or drop them in some out-of-the-way cave of +ocean, where time and the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_655" id="Page_655">[Pg 655]</a></span> elements will write new riddles with their +bones.—But to return to land again.</p> + +<p>In this bank, above the clay, I counted in the summer two hundred holes +of the bank-swallow within a space six rods long, and there were at +least one thousand old birds within three times that distance, +twittering over the surf. I had never associated them in my thoughts +with the beach before. One little boy who had been a-bird's-nesting had +got eighty swallows' eggs for his share. Tell it not to the Humane +Society! There were many young birds on the clay beneath, which had +tumbled out and died. Also there were many crow-blackbirds hopping about +in the dry fields, and the upland plover were breeding close by the +light-house. The keeper had once cut off one's wing while mowing, as she +sat on her eggs there. This is also a favorite resort for gunners in the +fall to shoot the golden plover. As around the shores of a pond are seen +devil's-needles, butterflies, etc., so here, to my surprise, I saw at +the same season great devil's-needles of a size proportionably larger, +or nearly as big as my finger, incessantly coasting up and down the edge +of the bank, and butterflies also were hovering over it, and I never saw +so many dor-bugs and beetles of various kinds as strewed the beach. They +had apparently flown over the bank in the night, and could not get up +again, and some had perhaps fallen into the sea and were washed ashore. +They may have been in part attracted by the light-house lamps.</p> + +<p>The Clay Pounds are a more fertile tract than usual. We saw some fine +patches of roots and corn here. As generally on the Cape, the plants had +little stalk or leaf, but ran remarkably to seed. The corn was hardly +more than half as high as in the interior, yet the ears were large and +full, and one farmer told us that he could raise forty bushels on an +acre without manure, and sixty with it. The heads of the rye also were +remarkably large. The shadbush, (<i>Amelanchier</i>,) beach-plums, and +blueberries, (<i>Vaccinium Pennsylvanicum</i>,) like the apple-trees and +oaks, were very dwarfish, spreading over the sand, but at the same time +very fruitful. The blueberry was but an inch or two high, and its fruit +often rested on the ground, so that you did not suspect the presence of +the bushes, even on those bare hills, until you were treading on them. I +thought that this fertility must be owing mainly to the abundance of +moisture in the atmosphere, for I observed that what little grass there +was was remarkably laden with dew in the morning, and in summer dense +imprisoning fogs frequently last till mid-day, turning one's beard into +a wet napkin about his throat, and the oldest inhabitant may lose his +way within a stone's-throw of his house, or be obliged to follow the +beach for a guide. The brick house attached to the light-house was +exceedingly damp at that season, and writing-paper lost all its +stiffness in it. It was impossible to dry your towel after bathing, or +to press flowers without their mildewing. The air was so moist that we +rarely wished to drink, though we could at all times taste the salt on +our lips. Salt was rarely used at table, and our host told us that his +cattle invariably refused it when it was offered them, they got so much +with their grass and at every breath; but he said that a sick horse, or +one just from the country, would sometimes take a hearty draught of salt +water, and seemed to like it and be the better for it.</p> + +<p>It was surprising to see how much water was contained in the terminal +bud of the sea-side golden-rod, standing in the sand early in July, and +also how turnips, beets, carrots, etc., flourished even in pure sand. A +man travelling by the shore near there not long before us noticed +something green growing in the pure sand of the beach, just at +high-water mark, and on approaching found it to be a bed of beets +flourishing vigorously, probably from seed washed out of the Franklin. +Also beets and turnips came up in the sea-weed used for manure in many +parts of the Cape. This suggests how various plants may have been +dispersed over the world to distant islands<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_656" id="Page_656">[Pg 656]</a></span> and continents. Vessels, +with seeds in their cargoes, destined for particular ports, where +perhaps they were not needed, have been cast away on desolate islands, +and though their crews perished, some of their seeds have been +preserved. Out of many kinds a few would find a soil and climate adapted +to them, become naturalized, and perhaps drive out the native plants at +last, and so fit the land for the habitation of man. It is an ill wind +that blows nobody any good, and for the time lamentable shipwrecks may +thus contribute a new vegetable to a continent's stock, and prove on the +whole a lasting blessing to its inhabitants. Or winds and currents might +effect the same without the intervention of man. What, indeed, are the +various succulent plants which grow on the beach but such beds of beets +and turnips, sprung originally from seeds which perhaps were cast on the +waters for this end, though we do not know the Franklin which they came +out of? In ancient times some Mr. Bell (?) was sailing this way in his +ark with seeds of rocket, saltwort, sandwort, beach-grass, samphire, +bayberry, poverty-grass, etc., all nicely labelled with directions, +intending to establish a nursery somewhere; and did not a nursery get +established, though he thought that he had failed?</p> + +<p>About the light-house I observed in the summer the pretty <i>Polygala +polygama</i>, spreading ray-wise flat on the ground, white +pasture-thistles, (<i>Cirsium pumilum</i>,) and amid the shrubbery the +<i>Smilax glauca</i>, which is commonly said not to grow so far north. Near +the edge of the banks about half a mile southward, the broom-crowberry, +(<i>Empetrum Conradii</i>,) for which Plymouth is the only locality in +Massachusetts usually named, forms pretty green mounds four or five feet +in diameter by one foot high,—soft, springy beds for the wayfarer: I +saw it afterward in Provincetown. But prettiest of all, the scarlet +pimpernel, or poor-man's weather-glass, (<i>Anagallis arvensis</i>,) greets +you in fair weather on almost every square yard of sand. From Yarmouth I +have received the <i>Chrysopsis falcata</i>, (golden aster,) and <i>Vaccinium +stamineum</i>, (deer-berry or squaw-huckleberry,) with fruit not edible, +sometimes as large as a cranberry (Sept. 7).</p> + +<p>The Highland Light-house,<a name="FNanchor_A_1" id="FNanchor_A_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_A_1" class="fnanchor">[A]</a> where we were staying, is a +substantial-looking building of brick, painted white, and surmounted by +an iron cap. Attached to it is the dwelling of the keeper, one story +high, also of brick, and built by Government. As we were going to spend +the night in a light-house, we wished to make the most of so novel an +experience, and therefore told our host that we should like to accompany +him when he went to light up. At rather early candle-light he lighted a +small Japan lamp, allowing it to smoke rather more than we like on +ordinary occasions, and told us to follow him. He led the way first +through his bedroom, which was placed nearest to the light-house, and +then through a long, narrow, covered passage-way, between whitewashed +walls, like a prison-entry, into the lower part of the light-house, +where many great butts of oil were arranged around; thence we ascended +by a winding and open iron stairway, with a steadily increasing scent of +oil and lamp-smoke, to a trap-door in an iron floor, and through this +into the lantern. It was a neat building, with everything in apple-pie +order, and no danger of anything rusting there for want of oil. The +light consisted of fifteen argand lamps, placed within smooth concave +reflectors twenty-one inches in diameter, and arranged in two horizontal +circles one above the other, facing every way excepting directly down +the Cape. These were surrounded, at a distance of two or three feet, by +large plate-glass windows, which defied the storms, with iron sashes, on +which rested the iron cap. All the iron work, except the floor, was +painted white. And thus the light-house was completed. We walked slowly +round in that narrow space as the keeper lighted each lamp in +succession, conversing with him at the same moment that many a sailor on +the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_657" id="Page_657">[Pg 657]</a></span> deep witnessed the lighting of the Highland Light. His duty was to +fill and trim and light his lamps, and keep bright the reflectors. He +filled them every morning, and trimmed them commonly once in the course +of the night. He complained of the quality of the oil which was +furnished. This house consumes about eight hundred gallons in a year, +which cost not far from one dollar a gallon; but perhaps a few lives +would be saved, if better oil were provided. Another light-house keeper +said that the same proportion of winter-strained oil was sent to the +southernmost light-house in the Union as to the most northern. Formerly, +when this light-house had windows with small and thin panes, a severe +storm would sometimes break the glass, and then they were obliged to put +up a wooden shutter in haste to save their lights and reflectors,—and +sometimes in tempests, when the mariner stood most in need of their +guidance, they had thus nearly converted the light-house into a +dark-lantern, which emitted only a few feeble rays, and those commonly +on the land or lee side. He spoke of the anxiety and sense of +responsibility which he felt in cold and stormy nights in the winter, +when he knew that many a poor fellow was depending on him, and his lamps +burned dimly, the oil being chilled. Sometimes he was obliged to warm +the oil in a kettle in his house at midnight, and fill his lamps over +again,—for he could not have a fire in the light-house, it produced +such a sweat on the windows. His successor told me that he could not +keep too hot a fire in such a case. All this because the oil was poor. A +government lighting the mariners on its wintry coast with +summer-strained oil, to save expense! That were surely a summer-strained +mercy!</p> + +<p>This keeper's successor, who kindly entertained me the next year, stated +that one extremely cold night, when this and all the neighboring lights +were burning summer oil, but he had been provident enough to reserve a +little winter oil against emergencies, he was waked up with anxiety, and +found that his oil was congealed, and his lights almost extinguished; +and when, after many hours' exertion, he had succeeded in replenishing +his reservoirs with winter oil at the wick-end, and with difficulty had +made them burn, he looked out, and found that the other lights in the +neighborhood, which were usually visible to him, had gone out, and he +heard afterward that the Pamet River and Billingsgate Lights also had +been extinguished.</p> + +<p>Our host said that the frost, too, on the windows caused him much +trouble, and in sultry summer nights the moths covered them and dimmed +his lights; sometimes even small birds flew against the thick +plate-glass, and were found on the ground beneath in the morning with +their necks broken. In the spring of 1855 he found nineteen small +yellow-birds, perhaps goldfinches or myrtle-birds, thus lying dead +around the light-house; and sometimes in the fall he had seen where a +golden plover had struck the glass in the night, and left the down and +the fatty part of its breast on it.</p> + +<p>Thus he struggled, by every method, to keep his light shining before +men. Surely the light-house keeper has a responsible, if an easy, +office. When his lamp goes out, <i>he</i> goes out; or, at most, only one +such accident is pardoned.</p> + +<p>I thought it a pity that some poor student did not live there, to profit +by all that light, since he would not rob the mariner. "Well," he said, +"I do sometimes come up here and read the newspaper when they are noisy +down below." Think of fifteen argand lamps to read the newspaper by! +Government oil!—light enough, perchance, to read the Constitution by! I +thought that he should read nothing less than his Bible by that light. I +had a classmate who fitted for college by the lamps of a light-house, +which was more light, methinks, than the University afforded.</p> + +<p>When we had come down and walked a dozen rods from the light-house, we +found that we could not get the full strength of its light on the narrow +strip<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_658" id="Page_658">[Pg 658]</a></span> of land between it and the shore, being too low for the focus, +and we saw only so many feeble and rayless stars; but at forty rods +inland we could see to read, though we were still indebted to only one +lamp. Each reflector sent forth a separate "fan" of light: one shone on +the windmill, and one in the hollow, while the intervening spaces were +in shadow. This light is said to be visible twenty nautical miles and +more, to an observer fifteen feet above the level of the sea. We could +see the revolving light at Race Point, the end of the Cape, about nine +miles distant, and also the light on Long Point, at the entrance of +Provincetown Harbor, and one of the distant Plymouth Harbor Lights, +across the Bay, nearly in a range with the last, like a star in the +horizon. The keeper thought that the other Plymouth Light was concealed +by being exactly in a range with the Long Point Light. He told us that +the mariner was sometimes led astray by a mackerel-fisher's lantern, who +was afraid of being run down in the night, or even by a cottager's +light, mistaking them for some well-known light on the coast,—and, when +he discovered his mistake, was wont to curse the prudent fisher or the +wakeful cottager without reason.</p> + +<p>Though it was once declared that Providence placed this mass of clay +here on purpose to erect a light-house on, the keeper said that the +light-house should have been erected half a mile farther south, where +the coast begins to bend, and where the light could be seen at the same +time with the Nauset Lights, and distinguished from them. They now talk +of building one there. It happens that the present one is the more +useless now, so near the extremity of the Cape, because other +light-houses have since been erected there.</p> + +<p>Among the many regulations of the Light-House Board, hanging against the +wall here, many of them excellent, perhaps, if there were a regiment +stationed here to attend to them, there is one requiring the keeper to +keep an account of the number of vessels which pass his light during the +day. But there are a hundred vessels in sight at once, steering in all +directions, many on the very verge of the horizon, and he must have more +eyes than Argus, and be a good deal farther-sighted, to tell which are +passing his light. It is an employment in some respects best suited to +the habits of the gulls which coast up and down here and circle over the +sea.</p> + +<p>I was told by the next keeper, that on the eighth of June following, a +particularly clear and beautiful morning, he rose about half an hour +before sunrise, and, having a little time to spare, for his custom was +to extinguish his lights at sunrise, walked down toward the shore to see +what he might find. When he got to the edge of the bank, he looked up, +and, to his astonishment, saw the sun rising, and already part way above +the horizon. Thinking that his clock was wrong, he made haste back, and, +though it was still too early by the clock, extinguished his lamps, and +when he had got through and come down, he looked out of the window, and, +to his still greater astonishment, saw the sun just where it was before, +two-thirds above the horizon. He showed me where its rays fell on the +wall across the room. He proceeded to make a fire, and when he had done, +there was the sun still at the same height. Whereupon, not trusting to +his own eyes any longer, he called up his wife to look at it, and she +saw it also. There were vessels in sight on the ocean, and their crews, +too, he said, must have seen it, for its rays fell on them. It remained +at that height for about fifteen minutes by the clock, and then rose as +usual, and nothing else extraordinary happened during that day. Though +accustomed to the coast, he had never witnessed nor heard of such a +phenomenon before. I suggested that there might have been a cloud in the +horizon invisible to him, which rose with the sun, and his clock was +only as accurate as the average; or perhaps, as he denied the +possibility of this, it was such a looming of the sun as is said to +occur at Lake Superior<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_659" id="Page_659">[Pg 659]</a></span> and elsewhere. Sir John Franklin, for instance, +says in his "Narrative," that, when he was on the shore of the Polar +Sea, the horizontal refraction varied so much one morning that "the +upper limb of the sun twice appeared at the horizon before it finally +rose."</p> + +<p>He certainly must be a son of Aurora to whom the sun looms, when there +are so many millions to whom it <i>glooms</i> rather, or who never see it +till an hour <i>after</i> it has risen. But it behooves us old stagers to +keep our lamps trimmed and burning to the last, and not trust to the +sun's looming.</p> + +<p>This keeper remarked that the centre of the flame should be exactly +opposite the centre of the reflectors, and that accordingly, if he was +not careful to turn down his wicks in the morning, the sun falling on +the reflectors on the south side of the building would set fire to them, +like a burning-glass, in the coldest day, and he would look up at noon +and see them all lighted! When your lamp is ready to give light, it is +readiest to receive it, and the sun will light it. His successor said +that he had never known them to blaze in such a case, but merely to +smoke.</p> + +<p>I saw that this was a place of wonders. In a sea-turn or shallow fog, +while I was there the next summer, it being clear overhead, the edge of +the bank twenty rods distant appeared like a mountain-pasture in the +horizon. I was completely deceived by it, and I could then understand +why mariners sometimes ran ashore in such cases, especially in the +night, supposing it to be far away, though they could see the land. Once +since this, being in a large oyster-boat two or three hundred miles from +here, in a dark night, when there was a thin veil of mist on land and +water, we came so near to running on to the land before our skipper was +aware of it, that the first warning was my hearing the sound of the surf +under my elbow. I could almost have jumped ashore, and we were obliged +to go about very suddenly to prevent striking. The distant light for +which we were steering, supposing it a light-house five or six miles +off, came through the cracks of a fisherman's bunk not more than six +rods distant.</p> + +<p>The keeper entertained us handsomely in his solitary little ocean-house. +He was a man of singular patience and intelligence, who, when our +queries struck him, rang as clear as a bell in response. The light-house +lamps a few feet distant shone full into my chamber, and made it as +bright as day, so I knew exactly how the Highland Light bore all that +night, and I was in no danger of being wrecked. Unlike the last, this +was as still as a summer night. I thought, as I lay there, half awake +and half asleep, looking upward through the window at the lights above +my head, how many sleepless eyes from far out on the +ocean-stream—mariners of all nations spinning their yarns through the +various watches of the night—were directed toward my couch.</p> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_A_1" id="Footnote_A_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_A_1"><span class="label">[A]</span></a> The light-house has since been rebuilt, and shows a +<i>Fresnel</i> light.</p></div> +</div> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_660" id="Page_660">[Pg 660]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="ENGLISH_AUTHORS_IN_FLORENCE" id="ENGLISH_AUTHORS_IN_FLORENCE"></a>ENGLISH AUTHORS IN FLORENCE.</h2> + + +<p>Bella Firenze, "Flower of all Cities and City of all Flowers," is not +only the garden of Italy's intellect, but the hot-house to which many a +Northern genius has been transplanted. The house where Milton resided is +still pointed out and held sacred by his venerators; and Casa Guidi, +gloomier and grayer now that the grand light has gone out of it, is of +especial interest to every cultivated traveller. A gratified smile, born +of sorrow, passes over the stranger's face, as he reads the inscription +upon the tablet that makes Casa Guidi historical,—a tablet inserted by +the municipality of Florence as a grateful tribute to the memory of a +truly great woman, great enough to love Truth "more than Plato and +Plato's country, more than Dante and Dante's country, more even than +Shakspeare and Shakspeare's country."</p> + + +<p class="center">Quì scrisse e morì<br /> +Elisabetta Barrett Browning<br /> +Che in cuore di donna conciliava<br /> +Scienza di dotto o spirito di poeta<br /> +E fece del suo verso aureo anello<br /> +Fra Italia e Inghilterra<br /> +Pone questa memoria<br /> +Firenze grata<br /> +1861</p> + + +<p>Here wrote and died Elizabeth Barrett Browning!</p> + +<p>Tradition says that years ago Casa Guidi was the scene of several dark +deeds; and after having wandered through the great rooms, for the most +part perpetually in shadow, one's imagination puts full faith in a +time-worn story. Whatever may have been the stain left upon the old +palace by the Guidi, it has been removed by an alien woman,—by her who +sat "By the Fireside," and toiled unceasingly for the good of man and +the love, of God. Casa Guidi heard the whispering of "One Word More," +the echo of which is growing fainter and fainter to the ear, but +subtiler to the soul; and looking up at <i>her</i> house, we hear the murmur +of a poet's voice, saying,—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"God be thanked, the meanest of His creatures<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Boasts two soul-sides, one to face the world with,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">One to show a woman when he loves her."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>The unsuspected prophecy of "One Word More" has been fulfilled,—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Lines I write the first time and the last time,"—<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>for Destiny has given to them other than the author's meaning: because +of this destiny, we pass from the shadow of Casa Guidi with bowed head.</p> + +<p>It is a beautiful custom, this of Italy, marking the spot where noble +souls have lived or died, that coming generations may learn to venerate +the greatness of the past, and become inspired thereby to exalted deeds +in the present. We of America, eagerly busy jostling the elbows of +To-Day, have not even a turn of the head for the haunts of dead men whom +we honor. No tablets mark their homes; and indeed they would be of +little profit to a country where mementos of "lang syne" are never +spared, when the requirements of commerce or of real estate issue their +universal mandate, "Destroy and build anew!" America shakes all dust +from off her feet, even that of great men's bones; though indeed Boston, +which is not wanting in esteem for its respectable antecedents, has made +a feeble attempt to do honor to the Father of his Country. The tablet is +but an attempt, however, which has become thoroughly demoralized by +keeping company with attorneys' signs and West-India goods; the bouquet +of law-papers, <i>plus</i> coffee and tobacco, has deprived the salt of its +savor.</p> + +<p>Far different is it in Florence, where the identical houses still +remain. Almost every street bears the record of a great man. To walk +there is to hold intimate communion with departed genius. What traveller +has not mused before Dante's stone? The most careless cannot pass +Palazzo Buonarotti without<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_661" id="Page_661">[Pg 661]</a></span> giving a thought to Michel Angelo and his +art. An afternoon's stroll along the Lung' Arno to drink in the warmth +of an Italian sunset is made doubly suggestive by a glance at the house +where set another sun when the Piedmontese poet-patriot, Alfieri, died. +We never passed through the Via Guicciardini, as clingy, musty, and +gloomy as the writings of the old historian whose palace gives name to +the street, without looking up at the weather-beaten <i>casa</i> dedicated to +the memory of that wonderfully subtile Tuscan, Niccolò Macchiavelli; and +by dint of much looking we fancied ourselves drawn nearer to the +Florence of 1500, and read "The Prince," with a gusto and an +apprehension which nothing but the old house could have inspired. This, +at least, we believed, and our faith in the fancy remains unshaken, now +that Mr. Denton, the geologist, has expounded the theory of +"Psychometry," which he tells us is the divination of soul through the +contact of matter with a psychometrical mind. Had we in those days been +better versed in this theory of "the soul of things," we should have +made a gentle application of forehead to the door-step of Macchiavelli's +mundane residence, and doubtless have arisen thoroughly pervaded with +the true spirit of the man whose feet were familiar to a stone now +desecrated by wine-flasks, onions, cabbages, and <i>contadini</i>.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Somerville, to whom the world is indebted for several developments +in physical geography, is almost as fixed a Florentine celebrity as the +Palazzo Vecchio; and Villino Trollope has become endeared to many +<i>forestieri</i> from the culture and hospitality of its inmates. It is the +residence of Mr. and Mrs. Thomas Adolphus Trollope, earnest contributors +to the literature of England, and active friends of Cavour's Italy. +Justice prompts us to say that no other foreigner of the present day has +done so much as Mr. Trollope to familiarize the Anglo-Saxon mind with +the genius and aspirations of Italy. A constant writer for the liberal +press of London, Mr. Trollope is also the author of several historical +works that have taken their place in a long-neglected niche. "A Decade +of Italian Women" has woven new interest around ten females of renown, +while his later works of "Filippo Strozzi" and "Paul the Pope and Paul +the Friar," have thrown additional light upon three vigorous historical +characters, as well as upon much Romish iniquity. "Tuscany in '48 and +'59" is the most satisfactory book of the kind that has been published, +Mr. Trollope's constant residence in Florence having made him perfectly +familiar with the actual <i>status</i> of Tuscany during these important eras +in her history. The old saying, "Merit is its own reward," to which it +is usually necessary to give a Pre-Raphaelite interpretation, has had a +broader signification to Mr. Trollope, whose efforts in Italy's behalf +have been appreciated by the <i>Rè Galantuomo</i>, Victor Emanuel, by whom he +has been knighted with the Order of Saints Maurice and Lazarus. As the +decoration was entirely unsolicited,—for Mr. Trollope is a true +democrat,—and as he is nearly, if not quite, the only Englishman +similarly honored, the compliment is as pleasing as it is flattering.</p> + +<p>Historian though he be, Mr. Trollope has more recently made his mark as +a novelist. "La Beata," an Italian story, published three years ago, is +greatly praised by London critics, one strong writer describing it as a +"beatific book." The character of the heroine has been drawn with a +pathos rare and heart-rending, nor can the reader fail to be impressed +with the nobility of the mind that could conceive of such exceeding +purity and self-sacrifice in woman. Mr. Trollope's later novels of +"Marietta" and "Giulio Malatesta" have also met with great success, and, +although not comparable with "La Beata," give most accurate pictures of +Italian life and manners,—and truth is ordinarily left out of +Anglo-Italian stories. "Giulio Malatesta" is of decided historical +interest, giving a side-view of the Revolution of '48 and of the Battle +of Curtatone, which was fought so nobly by<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_662" id="Page_662">[Pg 662]</a></span> Tuscan volunteers and +students. It is a matter of regret to all lovers of Italy that Mr. +Trollope's works have not been republished in America, as no American +has labored in the same field, nor do Americans <i>en masse</i> possess very +correct ideas of a country whose great future is creating an additional +interest in her promising present and wonderful past. Mr. Trollope's +"History of Florence," upon which he is now at work, will be his most +valuable contribution to literature.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Trollope, who from her polyglot accomplishments may be called a +many-sided woman, has been, both by Nature and education, most liberally +endowed with intellectual gifts. The depressing influence of continual +invalidism alone prevents her from taking that literary position which +good health and application would soon secure for her. Nevertheless, +Mrs. Trollope has for several years been a constant correspondent of the +London "Athenæum," and in all seasons Young Italy has found an +enthusiastic friend in her. Many are the machinations of the clerical +and Lorraine parties that have been revealed to the English reader by +Mrs. Trollope; and when, some time since, her letters upon the "Social +Aspects of Revolution in Italy," were collected and published in +book-form, they met with the cordial approbation of the critics. These +letters are marked by purity of style, quaint picturesqueness, and an +admirable <i>couleur locale</i>. As a translator, Mrs. Trollope possesses +very rare ability. Her natural aptitude for language is great. A +residence in Italy of seventeen years has made her almost as familiar +with the mother-tongue of Dante as with that of Shakspeare; and we make +bold to say that Giovan Battista Niccolini's most celebrated tragedy, +"Arnaldo da Brescia," loses none of its Italian lustre in Mrs. +Trollope's setting of English blank-verse,—Ah! we cannot soon forget +the first time that we saw this same Niccolini, the greatest poet of +modern Italy! It was in the spring of 1860, upon the memorable +inauguration of the Theatre Niccolini,—<i>ci-devant</i> Cocomero, +(water-melon,)—when Florence gave its first public reception to the +poet, who was not only Tuscan, but Italianissimo, and rendered more than +a passing homage to his name in the new baptism of a charming theatre. +Since 1821 Niccolini had been fighting for the good cause with pen as +cutting as Damascus blade; the goal was not reached until the veteran of +eighty-two, paralyzed in body and mind, was borne into the presence of +an enthusiastic audience to receive its bravos. So lately as the +previous year the Ducal government had suppressed a demonstration in +Niccolini's favor: <i>this</i> night must have atoned for the persecutions of +the past. It was then that we heard Rossi, the great actor, declaim +entire scenes from "Arnold of Brescia"; and though he stood before us as +plain citizen Rossi in a lustrous suit of broadcloth, the fervor and +intensity with which he interpreted the master-thoughts of Niccolini +forced the audience to see in him the embodiment of the grand +patriot-priest. We have witnessed but few greater dramatic performances; +never have we been present at so impassioned a political demonstration. +Freedom of speech was but just born to Italy, and Florence drew a long +breath in the presence of a national teacher. Eighteen months later +Niccolini gazed for the last time upon Italy, and saw the fulfilment of +his prophecies.</p> + +<p>We wish there were a copy of Mrs. Trollope's translation of "Arnaldo da +Brescia" in America, that we might make noble extracts, and cause other +eyes to glisten with the fire of its passion. We can recall but one +passage, a speech made by Arnaldo to the recreant Pope Adrian. It is as +strong and fearless as was the monk himself.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Adrian, thou dost deceive thyself. The dread<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of Roman thunderbolts is growing faint,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Reason slacks the bonds thou'dst have eternal.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She'll break them; yet she is not well awake.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Already human thought so far rebels,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_663" id="Page_663">[Pg 663]</a></span><br /></span> +<span class="i0">That tame it thou canst not: Christ cries to it,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As to the sick of old, '<i>Arise and walk!</i>'<br /></span> +<span class="i0">'T will trample thee, if thou precede it not:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The world has other truths than of the altar,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor will endure a church which hideth Heaven.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou wast a shepherd,—be a father: men<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Are tired at last of being called a flock;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Too long have they stood trembling in the path<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Smit by your pastoral staff. Why in the name<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of Heaven dost trample on the race of man,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The latest offspring of the Thought Divine?"<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>It is not strange that the emancipated Florentines grow wild with +delight when Rossi declaimed such heresy as this.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Trollope's later translations of the patriotic poems of Dall' +Ongaro, the clever Venetian, are very spirited; nor is she unknown as an +original poet. "Baby Beatrice," a poem inscribed to her own fairy child, +that appeared several years ago in "Household Words," is exceedingly +charming; and one of her fugitive pieces, having naturally transformed +itself into "<i>la lingua del sì</i>," has ever been attributed to her friend +Niccolini.</p> + +<p>It was as a poet that Mrs. Trollope, then Miss Garrow, began to +write,—and indeed she may be called a <i>protégée</i> of Walter Savage +Landor, for through his encouragement and instrumentality she first made +her appearance in print as a contributor to Lady Blessington's "Book of +Beauty." There are few who remember the old lion-poet's lines to Miss +Garrow, and their insertion here cannot be considered <i>mal-à-propos</i>.</p> + +<p class="center">"<span class="smcap">To Theodosia Garrow</span>.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Unworthy are these poems of the lights<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That now run over them, nor brief the doubt<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In my own breast if such should interrupt<br /></span> +<span class="i0">(Or follow so irreverently) the voice<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of Attic men, of women such as thou,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of sages no less sage than heretofore,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of pleaders no less eloquent, of souls<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Tender no less, or tuneful, or devout.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Unvalued, even by myself, are they,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Myself, who reared them; but a high command<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Marshalled them in their station; here they are;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Look round; see what supports these parasites.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Stinted in growth and destitute of odor,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They grow where young Ternissa held her guide,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where Solon awed the ruler; there they grow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Weak as they are, on cliffs that few can climb.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">None to thy steps are inaccessible,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Theodosia! wakening Italy with song<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Deeper than Filicaia's, or than his,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The triple deity of plastic art.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Mindful of Italy and thee, fair maid!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I lay this sear, frail garland at thy feet."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Mrs. Trollope is still a young woman, and it is sincerely to be hoped +that improved health will give her the proper momentum for renewed +exertions in a field where nobly sowing she may nobly reap.</p> + +<p>Ah, this Villino Trollope is quaintly fascinating, with its marble +pillars, its grim men in armor, starting like sentinels from the walls, +and its curiosities greeting you at every step. The antiquary revels in +its <i>majolica</i>, its old Florentine bridal chests and carved furniture, +its beautiful terra-cotta of the Virgin and Child by Orgagna, its +hundred <i>oggetti</i> of the Cinque Cento. The bibliopole grows silently +ecstatic, as he sinks quietly into a mediaeval chair and feasts his eyes +on a model library, bubbling over with five thousand rare books, many +wonderfully illuminated and enriched by costly engravings. To those who +prefer (and who does not?) an earnest talk with the host and hostess on +politics, art, religion, or the last new book, there is the cozy +<i>laisser-faire</i> study where Miss Puss and Bran, the honest dog, lie side +by side on Christian terms, and where the sunbeam Beatrice, when <i>very</i> +beaming, will sing to you the <i>canti popolari</i> of Tuscany, like a young +nightingale in voice, though with more than youthful expression. Here +Anthony Trollope is to be found, when he visits Florence; and it is no +ordinary pleasure to enjoy simultaneously the philosophic reasoning of +Thomas Trollope,—looking half Socrates and half Galileo,—whom Mrs. +Browning was wont to call<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_664" id="Page_664">[Pg 664]</a></span> "Aristides the Just," and the almost boyish +enthusiasm and impulsive argumentation of Anthony Trollope, who is a +noble specimen of a thoroughly frank and loyal Englishman. The unity of +affection existing between these brothers is as charming as it is rare.</p> + +<p>Then in spring, when the soft winds kiss the budding foliage and warm it +into bloom, the beautiful terrace of Villino Trollope is transformed +into a reception-room. Opening upon a garden, with its lofty pillars, +its tessellated marble floor, its walls inlaid with terra-cotta, +bas-reliefs, inscriptions, and coats-of-arms, with here and there a +niche devoted to some antique Madonna, the terrace has all the charm of +a <i>campo santo</i> without the chill of the grave upon it; or were a few +cowled monks to walk with folded arms along its space, one might fancy +it the cloister of a monastery. And here of a summer's night, burning no +other lights than the stars, and sipping iced lemonade, one of the +specialties of the place, the intimates of Villino Trollope sit and talk +of Italy's future, the last <i>mot</i> from Paris, and the last allocution at +Rome.</p> + +<p>Many charming persons have we met at the Villino, the recollection of +whom is as bright and sunny to us as a June day,—persons whose lives +and motive-power have fully convinced us that the world is not quite as +hollow as it is represented, and that all is not vanity of vanities. In +one corner we have melodiously wrangled, in a <i>tempo</i> decidedly <i>allegro +vivace</i>, with enthusiastic Mazzinians, who would say clever, sharp, +cruel things of Cavour, the man of all men to our way of thinking, "the +one man of three men in all Europe," according to Louis Napoleon. +Gesticulation grew as rampant at the mention of the French Emperor, who +was familiarly known as "<i>quel volpone</i>," (that fox,) as it becomes +to-day in America at the mention of Wendell Phillip's name to one of the +"Chivalry." Politics ran high in Italy in these days of the +<i>Renaissance</i>, and to have a pair of stout fists shaken in one's face in +a drawing-room for a difference of opinion is not as much "out of order" +as it would be on this more phlegmatic side of the Atlantic, where fists +have a deep significance not dreamed of by expansive Italians. In +another corner we have had many a <i>tête-à-tête</i> with Dall' Ongaro, the +poet, who is as quick at an <i>impromptu</i> as at a malediction against "<i>il +Papa</i>," and whose spirited recitations of his own patriotic poems have +inspired his private audiences with a like enthusiasm for Italian +liberty. Not unlike Garibaldi in appearance, he is a Mazzini-Garibaldian +at heart, and always knowing in the ways of that mysterious prophet of +the "Reds" who we verily believe fancies himself author not only of the +phrase "<i>Dio ed il Popolo</i>," but of the reality as well. When Mazzini +was denied entrance into Tuscany under pain of imprisonment, and yet, in +spite of Governor Ricasoli's decree, came to Florence <i>incognito</i>, it +was Dall' Ongaro who knew his hiding-place, and who conferred with him +much to the disgust and mortification of the Governor and his police, +who were outwitted by the astute republican. Mazzini is an incarnation +of the <i>Sub Rosa</i>, and we doubt whether he could live an hour, were it +possible to fulminate a bull for the abolition of intrigue and secret +societies. Dall' Ongaro was a co-laborer of Mazzini's in Rome in '48; +and when the downfall of the Republic forced its partisans to seek +safety in exile, he travelled about Europe with an American passport. "I +could not be an Italian," he said to us, "and I became, ostensibly, the +next best thing, a citizen of the United States. I sought shelter under +a republican flag."</p> + +<p>It was at Villino Trollope that we first shook hands with Colonel +Peard,—"<i>l'Inglese con Garibaldi</i>," as the Italians used to call +him,—about whose exploits in sharp-shooting the newspapers manufactured +such marvellous stories. Colonel Peard assured us that he never <i>did</i> +keep a written account of the men he killed, for we were particular in +our inquiries on this interesting subject; but we know that as a +volunteer he fought<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_665" id="Page_665">[Pg 665]</a></span> under Garibaldi throughout the Lombard campaign and +followed his General into Sicily, where, facing the enemy most manfully, +Garibaldi promoted him from the rank of Captain to that of +Lieutenant-Colonel. It is good to meet a person like Colonel Peard,—to +see a man between fifty and sixty years of age, with noble head and gray +hair and a beard that any patriarch might envy surmounting a figure of +fine proportions endowed with all the robustness of healthy +maturity,—to see intelligence and years and fine appearance allied to +great amiability and a youthful enthusiasm for noble deeds, an +enthusiasm which was ready to give blood and treasure to the cause it +espoused from love. Such a reality is most exhilarating and delightful, +a fact that makes us take a much more hopeful view of humanity. We value +our photograph of Colonel Peard almost as highly as though the +picturesque <i>poncho</i> and its owner had seen service in America instead +of Italy. His battle-cry is ours,—"Liberty!"</p> + +<p>There, too, we met Frances Power Cobbe, author of that admirable book, +"Intuitive Morals." In her preface to the English edition of Theodore +Parker's works, of which she is the editor, Miss Cobbe has shown herself +as large by the heart as she is by the head. That sunny day in Florence, +when she, one of a chosen band, followed the great Crusader to his +grave, is a sad remembrance to us, and it seemed providentially ordained +that the apostle who had loved the man's <i>soul</i> for so many years should +be brought face to face with the <i>man</i> before that soul put on +immortality. Great was Miss Cobbe's interest in the bust of Theodore +Parker executed by the younger Robert Hart from photographs and casts, +and which is without doubt the best likeness of Parker that has yet been +taken. Its merits as a portrait-bust have never been appreciated, and +the artist, whose sad death occurred two years ago, did not live to +realize his hope of putting it into marble. The clay model still remains +in Florence.</p> + +<p>Miss Cobbe is the embodiment of genial philanthropy, as delightful a +companion as she is heroic in her great work of social reform. A true +daughter of Erin, she excels as a <i>raconteur</i>, nor does her philanthropy +confine itself to the human race. Italian maltreatment of animals has +almost reduced itself to a proverb, and often have we been witness to +her righteous indignation at flagrant cruelty to dumb beasts. Upon +expostulating one day with a coachman who was beating his poor straw-fed +horse most unmercifully, the man replied, with a look of wonderment, +"<i>Ma, che vole, Signora? non è Cristiano!</i>" (But what would you have, +Signora? he is not a Christian!) Not belonging to the Church, and having +no soul to save, why should a horse be spared the whip? The reasoning is +not logical to our way of thinking, yet it is Italian, and was delivered +in good faith. It will require many Miss Cobbes to lead the Italians out +of their Egypt of ignorance.</p> + +<p>It was at Villino Trollope that we first saw the wonderfully clever +author, George Eliot. She is a woman of forty, perhaps, of large frame +and fair Saxon coloring. In heaviness of jaw and height of cheek-bone +she greatly resembles a German; nor are her features unlike those of +Wordsworth, judging from his pictures. The expression of her face is +gentle and amiable, while her manner is particularly timid and retiring. +In conversation Mrs. Lewes is most entertaining, and her interest in +young writers is a trait which immediately takes captive all persons of +this class. We shall not forget with what kindness and earnestness she +addressed a young girl who had just begun to handle a pen, how frankly +she related her own literary experience, and how gently she <i>suggested</i> +advice. True genius is always allied to humility, and in seeing Mrs. +Lewes do the work of a good Samaritan so unobtrusively, we learned to +respect the woman as much as we had ever admired the writer. "For +years," said she to us, "I wrote reviews because I knew too little of +humanity." In the maturity of her wisdom<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_666" id="Page_666">[Pg 666]</a></span> this gifted woman has startled +the world with such novels as "Scenes from Clerical Life," "Adam Bede," +"Mill on the Floss," and "Silas Marner," making an era in English +fiction, and raising herself above rivalry. Experience has been much to +her: her men are men, her women women, and long did English readers rack +their brains to discover the sex of George Eliot. We do not aver that +Mrs. Lewes has actually encountered the characters so vividly portrayed +by her. Genius looks upon Nature, and then creates. The scene in the +pot-house in "Silas Marner" is as perfect as a Dutch painting, yet the +author never entered a pot-house. Her strong <i>physique</i> has enabled her +to brush against the world, and in thus brushing she has gathered up the +dust, fine and coarse, out of which human beings great and small are +made. It is a powerful argument in the "Woman Question," that—without +going to France for George Sand—"Adam Bede" and the wonderfully unique +conception "Paul Ferroll" are women's work and yet real. Men cannot know +women by knowing men; and a discriminating public will soon admit, if it +has not done so already, that women are quite as capable of drawing male +portraits as men are of drawing female. Half a century ago a woman +maintained that genius had no sex;—the dawn of this truth is only now +flashing upon the world.</p> + +<p>We know not whether George Eliot visited Florence <i>con intenzione</i>, yet +it almost seems as though "Romola" were the product of that fortnight's +sojourn. It could scarce have been written by one whose eye was +unfamiliar with the <i>tone</i> of Florentine localities. As a novel, +"Romola" is not likely to be popular, however extensively it may be +read; but viewed as a sketch of Savonarola and his times, it is most +interesting and valuable. The deep research and knowledge of mediaeval +life and manners displayed are cause of wonderment to erudite +Florentines, who have lived to learn from a foreigner. "<i>Son rimasti</i>" +to use their own phraseology. The <i>couleur locale</i> is +marvellous;—nothing could be more delightfully real, for example, than +the scenes which transpire in Nello's barber's-shop. Her <i>dramatis +personæ</i> are not English men and women in fancy-dress, but true Tuscans +who express themselves after the manner of natives. It would be +difficult to find a greater contrast than exists between "Romola" and +the previous novels of George Eliot: they have little in common but +genius; and genius, we begin to think, has not only no sex, but no +nationality. "Romola" has peopled the streets of Florence still more +densely to our memory.</p> + +<p>It would seem as though the newly revived interest in Savonarola, after +centuries of apathy, were a sign of the times. Uprisings of peoples and +wars for "ideas" have made such a market for martyrs as was never known +before. Could we jest upon what is a most encouraging trait in present +humanity, we should say that martyrs were fashionable; for even +Toussaint L'Ouverture has found a biographer, and <i>Frenchmen</i> are +writing Lives of Jesus. Yet Orthodoxy stigmatizes this age of John +Browns as irreligious:—rather do we think it the dawn of the true +faith. It is to another <i>habitué</i> of Villino Trollope, Pasquale Villari, +Professor of History at Pisa, that we owe in great part the revival of +Savonarola's memory; and it must have been no ordinary love for his +noble aspirations that led the young Neopolitan exile to bury the ten +best years of his life in old Florentine libraries, collecting material +for a full life of the friar of San Marco. So faithfully has he done his +work, that future writers upon Savonarola will go to Villari, and not to +Florentine manuscripts for their facts. This history was published in +1859, and it may be that "Romola" is the flower of the sombre Southern +plant. Genius requires but a suggestion to create,—though, indeed, Mr. +Lewes, who is a wonderfully clever man, <i>au fait</i> in all things, from +acting to languages, living and dead, and from languages to natural +history, may have anticipated Villari in that suggestion.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_667" id="Page_667">[Pg 667]</a></span></p> + +<p>Villino Trollope introduced us to "Owen Meredith," the poet from +melody,—one far older in experience than in years, looking like his +poetry, just so polished and graceful, just so sweetly in tune, just so +Gallic in taste, and—shall we say it?—just so <i>blasé</i>! We doubt +whether Robert Lytton, the diplomate, will ever realize the best +aspirations of "Owen Meredith," the poet. Good came out of Nazareth, but +it is not in our faith to believe that foreign courts can bear the rare +fruit of ideal truth and beauty.—Then there was Blumenthal, the +composer, who talked Buckle in admirable English, and played his own +Reveries most daintily,—Reveries that are all languor, sighs, and +tears, whose fitting home is the boudoirs of French marquises. +Blumenthal is a Thalberg in small.—We have pleasant recollections of +certain clever Oxonians, "Double-Firsts," potential in the classics and +mathematics. A "Double-First" is the incarnation of Oxford, a +masterpiece of Art. All that he knows he knows profoundly, nor does it +require an Artesian bore to bring that knowledge bubbling to the +surface. His mastery over his intellect is as great as that of Liszt +over the piano-forte,—it is a slave to do his bidding. He is the result +of a thousand years of culture. A "Double-First" never gives way to +enthusiasms; his heart never gets into his head. Impulse is snubbed as +though it were a poor relation; and argument is carried on by clear, +acute reason, independent of feeling. Woe unto the American who loses +his temper while duelling mentally with a "Double-First"! Oxford phlegm +will triumph. Of course a "Double-First" is conservative; he disbelieves +in republics and universal suffrage, attends the Established Church, and +won't publicly deny the Thirty-Nine Articles, whatever maybe his <i>very</i> +private opinion of them. He writes brilliant articles for the "Saturday +Review," (familiarly known among Liberals as the "Saturday Reviler,") +and ends by being a learned and successful barrister, or a Gladstone, or +both. Genius will rarely subscribe to the Thirty-Nine Articles. With all +his conservatism and want of what the French call <i>effusion</i>, a +"Double-First" can be a delightful companion and charming man,—even to +a democratic American.</p> + +<p>We well remember with what admiring curiosity the Italians regarded Mrs. +Stowe one evening that she passed at Villino Trollope. "<i>È la Signora +Stowe?</i>"—"<i>Davvero?</i>"—"<i>L'autrice di 'Uncle +Tom'?</i>"—"<i>Possibile?</i>"—were their oft-repeated exclamations; for +"Uncle Tom's Cabin" is the one American book in which Italians are +deeply read. To most of them, Byron and "Uncle Tom" comprehend the whole +of English literature. However poorly informed an Italian may be as +regards America in other respects, he has a very definite idea of +slavery, thanks to Mrs. Stowe. To read "Uncle Tom's Cabin" aloud in +Italian to an Italian audience is productive of queer sensations. This +office an American woman took upon herself for the enlightenment of some +<i>contadine</i> of Fiesole with whom she was staying. She appealed to a +thoroughly impartial jury. The verdict would have been balm of Gilead to +long-suffering Abolitionists. So admirable an idea of justice had these +acute peasant-women, so exalted was their opinion of America, which they +believed to be a model republic where all men were born free and equal, +that it was long before the reader could impress upon her audience the +fact of the existence of slavery there. When this fact <i>did</i> take root +in their simple minds, their righteous indignation knew no bounds, and, +unlike the orator of the Bird o' Freedom, they thanked God that they +were <i>not</i> Americans.</p> + +<p>Then——But our recollections are too numerous for the patience of those +who do not know Villino Trollope; and we shut up in our thoughts many +"pictures beautiful that hang on Memory's walls," turning their faces so +that we, at least, may see and enjoy them.</p> + +<p>But ere turning away, we pause before one face, now no longer of the +living, that of Mrs. Frances Trollope. Knowing<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_668" id="Page_668">[Pg 668]</a></span> how thoroughly erroneous +an estimate has been put upon Mrs. Trollope's character in this country, +we desire to give a glimpse of the real woman, now that her death has +removed the seal of silence.</p> + +<p>Frances Trollope, daughter of the Reverend William Milton, a fellow of +New College, Oxford, was born at Stapleton, near Bristol, where her +father had a curacy. She died in Florence, on the sixth of October, +1863, at the advanced age of eighty-three. In 1809 she married Thomas +Anthony Trollope, barrister-at-law, by whom she had six children: Thomas +Adolphus, now of Florence,—Henry, who died unmarried at Bruges, in +Flanders, in 1834,—Arthur, who died under age,—Anthony, the well-known +novelist,—Cecilia, who married John Tilley, Assistant-Secretary of the +General Post-Office, London,—and Emily, who died under age.</p> + +<p>Mr. Thomas Anthony Trollope married and became the father of a family as +presumptive heir to the good estate of an uncle. The latter, however, on +becoming a widower, unexpectedly married a second time, and in his old +age was himself a father. The sudden change thus caused in the position +and fortune of Mr. Trollope so materially deranged his affairs as to +necessitate the breaking-up of his establishment at Harrow-on-the-Hill, +near London. It was at this time that Miss Fanny Wright (whom Mr. and +Mrs. Trollope met at the country-house of Lafayette, when visiting the +General in France) persuaded Mrs. Trollope to proceed to America with +the hope of providing a career for her second son, Henry. Miss Wright +was then bent on founding an establishment, in accordance with her +cherished principles, at Nashaba, near Memphis, and the career marked +out for Henry Trollope was in connection with this scheme, the fruit of +which was disappointment to all the parties concerned. Mrs. Trollope +afterwards endeavored to establish her son in Cincinnati; but these +attempts were ill managed, and consequently proved futile. Both mother +and son then returned to England, the former taking with her a mass of +memoranda and notes which she had made during her residence in the +United States. These were shown to Captain Basil Hall, whose then recent +work on America had encountered bitterly hostile criticism and denial +with respect to many of its statements. Finding that Mrs. Trollope's +account of various matters was corroborative of his own, Basil Hall for +this reason, as also from friendly motives, urged Mrs. Trollope to bring +out a work on America. "The Domestic Manners of the Americans" was the +result, and so immense was its success that at the age of fifty Mrs. +Trollope adopted literature as a profession.</p> + +<p>In the eyes of the patriots of thirty years ago Mrs. Trollope committed +the unpardonable sin, when she published her book on America; and +certainly no country ever rendered itself more ridiculous than did ours, +when it made the welkin ring with cries of indignation. The sensible +American of to-day reads this same book and wonders how his countrymen +lashed themselves into such a violent rage. In her comments upon America +Mrs. Trollope is certainly frequently at fault, but unintentionally. She +firmly believed all that she wrote, and did <i>not</i> romance, as Americans +were wont to declare. When she finds fault with the disgusting practice +of tobacco-chewing, assails the too common custom of dram-drinking, and +complains of a want of refinement in some parts of the country, she +certainly has the right on her side. When she speaks of Jefferson's +<i>dictum</i>, "All men are born free and equal," as a phrase of mischievous +sophistry, and refers to his posthumous works as a mass of mighty +mischiefs,—when she accuses us of being drearily cold and lacking +enthusiasm, and regards the American women as the most beautiful in the +world, but the least attractive,—we may naturally differ from her, but +we have no right to tyrannize over her convictions. That she bore us no +malice is the verdict of every one who knew her ever so slightly; and +her sons, who were greatly<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_669" id="Page_669">[Pg 669]</a></span> subjected to her influence, entertain the +kindest and most friendly sentiments towards the United States.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Trollope's works, beginning with the "Domestic Manners of the +Americans," published in 1832, and ending with "Paris and London," which +appeared in 1856, amount to <i>one hundred and fourteen</i> volumes, all, be +it remembered, written after her fiftieth year. Of her novels perhaps +the most successful and widely known were the "Vicar of Wrexhill," a +violent satire on the Evangelical religionists, published in +1837,—"Widow Barnaby," in 1839,—and "The Ward of Thorpe Combe," in +1847. "Michael Armstrong," printed in 1840, was written with a view to +assist the movement in favor of protection to the factory-operatives, +which resulted in the famous "Ten-Hour Bill." The descriptions were the +fruits of a personal visit to the principal seats of factory-labor. At +the time, this book created considerable sensation.</p> + +<p>Two works of travel and social sketches, "Paris and the Parisians," and +"Vienna and the Austrians," were also very extensively read. With regard +to the second we deem it proper to observe that Mrs. Trollope suffered +herself to be so far dazzled by the very remarkable cordiality of her +reception in the exclusive society of Vienna, and by the flattering +intimacy with which she was honored by Prince Metternich and his circle, +as to have been led to regard the then dominant Austrian political and +social system in a more favorable light than was consistent with the +generally liberal tone of her sentiments and opinions.</p> + +<p>Though late in becoming an author, Mrs. Trollope had at all periods of +her life been inclined to literary pursuits, and in early youth enjoyed +the friendship of many distinguished men, among whom were Mathias, the +well-known author of the "Pursuits of Literature," Dr. Nott, the Italian +scholar, one of the few foreigners who have been members of the Della +Crusca,—General Pepe, the celebrated defender of Venice, whom she knew +intimately for many years,—General Lafayette,—and others.</p> + +<p>Both before and after she achieved literary celebrity, Mrs. Trollope was +very popular in society, for the pleasures of which she was especially +fitted by her talents. In Florence she gathered around her persons of +eminence, both foreign and native, and her interest in men and things +remained undiminished until within a very few years of her death. Even +at an advanced age her mind was ready to receive new ideas and to deal +with them candidly. We have in our possession letters written by her in +'54 and '55 on the much-abused subject of Spiritualism, which was then +in its infancy. They are addressed to an American literary gentleman +then resident in Florence, and give so admirable an idea of Mrs. +Trollope's clearness of mental vision and the universally inquisitive +tendency of her mind that we insert them at large.—Dec. 21st, 1854, +Mrs. Trollope writes: "I am afraid, my dear Sir, that I am about to take +an unwarrantable liberty by thus intruding on your time, but I must +trust to your indulgence for pardon. During the few minutes that I had +the pleasure of speaking with you, the other evening, on the subject of +spiritual visitations, there was in your conversation a tone so equally +removed from enthusiasm on one side and incredulity on the other that I +felt more satisfaction in listening to you than I have ever done when +this subject has been the theme. That so many thousands of educated and +intelligent people should yield their belief to so bold a delusion as +this must be, if there be <i>no</i> occult cause at work, is inconceivable. +By <i>occult</i> cause I mean, of course, nothing at all analogous to hidden +<i>trickery</i>, but to the interference of some power with which the earth +has been hitherto unacquainted. If it were not taking too great a +liberty, I would ask you to call upon me,... that I might have the +pleasure and advantage of having your opinion more at length upon one or +two points connected with this most curious subject."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_670" id="Page_670">[Pg 670]</a></span> The desired +interview took place, and a week later Mrs. Trollope returned a pamphlet +on spiritual manifestations with the following note: "Many thanks, my +dear Sir, for your kindness in permitting me a leisurely perusal of the +inclosed. It is a very curious and interesting document, and I think it +would be impossible to read it without arriving at the conviction that +the writer deserves to be listened to with great attention and great +confidence. But as yet I feel that we have no sure ground under our +feet. The only idea that suggests itself to me is that the medium is in +a mesmeric condition; and after giving considerable time and attention +to these mysterious mesmeric symptoms, I am persuaded that a patient +liable to such influence is in a diseased state. It has often appeared +to me that the soul was <i>partially</i>, as it were, disentangled from the +body. I have watched the —— sisters (the well-known patients of Dr. +Elliotson) for more than a year, during which interval they were +perfectly, as to the mind, in an abnormal state,—not recognizing +father, mother, or brothers, or remembering <i>anything</i> connected with +the year preceding their mesmeric condition. They learned everything +which was submitted to their <i>intellect</i> during this interval with +something very like <i>supernatural</i> intelligence. Emma, another +well-known patient of Dr. Elliotson, constantly described herself, when +in a mesmeric state, as 'greatly better than well,' and this was always +said with a countenance expressive of very sublime happiness,—but as if +her hearers were not capable of comprehending it. I shall feel very +anxious to hear the results of your own experience; for it appears to me +that you are in a state of mind equally unlikely to mistake truth for +falsehood, or falsehood for truth." Upon receiving a second pamphlet +treating on the same subject, Mrs. Trollope wrote as follows: "The +document you have sent me, my dear Sir, is indeed full of interest. Had +it been less so, I should not have retained it so long. In speaking of a +state of mesmerism as being one of disease, I by no means infer that the +mesmeric influence is either the cause or effect of disease, but that +only diseased persons are liable to it. I have listened to statements +from more than one physician in great practice tending very clearly to +show that the manifestations of this semi-spiritual state are never +observed in perfectly healthy persons. One gentleman in large practice +told me that he had almost constantly perceived in the last stage of +pulmonary consumption a manifest brightening of the intellect; and +children, at the moment of passing from this state to that which follows +it, will often (as I well know) speak with a degree of high intelligence +that strongly suggests the idea that <i>there are moments when the two +conditions touch</i>. That the region next above us is occupied by the +souls of men about to be made perfect, I have not the shadow of a doubt. +The puzzling part of the present question is this,—Why do we get a dark +and uncertain peep at this stage of existence, when philosophy has so +long been excluded from it? and I am inclined to say in reply, 'Be +patient and be watchful, and we shall all know more anon.'"—Such is the +character of notes that Mrs. Trollope wrote at the age of seventy-five.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Trollope realized from her writings the large sum of one hundred +thousand dollars; but generous tastes and a numerous family created as +large a demand as there was supply, and kept her pen constantly busy. +She wrote with a rapidity which seems to have been inherited by both her +sons, more particularly by Anthony Trollope. One of her novels was +written in three weeks; another she wrote at the bedside of a son dying +of consumption, she being bound by contract to finish the work at a +given time. Acting day and night as nurse, the overtasked mother was +obliged to stimulate her nervous system by a constant use of strong +coffee, and betweenwhiles would turn to the unfinished novel and write +of fictitious joys and sorrows while her own heart was bleeding for the +beloved son<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_671" id="Page_671">[Pg 671]</a></span> dying beside her. It was no doubt owing to this constant +taxation of the brain that her intellect was but a wreck of its former +self during the last four years of her life. During this time her +condition was but a living death, though she was physically well. She +was watched over and cared for with the most unselfish devotion by her +son Thomas Adolphus and his wife, who gave up all pleasures away from +home to be near their mother. The favorite reading in these last days +was her son Anthony's novels.</p> + +<p>And Thomas Trollope, writing of his mother's death, says: "Though we +have been so long prepared for it, and though my poor dear mother has +been in fact dead to us for many months past, and though her life, free +from suffering as it was, was such as those who loved her could not have +wished prolonged, yet for all this the last separation brings a pang +with it. She was as good and dear a mother as ever man had; and few sons +have passed so large a portion of their lives in such intimate +association with their mother as I have for more than thirty years."</p> + +<p>This is a noble record for both mother and son. To her children Mrs. +Trollope was a providence and support in all time of sorrow or +trouble,—a cause of prosperity, a confidant, a friend, and a companion.</p> + +<p>A grateful American makes this humble offering to her memory in the name +of justice.</p> + +<p>There is a villa too, near Florence, "on the link of Bellosguardo," as +dear from association as Villino Trollope. It has for a neighbor the +Villa Mont' Auto, where Hawthorne lived, and which he transformed by the +magic of his pen into the Monte Bene of the "Marble Faun." Not far off +is the "tower" wherein Aurora Leigh sought peace,—and found it. The +inmate of this villa was a little lady with blue-black hair and +sparkling jet eyes, a writer whose dawn is one of promise, a chosen +friend of the noblest and best, and on her terrace the Brownings, Walter +Savage Landor, and many choice spirits have sipped tea while their eyes +drank in such a vision of beauty as Nature and Art have never equalled +elsewhere.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"No sun could die, nor yet be born, unseen<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By dwellers at my villa: morn and eve<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Were magnified before us in the pure<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Illimitable space and pause of sky,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Intense as angels' garments blanched with God,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Less blue than radiant. From the outer wall<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of the garden dropped the mystic floating gray<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of olive-trees, (with interruptions green<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From maize and vine,) until 't was caught and torn<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On that abrupt line of dark cypresses<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which signed the way to Florence. Beautiful<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The city lay along the ample vale,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Cathedral, tower and palace, piazza and street;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The river trailing like a silver cord<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Through all, and curling loosely, both before<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And after, over the whole stretch of land,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sown whitely up and down its opposite slopes<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With farms and villas."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>What Aurora Leigh saw from her tower is almost a counterpart of what +Mrs. Browning gazed upon so often from the terrace of Villa Brichieri.</p> + +<p>Florence without the Trollopes and our Lady of Bellosguardo would be +like bread without salt. A blessing, then, upon houses which have been +spiritual asylums to many forlorn Americans!—a blessing upon their +inmates, whose hearts are as large and whose hands are as open as their +minds are broad and catholic!</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_672" id="Page_672">[Pg 672]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="A_TOBACCONALIAN_ODE" id="A_TOBACCONALIAN_ODE"></a>A TOBACCONALIAN ODE.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O plant divine!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Not to the tuneful Nine,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who sit where purple sunlight longest lingers,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Twining the bay, weaving with busy fingers<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The amaranth eterne and sprays of vine,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Do I appeal. Ah, worthier brows than mine<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shall wear those wreaths! But thou, O potent plant,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of thy broad fronds but furnish me a crown,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let others sing the yellow corn, the vine,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And others for the laurel-garland pant,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Content with my rich meed, I'll sit me down,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor ask for fame, nor heroes' high renown,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor wine.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And ye, ye airy sprites,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Born of the Morning's womb, sired of the Sun,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who cull with nice acumen, one by one,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">All gentle influences from the air,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And from within the earth what most delights<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The tender roots of springing plants, whose care<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Distils from gross material its spirit<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To paint the flower and give the fruit its merit,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Apply to my dull sense your subtile art!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When ye, with nicest, finest skill, had wrought<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This chiefest work, the choicest blessings brought<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And stored them at its roots, prepared each part,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Matured the bud, painted the dainty bloom,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ye stood and gazed until the fruit should come.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ah, foolish elves!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Look ye that yon frail flower should be sublimed<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To fruit commensurate with all your power<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And cunning art? Was it for such ye climbed<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The slanting sunbeams, coaxing many a shower<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From the coy clouds? Ye did exceed yourselves;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And as ye stand and gaze, lo, instantly<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The whole etherealized ye see:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From topmost golden spray to lowest root,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The whole is fruit.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Well have ye wrought,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And in your honor now shall incense rise.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The oaken chair, the cheerful blaze, invite<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Calm meditation, while the flickering light<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Casts strange, fantastic shadows on the wall,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where goodly tomes, with ample lading fraught<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of gold of wit and gems of fancy rare,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Poet and sage, mute witnesses of all,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Smile gently on me, as, with sober care,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I reach the pipe and thoughtfully prepare<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The sacrifice.<br /></span><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_673" id="Page_673">[Pg 673]</a></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O fragile clay!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Erst white as e'er a lily of old Nile,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But now imbrowned and ambered o'er and through<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With richest tints and ever-deepening hue,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Quintessence of rare essences the while<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Uphoarding, as thou farest day by day,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou mind'st me of a genial face I knew.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">At first it was but fair, nought but a face;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But as I read and learned it, wondrous grace<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And beauty marvellous did grow and grow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till every hue of the sweet soul did show<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Most beautiful from brow and lip and eye.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And thus, O clay,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Child of the sea-foam, nursed amid the spray,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy visage changes, ever grows more fair<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As the fine spirit works expression there!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Blest be the tide that rapt thee from the roar<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And cast thee on the far Danubian shore,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And blest the art that shaped thee daintily!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And thou, O fragrant tube attenuate!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No more in the sweet-blooming cherry-grove,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where the shy bulbul plaintive mourns her love,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shalt thou uplift thy blossoms to the sky,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or wave them o'er the waters rippling by;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No more thy fruit shall stud with jewels red<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The leafy crown thou fashionedst for thy head.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Not this thy fate.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When the swart damsel from thy parent tree<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Did lop thee with thy fellows, and did strip<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From off thee, bleeding, leaf and bud and blossom,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And bind the odorous fagot carefully,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And bear thee in to whom should fashion thee<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And set new fruit of amber on thy tip,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">More grateful than the old to eye and lip,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ambrosial odors thou didst then exhale,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Leaving thy fragrance in her tawny bosom.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou still dost hold it. Nothing may avail<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To rob thee of the odorous memory<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou sweetly bearest of the cherry-grove,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where blossoms bloom and lovers tell their love.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bright amber, fragrant wood, enamelled clay,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Help me to burn the incense worthily!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou fire, assist! Promethean fire, unbound,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The azure clouds go wreathing round and round,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Float slowly up, then gently melt away;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And in their circling wreaths I dimly spy<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Full many a fleeting vision's fantasy.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Alas! alas!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How bright soe'er before my view they pass,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whether it be that Memory, pointing back,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Doth show each flower along the devious track<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By which I came forth from the fields of youth,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_674" id="Page_674">[Pg 674]</a></span>—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or bright-robed Hope doth deck the sober truth<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With many-colored garments, pointing on<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To lighter days and envied honors won,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or Fancy, taking many a meaner thing,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Doth gild it o'er with bright imagining,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Alas! alas!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Light as the circling smoke, they fade and pass,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What time the last thin wreath hath faintly sped<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Up from the embers dying, dying, dead!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So earth's best blessings fade and fleet away,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nought left but ashes, smoke, and empty clay.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Awake, my soul! 't is time thou wert awaking!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For radiant spirits, innocent and fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Walking beside thee, hovering in the air<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Adown the past, thronging thy future way,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wait but thy calling and the thraldom's breaking,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which, all unworthily, to sense hath bound thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To bless thy days and make the night around thee<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As bright and beautiful and fair as day.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Call thou on these, my soul, and fix thee there!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Name nought divine which hath not godlike in it;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And if thou burnest incense, let it be<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That of the heart, enkindled thankfully;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And if thine eye offend thee, pluck it out,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor let it poison all thy sight forever;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whate'er thou hast to do of worth, begin it,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor leave the issue free to any doubt,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Forgetting never what thou art, and never<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whither thou goest, to the far Forever.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And then shall gentle Memory, pointing back,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Show blessings scattered all along thy track;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And bright-robed Hope, shaming thy dreams of youth,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shall lead thee up from dreaming to the truth;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Fancy, leaving every meaner thing,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shall see fulfilled each bright imagining.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then shall the ashes of thy musing be<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Only the ashes of thy naughtiness;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The smoke, the remnant of thy vanity<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And thorny passions, which entangled thee<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till thou didst pray deliverance; the clay,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That empty clay e'en, hath a power to bless,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Empty for that a gem hath passed away,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To shine forever in eternal day.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_675" id="Page_675">[Pg 675]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="HALCYON_DAYS" id="HALCYON_DAYS"></a>HALCYON DAYS.</h2> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Peace and good-will."<br /></span> +</div></div> + + +<p>Who hath enchanted Goliath? He sleeps with a smile on his face, but his +secret is hid from the charmer. The treacherous will looks abashed on +the calm of his slumber, and laments, "The thing that I would I do not!"</p> + +<p>Now while the halcyon broods through the Sabbath-days of winter, and, +looking from her nest, sees the waves of a summer calm and +brightness,—now while she meditates, with the eggs under her wings, of +a fast-approaching time when she shall teach her song to the little +flock that's coming,—let us also dream. The thing that hath been shall +be. Contentment, peace, and love! Fairy folk shall not personate this +blessedness for us. Who is your next-door neighbor? One face shines +serenely before me, and says, "The world is redeemed!" One voice, +sounding clear through all discords, has an echo, fine, true, and +eternal, in the midst of the Seraphim's praise.</p> + +<p>Therefore, thou blue-winged halcyon, shall I sit beneath the dead +sycamore in whose topmost branches thy great nest is built,—finding +death crowned here, as everywhere, with life; here shall be told the +Christmas tale of contentment, peace, and love.</p> + +<p>No tremulous tale of sorrow, of wrong endured and avenged; no report of +that Orthodox anguish which, renouncing the present, hopes only by the +hereafter; no story of desperate heroic achievement, or of +long-suffering patience, or even of martyrdom's glory. The sea is calm, +and the halcyon broods, and only love is eternal.</p> + +<p>Let us not stint thee, as selfishness must; nor shame thee with praise +inadequate; nor walk with shod feet, as the base-bred, into thy palaces; +nor as the weak, nor as the wise, who so often profane thee, but as the +loving who love thee, holy Love, may we take thy name on our lips, and +lay our gift on thine altar! It is a Christmas offering, fashioned, +however rudely, from an absolute truth. If thou deem the ointment +precious, when I break the unjewelled box, I pour it on thy feet. Let +others crown, I would only refresh thee.</p> + +<p>Children play on this white, shining, sandy beach, under the leafless +sycamore; they look for no shade, they would find no shade; there is +neither rock, nor shrub, nor evergreen-tree,—nothing but the white +sand, and the dead sycamore, and in the topmost branches the halcyon's +great nest.</p> + +<p>Is it not a place for children? A little flourish of imagination, and we +see them,—Silas, who beats the drum, and Columbia, who carries the +flag, manifest leaders of the wild little company, mermen and mermaids +all; and the music is fit for the Siren, and the beauty would shame not +Venus.</p> + +<p>Suppose we stroll home to their fathers, like respectable earth-keeping +creatures: the depths of human hearts have sometimes proved full of +mystery as the sea; and human faces sometimes glisten with a majesty of +feeling or of thought that reduces ocean-splendor to the subordinate +part of a similitude.</p> + +<p>There is Andrew, father of Silas,—Andrew Swift, says the sign. He +dwells in Salt Lane, you perceive, and he deals in ship-stores,—a +husband and father by no means living on sea-weed. A yellow-haired +little man, shrewd, and a ready reckoner. Of a serious turn of mind. +Deficient in self-esteem; his anticipations of the most humble +character. A sinner, because fearful and unbelieving: for what right has +a man to be such a man as to inspire himself with misgiving? But his +offences offset each other: for, if he doubted, Andrew was also +obstinate. And obstinacy alone led him into ventures whose failure he +expected: as when he laid out the savings of years<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_676" id="Page_676">[Pg 676]</a></span> in the purchase of +goods, wherewith he opened those ship-stores in Salt Lane. Ship-stores! +that sounds well. One might suppose I referred to blocks of marble-faced +buildings, instead of three shelves, three barrels, and their contents! +The obstinacy of Andrew Swift was the foundation of his fortune. Men +have built on worse.</p> + +<p>His opposite neighbor was one Silas Dexter, a flag- and banner-maker, +who went into business in Salt Lane sometime during that memorable year +of Andrew's venture. Apparently this young man was no better off than +Swift, between whom and himself a friendly intercourse was at once +established; but he had the advantage of a quick imagination and a +sanguine temperament; also the manly courage to look at Fortune with +respectful recognition, as we all look at royalty,—even as though he +had sometime been presented,—not with a snobbish conceit which would +seem to defy her Highness.</p> + +<p>Indeed, he was such a man as would find exhilaration of spirit even in +the uncertainties of his position. The sight of his banners waving from +the sign-post, showing all sorts of devices, the flags flowing round the +walls of his shop, enlivening the little dark place with their many +gorgeous colors, sufficed for his encouragement. Utter ruin could not +have ruined the man. He could not have failed with failure. Some sense +of this fact he had, and he lived like one who has had his life insured.</p> + +<p>Not a creature looked upon him but was free to the good he might derive. +The sparkling eyes, quick smile, and manly voice, the active limbs and +generous heart, seemed at the service of every soul that breathed. +Trashy thought and base utterance could not cheat his soul of her +integrity; the vileness of Salt Lane had nothing to do with him.</p> + +<p>And I cannot account for this by bringing his wife forward. For how came +he by this wife, except by the excellence and soundness of the virtue +which preferred her to the world, and made him preferred of her? Still, +you see the ripe cherry, one half full, beautiful, luscious, the other a +patch of skin stretched over the pit, worthless and sad to view. This, +but for his choice and hers, might have served as an emblem of Dexter.</p> + +<p>She was her husband's partner in a twofold sense: for it was <span class="smcap">Dexter & +Co.</span> on the sign-board, and Jessie was represented by the Company. Of +that woman I cannot refrain from saying what was so gracefully said of +"the fair and happy milkmaid,"—"All the excellences stand in her so +silently, as if they had stolen upon her without her knowledge."</p> + +<p>The effect of these diverse influences, his wife Jessie in the house, +and his neighbor Andrew to the opposite, kept the spirit of Silas Dexter +at work like a ploughing Pegasus. He was full of pranks as a boy, but +malice found poor encouragement of him. Andrew was his garden, and he +was Andrew's sun: he shone across the lane with a brightness and a +warmth sufficient to quicken the poorest earth; and the crops he +perfected were various, all of the kind that flourish in heavy soil, but +various and good. Do you think the good Samaritan could take the +leprosy?</p> + +<p>The sort of connection a man is bound to make between the everlasting +spirit-world and this transient mortal state Dexter proved in his humble +way. I doubt if spiritualists would have accepted his service as a +medium. He was neither profane nor imbecile; but he sat at the foot of a +ladder the pure ones could not fail to see, and by which they would not +disdain to descend. If they chose to come his way, the white robes would +take no taint.</p> + +<p>Success attended Dexter with a modest grace, and Swift shared in the +good fortune. I do not say the profits of either shop were forty +millions a year. "Keep the best of everything," said Silas to Andrew; +"don't be too hard on 'em; they'll come after they've found your way." +And Swift proved the wisdom of such counsel, and tried to get the better +of his grim countenance while waiting<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_677" id="Page_677">[Pg 677]</a></span> on the customers Dexter directed +to his side: gradually succeeding,—proving down there in Salt Lane the +truth of that ancient saying, "Art is the perfection of Nature."</p> + +<p>So these two men lived like brothers; and if it was a pleasant thing to +listen to Dexter's jokes and laughter, scarcely less profitable was it +to hear Swift praise the flag- and banner-maker when he was out of +sight.</p> + +<p>Dexter's popularity had a varied character. Sea-captains and +ship-builders, circus-men, aëronauts, politicians, engineers, +target-companies, firemen, the military, deputies of all sorts, looked +over his goods, consulted his taste, left their orders. His interest in +the several occupations represented by the men who frequented his shop, +his ingenuity in devising designs, his skill and expedition in supplying +orders, his cheerful speech, and love of talk, and fun, gave the shopman +troops of "friends." He could read the common mass of men at a glance, +and he was justifiable in the devices he made use of in order to bring +his customers into the buying mood: for what he said was true,—they +could satisfy themselves in his store, if anywhere.</p> + +<p>Dexter understood himself, and Jessie understood him: such folk make no +pretences; they are ineffably real.</p> + +<p>"Principles, not Men," was the banner-maker's motto. You might have seen +the flag on which it was painted with a mighty flourish (and very poor +result) in his old shop in the old time. That painting was his first +great effort, that flag his first possession; he could not have parted +with it, so he <i>said</i>, and so he believed, for any sum whatever.</p> + +<p>"Principles, not Men": he studied that sentiment in all his graver +moments, when he chanced to be alone in his shop,—you may guess with +what result, moral and philosophical.</p> + +<p>Andrew Swift used to say to his wife, that, when Dexter was studying his +thoughts, it was better to hear him than the minister: and verily he did +put time-serving to shame by the distinct integrity of his warm speech, +and his eloquence of action.</p> + +<p>Dexter married Jessie the day before he opened his flag-shop. She had +long been employed by his employer, and when she promised to be his, she +drew her earnings from the bank, and invested all with him. This was not +prudence, certainly, but it was love. Dexter might have failed in +business the first year,—might have died, you know, in six months, or +even in three, as men do sometimes. It was not prudence; but +Jessie—young lady determined on settlements!—Jessie was looking for +life and prosperity, as the honest and earnest and young have a right to +look in a world God created and governs. And if failure and death had in +fact choked the path that promised so fair, clear of regret, free of +reproaches, glad even of the losses that proved how love had once +blessed her, she would have buried the dead, and worked for the +retrieval of fortune.</p> + +<p>They began their housekeeping-romance back of the shop in two little +rooms. Do you require the actual measurement? There have been wider +walls that could contain greatly less.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"How big was Alexander, pa?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The people called him <i>great</i>."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>They considered the sixpences of their outlay and income with a purpose +and a spirit that made a miser of neither. But there was no delusion +indulged about the business. Jessie never mistook the hilarity of Silas +for an indication of incalculable prosperity. Silas never understood her +gravity for that of discontent and envy. They never spent in any week +more than they earned. They counted the cost of living, and were +therefore free and rich. "She was never alone," as Sir Thomas Overbury +said of that happy milkmaid, "but still accompanied with old songs, +honest thoughts, and prayers, but short ones." And Dexter loved her with +a valiant constancy that spoke volumes for both.</p> + +<p>His days were spent, according to the promise advertised, in endeavors +to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_678" id="Page_678">[Pg 678]</a></span> please the public; but, oh, if the public that traded with and liked +to patronize him, if the young lads and the old boys who hung about his +counters, could have seen him when he shut his shop-door behind him, and +went into the back-room where Jessie and he devised the patterns, where +she embroidered and lived, where she cooked and washed and ironed, where +she nursed Columbia, their daughter, one glance at all this, made with +the heart and the understanding, would—ah! <i>might</i>, have been to some +of them worth more than all Dexter's pleasant stones, and all the +contents of the shop, and all the profits the flag-maker would ever make +by trading.</p> + +<p>For I can hardly believe, though this story be but of "<i>common</i> life," +when I take up the newspapers and glance along the items I am +constrained to doubt, that such people as Silas and Jessie live in every +house, in every alley, lane, and street, in every square and avenue, on +every farm, wherever walls inclose those divine temples of which +Apostles talked as belonging to God, which temples, said they, are holy! +I can hardly believe that Love, void of fear and of selfishness, speaks +through all our domestic policy, and devises those curious arrangements, +political, theological, social, whose result has approval and praise, it +may be, in the regions of outer darkness.</p> + +<p>Dark faces, whose sleekness hides a gulf of waters more dead than those +of the dreadful Dead Sea, rise between me and the honest, brave face of +Silas,—dreary flats, whose wastes are not figured in utter barrenness +by the awful African deserts, where ranks upon ranks of women, like +Jessie at least in love and fidelity, must stand, or—"where is the +promise of His coming?"</p> + +<p>The daughter of Silas and Jessie was called Columbia in honor of some +valiant enterprise, nautical or other, which charmed the patriotic +spirit of the father; and as he was not a fighting man or a speaking +man, he offered this modest comment on the brilliant event by way of +showing his appreciation.</p> + +<p>Columbia Dexter was a great favorite with the children of Salt Lane for +various reasons, and among them this, that in all parades and +processions she supplied the banners. Columbia's friend of friends was +Silas, son of Andrew Swift,—and thus we come among the children of the +neighbors.</p> + +<p>They were not dependent on Salt Lane for a play-ground. They had the +Long Wharf. Ships from the most distant foreign shores deposited their +loads of freightage there, and the children were free to read the +foreign brands, to guess the contents, and to watch the sailors,—free +to all brain-puzzling calculations, and to clothes-soiling, +clothes-rending feats, among the treasures of the ship-hold and the +wharf: no mean privileges, with the roar of ocean in their ears, and +great ships with their towering masts before their eyes. They had the +wharf for bustle, confusion, excitement,—and for this they loved it; +but the beach that stretched beyond they had for quiet, and there, for +miles and miles, curious shells and pretty pebbles, fish-bones and crabs +and sand, sea-weed fine and fair, and the old sycamores, the old dead +trees, in the tops of whose white branches the halcyon built its nest. +Well the children knew the winter days, so bright and mild, when the +brave birds were breeding. Well they knew when the young kingfisher +would begin to make his royal progress, with such safe dignity +descending, branch by branch, until he could no longer resist Nature, +but must dash out in a "fine frenzy" for the bounding waves!</p> + +<p>Silas Swift, Dexter's namesake, was a grave, sturdy, somewhat +heavy-looking fellow, whose brain teemed with thoughts and projects of +which his slow-moving body offered no suggestion. Whoever prophesied of +them did so at his hazard. Let him play at his will, and the children +even were amazed. But this could not happen every day. Set him at work, +and the sanguine were in despair. This was because, when work must be +done, he deliberated, and did the thing that must be; so that, while +misapprehension fretted<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_679" id="Page_679">[Pg 679]</a></span> gently sometimes because of his dulness, he was +preparing for that which was not hoped. Celerity enough when he had come +to a decision, but no sign or token till he had come to that.</p> + +<p>The first exercise of his imagination trusted to the inspection of +others was in behalf of Columbia Dexter, with intent to moderate her +grief over a dead kitten which they buried in the sand under the +sycamore-tree, the procession carrying banners furled and decorated with +badges of mourning. Silas made a monument then and there in the high +noon of a halcyon day: carved on a pine board which had served for a +bier was the face of Tabby, surrounded with devices intended to +represent the duration of her virtues. His work consoled Columbia, and +inspired him to a more ambitious enterprise, namely, the carving of the +same in a block of gypsum, which work of art Dexter obtaining sight of +declared that it would have done credit to an artist, and set it on his +mantel-shelf between two precious household cards lettered in gilt as +follows "<i>Union is Strength</i>," and "<i>Principles, not Men</i>."</p> + +<p>I suppose no children ever led a happier life,—the special joy of +childhood being in sport, and food, and liberty, and the love of those +who own them. They basked in the sun; they were busy with sport, fretted +by no cares; kind words directed them. They lived in the midst of +illusions, like princes, or fairies, or spirits,—like <i>children</i>. They +followed about with processions, training in the rear of every +train-band, keeping time with the march of the happy Sunday-schools, +when they had their celebrations. Young Silas could be trusted with the +care of Columbia, and hand in hand, like brother and sister, they went. +Especially were they proud, if the procession carried one of Dexter's +flags. Silas, no doubt, had suggested a point of the device, or Columbia +had worked a corner.</p> + +<p>When Dexter would go on board ship, or to some lodge, with the flags +which had been ordered of him, in anticipation of voyages and +processions, the children often accompanied him. I see them walking +shyly in the rear, and looking up to the father of the little girl with +the reverence he deserved. By-and-by would they grow wise and feel +ashamed of this? Will you see the fair Columbia, whom the captain pats +so kindly on the head, smiling broadly when he hears her name, will you +see her, a woman grown, attending her father on such errands? And if you +see her not, will the reason be such as proves her worthy to be old +Dexter's daughter? Will you hear her saying to her friends, as now, +"Guess who worked those flowers," while the target-shooters march past, +carrying their blue silk banner, royal with red roses? She and Silas +often run panting in the wake of great processions; they would not for +the world miss seeing the wide, fluttering folds of the Stars and +Stripes, or it might be the conquering St. George, or the transparencies +they were all so busy over a day or two ago. Their speed will soon +abate, and why?</p> + +<p>Human beings are not children forever. Maturity must not manifest itself +as childhood does. Ah, but "Principles, not Men"! Is any truth involved +in that beyond what Silas recognizes in his trade? Is there another +reason which shall have power to make Columbia some day stand coolly on +the sidewalk, while her heart is beating fast,—which shall induce her +to point out the mottoes on the banners, and the various devices, to +another, without trembling in the voice or tears in the eye? If ever she +shall glide along the streets, she whose early race-course was Salt +Lane, if ever like a lady she shall walk there, will it be at the price +of forgetfulness of all this humble sport and joy,—as a sustainer of +feeble "social fictions," and a violator of the great covenant?</p> + +<p>To the boy and girl it was not a question whether all their lives these +relations should continue, and this play go on; but even to them, as +children, a question that seriously concerned them, and in whose +discussion they bore serious part, arose.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_680" id="Page_680">[Pg 680]</a></span></p> + +<p>The old building Dexter occupied was becoming unfit for tenants. It had +been patched over and over, until it was no longer safe, and agents +refused to insure it. The proprietor accordingly determined to pull it +down.</p> + +<p>A change to a better locality had often been suggested to Dexter; but +his invariable reply was, that "people shouldn't try to run before they +were able to walk,—he was satisfied with Salt Lane and his neighbors": +though of late he had made such replies with gravity, thinking of his +daughter.</p> + +<p>And now that the necessity was facing him, he met it like a man. He +talked the matter over with his wife, and the claim of their child was +urgent in the heart of each while they talked, and it could not have +surprised either when suddenly their hopes met in her benediction. For +Columbia's sake they must find a pleasant place for the new nest, some +nook where beauty would be welcome, and gentle grace, and quiet, and +light, and fair colors, and sweet odors would be possible; so pure and +fair a child she seemed to father Dexter, so did the mother's heart +desire to protect her from all odious influences and surroundings, that, +when the prospect of change was before them, it was in reference to her, +as well as trade, that the Company would make it.</p> + +<p>Swift was taken into their confidence, and he walked with the pair +around the streets one evening to see the shop Dexter's eyes had fixed +on. It was a modest tenement in a crowded quarter, on whose door and +windows "<i>To Let</i>" was posted. Silas had been out house-hunting in the +afternoon, and this place appeared to meet his wishes; he had inquired +about the rent, it did not seem too high for a house so comfortable, and +it was probable that by to-morrow night the family would, after a +fashion, be settled within those walls.</p> + +<p>They sat down on the door-step and talked about the change with serious +gravity, mindful that the old tenement they were about to leave had +sheltered them since their marriage-day, that they had prospered in Salt +Lane, and that the change they were about to make would be attended with +some risk. Andrew Swift sighed dolefully while Jessie or Silas Dexter +alluded to these matters of past experience: it was no easy matter to +talk him into a cheerful mood again; but the brave pair accomplished it +on their way home, when certainly either of them had as much need of a +comforter as he.</p> + +<p>To have heard them, one might have supposed that no tears would be shed +when the tenement so long occupied by the flag-maker should come down. +Old Mortality will not be hindered in his thinking.</p> + +<p>Andrew offered his son Silas to assist his neighbors in the labor of +removal, and his wife came with her service; and the rest of Salt Lane +was ready at the door to lend a helping hand, when it was understood +that the life and soul of the lane was going away to High Street.</p> + +<p>Dexter's face was unusually bright while the work of packing went on. He +knew that for everybody's sake more light than usual must be diffused by +him that day. You know how it is that the brave win the notable +victories, when their troops have fallen back in despair, and would fain +beat a retreat. It is the living voice and the flashing eye, the courage +and the will. What is he, indeed, that he should surrender,—above all, +in the worst extremity?</p> + +<p>How is death even swallowed up in victory, when the beleaguered spirit +dashes across the breach, and, unarmed, possesses life!</p> + +<p>Dexter told Andrew Swift that Silas was worth a dozen draymen, and in +truth he was, that day; for he, and every one, were animated by the +spirit of the leader. Courage! at least for that day, though they dared +not look beyond it.</p> + +<p>Thus these people went to High Street: into the house with many rooms, +four at least; into the rooms with many windows, and high ceilings, +which you could <i>not</i> touch with your uplifted hand,—rooms whose walls +were papered, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_681" id="Page_681">[Pg 681]</a></span> whose floors should have carpets, for Dexter said the +house was leased for ten years, and they would make their home +comfortable. What ample scope they had! Many a fancy they had checked +before it became a wish in the old quarters, they were so cramped there, +though never in danger of suffocation, Heaven knows. Grandly the great +arch lifted over the old moss-grown roof. But now they need stifle no +fancy of all that should come to them; there was room in the house, and +behind it,—yes, a strip of ground in the rear, and against the brick +wall an apricot-tree and a grape-vine! Very Garden of Eden: was it big +enough for the Serpent?</p> + +<p>It was a sight to see the happy family while they talked over their +possessions.</p> + +<p>Over the shop, fronting the street, was a large apartment, by common +consent to be used for parlor and show-room: young Swift was to decorate +this, Dexter said, Columbia should be his helper, and he and his wife +would criticize the result. Dexter talked with a purpose when he made +these arrangements, but he kept the purpose secret until the work was +done.</p> + +<p>In the three windows ornamental flags were hung, which should serve for +signs from the street: this was young Swift's design. In the middle +window, Columbia responded, should be the George Washington flag. Yes, +and to the left Lafayette, with Franklin for the right. Even so. Then +above the middle window they secured the gilded American eagle. Oh, the +harmony that prevailed among the young decorators!</p> + +<p>Then "<i>Principles, not Men</i>" remained to be disposed of. They did it in +such a way that the gilded motto shone on the white wall. The mantel was +a masterpiece of arrangement, and solely after Columbia's suggestions. +There was the monumental cat for a centre-piece, with the more recent +creations of Silas Swift for immediate surroundings, and a banner at +either end floating from the shelf.</p> + +<p>You can imagine, if your imagination is genial and kindly, how very +queer and fanciful the room looked with these decorations; and the +gentle heart will understand the loving humility, the pleasure, with +which Jessie surveyed all, when the children's work was done.</p> + +<p>It was a pretty scene when Dexter came up, sent by Silas for an opinion, +while the latter kept the shop. At first he laughed a little, and +exclaimed, while he walked about; then Jessie turned away, and gave him +an opportunity to brush the tears from his eyes unobserved; but +presently she began to circle round him, unconsciously it seemed, till +she stood close beside him; then he took her hand and held it, and she +knew what he was thinking, and that he was proud and happy.</p> + +<p>"It beats all!" he said more than once. And Columbia was talking of +Silas, showing his work, and repeating his words, till Dexter broke +out,—</p> + +<p>"We must keep Silas! We can't get along without Silas! He mustn't go +back to Salt Lane. I'll teach him business in High Street."</p> + +<p>And the father did not seem to notice when his child slipped away down +the stairs, to the shop, to the lad, who was thinking rather sadly, +that, now his work was done, there was no more chance for him here: she +had come to make him smile as much by her own delight as by his +satisfaction.</p> + +<p>But all this excitement must pass off. And in spite of the general +gladness and gratulation, probably a more lonely, homesick party could +not have been easily found than the Dexter family in their new home.</p> + +<p>Dexter could not reproach himself for his removal, as he thought the +matter seriously over. It was a forced removal, and certainly he would +have been without excuse, had he gone into worse quarters instead of +better, since better he could afford. It was not extravagance, but +homesickness, that tormented him.</p> + +<p>He was too generous, when all was done, to torment his wife with such +misgivings as he had; and erelong the trouble, for want of nursing, +died, as most of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_682" id="Page_682">[Pg 682]</a></span> this life's troubles will, after their shabby fashion. +But, indeed, how can they help it? that, too, is the will of Nature.</p> + +<p>And was not Dexter himself, in the new neighborhood as in the old? His +customers were still of the same class. But his surroundings were of a +superior character,—there was a better atmosphere prevailing in High +Street, and more light in his house. He did not love darkness better.</p> + +<p>Pretty and well-dressed women were to be seen in High Street, and they +never, except by mistake or disaster, wandered through Salt Lane. +Standing in his door, and observing them according to his thoughtful +fashion, Dexter remembered that his daughter was growing rapidly into a +tall, handsome girl, and foresaw that she could not always be a child. +He saw young misses going past with their school-books in their hands, +and if he followed them with his eyes as far as eyes could follow, it +was not for any reason save such as should have made them love and trust +the man. He was thinking so seriously about his daughter, up-stairs at +work with her mother, embroidering scarfs and banners.</p> + +<p>He had only Columbia. She learned fast, when she went with Silas Swift +to the school in Salt Lane,—so they all said, and he knew she was fond +of her book. He had no ambition to make a lady of Columbia,—oh, no! But +he was looking forward, according to his nature, and—who could tell +what future might wait on her? He based his expectations for his child +on his own experience. Neither he nor Jessie had ever looked for such +good fortune as they had; and a step farther, must it not be a step +higher, and accordingly new prospects?</p> + +<p>Prophecy is unceasing. In what does the prescience of love differ from +inspiration?</p> + +<p>One morning Dexter was sent for by the principal of the seminary of the +town, to assist in the decoration of her school-room preparatory to the +examination and exhibition of her pupils.</p> + +<p>While at work there, aided by Silas Swift, who was now his assistant in +business, and notable for his skill as a designer and painter and +painter of transparencies, and whatsoever in that line was desired for +public festivities, processions, illuminations, and general jubilation +of any character,—while at work in the great school-room, Mr. Dexter +was unusually silent.</p> + +<p>This was no occasion for, there was no need of, much speaking or of +merriment. It was not expected of him. He was not dealing with, while he +worked for, others now, but he was dealt with constantly, to an extent +that confounded and embarrassed him. He did not make the demonstrations +people sometimes do in such a case, but was silent, and half sad. +Everything that passed before him he saw, it made an impression rapid +and deep on his mind. The pictures drawn and painted by the pupils, and +hung around the walls for exhibition, the pupils themselves, passing in +and out,—girls of all ages, ladies to look at, all of them,—suggested +anew the question, Why should his daughter be shut off from the +privileges of these? He felt ashamed when he asked. Yet the question +would be answered; and without palliation, self-excusing, or retort, he +meditated.</p> + +<p>Finally he said to Silas Swift, who worked with him in silence broken +only by question and answer that referred merely to their business,—</p> + +<p>"Look!"—and his eyes followed a young girl who had been hunting for +several minutes among the desks for a book.</p> + +<p>The youth obeyed,—he looked, but seemed not to understand the +flag-maker as quickly or as clearly as was expected of him.</p> + +<p>"Columby," said Dexter, with a wink and a nod, that to his mind +expressed everything.</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes," said Silas, as if he understood.</p> + +<p>His penetration was not put to further proof. The mere supposition of +his apprehension satisfied his employer, who could now go on without +embarrassment.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_683" id="Page_683">[Pg 683]</a></span></p> + +<p>"She ought to come to school," said Dexter.</p> + +<p>"Oh!" exclaimed Silas, with surprise sufficient to convince the father +that the young man had not attempted to practise a deceit.</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Dexter, "she ought, she's old enough,"—as if that were all +he had been waiting for.</p> + +<p>"I think so," answered Silas Swift, with a decision encouraging to hear, +and final as to influence.</p> + +<p>"You do? Yes, I ought to afford it, if I lived on a crust to manage the +bills. Why not? What's the difference 'twixt her and the rest, I'd like +to know?"</p> + +<p>"She could beat the whole batch at her books," said Silas, not doubting +that he spoke with moderation.</p> + +<p>"Pretty quick, wasn't she?" said the pleased father. "Yes, I know +Columby!"</p> + +<p>"And she deserves it."</p> + +<p>"Deserves! You don't think I've been waiting to find that out! Well, +Sir, put it that way, I say, Yes, she does deserve it."</p> + +<p>Dexter and young Swift, having spoken thus far, thought on in their +several directions, with serious, steady, strong, far-reaching looks +into the future.</p> + +<p>Thus it was that Columbia Dexter took her place in the great school, +where girls, it was said, were regarded and taught as responsible human +beings.</p> + +<p>Silas Swift looked so grave, whenever the families mentioned Dexter's +resolution, that Columbia, who had made him repeat already many times +his reflections and observations in the school-room that day when he and +her father were employed in its decoration, said to him one morning, +when they happened to be alone together,—</p> + +<p>"I'm afraid you don't think well of what we're going to do."</p> + +<p>Whereupon he, somewhat proudly for him, answered,—</p> + +<p>"I told your father, when he asked me, what I thought, before he had +made up his mind."</p> + +<p>"What did you say?" she asked,—though she could have guessed correctly, +had he insisted upon it, but Silas was not in the mood.</p> + +<p>"I said it should be done," he answered, seriously.</p> + +<p>"I should go to school?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, it is but right."</p> + +<p>"Then why do you look so solemn?"</p> + +<p>"You're going away from us."</p> + +<p>Her hand was lying quietly in his, when she answered,—</p> + +<p>"Going away? I shall see you three times every day. What do you mean?"</p> + +<p>"When there was your father and mother and me, 'us four, and no more,' +there were not dozens to think about. You'll have dozens now."</p> + +<p>"I hope they will be pleasant," she said, looking away, that he should +not see how bright her eyes were, when his were so grave.</p> + +<p>"I hope they will. And I'm sure of it. Never fear. I suppose, too, they +must make you like themselves, some ways. I'd be glad, if I thought +you'd make any of them like you."</p> + +<p>"How's that?" she asked, half laughing, but she trembled as well. What +would honest Silas say next, he was making such a very grave business +out of this school-going?</p> + +<p>"True,—modest,—sensible,—respectful,—a lady, ten times more than +those they make up so fine," said he, slowly. And still he held her hand +as quietly as if it did not thrill with quickening pulses; and his +speech and composure showed what power of self-control the young man +had,—for he was fearful when he looked forward, anticipating the change +this year might bring to pass in and for Columbia Dexter.</p> + +<p>But Dexter and Company looked forward with no forebodings, when they +bought the needful school-books, and saw their daughter fairly occupied +with them. They had not been ashamed to reveal their hopes and fears to +the principal. She really listened in a way that made them love her, you +will know how,—as if she had the interest of the girl at heart,—as +though she would not deal so<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_684" id="Page_684">[Pg 684]</a></span> sacrilegiously with their dear child as to +paste a few flashing ornaments upon her, worthless as dead fish-scales, +and swear she was covered with pearls. Honest and loving sponsors! +virtuous, confiding parents! they were ready to promise for Columbia; +she went from their hands a pure, industrious, obedient girl, only +fourteen; they were sure she would take pride in making good all +deficiencies of her past education. And the woman promised in +turn,—chiefly thinking, I infer, that here at least were responsible +paymasters. Why not? She taught for a living. Only we never like to +suppose that poets sing merely for money, or that kings reign for the +sake of the crown; we do not imagine a statesman delights in his +martyrdom for eight dollars a day. I know one woman who teaches because +it is her vocation; she loves the work God allows her. But even the +worst school that's used as a hot-bed could not have ruined a plant like +this bearing the Dexter label.</p> + +<p>Thus this great fact of the flag-makers' married life transpired,—their +child went to school with the children of gentlemen. Dexter could tell +that figure among dozens of girls; under one modest bonnet was a young +face with brown eyes and brown hair, a fair, sweet countenance, which he +loved with a love we will not dwell upon. In the sacred narrative, as in +the sacred temple, is always a place hid from the eyes and the feet of +the congregation. We may be all Gentiles here.</p> + +<p>Like responsible sentinels, Dexter and Jessie stood at their post. Like +debtors to the great universe, they made their calling sure. They were +living thus peacefully while nations went to war, while panics taught +the people it was not beneath their wisdom to look to the foundations +they built their pride upon,—thus, while great world-events were going +on that must concern every soul under the whole heaven. But never shall +the man be lost in the multitude; and was it not, is it not, of +incalculable importance that mortals by their own firesides should learn +to believe in peace and good-will,—else how shall come the universal +harmony?</p> + +<p>Therefore I dwell thus on Dexter's humble fortunes. Let us not fear too +much reverence, too patient observation; every living creature is one +other evidence, speaking his yea or nay,—by joy or sorrow, shame or +honor, testifying to the eternal laws of God.</p> + +<p>Sometime during the last six months of Columbia's second year at the +seminary among the books and new associates, Silas Swift had some +strange secret experiences, which came to their inevitable expression +when he told Mr. Dexter that he must leave his service. He perceived, he +said, that he could not spend life in a shop,—he must have other +employment. He hinted about the sea, but on that subject was not clear; +but he was clear in this,—tired of his life, sick, and knew not the +physician. Was a serpent distilling poison under the apricot-tree?</p> + +<p>Dexter was amazed. Silas anticipated everything he said,—was prepared +to answer all; and he answered in a manner that showed the flag-maker +something instant and effective must be done. He talked the matter over +accordingly with Andrew Swift, and the two men were at their wits' end; +they did not understand, and knew not what to prescribe for the case, so +desperate it seemed. But Jessie said, "Take him in for a partner, Silas. +Let <i>him</i> stand for Company. You and I are one; so the sign, as it goes, +is a fib, you know."</p> + +<p>The two men looked at Jessie as if she had been an oracle. This very +promotion of their son had long seemed to Swift and his wife the most +desirable issue, of all their expectations; but they had not thought to +look for it these many years. However, Andrew was ready to pay down, any +day, whatever sum Silas Dexter should specify in order that his son +might be admitted to equal partnership.</p> + +<p>So they waited together till young Swift came into the little room back +of the shop, where they were all looking for<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_685" id="Page_685">[Pg 685]</a></span> him. They laid their plan +before him. What could he do? Neither explain himself, nor yet defy them +all. He surrendered; and the next day the old sign, <span class="smcap">Dexter & Co.</span>, meant +what it had not meant the day before. The word of any one of these +people was as good as a bond to the others; therefore no papers of +agreement were made out, but Andrew paid down the money, because that +was his way of satisfying himself,—and son Silas was now a partner.</p> + +<p>Everybody concerned was so well pleased with this arrangement, that he +whose pleasure in it was specially desired had not the heart to speak +his mind, or to resolve further than that he would do his duty. Indeed, +he soon began to believe that he was satisfied.</p> + +<p>Young Silas thought he saw good reason for bringing forward his +partner's motto into fresh conspicuity in these days: he believed in +that motto, he purposed to work by it, but it was not merely his policy +to give his faith manifestation. He made several efforts, after his own +odd, original style, to impress the pretty Columbia with the +significance of that sentiment. Often his talk with the young lady had +the gravity and weight of a moral essay, and she took it well,—was not +impatient,—would answer him as a child, "I know it is so, Silas,"—did +not imagine how much these very lectures cost him, or that he delivered +them with as much inward composure as an orator might be supposed to +feel on the brink of a precipice, where the awful rocks and depths gave +echo to his utterance.</p> + +<p>Why should he so much disturb himself on her account?—she was so +studious, so blameless, what great need of this oversight he was +exercising continually?</p> + +<p>Young Alexander, now Midshipman Alexander, once a cabin-boy, promoted +step by step on the score of actual merit and brave service +performed,—Midshipman Alexander, son of an old sailor's old widow, who +lived in Salt Lane, to whom Andrew Swift and Silas Dexter and other +well-disposed men had lent a helping hand when poverty had brought her +to some desperate strait,—this young Alexander, who had been coming +home once in every three years since his twelfth birthday, and who in +the course of many years of voyages came to look on Dexter's house as +his home on land, after his mother died,—he interfered with the peace +of Silas Swift.</p> + +<p>He returned from service, after every voyage, a taller, stronger, +nobler, wiser, handsomer man. He had a career open before him; he could +not fail of honorable fortune. Every inch a hero Alexander looked, and +was; nobody ever tired of hearing his adventures; no one grew +unbelieving, when he spoke of the future,—all things seemed so possible +to him; and then he was really not possessed of the demon of vanity, the +ill-shaped evil monster, but was straightforward, and earnest, and +determined, and capable.</p> + +<p>And Dexter, any one could see, was growing dreadfully proud of his +Columbia.</p> + +<p>Silas Swift felt the sands moving under his feet. He dared not build on +a foundation so insecure. But, oh, he wished himself away from High +Street, ten thousand, thousand miles! He fell into dreaming moods that +did not leave him satisfied and cheerful. Surely, other quarters of the +globe had other circumstances than these which kept him to a life so +dull, under skies so leaden. Alas! the waving of the banners did not any +more uplift him, leading him on as a good soldier to battles and +victories. He tried to get the better of himself,—after the last visit +of this Alexander, he was tolerably successful; he studied hard, +ambitious to keep at least on an equality of learning with +Columbia,—and he went far ahead of her, for certain desperate reasons. +But when Dexter began to treat him with profound respect, as a man of +learning should be treated, according to his notions, the poor young +fellow, mortified and miserable, put away his books, and loathed his +false position.</p> + +<p>The old time to which through all prosperity Silas clung with fond +fears, the dear old time was all over, he said to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_686" id="Page_686">[Pg 686]</a></span> himself one day, when +Columbia called him up into the parlor, clapping her hands ever +suspecting that the theme might please another less,—there was but one +for him as if he had been a slave, a signal he well understood, and was +proud to understand,—when she asked him to bring the step-ladder, and +to help her, for the curtains must come down from the show-room, it was +going to be a parlor now, and no show-room again forever. With heavy +misgivings, with a feeling that they were hard on to "the parting of the +ways," Silas obeyed her.</p> + +<p>Even so, according to her will was it that the drapery, the flags rich +in patriotic portraiture, the Washington, the Franklin, and the +Lafayette, must come down. Some pictures she had painted, some sketches +she had made, were to take their place: her father had insisted on +having them framed, and now they should hang on the walls.</p> + +<p>He assisted Columbia without a word of comment. Now the room, she said, +would no longer look hot and uncomfortable. There would be less dust to +distract one on the walls. But Silas, the stickler for old things, +thought jealously, "There's always a reason ready to excuse every +change. It's pride that's to pay now,—she's getting ashamed of the +shop."</p> + +<p>And he remembered the queer look Alexander had cast around him the last +time he entered that room; and he knew that this same Alexander was now +expected home daily.</p> + +<p>This was the rock, then, against which the sturdy craft of Silas was +destined to strike and go to pieces! This was the whirlpool which should +uproot the fairest tree and swing it to final ingulfing! Dark +foreboding! sad fear! his heart was so concerned about Columbia Dexter. +Alas for the halcyon days! it was winter indeed, but a winter worthy of +Labrador.</p> + +<p>So much she rejoiced in this midshipman's advancement, so proud of it +she seemed,—she was so bold in prophecy where he was concerned, so +manifestly fitted to appreciate a hero's career,—she could talk so long +about him without every suspecting that the theme might please another +less,—there was but one end likely, or desirable, for all this.</p> + +<p>Then Alexander came. And his popularity waxed, instead of waning. So +Silas at last gravely said to himself, after his sensible, moderate +manner of dealing with that unhappy person, "If she and the young man +were only married and settled, there the business would end; <i>he</i> should +no longer be distracted, as he did not deny he had long been, on her +account." That admission was fatal. It compelled him to ask himself +sharply why he should be distracted. "What business was this of his? Did +he not, above all things, desire that Columbia should be happy? Must she +not be the best judge of what could make her happiness?" He tried to +deal honestly with himself.</p> + +<p>This endeavor led him to remark one morning to Columbia,—</p> + +<p>"You and Alexander seem to be getting on finely."</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes," said she,—"of course."</p> + +<p>"I hope you always will," he continued, with a tragic vehemence of wish.</p> + +<p>"Thank you, Silas; we shall, I think," she replied, with such an excess +of gratitude, so he deemed it, that the poor fellow attempted no more.</p> + +<p>All that day he thought and thought; and at night Silas Swift looked +back from a corner of High Street at a building over whose door a flag +was waving, and said to himself, "I was born as free as others,"—and he +walked on silently, with himself for his dismal company.</p> + +<p>It made no difference to him where he went, which path he took, he said; +but he passed Salt Lane, and crossed Long Wharf, and walked down the +beach, under the old sycamores, and wandered on. There was another +seaport-town some miles down the coast; he was walking in that +direction, but he did not acknowledge a purpose.</p> + +<p>How splendid was the night! a night of magnificent constellations, of +flashing auroras, of many meteors; and he saw the comet, which he and +Columbia had looked for since its first announcement.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_687" id="Page_687">[Pg 687]</a></span> But the heavens +might as well have been "hung in black." Chilled by more than the wintry +wind, he went his way. When the sun rose, he was still wandering on. +Light, heaven-deep, shone on land and sea. He sat down to rest, and to +order himself for future movements: for the town was now in sight; in an +hour or two he should come to the busy streets; already he could discern +the lofty spires, and the tall masts of the great vessels.</p> + +<p>Yes,—he would find a situation on one of those ships. He would go out +as supercargo to China, or India, or Spain. He could get a situation +without difficulty, for he was well known in the town. Then, after he +had sailed, word could go back to his father and mother.</p> + +<p>So, then, he should go to sea? Of course. It was now arranged,—to +foreign ports. He should see foreign people, and visit ancient places. +The strange would have advantage over the familiar. He did not desire +death. He had not that weakness, not being worn out by sickness, and +having never used this life as abusing it. The friends he loved were +living; his affections were strong. No, he could not think of death +without a shudder, for Love was on the earth. Yet—what had he to do +with Love? By her own election <i>she</i> was no more to him than a hundred +others as good and fair might prove. Must he be so weak as to go through +life regretting? Not he, Silas Swift!</p> + +<p>By-and-by he rose up from the sand. I think his face must have +resembled, then, the face of Elijah when the Lord inquied, with the +still, small voice, "What dost thou here?" For, as he arose, he looked +back on the waste by which he came,—his face turned homewards. Ay, and +his steps likewise; and not with indecision, as though fearing when he +surrendered to himself and One mightier.</p> + +<p>Do they tell us filial reverence is a forgotten virtue? Silas was going +home. Child, do you call him coward? Perhaps he was that,—no, not even +yesterday, for the yesterday was capable of to-day! Do you, then, say, +with a doubting smile, "Love! Love!" Yea, verily, Love! The mount of God +takes up your word, so feebly and falsely spoken, and the echo is like +thunder whose fire can destroy. Yea, <i>Love</i>! Two old faces, wrinkled, +anxious. Eyes not so bright as once, dimmer to-day for tears; hair +sprinkled with gray. Prayers broken by sobbing; trust disappointed; +confidence violated. Ay, hearts that loved him first, and would surely +love him always. Smiles first recognized of all he has ever seen, that +could not change to frowns. They call him with tremulous tenderness, and +the heart of Silas breaks with hearing. Bleed, poor heart, but let not +those old hearts bleed!</p> + +<p>The music of the inviting waves is not so soft as the sound of those +feeble voices,—the freedom they promise is not powerful to tempt him; +behold the arms that hang powerless yonder, and the hearts whose tides +are more wondrous than those of the sea! The halcyon days shall never +break through eternal ages on him, if he will walk on now in darkness.</p> + +<p>"I will arise and go to my father."</p> + +<p>The everlasting gates lift up their heads. The full-grown man reënters. +Love drove him forth with stripes; there may have been who rejoiced and +thought of fainting Ishmael. But against no man should this youth's hand +be lifted. No son of the bond-woman he. Isaac, not Ishmael.</p> + +<p>Love drove him forth with stripes; but a holier drew him home. By his +past life's integrity the man was bound,—by the honor of a good name, +that waited to be justified.</p> + +<p>He went home to ask forgiveness of <span class="smcap">Love</span>. Not of Youth and Beauty, but of +Age and Trust.</p> + +<p>He went home to souls which had proved themselves, each one, before the +divine messenger in the hours of his absence.</p> + +<p>Back, once more to break on a little circle gathered in an obscure +corner of the town, talking his case over with distressed perplexity: to +women disturbed with fears incredible to them,—to three, save one who +did not seem distracted,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_688" id="Page_688">[Pg 688]</a></span> and who looked around her with something like +triumph, as a prophet might gaze when his word was verified. She was the +youngest and the fairest of them all. How many times she had said, "He +can explain. He will come soon. How can you fear for Silas?"</p> + +<p>He went back to the dead silence that fell with his appearing. His +mother was first to break it. With a faltering voice she spoke, but with +the authority of maternal love and faith,—through sobs, but with +authority.</p> + +<p>"There! there! I told you! Now speak, Silas! quick! Did you find +him?"—and, half fainting, she threw her arms about her son.</p> + +<p>The father would fain speak with severity, but he failed in the attempt; +he could no longer harbor his cruel fear, with the lad there before him.</p> + +<p>"Silas, what do you mean, Sir? Here's Mr. Dexter's shop broke in, and +his till robbed, and you off, and the Devil to pay! But Columby, there, +said you had gone in search of the thief. Oh! oh!"</p> + +<p>"Of course!" cried Dexter, the words rolling out as a cloud of smoke +from a conspicuous safety-valve,—"I knew 't was all right. I'd expect +the world to bu'st up as quick as for you to cheat us. I said it, I did, +fifty times." And there Dexter choked, and was silent.</p> + +<p>Ay, time for him to return! "Glory to God!" said Silas, and he looked +around him, scanning every face, as a man might scan the faces of +accusers.</p> + +<p>More than any said or thought he saw in Columbia's eyes. Silent, pale, +she merely sat gazing at him steadfastly. Oh, powers of speech, +surrender! It was a gaze that made the young fellow turn from all, that +the spasm of joy might pass, and leave him breath to declare himself +like a man in the hearing of those present.</p> + +<p>The words he spoke might not disturb the dreaming halcyon, but they must +have brought angels nearer,—so near that not one there in the little +back-room could escape the heavenly atmosphere.</p> + +<p>Was Love born in a stable? Is Nature changed since, that a little room +back of a shop should not be heaven itself, and the inmates kings and +priests, though without the ermine and ephod?</p> + +<p>Shall we sing the halcyon's song?</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="ON_TRANSLATING_THE_DIVINA_COMMEDIA" id="ON_TRANSLATING_THE_DIVINA_COMMEDIA"></a>ON TRANSLATING THE DIVINA COMMEDIA.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Oft have I seen at some cathedral-door<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A laborer, pausing in the dust and heat,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lay down his burden, and with reverent feet<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Enter, and cross himself, and on the floor<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Kneel to repeat his pater-noster o'er;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Far off the noises of the world retreat;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The loud vociferations of the street<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Become an undistinguishable roar.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So, as I enter here from day to day,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And leave my burden at this minster-gate,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Kneeling in prayer, and not ashamed to pray,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The tumult of the time disconsolate<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To inarticulate murmurs dies away,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">While the eternal ages watch and wait.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_689" id="Page_689">[Pg 689]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="HOUSE_AND_HOME_PAPERS" id="HOUSE_AND_HOME_PAPERS"></a>HOUSE AND HOME PAPERS.</h2> + +<h3>BY CHRISTOPHER CROWFIELD.</h3> + + +<h4>XI.</h4> + +<p>My wife and I were sitting at the open bow-window of my study, watching +the tuft of bright red leaves on our favorite maple, which warned us +that summer was over. I was solacing myself, like all the world in our +days, with reading the "Schönberg Cotta Family," when my wife made her +voice heard through the enchanted distance, and dispersed the pretty +vision of German cottage-life.</p> + +<p>"Chris!"</p> + +<p>"Well, my dear."</p> + +<p>"Do you know the day of the month?"</p> + +<p>Now my wife knows this is a thing that I never do know, that I can't +know, and, in fact, that there is no need I should trouble myself about, +since she always knows, and what is more, always tells me. In fact, the +question, when asked by her, meant more than met the ear. It was a +delicate way of admonishing me that another paper for the "Atlantic" +ought to be in train; and so I answered, not to the external form, but +to the internal intention.</p> + +<p>"Well, you see, my dear, I haven't made up my mind what my next paper +shall be about."</p> + +<p>"Suppose, then, you let me give you a subject."</p> + +<p>"Sovereign lady, speak on! Your slave hears!"</p> + +<p>"Well, then, take <i>Cookery</i>. It may seem a vulgar subject, but I think +more of health and happiness depends on that than on any other one +thing. You may make houses enchantingly beautiful, hang them with +pictures, have them clean and airy and convenient; but if the stomach is +fed with sour bread and burnt coffee, it will raise such rebellions that +the eyes will see no beauty anywhere. Now in the little tour that you +and I have been taking this summer, I have been thinking of the great +abundance of splendid material we have in America, compared with the +poor cooking. How often, in our stoppings, we have sat down to tables +loaded with material, originally of the very best kind, which had been +so spoiled in the treatment that there was really nothing to eat! Green +biscuit with acrid spots of alkali,—sour yeast-bread,—meat slowly +simmered in fat till it seemed like grease itself, and slowly congealing +in cold grease,—and above all, that unpardonable enormity, strong +butter! How often I have longed to show people what might have been done +with the raw material out of which all these monstrosities were +concocted!"</p> + +<p>"My dear," said I, "you are driving me upon delicate ground. Would you +have your husband appear in public with that most opprobrious badge of +the domestic furies, a dish-cloth pinned to his coat-tail? It is coming +to exactly the point I have always predicted, Mrs. Crowfield: you must +write, yourself. I always told you that you could write far better than +I, if you would only try. Only sit down and write as you sometimes talk +to me, and I might hang up my pen by the side of 'Uncle Ned's' fiddle +and bow."</p> + +<p>"Oh, nonsense!" said my wife. "I never could write. I know what ought to +be said, and I could <i>say</i> it to any one; but my ideas freeze in the +pen, cramp in my fingers, and make my brain seem like heavy bread. I was +born for extemporary speaking. Besides, I think the best things on all +subjects in this world of ours are said not by the practical workers, +but by the careful observers."</p> + +<p>"Mrs. Crowfield, that remark is as good as if I had made it myself," +said I.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_690" id="Page_690">[Pg 690]</a></span></p> + +<p>"It is true that I have been all my life a speculator and observer in +all domestic matters, having them so confidentially under my eye in our +own household; and so, if I write on a pure woman's matter, it must be +understood that I am only your pen and mouth-piece,—only giving +tangible form to wisdom which I have derived from you."</p> + +<p>So down I sat and scribbled, while my sovereign lady quietly stitched by +my side. And here I tell my reader that I write on such a subject under +protest,—declaring again my conviction, that, if my wife only believed +in herself as firmly as I do, she would write so that nobody would ever +want to listen to me again.</p> + + +<h3>COOKERY.</h3> + +<p>We in America have the raw material of provision in greater abundance +than any other nation. There is no country where an ample, +well-furnished table is more easily spread, and for that reason, +perhaps, none where the bounties of Providence are more generally +neglected. I do not mean to say that the traveller through the length +and breadth of our land could not, on the whole, find an average of +comfortable subsistence; yet, considering that our resources are greater +than those of any other civilized people, our results are comparatively +poorer.</p> + +<p>It is said, that, a list of the summer vegetables which are exhibited on +New-York hotel-tables being shown to a French <i>artiste</i>, he declared +that to serve such a dinner properly would take till midnight. I +recollect how I was once struck with our national plenteousness, on +returning from a Continental tour, and going directly from the ship to a +New-York hotel, in the bounteous season of autumn. For months I had been +habituated to my neat little bits of chop or poultry garnished with the +inevitable cauliflower or potato, which seemed to be the sole +possibility after the reign of green-peas was over; now I sat down all +at once to a carnival of vegetables: ripe, juicy tomatoes, raw or +cooked; cucumbers in brittle slices; rich, yellow sweet-potatoes; broad +Lima-beans, and beans of other and various names; tempting ears of +Indian-corn steaming in enormous piles, and great smoking tureens of the +savory succotash, an Indian gift to the table for which civilization +need not blush; sliced egg-plant in delicate fritters; and +marrow-squashes, of creamy pulp and sweetness: a rich variety, +embarrassing to the appetite, and perplexing to the choice. Verily, the +thought has often impressed itself on my mind that the vegetarian +doctrine preached in America left a man quite as much as he had capacity +to eat or enjoy, and that in the midst of such tantalizing abundance he +really lost the apology which elsewhere bears him out in preying upon +his less gifted and accomplished animal neighbors.</p> + +<p>But with all this, the American table, taken as a whole, is inferior to +that of England or France. It presents a fine abundance of material, +carelessly and poorly treated. The management of food is nowhere in the +world, perhaps, more slovenly and wasteful. Everything betokens that +want of care that waits on abundance; there are great capabilities and +poor execution. A tourist through England can seldom fail, at the +quietest country-inn, of finding himself served with the essentials of +English table-comfort,—his mutton-chop done to a turn, his steaming +little private apparatus for concocting his own tea, his choice pot of +marmalade or slice of cold ham, and his delicate rolls and creamy +butter, all served with care and neatness. In France, one never asks in +vain for delicious <i>café-au-lait</i>, good bread and butter, a nice omelet, +or some savory little portion of meat with a French name. But to a +tourist taking like chance in American country-fare what is the +prospect? What is the coffee? what the tea? and the meat? and above all, +the butter?</p> + +<p>In lecturing on cookery, as on house-building, I divide the subject into +not<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_691" id="Page_691">[Pg 691]</a></span> four, but five grand elements: first, Bread; second, Butter; third, +Meat; fourth, Vegetables; and fifth, Tea,—by which I mean, generically, +all sorts of warm, comfortable drinks served out in teacups, whether +they be called tea, coffee, chocolate, broma, or what not.</p> + +<p>I affirm, that, if these five departments are all perfect, the great +ends of domestic cookery are answered, so far as the comfort and +well-being of life are concerned. I am aware that there exists another +department, which is often regarded by culinary amateurs and young +aspirants as the higher branch and very collegiate course of practical +cookery, to wit, Confectionery,—by which I mean to designate all +pleasing and complicated compounds of sweets and spices, devised not for +health or nourishment, and strongly suspected of interfering with +both,—mere tolerated gratifications of the palate, which we eat, not +with the expectation of being benefited, but only with the hope of not +being injured by them. In this large department rank all sorts of cakes, +pies, preserves, ices, etc. I shall have a word or two to say under this +head before I have done. I only remark now, that in my tours about the +country I have often had a virulent ill-will excited towards these works +of culinary supererogation, because I thought their excellence was +attained by treading under foot and disregarding the five grand +essentials. I have sat at many a table garnished with three or four +kinds of well-made cake, compounded with citron and spices and all +imaginable good things, where the meat was tough and greasy, the bread +some hot preparation of flour, lard, saleratus, and acid, and the butter +unutterably detestable. At such tables I have thought, that, if the +mistress of the feast had given the care, time, and labor to preparing +the simple items of bread, butter, and meat that she evidently had given +to the preparation of these extras, the lot of a traveller might be much +more comfortable. Evidently, she never had thought of these common +articles as constituting a good table. So long as she had puff pastry, +rich black cake, clear jelly, and preserves, she seemed to consider that +such unimportant matters as bread, butter, and meat could take care of +themselves. It is the same inattention to common things as that which +leads people to build houses with stone fronts and window-caps and +expensive front-door trimmings, without bathing-rooms or fireplaces or +ventilators.</p> + +<p>Those who go into the country looking for summer board in farm-houses +know perfectly well that a table where the butter is always fresh, the +tea and coffee of the best kinds and well made, and the meats properly +kept, dressed, and served, is the one table of a hundred, the fabulous +enchanted island. It seems impossible to get the idea into the minds of +people that what is called common food, carefully prepared, becomes, in +virtue of that very care and attention, a delicacy, superseding the +necessity of artificially compounded dainties.</p> + +<p>To begin, then, with the very foundation of a good table,—<i>Bread:</i> What +ought it to be? It should be light, sweet, and tender.</p> + +<p>This matter of lightness is the distinctive line between savage and +civilized bread. The savage mixes simple flour and water into balls of +paste, which he throws into boiling water, and which come out solid, +glutinous masses, of which his common saying is, "Man eat dis, he no +die,"—which a facetious traveller who was obliged to subsist on it +interpreted to mean, "Dis no kill you, nothing will." In short, it +requires the stomach of a wild animal or of a savage to digest this +primitive form of bread, and of course more or less attention in all +civilized modes of bread-making is given to producing lightness. By +lightness is meant simply that the particles are to be separated from +each other by little holes or air-cells, and all the different methods +of making light bread are neither more nor less than the formation in +bread of these air-cells.</p> + +<p>So far as we know, there are four practicable methods of aërating bread, +namely—by<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_692" id="Page_692">[Pg 692]</a></span> fermentation,—by effervescence of an acid and an +alkali,—by aërated egg, or egg which has been filled with air by the +process of beating,—and lastly, by pressure of some gaseous substance +into the paste, by a process much resembling the impregnation of water +in a soda-fountain. All these have one and the same object,—to give us +the cooked particles of our flour separated by such permanent air-cells +as will enable the stomach more readily to digest them.</p> + +<p>A very common mode of aërating bread, in America, is by the +effervescence of an acid and an alkali in the flour. The carbonic acid +gas thus formed produces minute air-cells in the bread, or, as the cook +says, makes it light. When this process is performed with exact +attention to chemical laws, so that the acid and alkali completely +neutralize each other, leaving no overplus of either, the result is +often very palatable. The difficulty is, that this is a happy +conjunction of circumstances which seldom occurs. The acid most commonly +employed is that of sour milk, and, as milk has many degrees of +sourness, the rule of a certain quantity of alkali to the pint must +necessarily produce very different results at different times. As an +actual fact, where this mode of making bread prevails, as we lament to +say it does to a great extent in this country, one finds five cases of +failure to one of success. It is a woful thing that the daughters of New +England have abandoned the old respectable mode of yeast-brewing and +bread-raising for this specious substitute, so easily made, and so +seldom well made. The green, clammy, acrid substance, called biscuit, +which many of our worthy republicans are obliged to eat in these days, +is wholly unworthy of the men and women of the Republic. Good patriots +ought not to be put off in that way,—they deserve better fare.</p> + +<p>As an occasional variety, as a household convenience for obtaining bread +or biscuit at a moment's notice, the process we earnestly entreat +American housekeepers, in Scriptural language, to stand in the way and +ask for the old paths, and return to the good yeast-bread of their +sainted grandmothers.</p> + +<p>If acid and alkali must be used, by all means let them be mixed in due +proportions. No cook should be left to guess and judge for herself about +this matter. There is an article, called "Preston's Infallible +Yeast-Powder," which is made by chemical rule, and produces very perfect +results. The use of this obviates the worst dangers in making bread by +effervescence.</p> + +<p>Of all processes of aëration in bread-making, the oldest and most +time-honored is by fermentation. That this was known in the days of our +Saviour is evident from the forcible simile in which he compares the +silent permeating force of truth in human society to the very familiar +household process of raising bread by a little yeast.</p> + +<p>There is, however, one species of yeast, much used in some parts of the +country, against which I have to enter my protest. It is called +salt-risings, or milk-risings, and is made by mixing flour, milk, and a +little salt together, and leaving them to ferment. The bread thus +produced is often very attractive, when new and made with great care. It +is white and delicate, with fine, even air-cells. It has, however, when +kept, some characteristics which remind us of the terms in which our old +English Bible describes the effect of keeping the manna of the ancient +Israelites, which we are informed, in words more explicit than +agreeable, "stank, and bred worms." If salt-rising bread does not fulfil +the whole of this unpleasant description, it certainly does emphatically +a part of it. The smell which it has in baking, and when more than a day +old, suggests the inquiry, whether it is the saccharine or the putrid +fermentation with which it is raised. Whoever breaks a piece of it after +a day or two will often see minute filaments or clammy strings drawing +out from the fragments, which, with the unmistakable<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_693" id="Page_693">[Pg 693]</a></span> smell, will cause +him to pause before consummating a nearer acquaintance.</p> + +<p>The fermentation of flour by means of brewer's or distiller's yeast +produces, if rightly managed, results far more palatable and wholesome. +The only requisites for success in it are, first, good materials, and, +second, great care in a few small things. There are certain low-priced +or damaged kinds of flour which can never by any kind of domestic +chemistry be made into good bread; and to those persons whose stomachs +forbid them to eat gummy, glutinous paste, under the name of bread, +there is no economy in buying these poor brands, even at half the price +of good flour.</p> + +<p>But good flour and good yeast being supposed, with a temperature +favorable to the development of fermentation, the whole success of the +process depends on the thorough diffusion of the proper proportion of +yeast through the whole mass, and on stopping the subsequent +fermentation at the precise and fortunate point. The true housewife +makes her bread the sovereign of her kitchen,—its behests must be +attended to in all critical points and moments, no matter what else be +postponed. She who attends to her bread when she has done this, and +arranged that, and performed the other, very often finds that the forces +of Nature will not wait for her. The snowy mass, perfectly mixed, +kneaded with care and strength, rises in its beautiful perfection till +the moment comes for fixing the air-cells by baking. A few minutes now, +and the acetous fermentation will begin, and the whole result be +spoiled. Many bread-makers pass in utter carelessness over this sacred +and mysterious boundary. Their oven has cake in it, or they are skimming +jelly, or attending to some other of the so-called higher branches of +cookery, while the bread is quickly passing into the acetous stage. At +last, when they are ready to attend to it, they find that it has been +going its own way,—it is so sour that the pungent smell is plainly +perceptible. Now the saleratus-bottle is handed down, and a quantity of +the dissolved alkali mixed with the paste,—an expedient sometimes +making itself too manifest by greenish streaks or small acrid spots in +the bread. As the result, we have a beautiful article spoiled,—bread +without sweetness, if not absolutely sour.</p> + +<p>In the view of many, lightness is the only property required in this +article. The delicate, refined sweetness which exists in carefully +kneaded bread, baked just before it passes to the extreme point of +fermentation, is something of which they have no conception, and thus +they will even regard this process of spoiling the paste by the acetous +fermentation, and then rectifying that acid by effervescence with an +alkali, as something positively meritorious. How else can they value and +relish bakers' loaves, such as some are, drugged with ammonia and other +disagreeable things, light indeed, so light that they seem to have +neither weight nor substance, but with no move sweetness or taste than +so much white cotton?</p> + +<p>Some persons prepare bread for the oven by simply mixing it in the mass, +without kneading, pouring it into pans, and suffering it to rise there. +The air-cells in bread thus prepared are coarse and uneven; the bread is +as inferior in delicacy and nicety to that which is well kneaded as a +raw Irish servant to a perfectly educated and refined lady. The process +of kneading seems to impart an evenness to the minute air-cells, a +fineness of texture, and a tenderness and pliability to the whole +substance, that can be gained in no other way.</p> + +<p>The divine principle of beauty has its reign over bread as well as over +all other things; it has its laws of aesthetics; and that bread which is +so prepared that it can be formed into separate and well-proportioned +loaves, each one carefully worked and moulded, will develop the most +beautiful results. After being moulded, the loaves should stand a little +while, just long enough to allow the fermentation going on in them to +expand each little air-cell to the point at which it stood before it was +worked down, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_694" id="Page_694">[Pg 694]</a></span> then they should be immediately put into the oven.</p> + +<p>Many a good thing, however, is spoiled in the oven. We cannot but +regret, for the sake of bread, that our old steady brick ovens have been +almost universally superseded by those of ranges and cooking-stoves, +which are infinite in their caprices, and forbid all general rules. One +thing, however, may be borne in mind as a principle,—that the +excellence of bread in all its varieties, plain or sweetened, depends on +the perfection of its air-cells, whether produced by yeast, egg, or +effervescence, that one of the objects of baking is to fix these +air-cells, and that the quicker this can be done through the whole mass +the better will the result be. When cake or bread is made heavy by +baking too quickly, it is because the immediate formation of the top +crust hinders the exhaling of the moisture in the centre, and prevents +the air-cells from cooking. The weight also of the crust pressing down +on the doughy air-cells below destroys them, producing that horror of +good cooks, a heavy streak. The problem in baking, then, is the quick +application of heat rather below than above the loaf, and its steady +continuance till all the air-cells are thoroughly dried into permanent +consistency. Every housewife must watch her own oven to know how this +can be best accomplished.</p> + +<p>Bread-making can be cultivated to any extent as a fine art,—and the +various kinds of biscuit, tea-rusks, twists, rolls, into which bread may +be made, are much better worth a housekeeper's ambition than the +getting-up of rich and expensive cake or confections. There are also +varieties of material which are rich in good effects. Unbolted flour, +altogether more wholesome than the fine wheat, and when properly +prepared more palatable,—rye-flour and corn-meal, each affording a +thousand attractive possibilities,—each and all of these come under the +general laws of bread-stuffs, and are worth a careful attention.</p> + +<p>A peculiarity of our American table, particularly in the Southern and +Western States, is the constant exhibition of various preparations of +hot bread. In many families of the South and West, bread in loaves to be +eaten cold is an article quite unknown. The effect of this kind of diet +upon the health has formed a frequent subject of remark among +travellers; but only those know the full mischiefs of it who have been +compelled to sojourn for a length of time in families where it is +maintained. The unknown horrors of dyspepsia from bad bread are a topic +over which we willingly draw a veil.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>Next to Bread comes <i>Butter</i>,—on which we have to say, that, when we +remember what butter is in civilized Europe, and compare it with what it +is in America, we wonder at the forbearance and lenity of travellers in +their strictures on our national commissariat.</p> + +<p>Butter, in England, France, and Italy, is simply solidified cream, with +all the sweetness of the cream in its taste, freshly churned each day, +and unadulterated by salt. At the present moment, when salt is five +cents a pound and butter fifty, we Americans are paying, I should judge +from the taste, for about one pound of salt to every ten of butter, and +those of us who have eaten the butter of France and England do this with +rueful recollections.</p> + +<p>There is, it is true, an article of butter made in the American style +with salt, which, in its own kind and way, has a merit not inferior to +that of England and France. Many prefer it, and it certainly takes a +rank equally respectable with the other. It is yellow, hard, and worked +so perfectly free from every particle of buttermilk that it might make +the voyage of the world without spoiling. It is salted, but salted with +care and delicacy, so that it may be a question whether even a +fastidious Englishman might not prefer its golden solidity to the white, +creamy freshness of his own. Now I am not for universal imitation of +foreign customs, and where I find this butter made perfectly, I call it +our<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_695" id="Page_695">[Pg 695]</a></span> American style, and am not ashamed of it. I only regret that this +article is the exception, and not the rule, on our tables. When I +reflect on the possibilities which beset the delicate stomach in this +line, I do not wonder that my venerated friend Dr. Mussey used to close +his counsels to invalids with the direction, "And don't eat grease on +your bread."</p> + +<p>America must, I think, have the credit of manufacturing and putting into +market more bad butter than all that is made in all the rest of the +world together. The varieties of bad tastes and smells which prevail in +it are quite a study. This has a cheesy taste, that a mouldy,—this is +flavored with cabbage, and that again with turnip, and another has the +strong, sharp savor of rancid animal fat. These varieties, I presume, +come from the practice of churning only at long intervals, and keeping +the cream meanwhile in unventilated cellars or dairies, the air of which +is loaded with the effluvia of vegetable substances. No domestic +articles are so sympathetic as those of the milk tribe: they readily +take on the smell and taste of any neighboring substance, and hence the +infinite variety of flavors on which one mournfully muses who has late +in autumn to taste twenty firkins of butter in hopes of finding one +which will simply not be intolerable on his winter table.</p> + +<p>A matter for despair as regards bad butter is that at the tables where +it is used it stands sentinel at the door to bar your way to every other +kind of food. You turn from your dreadful half-slice of bread, which +fills your mouth with bitterness, to your beefsteak, which proves +virulent with the same poison; you think to take refuge in vegetable +diet, and find the butter in the string-beans, and polluting the +innocence of early peas,—it is in the corn, in the succotash, in the +squash,—the beets swim in it, the onions have it poured over them. +Hungry and miserable, you think to solace yourself at the dessert,—but +the pastry is cursed, the cake is acrid with the same plague. You are +ready to howl with despair, and your misery is great upon +you,—especially if this is a table where you have taken board for three +months with your delicate wife and four small children. Your case is +dreadful,—and it is hopeless, because long usage and habit have +rendered your host perfectly incapable of discovering what is the +matter. "Don't like the butter, Sir? I assure you I paid an extra price +for it, and it's the very best in the market. I looked over as many as a +hundred tubs, and picked out this one." You are dumb, but not less +despairing.</p> + +<p>Yet the process of making good butter is a very simple one. To keep the +cream in a perfectly pure, cool atmosphere, to churn while it is yet +sweet, to work out the buttermilk thoroughly, and to add salt with such +discretion as not to ruin the fine, delicate flavor of the fresh +cream,—all this is quite simple, so simple that one wonders at +thousands and millions of pounds of butter yearly manufactured which are +merely a hobgoblin-bewitchment of cream into foul and loathsome poisons.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>The third head of my discourse is that of <i>Meat</i>, of which America +furnishes, in the gross material, enough to spread our tables royally, +were it well cared for and served.</p> + +<p>The faults in the meat generally furnished to us are, first, that it is +too new. A beefsteak, which three or four days of keeping might render +practicable, is served up to us palpitating with freshness, with all the +toughness of animal muscle yet warm. In the Western country, the +traveller, on approaching a hotel, is often saluted by the last shrieks +of the chickens which half an hour afterward are presented to him <i>à la</i> +spread-eagle for his dinner. The example of the Father of the Faithful, +most wholesome to be followed in so many respects, is imitated only in +the celerity with which the young calf, tender and good, was transformed +into an edible dish for hospitable purposes. But<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_696" id="Page_696">[Pg 696]</a></span> what might be good +housekeeping in a nomadic Emir, in days when refrigerators were yet in +the future, ought not to be so closely imitated as it often is in our +own land.</p> + +<p>In the next place, there is a woful lack of nicety in the butcher's work +of cutting and preparing meat. Who that remembers the neatly trimmed +mutton-chop of an English inn, or the artistic little circle of +lamb-chop fried in bread-crumbs coiled around a tempting centre of +spinach which can always be found in France, can recognize any +family-resemblance to these dapper civilized preparations in those +coarse, roughly hacked strips of bone, gristle, and meat which are +commonly called mutton-chop in America? There seems to be a large dish +of something resembling meat, in which each fragment has about two or +three edible morsels, the rest being composed of dry and burnt skin, +fat, and ragged bone.</p> + +<p>Is it not time that civilization should learn to demand somewhat more +care and nicety in the modes of preparing what is to be cooked and +eaten? Might not some of the refinement and trimness which characterize +the preparations of the European market be with advantage introduced +into our own? The housekeeper who wishes to garnish her table with some +of those nice things is stopped in the outset by the butcher. Except in +our large cities, where some foreign travel may have created the demand, +it seems impossible to get much in this line that is properly prepared.</p> + +<p>I am aware, that, if this is urged on the score of aesthetics, the ready +reply will be,—"Oh, we can't give time here in America to go into +niceties and French whim-whams!" But the French mode of doing almost all +practical things is based on that true philosophy and utilitarian good +sense which characterize that seemingly thoughtless people. Nowhere is +economy a more careful study, and their market is artistically arranged +to this end. The rule is so to cut their meats that no portion designed +to be cooked in a certain manner shall have wasteful appendages which +that mode of cooking will spoil. The French soup-kettle stands ever +ready to receive the bones, the thin fibrous flaps, the sinewy and +gristly portions, which are so often included in our roasts or +broilings, which fill our plates with unsightly <i>débris</i>, and finally +make an amount of blank waste for which we pay our butcher the same +price that we pay for what we have eaten.</p> + +<p>The dead waste of our clumsy, coarse way of cutting meats is immense. +For example, at the beginning of the present season, the part of a lamb +denominated leg and loin, or hind-quarter, sold for thirty cents a +pound. Now this includes, besides the thick, fleshy portions, a quantity +of bone, sinew, and thin fibrous substance, constituting full one-third +of the whole weight. If we put it into the oven entire, in the usual +manner, we have the thin parts overdone, and the skinny and fibrous +parts utterly dried up, by the application of the amount of heat +necessary to cook the thick portion. Supposing the joint to weigh six +pounds, at thirty cents, and that one-third of the weight is so treated +as to become perfectly useless, we throw away sixty cents. Of a piece of +beef at twenty-five cents a pound, fifty cents' worth is often lost in +bone, fat, and burnt skin.</p> + +<p>The fact is, this way of selling and cooking meat in large, gross +portions is of English origin, and belongs to a country where all the +customs of society spring from a class who have no particular occasion +for economy. The practice of minute and delicate division comes from a +nation which acknowledges the need of economy, and has made it a study. +A quarter of lamb in this mode of division would be sold in three nicely +prepared portions. The thick part would be sold by itself, for a neat, +compact little roast; the rib-bones would be artistically separated, and +all the edible matters scraped away would form those delicate dishes of +lamb-chop, which, fried in bread-crumbs to a golden brown,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_697" id="Page_697">[Pg 697]</a></span> are so +ornamental and so palatable a side-dish; the trimmings which remain +after this division would be destined to the soup-kettle or stew-pan. In +a French market is a little portion for every purse, and the far-famed +and delicately flavored soups and stews which have arisen out of French +economy are a study worth a housekeeper's attention. Not one atom of +food is wasted in the French modes of preparation; even tough animal +cartilages and sinews, instead of appearing burned and blackened in +company with the roast meat to which they happen to be related, are +treated according to their own laws, and come out either in savory +soups, or those fine, clear meat-jellies which form a garnish no less +agreeable to the eye than palatable to the taste.</p> + +<p>Whether this careful, economical, practical style of meat-cooking can +ever to any great extent be introduced into our kitchens now is a +question. Our butchers are against it; our servants are wedded to the +old wholesale wasteful ways, which seem to them easier because they are +accustomed to them. A cook who will keep and properly tend a soup-kettle +which shall receive and utilize all that the coarse preparations of the +butcher would require her to trim away, who understands the art of +making the most of all these remains, is a treasure scarcely to be hoped +for. If such things are to be done, it must be primarily through the +educated brain of cultivated women who do not scorn to turn their +culture and refinement upon domestic problems.</p> + +<p>When meats have been properly divided, so that each portion can receive +its own appropriate style of treatment, next comes the consideration of +the modes of cooking. These may be divided into two great general +classes: those where it is desired to keep the juices within the meat, +as in baking, broiling, and frying,—and those whose object is to +extract the juice and dissolve the fibre, as in the making of soups and +stews. In the first class of operations, the process must be as rapid as +may consist with the thorough cooking of all the particles. In this +branch of cookery, doing quickly is doing well. The fire must be brisk, +the attention, alert. The introduction of cooking-stoves offers to +careless domestics facilities for gradually drying-up meats, and +despoiling them of all flavor and nutriment,—facilities which appear to +be very generally laid hold of. They have almost banished the genuine, +old-fashioned roast-meat from our tables, and left in its stead dried +meats with their most precious and nutritive juices evaporated. How few +cooks, unassisted, are competent to the simple process of broiling a +beefsteak or mutton-chop! how very generally one has to choose between +these meats gradually dried away, or burned on the outside and raw +within! Yet in England these articles <i>never</i> come on table done amiss; +their perfect cooking is as absolute a certainty as the rising of the +sun.</p> + +<p>No one of these rapid processes of cooking, however, is so generally +abused as frying. The frying-pan has awful sins to answer for. What +untold horrors of dyspepsia have arisen from its smoky depths, like the +ghosts from witches' caldrons! The fizzle of frying meat is as a warning +knell on many an ear, saying, "Touch not, taste not, if you would not +burn and writhe!"</p> + +<p>Yet those who have travelled abroad remember that some of the lightest, +most palatable, and most digestible preparations of meat have come from +this dangerous source. But we fancy quite other rites and ceremonies +inaugurated the process, and quite other hands performed its offices, +than those known to our kitchens. Probably the delicate <i>côtelletes</i> of +France are not flopped down into half-melted grease, there gradually to +warm and soak and fizzle, while Biddy goes in and out on her other +ministrations, till finally, when thoroughly saturated, and dinner-hour +impends, she bethinks herself, and crowds the fire below to a roaring +heat, and finishes the process by a smart burn, involving the kitchen +and surrounding precincts in volumes of Stygian gloom.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_698" id="Page_698">[Pg 698]</a></span></p> + +<p>From such preparations has arisen the very current medical opinion that +fried meats are indigestible. They are indigestible, if they are greasy; +but French cooks have taught us that a thing has no more need to be +greasy because emerging from grease than Venus had to be salt because +she rose from the sea.</p> + +<p>There are two ways of frying employed by the French cook. One is, to +immerse the article to be cooked in <i>boiling</i> fat, with an emphasis on +the present participle,—and the philosophical principle is, so +immediately to crisp every pore, at the first moment or two of +immersion, as effectually to seal the interior against the intrusion of +greasy particles; it can then remain as long as may be necessary +thoroughly to cook it, without imbibing any more of the boiling fluid +than if it were inclosed in an eggshell. The other method is to rub a +perfectly smooth iron surface with just enough of some oily substance to +prevent the meat from adhering, and cook it with a quick heat, as cakes +are baked on a griddle. In both these cases there must be the most rapid +application of heat that can be made without burning, and by the +adroitness shown in working out this problem the skill of the cook is +tested. Any one whose cook attains this important secret will find fried +things quite as digestible and often more palatable than any other.</p> + +<p>In the second department of meat-cookery, to wit, the slow and gradual +application of heat for the softening and dissolution of its fibre and +the extraction of its juices, common cooks are equally untrained. Where +is the so-called cook who understands how to prepare soups and stews? +These are precisely the articles in which a French kitchen excels. The +soup-kettle, made with a double bottom, to prevent burning, is a +permanent, ever-present institution, and the coarsest and most +impracticable meats distilled through that alembic come out again in +soups, jellies, or savory stews. The toughest cartilage, even the bones, +being first cracked, are here made to give forth their hidden virtues, +and to rise in delicate and appetizing forms. One great law governs all +these preparations: the application of heat must be gradual, steady, +long protracted, never reaching the point of active boiling. Hours of +quiet simmering dissolve all dissoluble parts, soften the sternest +fibre, and unlock every minute cell in which Nature has stored away her +treasures of nourishment. This careful and protracted application of +heat and the skilful use of flavors constitute the two main points in +all those nice preparations of meat for which the French have so many +names,—processes by which a delicacy can be imparted to the coarsest +and cheapest food superior to that of the finest articles under less +philosophic treatment.</p> + +<p>French soups and stews are a study,—and they would not be an +unprofitable one to any person who wishes to live with comfort and even +elegance on small means.</p> + +<p>John Bull looks down from the sublime of ten thousand a year on French +kickshaws, as he calls them:—"Give me my meat cooked so I may know what +it is!" An ox roasted whole is dear to John's soul, and his +kitchen-arrangements are Titanic. What magnificent rounds and sirloins +of beef, revolving on self-regulating spits, with a rich click of +satisfaction, before grates piled with roaring fires! Let us do justice +to the royal cheer. Nowhere are the charms of pure, unadulterated animal +food set forth in more imposing style. For John is rich, and what does +he care for odds and ends and parings? Has he not all the beasts of the +forest, and the cattle on a thousand hills? What does he want of +economy? But his brother Jean has not ten thousand pounds a +year,—nothing like it; but he makes up for the slenderness of his purse +by boundless fertility of invention and delicacy of practice. John began +sneering at Jean's soups and ragouts, but all John's modern sons and +daughters send to Jean for their cooks, and the sirloins of England rise +up and do obeisance to this Joseph<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_699" id="Page_699">[Pg 699]</a></span> with a white apron who comes to rule +in their kitchens.</p> + +<p>There is no animal fibre that will not yield itself up to +long-continued, steady heat. But the difficulty with almost any of the +common servants who call themselves cooks is that they have not the +smallest notion of the philosophy of the application of heat. Such a one +will complacently tell you concerning certain meats, that the harder you +boil them the harder they grow,—an obvious fact, which, under her mode +of treatment, by an indiscriminate galloping boil, has frequently come +under her personal observation. If you tell her that such meat must +stand for six hours in a heat just below the boiling-point, she will +probably answer, "Yes, Ma'am," and go on her own way. Or she will let it +stand till it burns to the bottom of the kettle,—a most common +termination of the experiment. The only way to make sure of the matter +is either to import a French kettle, or to fit into an ordinary kettle a +false bottom, such as any tinman may make, that shall leave a space of +an inch or two between the meat and the fire. This kettle may be +maintained as a constant <i>habitué</i> of the range, and into it the cook +may be instructed to throw all the fibrous trimmings of meat, all the +gristle, tendons, and bones, having previously broken up these last with +a mallet.</p> + +<p>Such a kettle will furnish the basis for clear, rich soups or other +palatable dishes. Clear soup consists of the dissolved juices of the +meat and gelatine of the bones, cleared from the fat and fibrous +portions by straining when cold. The grease, which rises to the top of +the fluid, may thus be easily removed. In a stew, on the contrary, you +boil down this soup till it permeates the fibre which long exposure to +heat has softened. All that remains, after the proper preparation of the +fibre and juices, is the flavoring, and it is in this, particularly, +that French soups excel those of America and England and all the world.</p> + +<p>English and American soups are often heavy and hot with spices. There +are appreciable tastes in them. They burn your mouth with cayenne or +clove or allspice. You can tell at once what is in them, oftentimes to +your sorrow. But a French soup has a flavor which one recognizes at once +as delicious, yet not to be characterized as due to any single +condiment; it is the just blending of many things. The same remark +applies to all their stews, ragouts, and other delicate preparations. No +cook will ever study these flavors; but perhaps many cooks' mistresses +may, and thus be able to impart delicacy and comfort to economy.</p> + +<p>As to those things called hashes, commonly manufactured by unwatched, +untaught cooks, out of the remains of yesterday's repast, let us not +dwell too closely on their memory,—compounds of meat, gristle, skin, +fat, and burnt fibre, with a handful of pepper and salt flung at them, +dredged with lumpy flour, watered from the spout of the tea-kettle, and +left to simmer at the cook's convenience while she is otherwise +occupied. Such are the best performances a housekeeper can hope for from +an untrained cook.</p> + +<p>But the cunningly devised minces, the artful preparations choicely +flavored, which may be made of yesterday's repast,—by these is the true +domestic artist known. No cook untaught by an educated brain ever makes +these, and yet economy is a great gainer by them.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>As regards the department of <i>Vegetables</i>, their number and variety in +America are so great that a table might almost be furnished by these +alone. Generally speaking, their cooking is a more simple art, and +therefore more likely to be found satisfactorily performed, than that of +meats. If only they are not drenched with rancid butter, their own +native excellence makes itself known in most of the ordinary modes of +preparation.</p> + +<p>There is, however, one exception.</p> + +<p>Our stanch old friend, the potato, is to other vegetables what bread is +on the table. Like bread, it is held as a sort of <i>sine-qua-non</i>; like +that, it may be made<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_700" id="Page_700">[Pg 700]</a></span> invariably palatable by a little care in a few +plain particulars, through neglect of which it often becomes +intolerable. The soggy, waxy, indigestible viand that often appears in +the potato-dish is a downright sacrifice of the better nature of this +vegetable.</p> + +<p>The potato, nutritive and harmless as it appears, belongs to a family +suspected of very dangerous traits. It is a family-connection of the +deadly-nightshade and other ill-reputed gentry, and sometimes shows +strange proclivities to evil,—now breaking out uproariously, as in the +noted potato-rot, and now more covertly in various evil affections. For +this reason scientific directors bid us beware of the water in which +potatoes are boiled,—into which, it appears, the evil principle is +drawn off; and they caution us not to shred them into stews without +previously suffering the slices to lie for an hour or so in salt and +water. These cautions are worth attention.</p> + +<p>The most usual modes of preparing the potato for the table are by +roasting or boiling. These processes are so simple that it is commonly +supposed every cook understands them without special directions; and yet +there is scarcely an uninstructed cook who can boil or roast a potato.</p> + +<p>A good roasted potato is a delicacy worth a dozen compositions of the +cook-book; yet when we ask for it, what burnt, shrivelled abortions are +presented to us! Biddy rushes to her potato-basket and pours out two +dozen of different sizes, some having in them three times the amount of +matter of others. These being washed, she tumbles them into her oven at +a leisure interval, and there lets them lie till it is time to serve +breakfast, whenever that may be. As a result, if the largest are cooked, +the smallest are presented in cinders, and the intermediate sizes are +withered and watery. Nothing is so utterly ruined by a few moments of +overdoing. That which at the right moment was plump with mealy richness, +a quarter of an hour later shrivels and becomes watery,—and it is in +this state that roast potatoes are most frequently served.</p> + +<p>In the same manner we have seen boiled potatoes from an untaught cook +coming upon the table like lumps of yellow wax,—and the same article, +the day after, under the directions of a skilful mistress, appearing in +snowy balls of powdery lightness. In the one case, they were thrown in +their skins into water, and suffered to soak or boil, as the case might +be, at the cook's leisure, and after they were boiled to stand in the +water till she was ready to peel them. In the other case, the potatoes +being first peeled were boiled as quickly as possible in salted water, +which the moment they were done was drained off, and then they were +gently shaken for a minute or two over the fire to dry them still more +thoroughly. We have never yet seen the potato so depraved and given over +to evil that could not be reclaimed by this mode of treatment.</p> + +<p>As to fried potatoes, who that remembers the crisp, golden slices of the +French restaurant, thin as wafers and light as snow-flakes, does not +speak respectfully of them? What cousinship with these have those +coarse, greasy masses of sliced potato, wholly soggy and partly burnt, +to which we are treated under the name of fried potatoes <i>à la</i> America? +In our cities the restaurants are introducing the French article to +great acceptance, and to the vindication of the fair fame of this queen +of vegetables.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>Finally, I arrive at the last great head of my subject, to wit, +<span class="smcap">Tea</span>,—meaning thereby, as before observed, what our Hibernian friend did +in the inquiry, "Will y'r Honor take 'tay tay' or coffee tay?"</p> + +<p>I am not about to enter into the merits of the great tea-and-coffee +controversy, or say whether these substances are or are not wholesome. I +treat of them as actual existences, and speak only of the modes of +making the most of them.</p> + +<p>The French coffee is reputed the best<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_701" id="Page_701">[Pg 701]</a></span> in the world; and a thousand +voices have asked, What is it about the French coffee?</p> + +<p>In the first place, then, the French coffee is coffee, and not chiccory, +or rye, or beans, or peas. In the second place, it is freshly roasted, +whenever made,—roasted with great care and evenness in a little +revolving cylinder which makes part of the furniture of every kitchen, +and which keeps in the aroma of the berry. It is never overdone, so as +to destroy the coffee-flavor, which is in nine cases out of ten the +fault of the coffee we meet with. Then it is ground, and placed in a +coffee-pot with a filter, through which it percolates in clear drops, +the coffee-pot standing on a heated stove to maintain the temperature. +The nose of the coffee-pot is stopped up to prevent the escape of the +aroma during this process. The extract thus obtained is a perfectly +clear, dark fluid, known as <i>café noir</i>, or black coffee. It is black +only because of its strength, being in fact almost the very essential +oil of coffee. A table-spoonful of this in boiled milk would make what +is ordinarily called a strong cup of coffee. The boiled milk is prepared +with no less care. It must be fresh and new, not merely warmed or even +brought to the boiling-point, but slowly simmered till it attains a +thick, creamy richness. The coffee mixed with this, and sweetened with +that sparkling beet-root sugar which ornaments a French table, is the +celebrated <i>café-au-lait</i>, the name of which has gone round the world.</p> + +<p>As we look to France for the best coffee, so we must look to England for +the perfection of tea. The tea-kettle is as much an English institution +as aristocracy or the Prayer-Book; and when one wants to know exactly +how tea should be made, one has only to ask how a fine old English +housekeeper makes it.</p> + +<p>The first article of her faith is that the water must not merely be hot, +not merely <i>have boiled</i> a few moments since, but be actually <i>boiling</i> +at the moment it touches the tea. Hence, though servants in England are +vastly better trained than with us, this delicate mystery is seldom left +to their hands. Tea-making belongs to the drawing-room, and high-born +ladies preside at "the bubbling and loud-hissing urn," and see that all +due rites and solemnities are properly performed,—that the cups are +hot, and that the infused tea waits the exact time before the libations +commence. Oh, ye dear old English tea-tables, resorts of the +kindest-hearted hospitality in the world! we still cherish your memory, +even though you do not say pleasant things of us there. One of these +days you will think better of us. Of late, the introduction of English +breakfast-tea has raised a new sect among the tea-drinkers, reversing +some of the old canons. Breakfast-tea must be boiled! Unlike the +delicate article of olden time, which required only a momentary infusion +to develop its richness, this requires a longer and severer treatment to +bring out its strength,—thus confusing all the established usages, and +throwing the work into the hands of the cook in the kitchen.</p> + +<p>The faults of tea, as too commonly found at our hotels and +boarding-houses, are that it is made in every way the reverse of what it +should be. The water is hot, perhaps, but not boiling; the tea has a +general flat, stale, smoky taste, devoid of life or spirit; and it is +served, usually, with thin milk, instead of cream. Cream is as essential +to the richness of tea as of coffee. We could wish that the English +fashion might generally prevail, of giving the traveller his own kettle +of boiling water and his own tea-chest, and letting him make tea for +himself. At all events, he would then be sure of one merit in his +tea,—it would be hot, a very simple and obvious virtue, but one very +seldom obtained.</p> + +<p>Chocolate is a French and Spanish article, and one seldom served on +American tables. We, in America, however, make an article every way +equal to any which can be imported from Paris, and he who buys Baker's +best vanilla-chocolate may rest assured that no foreign<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_702" id="Page_702">[Pg 702]</a></span> land can +furnish anything better. A very rich and delicious beverage may be made +by dissolving this in milk slowly boiled down after the French fashion.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>I have now gone over all the ground I laid out, as comprising the great +first principles of cookery; and I would here modestly offer the opinion +that a table where all these principles are carefully observed would +need few dainties. The struggle after so-called delicacies comes from +the poorness of common things. Perfect bread and butter would soon drive +cake out of the field: it has done so in many families. Nevertheless, I +have a word to say under the head of <i>Confectionery</i>, meaning by this +the whole range of ornamental cookery,—or pastry, ices, jellies, +preserves, etc. The art of making all these very perfectly is far better +understood in America than the art of common cooking.</p> + +<p>There are more women who know how to make good cake than good +bread,—more who can furnish you with a good ice-cream than a +well-cooked mutton-chop; a fair charlotte-russe is easier to come by +than a perfect cup of coffee, and you shall find a sparkling jelly to +your dessert where you sighed in vain for so simple a luxury as a +well-cooked potato.</p> + +<p>Our fair countrywomen might rest upon their laurels in these higher +fields, and turn their great energy and ingenuity to the study of +essentials. To do common things perfectly is far better worth our +endeavor than to do uncommon things respectably. We Americans in many +things as yet have been a little inclined to begin making our shirt at +the ruffle; but, nevertheless, when we set about it, we can make the +shirt as nicely as anybody,—it needs only that we turn our attention to +it, resolved, that, ruffle or no ruffle, the shirt we will have.</p> + +<p>I have also a few words to say as to the prevalent ideas in respect to +French cookery. Having heard much of it, with no very distinct idea what +it is, our people have somehow fallen into the notion that its forte +lies in high spicing,—and so, when our cooks put a great abundance of +clove, mace, nutmeg, and cinnamon into their preparations, they fancy +that they are growing up to be French cooks. But the fact is, that the +Americans and English are far more given to spicing than the French. +Spices in our made dishes are abundant, and their taste is strongly +pronounced. In living a year in France I forgot the taste of nutmeg, +clove, and allspice, which had met me in so many dishes in America.</p> + +<p>The thing may be briefly defined. The English and Americans deal in +<i>spices</i>, the French in <i>flavors</i>,—flavors many and subtile, imitating +often in their delicacy those subtile blendings which Nature produces in +high-flavored fruits. The recipes of our cookery-books are most of them +of English origin, coming down from the times of our phlegmatic +ancestors, when the solid, burly, beefy growth of the foggy island +required the heat of fiery condiments, and could digest heavy sweets. +Witness the national recipe for plum-pudding, which may be +rendered,—Take a pound of every indigestible substance you can think +of, boil into a cannonball, and serve in flaming brandy. So of the +Christmas mince-pie and many other national dishes. But in America, +owing to our brighter skies and more fervid climate, we have developed +an acute, nervous delicacy of temperament far more akin to that of +France than of England.</p> + +<p>Half of the recipes in our cook-books are mere murder to such +constitutions and stomachs as we grow here. We require to ponder these +things, and think how we in our climate and under our circumstances +ought to live, and in doing so, we may, without accusation of foreign +foppery, take some leaves from many foreign books.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>But Christopher has prosed long enough. I must now read this to my wife, +and see what she says.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_703" id="Page_703">[Pg 703]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="ON_THE_COLUMBIA_RIVER" id="ON_THE_COLUMBIA_RIVER"></a>ON THE COLUMBIA RIVER.</h2> + + +<p>I have never known, nor seen any person who did know, why Portland, the +metropolis of Oregon, was founded on the Willamette River. I am unaware +why the accent is on the penult, and not on the ultimate of Willamette. +These thoughts perplexed me more than a well man would have suffered +them, all the way from the Callapooya Mountains to Portland. I had been +laid up in the backwoods of Oregon, in a district known as the Long-Tom +Country,—(and certainly a longer or more tedious Tom never existed +since the days of him additionally hight Aquinas,)—by a violent attack +of pneumonia, which came near terminating my earthly with my Oregon +pilgrimage. I had been saved by the indefatigable nursing of the best +friend I ever travelled with,—by wet compresses, and the impossibility +of sending for any doctor in the region. I had lived to pay +San-Francisco hotel-prices for squatter-cabin accommodations in the +rural residence of an Oregon landholder, whose tender mercies I fell +into from my saddle when the disease had reached its height, and who +explained his unusual charges on the ground that his wife had felt for +me like a mother. In the Long-Tom Country maternal tenderness is a +highly estimated virtue. It cost Bierstadt and myself sixty dollars, +besides the reasonable charge for five days' board and attendance to a +man who ate nothing and was not waited on, with the same amount against +his well companion. We had suffered enough extortion before that to +exhaust all our native grumblery. So we paid the bill, and entered on +our notebooks the following</p> + +<p><i>Mem.</i> "In stopping with anybody in the Long-Tom Country, make a special +contract for maternal tenderness, as it will invariably be included in +the bill."</p> + +<p>I had ridden on a straw-bed in the wagon of the man whose wife +cultivated the maternal virtues, until I was once more able to go along +by myself,—paying, you may be sure, maternal-virtue fare for my +carriage. During the period that I jolted on the straw, I diversified +the intervals between pulmonary spasms with a sick glance at the pages +of Bulwer's "Devereux" and Lever's "Day's Ride." The nature of these +works did not fail to attract the attention of my driver. It aroused in +him serious concern for my spiritual welfare. He addressed me with +gentle firmness,—</p> + +<p>"D' ye think it's exackly the way for an immortal creatur' to be +spendin' his time, to read them <i>novels</i>?"</p> + +<p>"Why is it particularly out of the way for an immortal creature?"</p> + +<p>"Because his higher interests don't give him no time for sich follies."</p> + +<p>"How can an immortal creature be pressed for time?"</p> + +<p>"Wal, you'll find out some day. G' lang, Jennie."</p> + +<p>I thought I had left this excellent man in a metaphysical bog. But he +had not discharged his duty, so he scrambled out and took new ground.</p> + +<p>"Now say,—d' <i>you</i> think it's exackly a Christian way of spendin' time, +yourself?"</p> + +<p>"I know a worse way."</p> + +<p>"Eh? What's that?"</p> + +<p>"In the house of a Long-Tom settler who charges five dollars a day extra +because his wife feels like a mother."</p> + +<p>He did not continue the conversation. I myself did not close it in +anger, but solely to avoid an extra charge, which in the light of +experience seemed imminent, for concern about my spiritual welfare. On +the maternal-tenderness scale of prices, an indulgence in this luxury +would have cleaned out Bierstadt and myself before we effected junction +with our drawers of exchange, and I was discourteous as a matter of +economy.</p> + +<p>We had enjoyed, from the summit of a hill twenty miles south of Salem, +one of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_704" id="Page_704">[Pg 704]</a></span> the most magnificent views in all earthly scenery. Within a +single sweep of vision were seven snow-peaks, the Three Sisters, Mount +Jefferson, Mount Hood, Mount Adams, and Mount St. Helen's, with the dim +suggestion of an eighth colossal mass, which might be Rainier. All these +rose along an arc of not quite half the horizon, measured between ten +and eighteen thousand feet in height, were nearly conical, and +absolutely covered with snow from base to pinnacle. The Three Sisters, a +triplet of sharp, close-set needles, and the grand masses of Hood and +Jefferson, showed mountainesque and earthly; it was at least possible to +imagine them of us and anchored to the ground we trod on. Not so with +the others. They were beautiful, yet awful ghosts,—spirits of dead +mountains buried in old-world cataclysms, returning to make on the +brilliant azure of noonday blots of still more brilliant white. I cannot +express their vague, yet vast and intense splendor, by any other word +than incandescence. It was as if the sky had suddenly grown white-hot in +patches. When we first looked, we thought St. Helen's an illusion,—an +aurora, or a purer kind of cloud. Presently we detected the luminous +chromatic border,—a band of refracted light with a predominant +orange-tint, which outlines the higher snow-peaks seen at long +range,—traced it down, and grasped the entire conception of the mighty +cone. No man of enthusiasm, who reflects what this whole sight must have +been, will wonder that my friend and I clasped each other's hands before +it, and thanked God we had lived to this day.</p> + +<p>We had followed down the beautiful valley of the Willamette to Portland, +finding everywhere glimpses of autumnal scenery as delicious as the +hills and meadows of the Housatonic. Putting up in Portland at the +Dennison House, we found the comforts of civilization for the first time +since leaving Sisson's, and a great many kind friends warmly interested +in furthering our enterprise. I have said that I do not know why +Portland was built on the Willamette. The point of the promontory +between the Willamette and the Columbia seems the proper place for the +chief commercial city of the State; and Portland is a dozen miles south +of this, up the tributary stream. But Portland does very well as it +is,—growing rapidly in business-importance, and destined, when the +proper railway-communications are established, to be a sort of Glasgow +to the London of San Francisco. When we were there, there was crying +need of a telegraph to the latter place. That need has now been +supplied, and the construction of the no less desirable railroad must +follow speedily. The country between Shasta Peak and Salem is at present +virtually without an outlet to market. No richer fruit and grain region +exists on the Pacific slope of the continent. No one who has not +travelled through it can imagine the exhaustless fertility which will be +stimulated and the results which will be brought forth, when a +continuous line of railroad unites Sacramento or even Tehama with the +metropolis of Oregon.</p> + +<p>Among the friends who welcomed us to Portland were Messrs. Ainsworth and +Thompson, of the Oregon Steamship Company. By their courtesy we were +afforded a trip up the Columbia River, in the pleasantest quarters and +under the most favorable circumstances.</p> + +<p>We left Portland the evening before their steamer sailed, taking a boat +belonging to a different line, that we might pass a night at Fort +Vancouver, and board the Company's boat when it touched at that place +the next morning. We recognized our return from rudimentary society to +civilized surroundings and a cultivated interest in art and literature, +when the captain of the little steamer Vancouver refused to let either +of us buy a ticket, because he had seen Bierstadt on the upper deck at +work with his sketch-book, and me by his side engaged with my journal.</p> + +<p>The banks of the Willamette below Portland are low and cut up by small<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_705" id="Page_705">[Pg 705]</a></span> +tributaries or communicating lagoons which divide them into islands. The +largest of these, measuring its longest border, has an extent of twenty +miles, and is called Sauveur's. Another, called "Nigger Tom's," was +famous as the seigniory of a blind African nobleman so named, living in +great affluence of salmon and whiskey with three or four devoted Indian +wives, who had with equal fervor embraced the doctrine of Mormonism and +the profession of day's-washing to keep their liege in luxury due his +rank. The land along the shore of the river was usually well timbered, +and in the level openings looked as fertile as might be expected of an +alluvial first-bottom frequently overflowed. At its junction with the +Columbia the Willamette is about three-quarters of a mile in width, and +the Columbia may be half a mile wider, though at first sight the +difference seems more than that from the tributary's entering the main +river at an acute angle and giving a diagonal view to the opposite +shore. Before we passed into the Columbia, we had from the upper deck a +magnificent glimpse to the eastward of Hood's spotless snow-cone rosied +with the reflection of the dying sunset. Short and hurried as it was, +this view of Mount Hood was unsurpassed for beauty by any which we got +in its closer vicinity and afterward, though nearness added rugged +grandeur to the sight.</p> + +<p>Six miles' sail between low and uninteresting shores brought us from the +mouth of the Willamette to Fort Vancouver, on the Washington-Territory +side of the river. Here we debarked for the night, making our way, in an +ambulance sent for us from the post, a distance of two minutes' ride, to +the quarters of General Alvord, the commandant. Under his hospitable +roof we experienced, for the first time in several months and many +hundred miles, the delicious sensation of a family-dinner, with a +refined lady at the head of the table and well-bred children about the +sides. A very interesting guest of General Alvord's was Major Lugenbeel, +who had spent his life in the topographical service of the United +States, and combined the culture of a student with an amount of +information concerning the wildest portions of our continent which I +have never seen surpassed nor heard communicated in style more +fascinating. He had lately come from the John-Day, Boisé, and +Snake-River Mines, where the Government was surveying routes of +emigration, and pronounced the wealth of the region exhaustless.</p> + +<p>After a pleasant evening and a good night's rest, we took the Oregon +Company's steamer, Wilson G. Hunt, and proceeded up the river, leaving +Fort Vancouver about seven <span class="smcap">A.M.</span> To our surprise, the Hunt proved an old +acquaintance. She will be remembered by most people who during the last +twelve years have been familiar with the steamers hailing from New York +Bay. Though originally built for river-service such as now employs her, +she came around from the Hudson to the Columbia by way of Cape Horn. By +lessening her top-hamper and getting new stanchions for her perilous +voyage, she performed it without accident.</p> + +<p>Such a vivid souvenir of the Hudson reminded me of an assertion I had +often heard, that the Columbia resembles it. There is some ground for +the comparison. Each of the rivers breaks through a noble +mountain-system in its passage to the sea, and the walls of its avenue +are correspondingly grand. In point of variety the banks of the Hudson +far surpass those of the Columbia,—trap, sandstone, granite, limestone, +and slate succeeding each other with a rapidity which presents ever new +outlines to the eye of the tourist. The scenery of the Columbia, between +Fort Vancouver and the Dalles, is a sublime monotone. Its banks are +basaltic crags or mist-wrapt domes, averaging below the cataract from +twelve to fifteen hundred feet in height, and thence decreasing to the +Dalles, where the escarpments, washed by the river, are low trap bluffs +on a level with the steamer's walking-beam, and the mountains have +retired, bare and brown, like those of the great continental basin<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_706" id="Page_706">[Pg 706]</a></span> +farther south, toward Mount Hood in that direction, and Mount Adams on +the north. If the Palisades were quintupled in height, domed instead of +level on their upper surfaces, extended up the whole navigable course of +the Hudson, and were thickly clad with evergreens wherever they were not +absolutely precipitous, the Hudson would much more closely resemble the +Columbia.</p> + +<p>I was reminded of another Eastern river, which I had never heard +mentioned, in the same company. As we ascended toward the cataract, the +Columbia water assumed a green tint as deep and positive as that of the +Niagara between the Falls and Lake Ontario. Save that its surface was +not so perturbed with eddies and marbled with foam, it resembled the +Niagara perfectly.</p> + +<p>We boarded the Hunt in a dense fog, and went immediately to breakfast. +With our last cup of coffee the fog cleared away and showed us a sunny +vista up the river, bordered by the columnar and mural trap formations +above mentioned, with an occasional bold promontory jutting out beyond +the general face of the precipice, its shaggy fell of pines and firs all +aflood with sunshine to the very crown. The finest of these promontories +was called Cape Horn, the river bending around it to the northeast. The +channel kept mid-stream with considerable uniformity,—but now and then, +as in the highland region of the Hudson, made a <i>détour</i> to avoid some +bare, rocky island. Several of these islands were quite columnar,—being +evidently the emerged capitals of basaltic prisms, like the other +uplifts on the banks. A fine instance of this formation was the stately +and perpendicular "Rooster Rock" on the Oregon side, but not far from +Cape Horn. Still another was called "Lone Rock," and rose from the +middle of the river. These came upon our view within the first hour +after breakfast, in company with a slender, but graceful stream, which +fell into the river over a sheer wall of basalt seven hundred feet in +height. This little cascade reminded us of Po-ho-nó, or The Bridal Veil, +near the lower entrance of the Great Yo-Semite.</p> + +<p>As the steamer rounded a point into each new stretch of silent, green, +and sunny river, we sent a flock of geese or ducks hurrying cloudward or +shoreward. Here, too, for the first time in a state of absolute Nature, +I saw that royal bird, the swan, escorting his mate and cygnets on an +airing or a luncheon-tour. It was a beautiful sight, though I must +confess that his Majesty and all the royal family are improved by +civilization. One of the great benefits of civilization is, that it +restricts its subjects to doing what they can do best. Park-swans seldom +fly,—and flying is something that swans should never attempt, unless +they wish to be taken for geese. I felt actually <i>désillusionné</i>, when a +princely <i>cortége</i>, which had been rippling their snowy necks in the +sunshine, clumsily lifted themselves out of the water and slanted into +the clouds, stretching those necks straight as a gun-barrel. Every line +of grace seemed wire-drawn out of them in a moment. Song is as little +their forte as flight,—barring the poetic license open to moribund +members of their family,—and I must confess, that, if this privilege +indicate approaching dissolution, the most intimate friends of the +specimens we heard have no cause for apprehension. An Adirondack loon +fortifying his utterance by a cracked fish-horn is the nearest approach +to a healthy swan-song. On the whole, the wild swan cannot afford to +"pause in his cloud" for all the encomiums of Mr. Tennyson, and had +better come down immediately to the dreamy water-level where he floats +dream within dream, like a stable vapor in a tangible sky. Anywhere else +he seems a court-beauty wandering into metaphysics.</p> + +<p>Alternating with these swimmers came occasional flocks of shag, a bird +belonging to the cormorant tribe, and here and there a gull, though +these last grew rarer as we increased our distance from the sea. I was +surprised to notice a fine seal playing in the channel, twenty miles<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_707" id="Page_707">[Pg 707]</a></span> +above Fort Vancouver, but learned that it was not unusual for these +animals to ascend nearly to the cataract. Both the whites and Indians +scattered along the river-banks kill them for their skin and +blubber,—going out in boats for the purpose. My informant's boat had on +one occasion taken an old seal nursing her calf. When the dam was towed +to shore, the young one followed her, occasionally putting its +fore-flippers on the gunwale to rest, like a Newfoundland dog, and +behaving with such innocent familiarity that malice was disarmed. It +came ashore with the boat's-crew and the body of its parent; no one had +the heart to drive it away; so it stayed and was a pet of the camp from +that time forward. After a while the party moved its position a distance +of several miles while Jack was away in the river on a +fishing-excursion, but there was no eluding him. The morning after the +shift he came wagging into camp, a faithful and much-overjoyed, but +exceedingly battered and used-up seal. He had evidently sought his +friends by rock and flood the entire night preceding.</p> + +<p>Occasionally the lonely river-stretches caught a sudden human interest +in some gracefully modelled canoe gliding out with a crew of Chinook +Indians from the shadow of a giant promontory, propelled by a square +sail learned of the whites. Knowing the natural, ingrained laziness of +Indians, one can imagine the delight with which they comprehended that +substitute for the paddle. After all, this may perhaps be an ill-natured +thing to say. Who does like to drudge when he can help it? Is not this +very Wilson G. Hunt a triumph of human laziness, vindicating its claim +to be the lord of matter by an ingenuity doing labor's utmost without +sweat? After all, nobody but a fool drudges for other reason than that +he may presently stop drudging.</p> + +<p>At short intervals along the narrow strip of shore under the more +gradual steeps, on the lower ledges of the basaltic precipices, and on +little rock-islands in the river, appeared rude-looking stacks and +scaffoldings where the Indians had packed their salmon. They left it in +the open air without guard, as fearless of robbers as if the fish did +not constitute their almost entire subsistence for the winter. And +within their own tribes they have justification for this fearlessness. +Their standard of honor is in most respects curiously adjustable,—but +here virtue is defended by the necessities of life.</p> + +<p>In the immediate vicinity of the cured article (I say "cured," though +the process is a mere drying without smoke or salt) maybe seen the +apparatus contrived for getting it in the fresh state. This is the +scaffolding from which the salmon are caught. It is a horizontal +platform shaped like a capital A, erected upon a similarly framed, but +perpendicular set of braces, with a projection of several feet over the +river-brink at a place where the water runs rapidly close in-shore. If +practicable, the constructor modifies his current artificially, banking +it inward with large stones, so as to form a sort of sluice in which +passing fish will be more completely at his mercy. At the season of +their periodic ascent, salmon swarm in all the rivers of our Pacific +coast; the Columbia and Willamette are alive with them for a long +distance above the cascades of the one and the Oregon-City fall of the +other. The fisherman stands, nearly or quite naked, at the edge of his +scaffolding, armed with a net extended at the end of a long pole, and so +ingeniously contrived that the weight of the salmon and a little +dexterous management draw its mouth shut on the captive like a purse as +soon as he has entered. A helper stands behind the fisherman to assist +in raising the haul,—to give the fish a tap on the nose, which kills +him instantly,—and finally to carry him ashore to be split and dried, +without any danger of his throwing himself back into the water from the +hands of his captors, as might easily happen by omitting the +<i>coup-de-grace</i>. Another method of catching salmon, much in vogue among +the Sacramento and Pitt-River tribes, but apparently<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_708" id="Page_708">[Pg 708]</a></span> less employed by +the Indians of the Columbia, is harpooning with a very clever instrument +constructed after this wise. A hard-wood shaft is neatly, but not +tightly, fitted into the socket of a sharp-barbed spear-head carved from +bone. Through a hole drilled in the spear-head a stout cord of +deer-sinew is fastened by one end, its other being secured to the shaft +near its insertion. The salmon is struck by this weapon in the manner of +the ordinary fish-spear; the head slips off the shaft as soon as the +barbs lodge, and the harpoon virtually becomes a fishing-rod, with the +sinew for a line. This arrangement is much more manageable than the +common spear, as it greatly diminishes the chances of losing fish and +breaking shafts.</p> + +<p>There can scarcely be a more sculpturesque sight than that of a finely +formed, well-grown young Indian struggling on his scaffold with an +unusually powerful fish. Every muscle of his wiry frame stands out in +its turn in unveiled relief, and you see in him attitudes of grace and +power which will not let you regret the Apollo Belvedere or the +Gladiator. The only pity is that this ideal Indian is a rare being. The +Indians of this coast and river are divided into two broad classes,—the +Fish Indians, and the Meat Indians. The latter, <i>ceteris paribus</i>, are +much the finer race, derive the greater portion of their subsistence +from the chase, and possess the athletic mind and body which result from +active methods of winning a livelihood. The former are, to a great +extent, victims of that generic and hereditary <i>tabes mesenterica</i> which +produces the peculiar pot-bellied and spindle-shanked type of savage; +their manners are milder; their virtues and vices are done in +water-color, as comports with their source of supply. There are some +tribes which partake of the habits of both classes, living in +mountain-fastnesses part of the year by the bow and arrow, but coming +down to the river in the salmon-season for an addition to their winter +bill-of-fare. Anywhere rather than among the pure Fish Indians is the +place to look for savage beauty. Still these tribes have fortified their +feebleness by such a cultivation of their ingenuity as surprises one +seeing for the first time their well-adapted tools, comfortable lodges, +and, in some cases, really beautiful canoes. In the last respect, +however, the Indians nearer the coast surpass those up the +Columbia,—some of their carved and painted canoes equalling the +"crackest" of shell-boats in elegance of line and beauty of ornament.</p> + +<p>In a former article devoted to the Great Yo-Semite I had occasion to +remark that Indian legend, like all ancient poetry, often contains a +scientific truth embalmed in the spices of metaphor,—or, to vary the +figure, that Mudjekeewis stands holding the lantern for Agassiz and Dana +to dig by.</p> + +<p>Coming to the Falls of the Columbia, we find a case in point. Nearly +equidistant from the longitudes of Fort Vancouver and Mount Hood, the +entire Columbia River falls twenty feet over a perpendicular wall of +basalt, extending, with minor deviations from the right angle, entirely +between-shores, a breadth of about a mile. The height of Niagara and the +close compression of its vast volume make it a grander sight than the +Falls of the Columbia,—but no other cataract known to me on this +continent rivals it for an instant. The great American Falls of Snake +are much loftier and more savage than either, but their volume is so +much less as to counterbalance those advantages. Taking the Falls of the +Columbia all in all,—including their upper and lower rapids,—it must +be confessed that they exhibit every phase of tormented water in its +beauty of color or grace of form, its wrath or its whim.</p> + +<p>The Indians have a tradition that the river once followed a uniform +level from the Dalles to the sea. This tradition states that Mounts Hood +and St. Helen's are husband and wife,—whereby is intended that their +tutelar divinities stand in that mutual relation; that in comparatively +recent times there existed a rocky bridge across the Columbia at the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_709" id="Page_709">[Pg 709]</a></span> +present site of the cataract, and that across this bridge Hood and St. +Helen's were wont to pass for interchange of visits; that, while this +bridge existed, there was a free subterraneous passage under it for the +river and the canoes of the tribes (indeed, this tradition is so +universally credited as to stagger the skeptic by a mere calculation of +chances); that, on a certain occasion, the mountainous pair, like others +not mountainous, came to high words, and during their altercation broke +the bridge down; falling into the river, this colossal Rialto became a +dam, and ever since that day the upper river has been backed to its +present level, submerging vast tracts of country far above its original +bed.</p> + +<p>I notice that excellent geological authorities are willing to treat this +legend respectfully, as containing in symbols the probable key to the +natural phenomena. Whether the original course of the Columbia at this +place was through a narrow <i>cañon</i> or under an actual roof of rock, the +adjacent material has been at no very remote date toppled into it to +make the cataract and alter the bed to its present level. Both Hood and +St. Helen's are volcanic cones. The latter has been seen to smoke within +the last twelve years. It is not unlikely that during the last few +centuries some intestine disturbance may have occurred along the axis +between the two, sufficient to account for the precipitation of that +mass of rock which now forms the dam. That we cannot refer the cataclysm +to a very ancient date seems to be argued by the state of preservation +in which we still find the stumps of the celebrated "submerged forest," +extending a long distance up the river above the Falls.</p> + +<p>At the foot of the cataract we landed from the steamer on the Washington +side of the river, and found a railroad-train waiting to do our portage. +It was a strange feeling, that of whirling along by steam where so few +years before the Indian and the trader had toiled through the virgin +forest, bending under the weight of their canoes. And this is one of the +characteristic surprises of American scenery everywhere. You cannot +isolate yourself from the national civilization. In a Swiss <i>châlet</i> you +may escape from all memories of Geneva; among the Grampians you find an +entirely different set of ideas from those of Edinburgh: but the same +enterprise which makes itself felt in New York and Boston starts up for +your astonishment out of all the fastnesses of the continent. Virgin +Nature wooes our civilization to wed her, and no obstacles can conquer +the American fascination. In our journey through the wildest parts of +this country, we were perpetually finding patent washing-machines among +the <i>chaparral</i>,—canned fruit in the desert,—Voigtlander's +field-glasses on the snow-peak,—lemon-soda in the <i>cañon</i>,—men who +were sure a railroad would be run by their cabin within ten years, in +every spot where such a surprise was most remarkable.</p> + +<p>The portage-road is six miles in length, leading nearly all the way +close along the edge of the North Bluff, which, owing to a recession of +the mountains, seems here only from fifty to eighty feet in height. From +the windows of the train we enjoyed an almost uninterrupted view of the +rapids, which are only less grand and forceful in their impression than +those above Niagara. They are broken up into narrow channels by numerous +bold and naked islands of trap. Through these the water roars, boils, +and, striking projections, spouts upward in jets whose plumy top blows +off in sheets of spray. It is tormented into whirlpools; it is combed +into fine threads, and strays whitely over a rugged ledge like old men's +hair; it takes all curves of grace and arrow-flights of force; it is +water doing all that water can do or be made to do. The painter who +spent a year in making studies of it would not throw his time away; when +he had finished, he could not misrepresent water under any phases.</p> + +<p>At the upper end of the portage-road we found another and smaller +steamer awaiting us, with equally kind provision for our comfort made by +the Company<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_710" id="Page_710">[Pg 710]</a></span> and the captain. In both steamers we were accorded +excellent opportunities for drawing and observation, getting seats in +the pilot-house.</p> + +<p>Above the rapids the river-banks were bold and rocky. The stream changed +from its recent Niagara green to a brown like that of the Hudson; and +under its waters, as we hugged the Oregon side, could be seen a +submerged alluvial plateau, studded thick with drowned stumps, here and +there lifting their splintered tops above the water, and measuring from +the diameter of a sapling to that of a trunk which might once have been +one hundred feet high.</p> + +<p>Between Fort Vancouver and the cataract the banks of the river seem +nearly as wild as on the day they were discovered by the whites. On +neither the Oregon nor the Washington side is there any settlement +visible,—a small wood-wharf, or the temporary hut of a salmon-fisher, +being the only sign of human possession. At the Falls we noticed a +single white house standing in a commanding position high up on the +wooded ledges of the Oregon shore; and the taste shown in placing and +constructing it was worthy of a Hudson-River landholder. This is, +perhaps, the first attempt at a distinct country-residence made in +Oregon, and belongs to a Mr. Olmstead, who was one of the earliest +settlers and projectors of public improvements in the State. He was +actively engaged in the building of the first portage-railroad, which +ran on the Oregon side. The entire interests of both have, I believe, +been concentrated in the newer one, and the Oregon road, after building +itself by feats of business-energy and ingenuity known only to American +pioneer enterprise, has fallen into entire or comparative disuse.</p> + +<p>Above the Falls we found as unsettled a river-margin as below. +Occasionally, some bright spot of color attracted us, relieved against +the walls of trap or glacis of evergreen, and this upon nearer approach +or by the glass was resolved into a group of river Indians,—part with +the curiously compressed foreheads of the Flat-head tribe, their serene +nakedness draped with blankets of every variety of hue, from fresh +flaming red to weather-beaten army-blue, and adorned as to their cheeks +with smutches of the cinnabar-rouge which from time immemorial has been +a prime article of import among the fashionable native circles of the +Columbia,—the other part round-headed, and (I have no doubt it appears +a perfect <i>sequitur</i> to the Flat-head conservatives) therefore slaves. +The captive in battle seems more economically treated among these +savages than is common anywhere else in the Indian regions we traversed, +(though I suppose slavery is to some extent universal throughout the +tribes,)—the captors properly arguing, that, so long as they can make a +man fish and boil pot for them, it is a very foolish waste of material +to kill him.</p> + +<p>At intervals above the Falls we passed several small islands of especial +interest as being the cemeteries of river-tribes. The principal, called +"Mimitus," was sacred as the resting-place of a very noted chief. I have +forgotten his name, but I doubt whether his friends see the "Atlantic" +regularly; so that oversight is of less consequence. The deceased is +entombed like a person of quality, in a wooden mausoleum having +something the appearance of a log-cabin upon which pains have been +expended, and containing, with the human remains, robes, weapons, +baskets, canoes, and all the furniture of Indian <i>ménage</i>, to an extent +which among the tribes amounts to a fortune. This sepulchral idea is a +clear-headed one, and worthy of Eastern adoption. Old ladies with lace +and nieces, old gentlemen with cellars and nephews, might be certain +that the solace which they received in life's decline was purely +disinterested, if about middle age they should announce that their Point +and their Port were going to Mount Auburn with them.</p> + +<p>The river grew narrower, its banks becoming low, perpendicular walls of +basalt, water-worn at the base, squarely cut and castellated at the top, +and bare everywhere as any pile of masonry. The hills beyond became +naked, or covered only<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_711" id="Page_711">[Pg 711]</a></span> with short grass of the <i>grama</i> kind and +dusty-gray sage-brush. Simultaneously they lost some of their previous +basaltic characteristics, running into more convex outlines, which +receded from the river. We could not fail to recognize the fact that we +had crossed one of the great thresholds of the continent,—were once +more east of the Sierra-Nevada axis, and in the great central plateau +which a few months previous, and several hundred miles farther south, we +had crossed amid so many pains and perils by the Desert route to Washoe. +From the grizzly mountains before us to the sources of the Snake Fork +stretched an almost uninterrupted wilderness of sage. The change in +passing to this region from the fertile and timbered tracts of the +Cascades and the coast is more abrupt than can be imagined by one +familiar with our delicately modulated Eastern scenery. This sharpness +of definition seems to characterize the entire border of the plateau. +Five hours of travel between Washoe and Sacramento carry one out of the +nakedest stone heap into the grandest forest of the continent.</p> + +<p>As we emerged from the confinement of the nearer ranges, Mount Hood, +hitherto visible only through occasional rifts, loomed broadly into +sight almost from base to peak, covered with a mantle of perennial snow +scarcely less complete to our near inspection than it had seemed from +our observatory south of Salem. Only here and there toward its lower rim +a tatter in it revealed the giant's rugged brown muscle of volcanic +rock. The top of the mountain, like that of Shasta, in direct sunlight +is an opal. So far above the line of thaw, the snow seems to have +accumulated until by its own weight it has condensed into a more +compactly crystalline structure than ice itself, and the reflections +from it, as I stated of Shasta, seem rather emanations from some +interior source of light. The look is distinctly opaline, or, as a poet +has called the opal, like "a pearl with a soul in it."</p> + +<p>About five o'clock in the afternoon we reached the Oregon town and +mining-depot of Dalles City. A glance at any good War-Department map of +Oregon and Washington Territories will explain the importance of this +place, where considerably previous to the foundation of the present +large and growing settlement there existed a fort and trading-post of +the same name. It stands, as we have said, at the entrance to the great +pass by which the Columbia breaks through the mountains to the sea. Just +west of it occurs an interruption to the navigation of the river, +practically as formidable as the first cataract. This is the upper +rapids and "the Dalles" proper,—presently to be described in detail. +The position of the town, at one end of a principal portage, and at the +easiest door to the Pacific, renders it a natural entrepot between the +latter and the great central plateau of the continent. This it must have +been in any case for fur-traders and emigrants, but its business has +been vastly increased by the discovery of that immense mining-area +distributed along the Snake River and its tributaries as far east as the +Rocky Mountains. The John-Day, Boisé, and numerous other tracts both in +Washington and Idaho Territories draw most of their supplies from this +entrepot, and their gold comes down to it either for direct use in the +outfit-market, or to be passed down the river to Portland and the +San-Francisco mint.</p> + +<p>In a late article upon the Pacific Railroad, I laid no particular stress +upon the mines of Washington and Idaho as sources of profit to the +enterprise. This was for the reason that the Snake River seems the +proper outlet to much of the auriferous region, and this route may be +susceptible of improvement by an alternation of portages, roads, and +water-levels, which for a long time to come will form a means of +communication more economical and rapid than a branch to the Pacific +Road. The northern mines east of the Rocky range will find themselves +occupying somewhat similar relations to the Missouri River, which +rises,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_712" id="Page_712">[Pg 712]</a></span> as one might almost say, out of the same spring as the +Snake,—certainly out of the same ridge of the Rocky Mountains.</p> + +<p>"The Dalles" is a town of one street, built close along the edge of a +bluff of trap thirty or forty feet high, perfectly perpendicular, level +on the top as if it had been graded for a city, and with depth of water +at its base for the heaviest draught boats on the river. In fact, the +whole water-front is a natural quay,—which wants nothing but time to +make it alive with steam-elevators, warehouses, and derricks. To +Portland and the Columbia it stands much as St. Louis to New Orleans and +the Mississippi. There is no reason why it should not some day have a +corresponding business, for whose wharfage-accommodation it has even +greater natural advantages.</p> + +<p>Architecturally, the Dalles cannot be said to lean very heavily on the +side of beauty. The houses are mostly two-story structures of wood, +occupied by all the trades and professions which flock to a new +mining-entrepot. Outfit-merchants, blacksmiths, printing-office, (for +there is really a very well-conducted daily at the Dalles,) are cheek by +jowl with doctors, tailors, and Cheap Johns,—the latter being only less +merry and thrifty over their incredible sacrifices in everything, from +pins to corduroy, than that predominant class of all, the bar-keepers +themselves. The town was in a state of bustle when our steamer touched +the wharf; it bustled more and more from there to the Umatilla House, +where we stopped; the hotel was one organized bustle in bar and +dining-room; and bed-time brought no hush. The Dalles, like the +Irishman, seemed sitting up all night to be fresh for an early start in +the morning.</p> + +<p>We found everybody interested in gold. Crowds of listeners, with looks +of incredulity or enthusiasm, were gathered around the party in the +bar-room which had last come in from the newest of the new mines, and a +man who had seen the late Fort-Hall discoveries was "treated" to that +extent that he might have become intoxicated a dozen times without +expense to himself. The charms of the interior were still further +suggested by placards posted on every wall, offering rewards for the +capture of a person who on the great gold route had lately committed +some of the grimmest murders and most talented robberies known in any +branch of Newgate enterprise. I had for supper a very good omelet, +(considering its distance from the culinary centres of the universe,) +and a Dalles editorial debating the claims of several noted cut-throats +to the credit of the operations ascribed to them,—feeling that in the +<i>ensemble</i> I was enjoying both the exotic and the indigenous luxuries of +our virgin soil.</p> + +<p>After supper and a stroll I returned to the ladies' parlor of the +Umatilla House, rubbed my eyes in vain to dispel the illusion of a piano +and a carpet at this jumping-off place of civilization, and sat down at +a handsome centre-table to write up my journal. I had reviewed my way +from Portland as far as Fort Vancouver, when another illusion happened +to me in the shape of a party of gentlemen and ladies, in ball-dresses, +dress-coats, white kids, and elaborate hair, who entered the parlor to +wait for further accessions from the hotel. They were on their way with +a band of music to give some popular citizen a surprise-party. The +popular citizen never got the fine edge of that surprise. I took it off +for him. If it were not too much like a little Cockney on Vancouver's +Island who used the phrase on all occasions, from stubbing his toe to +the death of a Cabinet Lord, I should say, "I never was more astonished +in me life!"</p> + +<p>None of them had ever seen me before,—and with my books and maps about +me, I may have looked like some public, yet mysterious character. I felt +a pleasant sensation of having interest taken in me, and, wishing to +make an ingenuous return, looked up with a casual smile at one of the +party. Again to my surprise, this proved to be a very charming young +lady, and I timidly became aware that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_713" id="Page_713">[Pg 713]</a></span> the others were equally pretty in +their several styles. Not knowing what else to do under the +circumstances, I smiled again, still more casually. An equal uncertainty +as to alternative set the ladies smiling quite across the row, and then, +to my relief, the gentlemen joined them, making it pleasant for us all. +A moment later we were engaged in general conversation,—starting from +the bold hypothesis, thrown out by one of the gentlemen, that perhaps I +was going to Boisé, and proceeding, by a process of elimination, to the +accurate knowledge of what I was going to do, if it wasn't that. I +enjoyed one of the most cheerful bits of social relaxation I had found +since crossing the Missouri, and nothing but my duty to my journal +prevented me, when my surprise-party left, from accompanying them, by +invitation, under the brevet title of Professor, to the house of the +popular citizen, who, I was assured, would be glad to see me. I +certainly should have been glad to see him, if he was anything like +those guests of his who had so ingenuously cultivated me in a far land +of strangers, where a man might have been glad to form the acquaintance +of his mother-in-law. This is not the way people form acquaintances in +New York; but if I had wanted that, why not have stayed there? As a +cosmopolite, and on general principles of being, I prefer the Dalles +way. I have no doubt I should have found in that circle of spontaneous +recognitions quite as many people who stood wear and improved on +intimacy as were ever vouchsafed to me by social indorsement from +somebody else. We are perpetually blaming our heads of Government +Bureaus for their poor knowledge of character,—their subordinates, we +say, are never pegs in the right holes. If we understood our civilized +system of introductions, we could not rationally expect anything else. +The great mass of polite mankind are trained <i>not</i> to know character, +but to take somebody else's voucher for it. Their acquaintances, most of +their friendships, come to them through a succession of indorsers, none +of whom may have known anything of the goodness of the paper. A sensible +man, conventionally introduced to his fellow, must always wonder why the +latter does not turn him around to look for signatures in chalk down the +back of his coat; for he knows that Brown indorsed him over to Jones, +and Jones negotiated him with Robinson, through a succession in which +perhaps two out of a hundred took pains to know whether he represented +metal. You do not find the people of new countries making mistakes in +character. Every man is his own guaranty,—and if he has no just cause +to suspect himself bogus, there will be true pleasure in a frank opening +of himself to the examination and his eyes for the study of others. Not +to be accused of intruding radical reform under the guise of +belles-lettres, let me say that I have no intention of introducing this +innovation at the East.</p> + +<p>After a night's rest, Bierstadt spent nearly the entire morning in +making studies of Hood from an admirable post of observation at the top +of one of the highest foot-hills,—a point several miles southwest of +the town, which he reached under guidance of an old Indian interpreter +and trapper. His work upon this mountain was in some respects the best +he ever accomplished, being done with a loving faithfulness hardly +called out by Hood's only rival, the Peak of Shasta. The result of his +Hood studies, as seen in the nearly completed painting, has a +superiority corresponding to that of the studies themselves, possessing +excellences not included even in the well-known "Lander's Peak."</p> + +<p>In the afternoon, we were provided, by the courtesy of the Company, with +a special train on the portage-railroad connecting Dalles City with a +station known as Celilo. This road had but recently come into full +operation, and was now doing an immense freight-business between the two +river-levels separated by the intervening "Dalles." It seemed somewhat +longer than the road around the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_714" id="Page_714">[Pg 714]</a></span> Falls. Its exact length has escaped me, +but I think it about eight or nine miles.</p> + +<p>With several officers of the road, who vied in giving us opportunities +of comfort and information, we set out, about three <span class="smcap">p.m.</span>, from a station +on the water-front below the town, whence we trundled through the long +main street, and were presently shot forth upon a wilderness of sand. An +occasional trap uplift rose on our right, but, as we were on the same +bluff-level as Dalles City, we met no lofty precipices. We were +constantly in view of the river, separated from its Oregon brink at the +farthest by about half a mile of the dreariest dunes of shifting sand +ever seen by an amateur in deserts. The most arid tracts along the +Platte could not rival this. The wind was violent when we left Dalles +City, and possessed the novel faculty of blowing simultaneously from all +points of the compass. It increased with every mile of advance, both in +force and faculty, until at Celilo we found it a hurricane. The +gentlemen of the Company who attended us told us, as seemed very +credible, that the highest winds blowing here (compared with which the +present might be styled a zephyr) banked the track so completely out of +sight with sand that a large force of men had to be steadily employed in +shovelling out trains that had been brought to a dead halt, and clearing +a way for the slow advance of others. I observed that the sides of some +of the worst sand-cuts had been planked over to prevent their sliding +down upon the road. Occasionally, the sand blew in such tempests as to +sift through every cranny of the cars, and hide the river-glimpses like +a momentary fog. But this discomfort was abundantly compensated by the +wonderfully interesting scenery on the Columbia side of our train.</p> + +<p>The river for the whole distance of the portage is a succession of +magnificent rapids, low cataracts, and narrow, sinuous channels,—the +last known to the old French traders as "<i>Dales</i>" or "Troughs," and to +us by the very natural corruption of "Dalles." The alternation between +these phases is wonderfully abrupt. At one point, about half-way between +Dalles City and Celilo, the entire volume of the Columbia River (and how +vast that is may be better understood by following up on the map the +river itself and all its tributaries) is crowded over upon the Oregon +shore through a passage not more than fifty yards in width, between +perfectly naked and perpendicular precipices of basalt. Just beyond this +mighty mill-race, where one of the grandest floods of the continent is +sliding in olive-green light and umber shadow, smoothly and resistlessly +as time, the river is a mile wide, and plunges over a ragged wall of +trap blocks, reaching, as at the lower cataract, from shore to shore. In +other neighboring places it attains even a greater width, but up to +Celilo is never out of torment from the obstructions of its bed. Not +even the rapids of Niagara can vie with these in their impression of +power, and only the Columbia itself can describe the lines of grace made +by its water, rasped to spray, churned to froth, tired into languid +sheets that flow like sliding glass, or shot up in fountains frayed away +to rainbows on their edges, as it strikes some basalt hexagon rising in +mid-stream. The Dalles and the Upper Cataracts are still another region +where the artist might stay for a year's University-course in +water-painting.</p> + +<p>At Celilo we found several steamers, in register resembling our second +of the day previous. They measured on the average about three hundred +tons. One of them had just got down from Walla Walla, with a large party +of miners from gold-tracts still farther off, taking down five hundred +thousand dollars in dust to Portland and San Francisco. We were very +anxious to accept the Company's extended invitation, and push our +investigations to or even up the Snake River. But the expectation that +the San-Francisco steamer would reach Portland in a day or two, and that +we should immediately return by her to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_715" id="Page_715">[Pg 715]</a></span> California, turned us most +reluctantly down the river after Bierstadt and I had made the fullest +notes and sketches attainable. Bad weather on the coast falsified our +expectations. For a week we were rain-bound in Portland, unable to leave +our hotel for an hour at a time without being drenched by the floods +which just now set in for the winter season, and regretting the lack of +that prescience which would have enabled us to accomplish one of the +most interesting side-trips in our whole plan of travel. While this +pleasure still awaited us, and none in particular of any kind seemed +present, save the in-door courtesies of our Portland friends, it was +still among the memories of a lifetime to have seen the Columbia in its +Cataracts and its Dalles.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="OUR_LAST_DAY_IN_DIXIE" id="OUR_LAST_DAY_IN_DIXIE"></a>OUR LAST DAY IN DIXIE.</h2> + + +<p>It was not far from eleven o'clock at night when we took leave of the +Rebel President, and, arm in arm with Judge Ould, made our way through +the silent, deserted streets to our elevated quarters in the Spotswood +Hotel at Richmond. As we climbed the long, rickety stairs which led to +our room in the fourth story, one of us said to our companion,—</p> + +<p>"We can accomplish nothing more by remaining here. Suppose we shake the +sacred soil from our feet to-morrow?"</p> + +<p>"Very well. At what hour will you start?" he replied.</p> + +<p>"The earlier, the better. As near daybreak as may be,—to avoid the +sun."</p> + +<p>"We can't be ready before ten o'clock. The mules are quartered six miles +out of town."</p> + +<p>That sounded strange, for Jack, our ebony Jehu, had said to me only the +day before, "Dem <i>is</i> mighty foine mules, Massa. I 'tends ter dem mules +myself; <i>we keeps 'em right round de corner</i>." Taken together, the +statements of the two officials had a bad look; but Mr. Davis had just +given me a message to his niece, and Mr. Benjamin had just intrusted +Colonel Jaquess with a letter—contraband, because three pages long—for +delivery within the limits of the "United States"; therefore the +discrepancy did not alarm me, for the latter facts seemed to assure our +safe deliverance from Dixie. Merely saying, "Very well,—ten o'clock, +then, let it be,—we'll be ready,"—we bade the Judge good-night at the +landing, and entered our apartment.</p> + +<p>We found the guard, Mr. Javins, stretched at full length on his bed, and +snoring like the Seven Sleepers. Day and night, from the moment of our +first entrance into the Rebel dominions, that worthy, with a revolver in +his sleeve, our door-key in his pocket, and a Yankee in each one of his +eyes, had implicitly observed his instructions,—"Keep a constant watch +upon them"; but overtasked nature had at last got the better of his +vigilance, and he was slumbering at his post. Not caring to disturb him, +we bolted the door, slid the key under his pillow, and followed him to +the land of dreams.</p> + +<p>It was a little after two o'clock, and the round, ruddy moon was looking +pleasantly in at my window, when a noise outside awoke me. Lifting the +sash, I listened. There was a sound of hurrying feet in the neighboring +street, and a prolonged cry of murder! It seemed the wild, strangled +shriek of a woman. Springing to the floor, I threw on my clothes, and +shook Javins.</p> + +<p>"Wake up! Give me the key!<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_716" id="Page_716">[Pg 716]</a></span> They're murdering a woman in the street!" I +shouted, loud enough to be heard in the next world.</p> + +<p>But he did not wake, and the Colonel, too, slept on, those despairing +cries in his ears, as peacefully as if his great dream of peace had been +realized. Still those dreadful shrieks, mingled now with curses hot from +the bottomless pit, came up through the window. No time was to be +lost,—so, giving another and a desperate tug at Javins, I thrust my +hand under his pillow, drew out his revolver and the door-key, and, +three steps at a time, bounded down the stairways. At the outer entrance +a half-drunken barkeeper was rubbing his eyes, and asking, "What's the +row?"—but not another soul was stirring. Giving no heed to him, I +hurried into the street. I had not gone twenty paces, however, before a +gruff voice from the shadow of the building called out,—</p> + +<p>"Halt! Who goes thar'?"</p> + +<p>"A friend," I answered.</p> + +<p>"Advance, friend, and give the countersign."</p> + +<p>"I don't know it."</p> + +<p>"Then ye carn't pass. Orders is strict."</p> + +<p>"What is this disturbance? I heard a woman crying murder."</p> + +<p>The stifled shrieks had died away, but low moans, and sounds like +hysterical weeping, still came up from around the corner.</p> + +<p>"Oh! nothin',—jest some nigger fellers on a time. Thet's all."</p> + +<p>"And you stood by and saw it done!" I exclaimed, with mingled contempt +and indignation.</p> + +<p>"Sor it? How cud <i>I</i> holp it? I hes my orders,—ter keep my eye on thet +'ar' door; 'sides, thar' war' nigh a dozen on 'em, and these Richmond +nigs, now thet the white folks is away, is more lawless nor old Bragg +himself. My life 'ou'dn't ha' been wuth a hill o' beans among 'em."</p> + +<p>By this time I had gradually drawn the sentinel to the corner of the +building, and looking down the dimly lighted street whence the sounds +proceeded, I saw that it was empty.</p> + +<p>"They are gone now," I said, "and the woman may be dying. Come, go down +there with me."</p> + +<p>"Carn't, Cunnel. I 'ou'dn't do it fur all the women in Richmond."</p> + +<p>"Was your mother a woman?"</p> + +<p>"I reckon, and a right peart 'un,—ye mought bet yer pile on thet."</p> + +<p>"I'll bet my pile she'd disown you, if she knew you turned your back on +a woman."</p> + +<p>He gave me a wistful, undecided look, and then, muttering something +about "orders," which I did not stop to bear, followed me, as I hurried +down the street.</p> + +<p>Not three hundred yards away, in a narrow recess between two buildings, +we found the woman. She lay at full length on the pavement, her neat +muslin gown torn to shreds, and her simple lace bonnet crushed into a +shapeless mass beside her. Her thick, dishevelled hair only +half-concealed her open bosom, and from the corners of her mouth the +blood was flowing freely. She was not dead,—for she still moaned +pitifully,—but she seemed to be dying. Lifting her head as tenderly as +I could, I said to her,—</p> + +<p>"Are you much hurt? Can't you speak to me?"</p> + +<p>She opened her eyes, and staring at the sentinel with a wild, crazed +look, only moaned,—</p> + +<p>"Oh! don't! Don't,—any more! Let me die! Oh! let me die!"</p> + +<p>"Not yet. You are too young to die yet. Come, see if you can't sit up."</p> + +<p>Something, it may have been the tone of my voice, seemed to bring her to +her senses, for she again opened her eyes, and, with a sudden effort, +rose nearly to her feet. In a moment, however, she staggered back, and +would have fallen, had not the sentinel caught her.</p> + +<p>"There, don't try again. Rest awhile. Take some of this,—it will give +you strength"; and I emptied my brandy-flask into her mouth. "Our +General" had filled it the morning we set out from his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_717" id="Page_717">[Pg 717]</a></span> camp; but two +days' acquaintance with the Judge, who declared "<i>such</i> brandy +contraband of war," had reduced its contents to a low ebb. Still, there +was enough to do that poor girl a world of good. She shortly revived, +and sitting up, her head against the sentinel's shoulder, told us her +story. She was a white woman, and served as nursery-maid in a family +that lived hard by. All of its male members being away with the array, +she had been sent out at that late hour to procure medicine for a sick +child, and, waylaid by a gang of black fiends, had been gagged and +outraged in the very heart of Richmond! And this is Southern +civilization under Jefferson I.!</p> + +<p>At the end of a long hour, I returned to the hotel. The sentry was +pacing to and fro before it, and, seating myself on the door-step, I +drew him into conversation.</p> + +<p>"Do such things often happen in Richmond?" I asked him.</p> + +<p>"Often! Ye's strange yere, I reckon," he replied.</p> + +<p>"No,—I've been here forty times, but not lately. Things must be in a +bad way here, now."</p> + +<p>"Wai, they is! Thar' 's nary night but thair' 's lots o' sech doin's. Ye +see, thar' ha'n't more 'n a corporal's-guard o' white men in the hull +place, so the nigs they hes the'r own way, and ye'd better b'lieve they +raise the Devil, and break things, ginerally."</p> + +<p>"I've seen no other able-bodied soldier about town; how is it that you +are here?"</p> + +<p>"I ha'n't able-bodied," he replied, holding up the stump of his left +arm, from which the sleeve was dangling. "I lost thet more 'n a y'ar +ago. I b'long ter the calvary,—Fust Alabama,—and bein' as I carn't +manage a nag now, they 's detailed me fur provost-duty."</p> + +<p>"First Alabama? I know Captains Webb and Finnan of that regiment."</p> + +<p>"Ye does? What! old man Webb, as lives down on Coosa?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, at Gadsden, in Cherokee County. Streight burnt his house, and both +of his mills', on his big raid, and the old man has lost both of his +sons in the war. It has wellnigh done him up."</p> + +<p>"I reckon. Stands ter natur' it sh'u'd. The Yankees is all-fired fiends. +The old man use' ter hate 'em loike——. I reckon he hates 'em wuss 'n +ever now."</p> + +<p>"No, he don't. His troubles seem to have softened him. When he told me +of them, he cried like a child. He reckoned the Lord had brought them on +him because he'd fought against the Union."</p> + +<p>"Wal, I doan't know. This war's a bad business, anyhow. When d'ye see +old Webb last?"</p> + +<p>"About a year ago,—down in Tennessee, nigh to Tullahoma."</p> + +<p>"Was he 'long o' the rigiment?"</p> + +<p>That was a home question, for I had met Captain Webb while he was a +prisoner, in the Court-House at Murfreesboro'. However, I promptly +replied,—</p> + +<p>"No,—he'd just left it."</p> + +<p>"Wal, I doan't blame him. Pears loike, ef sech things sh'u'd come onter +me, I'd let the war and the kentry go ter the Devil tergether."</p> + +<p>My acquaintance with Captain Webb naturally won me the confidence of the +soldier; and for nearly an hour, almost unquestioned, he poured into my +ear information that would have been of incalculable value to our +generals. Two days later I would have given my right hand for liberty to +whisper to General Grant some things that he said; but honor and honesty +forbade it.</p> + +<p>A neighboring clock struck four when I rose to go. As I did so, I said +to the sentinel,—</p> + +<p>"I saw no other sentry in the streets; why are you guarding this hotel?"</p> + +<p>"Wal, ye knows old Brown's a-raisin' Cain down thar' in Georgy. Two o' +his men bes come up yere ter see Jeff, and things ha'n't quite +satisfactory, so we's orders ter keep 'em tighter 'n a bull's-eye in +fly-time."</p> + +<p>So, not content with placing a guard in our very bedchamber, the +oily-tongued despot over the way had fastened a padlock<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_718" id="Page_718">[Pg 718]</a></span> over the +key-hole of our outside-door! What <i>would</i> happen, if he should hear +that I had picked the padlock, and prowled about Richmond for an hour +after midnight! The very thought gave my throat a preliminary choke, and +my neck an uneasy sensation. It was high time I sought the embrace of +that hard mattress in the fourth story. But my fears were groundless. +When I crept noiselessly to bed, Javins was sleeping as soundly and +snoring as sweetly as if his sins were all forgiven.</p> + +<p>When I awoke in the morning, breakfast was already laid on the +centre-table, and an army of newsboys were shouting under our windows, +"'Ere's the 'En'quirer' and <i>the</i> 'Dis'patch.' Great news from the +front. Gin'ral Grant mortally killed,—shot with a cannon." Rising, and +beginning my toilet, I said to Javins, in a tone of deep concern,—</p> + +<p>"When did that happen?"</p> + +<p>"Why, o' Saturday. I hearn of it afore we left the lines. 'Twas all over +town yesterday," he replied, with infinite composure.</p> + +<p>"And you didn't tell us! That was unkind of you, Javins,—very unkind. +How <i>could</i> you do it?"</p> + +<p>"It's ag'in' orders to talk news with you;—besides, I thought you +knowed it."</p> + +<p>"How should we know it?"</p> + +<p>"Why, your boat was only just ahead of his'n, comin' up the river. He +got shot runnin' that battery. Hit in the arm, and died when they +amputated him."</p> + +<p>"Amputated him! Did they cut off his head to save his arm?"</p> + +<p>Whether he saw a quiet twinkle in my eye, or knew that the news was +false, I know not. Whichever it was, he replied,—</p> + +<p>"I reckon. Then you don't b'lieve it?"</p> + +<p>"Why should I doubt it? Don't your papers always tell the truth?"</p> + +<p>"No, they never do; lyin' 's their trade."</p> + +<p>"Then you suppose they're whistling now to keep up their courage? But +let us see what they say. Oblige me with some of your currency."</p> + +<p>He kindly gave me three dollars for one, and ringing the bell, I soon +had the five dingy half-sheets which every morning, "Sundays excepted," +hold up this busy world, "its fluctuations and its vast concerns," to +the wondering view of beleaguered Richmond.</p> + +<p>"Dey's fifty cents apiece, Massa," said the darky, handing me the +papers, and looking wistfully on the poor specimen of lithography which +remained after the purchase; "what shill I do wid dis?"</p> + +<p>"Oh! keep it. I'd give you more, but that's all the lawful money I have +about me."</p> + +<p>He hesitated, as if unwilling to take my last half-dollar; but self soon +got the better of him. He pocketed the shin-plaster, and said nothing; +but "Poor gentleman! I's sorry for <i>you</i>! Libin' at do Spotswood, and no +money about you!" was legible all over his face.</p> + +<p>We opened the papers, and, sure enough, General Grant <i>was</i> dead, and +laid out in dingy sheets, with a big gun firing great volleys over him! +The cannon which that morning thundered Glory! Hallelujah! through the +columns of the "Whig" and the "Examiner" no doubt brought him to life +again. No such jubilation, I believe, disgraced our Northern journals +when Stonewall Jackson fell.</p> + +<p>Breakfast over, the Colonel and I packed our portmanteaus, and sat down +to the intellectual repast. It was a feast, and we enjoyed it. I always +have enjoyed the Richmond editorials. If I were a poet, I should study +them for epithets. Exhausting the dictionary, their authors ransack +heaven, earth, and the other place, and into one expression throw such a +concentration of scorn, hate, fury, or exultation as is absolutely +stunning to a man of ordinary nerves. Talk of their being bridled! They +never had a bit in their mouths. Before the war they ran wild, and now +they ride rough-shod over decorum, decency, and Davis himself.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_719" id="Page_719">[Pg 719]</a></span> But the +dictator endures it like a philosopher. "He lets it pass," said Judge +Ould to me, "like the idle wind, which it is."</p> + +<p>At last, ten o'clock—the hour when we were to set out from +Dixie—struck from a neighboring steeple, and I laid down the paper, and +listened for the tread of the Judge on the stairs. I had heard it often, +and it had always been welcome, for he is a most agreeable companion, +but I had not <i>listened</i> for it till then. Then I waited for it as "they +that watch for the morning," for he was to deliver us from the "den of +lions,"—from "the hold of every foul and unclean thing." Ten, twenty, +thirty minutes I waited, but he did not come! Why was he late, that +prompt man, who was always "on time,"—who put us through the streets of +Richmond the night before on a trot, lest we should be a second late at +our appointment? Did he mean to bake us brown with the mid-day sun? or +had the mules overslept themselves, or moved their quarters still +farther out of town? Well, I didn't know, and it was useless to +speculate, so I took up the paper, and went to reading again. But the +stinging editorials had lost their sting, and the pointed paragraphs, +though sharper than a meat-axe, fell on me as harmless as if I had been +encased in a suit of mail.</p> + +<p>At length eleven o'clock sounded, and I took out my watch to count the +minutes. One, two, three,—how slow they went! Four, +five,—ten,—fifteen,—twenty! What was the matter with the watch? Even +at this day I could affirm on oath that it took five hours for that +hour-hand to get round to twelve. But at last it got there, and +then—each second seeming a minute, each minute an hour—it crept slowly +on to one; but still no Judge appeared! Why did he not come? The reason +was obvious. The mules were "quartered six miles out of town," because +he had to see Mr. Davis before letting us go. And Davis had heard of my +nocturnal rambling, and concluded we had come as spies. Or he had, from +my cross-questioning the night before, detected <i>my</i> main object in +coming to Dixie. Either way <i>my</i> doom was sealed. If we were taken as +spies, it was hanging. If held on other grounds, it was imprisonment; +and ten days of Castle Thunder, in my then state of health, would have +ended my mortal career.</p> + +<p>I had looked at this alternative before setting out. But then I saw it +afar off; now I stood face to face with it, and—I thought of home,—of +the brave boy who had said to me, "Father, I think you ought to go. If I +was only a man, <i>I</i>'d go. If you never come back, <i>I</i>'ll take care of +the children."</p> + +<p>These thoughts passing in my mind, I rose and paced the room for a few +moments,—then, turning to Javins, said,—</p> + +<p>"Will you oblige me by stepping into the hall? My friend and I would +have a few words together."</p> + +<p>As he passed out, I said to the Colonel,—</p> + +<p>"Ould is more than three hours late! What does it mean?"</p> + +<p>All this while he had sat, his spectacles on his nose, and his chair +canted against the window-sill, absorbed in the newspapers. Occasionally +he would look up to comment on something he was reading; but not a +movement of his face, nor a glance of his eye, had betrayed that he was +conscious of Ould's delay, or of my extreme restlessness. When I said +this, he took off his spectacles, and, quietly rubbing the glasses with +his handkerchief, replied,—</p> + +<p>"It looks badly, but—<i>I</i> ask no odds of them. We may have to show we +are men. We have tried to serve the country. That is enough. Let them +hang us, if they like."</p> + +<p>"Colonel," I exclaimed, with a strong inclination to hug him, "you are a +trump! the bravest man I ever knew!"</p> + +<p>"I trust in God,—that is all," was his reply.</p> + +<p>This was all he said,—but his words convey no idea of the sublime +courage which shone in his eye and lighted up his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_720" id="Page_720">[Pg 720]</a></span> every feature. I felt +rebuked, and turned away to hide my emotion. As I did so, my attention +was arrested by a singular spectacle in a neighboring street. Coming +down the hill, hand in hand with a colored woman, were two little boys +of about eight or nine years, one white, the other black. As they neared +the opposite corner, the white lad drew back and struck the black boy a +heavy blow with his foot. The ebony juvenile doubled up his fist, and, +planting it behind the other's ear, felled him to the sidewalk. But the +white lad was on his feet again in an instant, and showering on the +black a perfect storm of kicks and blows. The latter parried the assault +coolly, and, watching his opportunity, planted another blow behind the +white boy's ear, which sent him reeling to the ground again. Meanwhile +the colored nurse stood by, enjoying the scene, and a score or more of +negroes of all ages and sizes gathered around, urging the young ebony on +with cheers and other expressions of encouragement. I watched the combat +till the white lad had gone down a third time, when a rap came at the +door, and Judge Ould entered.</p> + +<p>"Good evening," he said.</p> + +<p>"Good evening," we replied.</p> + +<p>"Well, Gentlemen, if you are ready, we'll walk round to the Libby," he +added, with a hardness of tone I had not observed in his voice before.</p> + +<p>My worst fears were realized! We were prisoners! A cold tremor passed +over me, and my tongue refused its office. A drooping plant turns to the +sun; so, being just then a drooping plant, I turned to the Colonel. He +stood, drawn up to his full height, looking at Ould. Not a feature of +his fine face moved, but his large gray eye was beaming with a sort of +triumph. I have met brave men,—men who have faced death a hundred times +without quailing; but I never met a man who had the moral grandeur of +that man. His look inspired me, for I turned to Ould, and, with a +coolness that amazed myself, said,—</p> + +<p>"Very well. We are ready. But here is an instructive spectacle"; and I +pointed to the conflict going on in the street. "That is what you are +coming to. Fight us another year, and that scene will be enacted, by +larger children, all over the South."</p> + +<p>"To prevent that is why we are fighting you at all," he replied, dryly.</p> + +<p>We shook Javins by the hand, and took up our portmanteaus to go. Then +our hotel-bill occurred to me, and I said to Ould,—</p> + +<p>"You cautioned us against offering greenbacks. We have nothing else. +Will you give us some Confederate money in exchange?"</p> + +<p>"Certainly. But what do you want of money?" he asked, resuming the free +and easy manner he had shown in our previous intercourse.</p> + +<p>"To pay our hotel-bill."</p> + +<p>"You have no bill here. It will be settled by the Confederacy."</p> + +<p>"We can't allow that. We are not here as the guests of your Government."</p> + +<p>"Yes, you are, and you can't help yourselves," he rejoined, laughing +pleasantly. "If you offer the landlord greenbacks, he'll have you +jugged, certain,—for it's against the law."</p> + +<p>"That's nothing to us. We are jugged already."</p> + +<p>"So you are!" and he laughed again, rather boisterously.</p> + +<p>His manner half convinced me that he had been playing on our +sensibilities; but I said nothing, and we followed him down the stairs.</p> + +<p>At the outer door stood Jack and the ambulance! Their presence assured +us a safe exit from Dixie, and my feelings found expression somewhat as +follows:—</p> + +<p>"How are you, Jack? You're the best-looking darky I ever saw."</p> + +<p>"I's bery well, Massa, bery well. Hope you's well," replied Jack, +grinning until he made himself uglier than Nature intended. "I's glad +you tinks I's good-lookin'."</p> + +<p>"Good-looking! You're better-looking<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_721" id="Page_721">[Pg 721]</a></span> than any man, black or white, I +ever met."</p> + +<p>"You've odd notions of beauty," said the Judge, smiling. "That accounts +for your being an Abolitionist."</p> + +<p>"No, it don't." And I added, in a tone too low for Jack to hear, "It +only implies, that, until I saw that darky, I doubted our getting out of +Dixie."</p> + +<p>The Judge gave a low whistle.</p> + +<p>"So you smelt a rat?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, a very big one. Tell us, why were you so long behind time?"</p> + +<p>"I'll tell you when the war is over. Now I'll take you to Libby and the +hospitals, if you'd like to go."</p> + +<p>We said we would, and, ordering Jack to follow with the ambulance, the +Judge led us down the principal thoroughfare. A few shops were open, a +few negro women were passing in and out among them, and a few wounded +soldiers were limping along the sidewalks; but scarcely an able-bodied +man was to be seen anywhere. A poor soldier, who had lost both legs and +a hand, was seated at a street-corner, asking alms of the colored women +as they passed. Pointing to him, the Judge said,—</p> + +<p>"There is one of our arguments against reunion. If you will walk two +squares, I'll show you a thousand."</p> + +<p>"All asking alms of black women? That is another indication of what you +are coming to."</p> + +<p>He made no reply. After a while, scanning our faces as if he would +detect our hidden thoughts, he said, in an abrupt, pointed way,—</p> + +<p>"Grant was to have attacked us yesterday. Why didn't he do it?"</p> + +<p>"How should we know?"</p> + +<p>"You came from Foster's only the day before. That's where the attack was +to have been made."</p> + +<p>"Why wasn't it made?"</p> + +<p>"<i>I</i> don't know. Some think it was because you came in, and were +<i>expected out</i> that way."</p> + +<p>"Oh! That accounts for your being so late! You think we are spies, sent +in to survey, and report on the route?"</p> + +<p>"No, I do not. I think you are honest men, and I've <i>said so</i>."</p> + +<p>And I have no doubt it was because he "said so" that we got out of +Richmond.</p> + +<p>By this time we had reached a dingy brick building, from one corner of +which protruded a small sign, bearing, in black letters on a white +ground, the words,—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">LIBBY AND SON,<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0"><i>SHIP-CHANDLERS AND GROCERS.</i><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>It was three stories high, and, I was told, eighty feet in width and a +hundred and ten in depth. In front, the first story was on a level with +the street, allowing space for a tier of dungeons under the sidewalk; +but in the rear the land sloped away till the basement-floor rose +above-ground. Its unpainted walls were scorched to a rusty brown, and +its sunken doors and low windows, filled here and there with a dusky +pane, were cobwebbed and weather-stained, giving the whole building a +most uninviting and desolate appearance. A flaxen-haired boy, in ragged +"butternuts" and a Union cap, and an old man, in gray regimentals, with +a bent body and a limping gait, were pacing to and fro before it, with +muskets on their shoulders; but no other soldiers were in sight.</p> + +<p>"If Ben Butler knew that Richmond was defended by only such men, how +long would it be before he took it?" I said, turning to the Judge.</p> + +<p>"Several years. When these men give out, our women will fall in. Let +Butler try it!"</p> + +<p>Opening a door at the right, he led us into a large, high-studded +apartment, with a bare floor, and greasy brown walls hung round with +battle-scenes and cheap lithographs of the Rebel leaders. Several +officers in "Secession gray" were lounging about this room, and one of +them, a short, slightly-built, youthful-looking man, rose as we entered, +and, in a half-pompous, half-obsequious way, said to Judge Ould,—</p> + +<p>"Ah! Colonel Ould, I am very glad to see you."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_722" id="Page_722">[Pg 722]</a></span></p> + +<p>The Judge returned the greeting with a stateliness that was in striking +contrast with his usual frank and cordial manner, and then introduced +the officer to us as "Major Turner, Keeper of the Libby." I had heard of +him, and it was with some reluctance that I took his proffered hand. +However, I did take it, and at the same time inquired,—</p> + +<p>"Are you related to Dr. Turner, of Fayetteville?"</p> + +<p>"No, Sir. I am of the old Virginia family." (I never met a negro-whipper +nor a negro-trader who did not belong to that family.) "Are you a +North-Carolinian?"</p> + +<p>"No, Sir"—</p> + +<p>Before I could add another word, the Judge said,—</p> + +<p>"No, Major; these gentlemen hail from Georgia. They are strangers here, +and I'd thank you to show them over the prison."</p> + +<p>"Certainly, Colonel, most certainly. I'll do it with great pleasure."</p> + +<p>And the little man bustled about, put on his cap, gave a few orders to +his subordinates, and then led us, through another outside-door, into +the prison. He was a few rods in advance with Colonel Jaquess, when +Judge Ould said to me,—</p> + +<p>"Your prisoners have belied Turner. You see he's not the hyena they've +represented."</p> + +<p>"I'm not so sure of that," I replied. "These cringing, mild-mannered men +are the worst sort of tyrants, when they have the power."</p> + +<p>"But you don't think <i>him</i> a tyrant?"</p> + +<p>"I do. He's a coward and a bully, or I can't read English. It is written +all over his face."</p> + +<p>The Judge laughed boisterously, and called out to Turner,—</p> + +<p>"I say, Major, our friend here is painting your portrait."</p> + +<p>"I hope he is making a handsome man of me," said Turner, in a +sycophantic way.</p> + +<p>"No, he isn't. He's drawing you to the life,—as if he'd known you for +half a century."</p> + +<p>We had entered a room about forty feet wide and a hundred feet deep, +with bare brick walls, a rough plank floor, and narrow, dingy windows, +to whose sash only a few broken panes were clinging. A row of tin +wash-basins, and a wooden trough which served as a bathing-tub, were at +one end of it, and half a dozen cheap stools and hard-bottomed chairs +were littered about the floor, but it had no other furniture. And this +room, with five others of similar size and appointments, and two +basements floored with earth and filled with <i>débris</i>, compose the +famous Libby Prison, in which, for months together, thousands of the +best and bravest men that ever went to battle have been allowed to rot +and to starve.</p> + +<p>At the date of our visit, not more than a hundred prisoners were in the +Libby, its contents having recently been emptied into a worse sink in +Georgia; but almost constantly since the war began, twelve and sometimes +thirteen hundred of our officers have been hived within those half-dozen +desolate rooms and filthy cellars, with a space of only ten feet by two +allotted to each for all the purposes of living!</p> + +<p>Overrun with vermin, perishing with cold, breathing a stifled, tainted +atmosphere, no space allowed them for rest by day, and lying down at +night "wormed and dovetailed together like fish in a basket,"—their +daily rations only two ounces of stale beef and a small lump of hard +corn-bread, and their lives the forfeit, if they caught but one streak +of God's blue sky through those filthy windows,—they have endured there +all the horrors of the middle-passage. My soul sickened as I looked on +the scene of their wretchedness. If the liberty we are fighting for were +not worth even so terrible a price,—if it were not cheaply purchased +even with the blood and agony of the many brave and true souls who have +gone into that foul den only to die, or to come out the shadows of +men,—living ghosts, condemned to walk the night and to fade away before +the breaking of the great day that is coming,—who would<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_723" id="Page_723">[Pg 723]</a></span> not cry out +for peace, for peace on any terms?</p> + +<p>And while these thoughts were in my mind, the cringing, foul-mouthed, +brutal, contemptible ruffian who had caused all this misery stood within +two paces of me! I could have reached out my hand, and, with half an +effort, have crushed him, and—I did not do it! Some invisible Power +held my arm, for murder was in my heart.</p> + +<p>"This is where that Yankee devil Streight, that raised hell so among you +down in Georgia, got out," said Turner, pausing before a jut in the wall +of the room. "A flue was here, you see, but we've bricked it up. They +took up the hearth, let themselves down into the basement, and then dug +through the wall, and eighty feet underground into the yard of a +deserted building over the way. If you'd like to see the place, step +down with me."</p> + +<p>"We would, Major. We'd be right glad ter," I replied, adopting, at a +hint from the Judge, the Georgia dialect.</p> + +<p>We descended a rough plank stairway, and entered the basement. It was a +damp, mouldy, dismal place, and even then—in hot July weather—as cold +as an ice-house. What must it have been in midwinter!</p> + +<p>The keeper led us along the wall to where Streight and his party had +broken out, and then said,—</p> + +<p>"It's three feet thick, but they went through it, and all the way under +the street, with only a few case-knives and a dust-pan."</p> + +<p>"Wal, they <i>war</i> smart. But, keeper, whar' wus yer eyes all o' thet +time? Down our way, ef a man couldn't see twenty Yankees a-wuckin' so +fur six weeks, by daylight, in a clar place like this yere, we'd reckon +he warn't fit ter 'tend a pen o' niggers."</p> + +<p>The Judge whispered, "You're overdoing it. Hold in." Turner winced like +a struck hound, but, smothering his wrath, smilingly replied,—</p> + +<p>"The place wasn't clear then. It was filled with straw and rubbish. The +Yankees covered the opening with it, and hid away among it when any one +was coming. I caught two of them down here one day, but they pulled the +wool over my eyes, and I let them off with a few days in a dungeon. But +that fellow Streight would outwit the Devil. He was the most unruly +customer I've had in the twenty months I've been here. I put him in +keep, time and again, but I never could cool him down."</p> + +<p>"Whar' is the keeps?" I asked. "Ye's got lots o' them, ha'n't ye?"</p> + +<p>"No,—only six. Step this way, and I'll show you."</p> + +<p>"Talk better English," said the Judge, as we fell a few paces behind +Turner on our way to the front of the building. "There are some +schoolmasters in Georgia."</p> + +<p>"Wal, thar' ha'n't,—not in the part I come from."</p> + +<p>The dungeons were low, close, dismal apartments, about twelve feet +square, boarded off from the remainder of the cellar, and lighted only +by a narrow grating under the sidewalk. Their floors were incrusted with +filth, and their walls stained and damp with the rain, which, in wet +weather, had dripped down from the street.</p> + +<p>"And how many does ye commonly lodge yere, when yer hotel's full?" I +asked.</p> + +<p>"I have had twenty in each, but fifteen is about as many as they +comfortably hold."</p> + +<p>"I reckon! And then the comfut moughtn't be much ter brag on."</p> + +<p>The keeper soon invited us to walk into the adjoining basement. I was a +few steps in advance of him, taking a straight course to the entrance, +when a sentinel, pacing to and fro in the middle of the apartment, +levelled his musket so as to bar my way, saying, as he did so,—</p> + +<p>"Ye carn't pass yere, Sir. Ye must gwo round by the wall."</p> + +<p>This drew my attention to the spot, and I noticed that a space, about +fifteen feet square, in the centre of the room, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_724" id="Page_724">[Pg 724]</a></span> directly in front +of the sentinel, had been recently dug up with a spade. While in all +other places the ground was trodden to the hardness and color of +granite, this spot seemed to be soft, and had the reddish-yellow hue of +the "sacred soil." Another sentry was pacing to and fro on its other +side, so that the place was completely surrounded! Why were they +guarding it so closely? The reason flashed upon me, and I said to +Turner;—</p> + +<p>"I say, how many barr'ls hes ye in thar'?"</p> + +<p>"Enough to blow this shanty to ——," he answered, curtly.</p> + +<p>"I reckon! Put 'em thar' when thet feller Dahlgreen wus a-gwine ter +rescue 'em,—the Yankees?"</p> + +<p>"I reckon."</p> + +<p>He said no more, but that was enough to reveal the black, seething hell +the Rebellion has brewed. Can there be any peace with miscreants who +thus deliberately plan the murder, at one swoop, of hundreds of unarmed +and innocent men?</p> + +<p>In this room, seated on the ground, or leaning idly against the walls, +were about a dozen poor fellows who the Judge told me were hostages, +held for a similar number under sentence of death by our Government. +Their dejected, homesick look, and weary, listless manner disclosed some +of the horrors of imprisonment.</p> + +<p>"Let us go," I said to the Colonel; "I have had enough of this."</p> + +<p>"No,—you must see the up-stairs," said Turner. "It a'n't so gloomy up +there."</p> + +<p>It was not so gloomy, for some little sunlight did come in through the +dingy windows; but the few prisoners in the upper rooms wore the same +sad, disconsolate look as those in the lower story.</p> + +<p>"It is not hard fare, or close quarters, that kills men," said Judge +Ould to me; "it is homesickness; and the strongest and the bravest +succumb to it first."</p> + +<p>In the sill of an attic-window I found a Minié-ball. Prying it out with +my knife, and holding it up to Turner, I said,—</p> + +<p>"So ye keeps this room fur a shootin'-gallery, does ye?"</p> + +<p>"Yes," he replied, laughing. "The boys practise once in a while on the +Yankees. You see, the rules forbid their coming within three feet of the +windows. Sometimes they do, and then the boys take a pop at them."</p> + +<p>"And sometimes hit 'em? Hit many on 'em?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, a heap."</p> + +<p>We passed a long hour in the Libby, and then visited Castle Thunder and +the hospitals for our wounded. I should be glad to describe what I saw +in those "institutions," but the limits of my paper forbid it.</p> + +<p>It was five o'clock when we bade the Judge a friendly good-bye, and took +our seats in the ambulance. As we did so, he said to us,—</p> + +<p>"I have not taken your parole, Gentlemen. I shall trust to your honor +not to disclose anything you have seen or heard that might operate +against us in a military way."</p> + +<p>"You may rely upon us, Judge; and, some day, give us a chance to return +the courtesy and kindness you have shown to us. We shall not forget it."</p> + +<p>We arrived near the Union lines just as the sun was going down. Captain +Hatch, who had accompanied us, waved his flag as we halted near a grove +of trees, and a young officer rode over to us from the nearest +picket-station. We despatched him to General Foster for a pair of +horses, and in half an hour entered the General's tent. He pressed us to +remain to dinner, proposing to kill the fatted calf,—"for these my sons +were dead and are alive again, were lost and are found."</p> + +<p>We let him kill it, (it tasted wonderfully like salt pork,) and in half +an hour were on our way to General Butler's head-quarters.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>Here ended our last day in Dixie, and here, perhaps, should end this +article; but the time has come when I can disclose my real purpose in +seeking an audience<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_725" id="Page_725">[Pg 725]</a></span> of the Rebel leader; and as such a disclosure may +relieve me, in the minds of candid men, from some of the aspersions cast +upon my motives by Rebel sympathizers, I willingly make it. In making +it, however, I wish to be understood as speaking only for myself. My +companion, Colonel Jaquess, while he fully shared in my motives, and +rightly estimated the objects I sought to accomplish, had other, and, it +may be, higher aims. And I wish also to say, that to him attaches +whatever credit is due to any one for the conception and execution of +this "mission." While I love my country as well as any man, and in this +enterprise cheerfully perilled my life to serve it, I was only his +co-worker: I should not have undertaken it alone.</p> + +<p>No reader of this magazine is so young as not to remember, that, between +the first of June and the first of August last, a Peace simoom swept +over the country, throwing dust into the people's eyes, and threatening +to bury the nation in disunion. All at once the North grew tired of the +war. It began to count the money and the blood it had cost, and to +overlook the great principles for which it was waged. Men of all shades +of political opinion—radical Republicans, as well as honest +Democrats—cried out for concession, compromise, armistice,—for +anything to end the war,—anything but disunion. To that the North would +not consent, and peace I knew could not be had without it, I knew that, +because on the sixteenth of June, Jeff. Davis had said to a prominent +Southerner that he would negotiate only on the basis of Southern +Independence, and that declaration had come to me only five days after +it was made.</p> + +<p>The people, therefore, were under a delusion. They were crying out for +peace when there was no peace,—when there <i>could</i> be no peace +consistent with the interest and security of the country. The result of +this delusion, were it not dispelled, would be that the Chicago +Convention, or some other convention, would nominate a man pledged to +peace, but willing to concede Southern independence, and on that tide of +popular frenzy he would sail into the Presidency. Then the deluded +people would learn, too late, that peace meant only disunion. They would +learn it too late, because power would then be in the hands of a Peace +Congress and a Peace President, and it required no spirit of prophecy to +predict what such an Administration would do. It would make peace on the +best terms it could get; and the best terms it could get were Disunion +and Southern Independence.</p> + +<p>The Peace epidemic could be stayed, and the consequent danger to the +country averted, it seemed to me, only by securing in a tangible form, +and before a trustworthy witness, the ultimatum of the Rebel President. +That ultimatum, spread far and wide, would convince every honest +Northern man that war was the only road to lasting peace.</p> + +<p>To get that ultimatum, and to give it to the four winds of heaven, were +my real objects in going to Richmond.</p> + +<p>I did not shut my eyes to the possibility of our paving the way for +negotiations that might end in peace, nor my ears to the blessings a +grateful nation would shower on us, if our visit had such a result; but +I did not <i>expect</i> these things. I expected to be smeared from head to +foot with Copperhead slime, to be called a knight-errant, a seeker after +notoriety, an abortive negotiator, and a meddlesome volunteer +diplomatist; but I expected also, if a good Providence spared our lives, +and my pen did not forget the English language, to be able to tell the +North the truth; and I knew that the <i>Truth</i> would stay the Peace +epidemic, and kill the Peace party. And by the blessing of God, and the +help of the Devil, it did do that. The Devil helped, for he inspired Mr. +Benjamin's circular, and that forced home the bolt we had driven, and +shivered the Peace party into a million of fragments, every fragment now +a good War man until the old flag shall float again all over the +country.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_726" id="Page_726">[Pg 726]</a></span></p> + +<p>If we accomplished this, "the scoffer need not laugh, nor the judicious +grieve," for our mountain did not bring forth a mouse,—our "mission to +Richmond" was not a failure.</p> + +<p>It was a difficult enterprise. At the outset it seemed wellnigh +impossible to gain access to Mr. Davis; but we finally did gain it, and +we gained it without official aid. Mr. Lincoln did not assist us. He +gave us a pass through the army-lines, stated on what terms he would +grant amnesty to the Rebels, and said, "Good-bye, good luck to you," +when we went away; and that is all he did.</p> + +<p>It was also a hazardous enterprise,—no holiday adventure, no pastime +for boys. It was sober, serious, dangerous <i>work</i>,—and work for <i>men</i>, +for cool, earnest, fearless, determined men, who relied on God, who +thought more of their object than of their lives, and who, for truth and +their country, were ready to meet the prison or the scaffold.</p> + +<p>If any one doubts this, let him call to mind what we had to accomplish. +We had to penetrate an enemy's lines, to enter a besieged city, to tell +home truths to the desperate, unscrupulous leaders of the foulest +rebellion the world has ever known, and to draw from those leaders, +deep, adroit, and wary as they are, their real plans and purposes. And +all this we had to do without any official safeguard, while entirely in +their power, and while known to be their earnest and active enemies. One +false step, one unguarded word, one untoward event would have consigned +us to Castle Thunder, or the gallows.</p> + +<p>Can any one believe that men who undertake such work are mere lovers of +adventure, or seekers of notoriety? If any one does believe it, let him +pardon me, if I say that he knows little of human nature, and nothing of +human history.</p> + +<p>I am goaded to these remarks by the strictures of the Copperhead press, +but I make them in no spirit of boasting. God forbid that I should boast +of anything we did! For <i>we</i> did nothing. Unseen influences prompted us, +unseen friends strengthened us, unseen powers were all about our way. We +felt their presence as if they had been living men; and had we been +atheists, our experience would have convinced us that there is a <span class="smcap">God</span>, +and that He means that all men, everywhere, shall be free.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THE_VANISHERS" id="THE_VANISHERS"></a>THE VANISHERS.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sweetest of all childlike dreams<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In the simple Indian lore<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Still to me the legend seems<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of the Elves who flit before.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Flitting, passing, seen and gone,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Never reached nor found at rest,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Baffling search, but beckoning on<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To the Sunset of the Blest.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">From the clefts of mountain rocks,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Through the dark of lowland firs,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Flash the eyes and flow the locks<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of the mystic Vanishers!<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_727" id="Page_727">[Pg 727]</a></span><br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And the fisher in his skiff,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the hunter on the moss,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hear their call from cape and cliff,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">See their hands the birch-leaves toss.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wistful, longing, through the green<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Twilight of the clustered pines,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In their faces rarely seen<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Beauty more than mortal shines.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Fringed with gold their mantles flow<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On the slopes of westering knolls;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In the wind they whisper low<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of the Sunset Land of Souls.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Doubt who may, O friend of mine!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thou and I have seen them too;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On before with beck and sign<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Still they glide, and we pursue.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">More than clouds of purple trail<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In the gold of setting day;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">More than gleams of wing or sail<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Beckon from the sea-mist gray.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Glimpses of immortal youth,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Gleams and glories seen and lost,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Far-heard voices sweet with truth<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As the tongues of Pentecost,—<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Beauty that eludes our grasp,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sweetness that transcends our taste,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Loving hands we may not clasp,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shining feet that mock our haste,—<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Gentle eyes we closed below,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tender voices heard once more,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Smile and call us, as they go<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On and onward, still before.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Guided thus, O friend of mine!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Let us walk our little way,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Knowing by each beckoning sign<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That we are not quite astray.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Chase we still with baffled feet<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Smiling eye and waving hand,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sought and seeker soon shall meet,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Lost and found, in Sunset Land!<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_728" id="Page_728">[Pg 728]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="ICE_AND_ESQUIMAUX" id="ICE_AND_ESQUIMAUX"></a>ICE AND ESQUIMAUX.</h2> + + +<h3>CHAPTER I.</h3> + +<h4>OFF.</h4> + +<p>Good bye, Boston! Good bye to State-House and Common, to the "Atlantic +Monthly" and Governor Andrew, memorable institutions all,—to you also, +true Heart of the Commonwealth, and to republican and Saxon America, the +land where a man's a man even in the most inconvenient paucity of pounds +sterling. Still yours, I am weary of work and of war, weary of spinning +out ten yards of strength-fibre to twenty yards' length. And so when an +angel in moustache comes to me out of unknown space, with a card from +the "Atlantic Monthly," on a corner of which is written a mysterious +"Go, if you can," and says, "Come with me to Labrador," what can I do +but accept the omen? Therefore, after due delay, and due warning from +dear friends, and due consultations of the connubial Delphi, not +forgetting to advise with Dr. Oramel, the discreet lip obeys the instant +indiscreet wish, and says, "I go."</p> + + +<p><i>June 5, 1864.</i> Provincetown. Came in here to get cheated in buying a +boat, and succeeded admirably! It was taken on board, not quite breaking +beneath its own weight; the anchor soon followed; we were away. Past the +long spit of sand on the north and west; past the new batteries, over +which floated the flag that for months would not again gladden our eyes, +save at the mast-head of some wandering ship; then, with change of +course, past the long curving neck of the desert cape; and so out upon +the open ocean we sped, with a free wind, a crested wave, and a white +wake. The land grew a low, blue cloud in the west, then melted into the +horizon. But before it faded, the heart of one man clung to it, +regretful, penitent, saying, "It was not well to go; it were better to +have stayed and suffered, as you, O Land, must suffer."</p> + +<p>But when it was gone; then the Before built to itself also a cloudland +and drew me on. The mystic North reached forth the wand by which it had +fascinated me so often, and renewed its spell. Who has not felt it? +Thoreau wrote of "The Wild" as he alone could write; but only in the +North do you find it,—unless you make it, as he did, by your +imagination. And even he could in this but partially succeed. Talk of +finding it in a ten-acre swamp! Why, man, you are just from a cornfield, +the echoes of your sister's piano are still in your ears, and you called +at the post-office for a letter as you came! Verdure and a mild heaven +are above; <i>clunking</i> frogs and plants that keep company with man are +beneath. But in the North Nature herself is wild. Of man she has never +so much as heard. She has seen, perchance, a biped atomy creeping +through her snows; but he is not Man, lording it in power of thought and +performance; he is a muffled imbecility, that can do nothing but hug and +hide its existence, lest some careless breath of hers should blow it +out; his pin-head taper must be kept under a bushel, or cease to be even +the covert pettiness it is. The wildness of the North is not scenic and +pictorial merely, but goes to the very heart of things, immeasurable, +immitigable, infinite; deaf and blind to all but itself and its own, it +prevails, it is, and it is all.</p> + +<p>The desert and the sea are indeed untamable, but the North is more. They +hold their own, and Civilization is but a Mrs. Partington, trying to +sweep <i>in</i> at their doors. But Commerce, though it cannot subdue, +stretches its arms across them; while Culture and Travel go and come, +still wearing their plumes, still redolent with odors of civilized +lands. The North reigns more absolutely. Commerce is but a surf on its +shores. Travel creeps guardedly, fearfully in, only to turn and creep +still more fearfully out.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_729" id="Page_729">[Pg 729]</a></span></p> + +<p>We, indeed, are feeble even in our purposes of travel. Not Kanes, +Parrys, Franklins, not intrepid to brave the presence of the Arctic +Czar, and look on his very face, with its half-year lights and +shades,—we go only to see the skirts of his robe, blown southward by +summer-seeking winds. But even the hope of this fills the Before with +enchantment, and lures us like a charm.</p> + +<p>Lures the ship, too, one would think: for how she flies! Fair wind and +fog we had, where clear skies were looked for,—fair wind and clear +skies, where we had expected to plough fog; Cape Sable forbears for once +to hide itself; the shores of Nova Scotia are seen through an atmosphere +of crystal and under an azure without stain, and on the third day the +Gut of Canso is reached, and anchor cast in the little harbor of a +little, dirty, bluenose villagette, ycleped "Port Mulgrave."</p> + +<p>Port Mulgrave? Port Filth, Port Rum, Port Dirk-Knife, Port Prostitution, +Port Fish-Gurry, Port everything unsavory and unconscionable!</p> + +<p>"What news from the war?" asks Bradford of the first man, on landing.</p> + +<p>Answer prompt. "Good news! Grant has been beaten, lost seventeen +thousand men, and is making for Washington as fast as he can run!"</p> + +<p>Respondent's visage questionable, however,—too dirty, and too happy. +Hence further researches; and at last a man is found who (under +prospects of trade) can contrive to tell the truth; and he acknowledges +that even the Canadian telegraph has told no such story.</p> + +<p>In the evening, as some of us go on shore, there is a drunken fight. +Knives are drawn, great gashes given, blood runs like rain; the +combatants tumble together into a shallow dock, stab in the mud and +water, creep out and clench and roll over and over in the ooze, stabbing +still, with beast-like, unintelligible yells, and half-intelligible +curses. A great, nasty mob huddles round,—doing what, think you? +Roaring with laughter, and hooting their fish-gurry happiness up to the +welkin! Suddenly there is a surging among them; then Smith, our young +parson, ploughs through, springs upon the fighters, who owe to nothing +but extreme drunkenness their escape from the crime of murder. He +clutches them,—jerks one this way, the other that, heedless of the +still plunging knives,—fastens upon the worst hurt of the two, and +drags him off. Are the lookers-on abashed? Never think it! They +remonstrate! Smith jets at them fine sentences of fiery, rebuking +eloquence. "Bah!" they say, "this is nothing; we are used to it!" It was +their customary theatricals, their Spanish bull-fight; and they were +little inclined to be robbed of their show.</p> + +<p>"Smith, you ran great risk of your life," said one, as the intrepid man +stepped on board, with a great gout of blood on his sleeve; "and your +life is surely worth more by many times than that of the creatures you +rescued."</p> + +<p>"I know nothing about that; I only know that they have immortal souls, +and are not fit to die."</p> + +<p>"Nor to live either, unhappily," said another.</p> + +<p>There was cod- and cunner-fishing while here. Trout, also, were caught +in a pond a little inland,—good trout, too, though nothing, of course, +to what we shall find in Labrador! Enjoy, while ye may, short pleasures, +O trouters! for long tramps—and faces—are to succeed!</p> + + +<p><i>June 11.</i> After prolonged northeast rain a bright day, and with it the +setting of sail, a many-handed seesaw at the windlass, and departure.</p> + +<p>"Well rid of that vile hole!" says one and another.</p> + +<p>"Oh, but you'll be glad enough to see it three months hence," answers +the experienced Bradford.</p> + +<p>And we were!</p> + +<p>The wind blew briskly down the Gut; the tide also, which, especially on +the ebb, runs with force, helping to carry off the waters of the St. +Lawrence, was against us; and the deer-footed schooner made haste slowly +toward the west. Slower vessels failed, and were swept down by the tide; +we crept on, crept<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_730" id="Page_730">[Pg 730]</a></span> past the noble Porcupine Head, which rises abruptly +six hundred and forty feet from the sea, and at last, ceasing to tack, +made a straight line out into the Gulf of St. Lawrence, beautiful, most +beautiful, this day, if never before. It was a sweet sail we had across +that gulf, well-named and ill-reputed. The sun shone like southern +summer; the summer breeze blew mild; the rising shores and rich red soil +of Cape-Breton Isle, patched here and there with dark evergreen-forests, +and elsewhere by the lighter green of deciduous woods, lay on the +starboard side, warm-looking and welcome to the eyes. This shore, as +then seen, reminded me more than any other ever did of the Spanish coast +on the approach to Gibraltar,—the spruce woods answering in hue to +olive-groves, the other to the green of vines. Meanwhile, the +palpitating sheen on the land, the star-sprinkled blueness of the sea, +together with the softness of the delicious day, brought vividly to mind +those days in the Aegean when not even the disabilities of an invalid +could prevent his leaping over and swimming along by the ship's side.</p> + +<p>It was a great surprise, this climate and scene. I had expected chill +skies and bleak shores: I found the perfect pleasantness of summer in +the air, and a coast-scenery with which that of New England in general +cannot vie.</p> + +<p>Cape-Breton Isle is worthy of respect. With a population, if I remember +rightly, of some thirty thousand, and an area of more than three +thousand square miles, embracing an inland sea, or salt lake, deep +enough for ships-of-the-line, it has, in addition to its great mineral +wealth, a soil capable of large crops. Wheat and corn do not thrive, but +barley, oats, potatoes, and many root-crops grow abundantly. And I may +add, in passing, that Nova Scotia, over which I travelled on my return, +is worthy of a better repute. On the ocean side there is, indeed, a +strip from twenty to forty miles wide which is barren as the "Secesh" +heart of Halifax. The rock here is metamorphic, the soil worthless, the +scenery rugged, yet mean. Gold is found,—in such quantities that the +labor of each man yields a <i>gross</i> result of two hundred and fifty-six +dollars a year! Deduct the cost of crushing the quartz, (for it is found +only in quartz,) and there is left—how much? But the Gulf-coast, and +the side of the province next the Bay of Fundy, have a carboniferous and +red-sandstone formation, with a soil often deep and rich, faultless +meads and river-intervals, and a tender shore-scenery, relieved by ruddy +cliffs, and high, broken, burnt-umber islands.</p> + +<p>But we are sailing up the Gulf. And while the day shines and wanes, and +the shades of evening, suffused with tender color, fall gently, and the +Gulf to the west is deeply touched with veiled, but glowing crimson, +when the sun is down, and on the other hand Cape-Breton Isle puts forth, +close to our course, two small representative islands, red sandstone, +charmingly ruddy under the sunset light,—while a mild wind, sinking, +but not ceasing, bears us on through daylight, twilight, starlight, each +perfect of its kind,—let me introduce our voyagers severally to the +reader.</p> + +<p>First, the ship, surely a voyager as much as any of us!</p> + +<p>"Benjamin S. Wright," fore-and-aft schooner, one hundred and thirty-six +tons, built by McKay, and worthy of him,—deep, sharp, broad of beam, a +fine seaboat, swift as the wind, a little long-masted for regular +sea-voyaging, but, with this partial exception, faultless.</p> + +<p>Next will naturally come the responsible originator and operator of the +expedition.</p> + +<p>William Bradford, artist,—slight in stature, delicate, though marked, +in feature,—sensitive, pious, ardent, absorbed,—not of distinguished +mental power, though of active mind, aside from his profusion, but +within it a proper man of genius, with no superior, so far as I know, +but Turner, and no equal but Stanfield, in his power to render the sea +in action.</p> + +<p>The passengers were twelve in number; but with them I include two +others,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_731" id="Page_731">[Pg 731]</a></span> who have a claim to that company. Here they are.</p> + +<p>A——, "the Colonel,"—a lieutenant in the regular army, retired on +account of illness,—brave, intelligent, cultivated, a Churchman +undeveloped in spiritual sense, rough in his sports, proud as a Roman, +his whole being, indeed, built up on manly, Roman pride,—a Greenland +voyager, and better read than any man I have met in the literature of +Northern travel.</p> + +<p>H——, "the Judge,"—cool-headed, warm-hearted, compassionate, +irascible, liberal, witty, easy speaker and fine conversationist, with +an inexhaustible fund of sense, anecdote, candor, and good heart.</p> + +<p>L——, navy-surgeon,—also retired on account of extreme illness,—a +sensible, quiet, good man and gentleman.</p> + +<p>A. S. Packard, Jr., <i>Magister Artium</i>, scientist,—devoting his +attention chiefly to Insecta, Mollusca, and Radiata, but giving +penetrating glances at geology and physical geography,—attracted to the +North, where he had been before,—imperturbable, equal in humor and +good-humor, companionable, a boon to the party, and richly meriting the +thanks I here offer him.</p> + +<p>M——, ornithologist,—young, unripe, inattentive to his person, but +very intelligent, and bound to be a man of mark.</p> + +<p>S——, "the Parson,"—Episcopal, twenty-five years old, active in mind, +naturally eloquent, pious, social, genial, generous, and frank as the +day.</p> + +<p>P——, graduate of college and law-school,—handsome, companionable, +fluent in writing or talk, and excellent at trolling a stave.</p> + +<p>L——, quietest mouse in the world, but seen at once to be a gentleman, +and found afterwards to be a man of thought and culture.</p> + +<p>C——, with the gravest, maturest, most thoughtful and balanced mind, +and one of the happiest appetites I ever found in a boy of fourteen, +singularly ingenuous and high-minded, a rare spirit.</p> + +<p>P——, photographer, skilful, and a good fellow.</p> + +<p>W——, whose wife is enviable among women.</p> + +<p>Captain H——, employed by Bradford, not as master, but as general +ally,—old whaler, one of Nature's noblemen, to whom experience has been +a university and the world a book, strong as the strongest of men, +tender as the tenderest of women.</p> + +<p>Ph——, fine Greek and Latin scholar, rich as Crœsus and simple in +his habits as Ochiltree,—passionately fond of travel,—as well read, I +will undertake to say, in the literature of travel in Egypt, Arabia, +Syria, and Turkey, as any other man twenty-five years old in Europe or +America,—full of facts, strong in mind, deep In heart, religious, +candid, sincere, courageous, at once frank and reticent,—a thoroughly +large and profound nature, whom it was worth going to Labrador to meet.</p> + +<p>Finally, your humble servant, "the Elder," who trusts that the reader +remembers meeting him before, and has somewhat, at least, of his own +pleasure in renewing the acquaintance.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>The morning of June twelfth, our second Sunday on board, was one to +remain memorable among mornings for beauty,—for these were halcyon +days, and Nature could not change for a moment from her mood. It was +nowise odd or strange, no Nubian of Thibetan beauty, no three-faced +Hindoo divinity, but a regular Grecian-featured Apollo, amber in +forehead, fitly arrayed, coming to a world worthy of him. Cape-Breton +Isle was a strip of denser sky on the southeast horizon; on the west, +far away, rose Entry Island, one of the Magdalen group, deliciously +ruddy and Mediterranean-looking, seen through the lovely, ethereal, +purple haze; while others of the group appeared farther away, one of +them, long and low, an island of absolute gold, polished gold, splendid +as gold under sunshine can be. The light wind bore us on so serenely<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_732" id="Page_732">[Pg 732]</a></span> as +to give the sense of calm more than calm itself; while the music of our +motion through the water, that incomparable barytone, rendered this calm +into sound.</p> + +<p>It was the very Sabbath and Sunday of Nature,—her Sabbath of rest, and +her Sunday of joy. I was surprised to find myself not surprised by this +wonderful morning. It seemed not new nor foreign, but suggested some +divine old-time familiarity and fellowship. It looked me in the eyes out +of its immortal hilarity and peace, took me by the hand, and said, +"Forever!" And in that "Forever" spoke to me an infinite remembrance and +an infinite hope.</p> + +<p>At eleven <span class="smcap">A. M.</span> we drew near to Gannet Rocks. These are three in number, +all high, one quite small and conical, a second somewhat larger, the +third, which is the home of gannets, several acres in extent. They were +all ruddy, being of red sandstone; and the smallest, in that warm light, +was actual carmine. The largest rises with precipitous sides, which in +parts beetle far over the sea, to a height of four hundred feet, having +above a surface nearly level, but sloping gently to the south. By zigzag +scrambling one may at a particular point climb to this surface; but it +is a hard climb, and a landing can be effected only in extreme calm.</p> + +<p>At the distance of two miles or more, on our approach, the surface was +visible, owing to its slight southward slope. It had precisely the +appearance of being deeply covered with snow, save in one part, about a +fourth of its area, where it was bright green. We knew that this snow +was no other than the female gannets, crowded together in the act of +sitting on their eggs; but by no inspection with powerful glasses could +we discern a single point where the rock appeared between them. They +were literally <i>packed</i> together, every inch of room being used. Six or +eight acres of them!</p> + +<p>But where are the males? There is no apparent room for them on the rock. +Just as this question occurred to me, some one cried out, "Look in the +air! look in the air above the rock!" I lifted my glass, and there they +were, a veritable <i>cloud</i>. They reminded me, saving the color, of a +cloud of midges which astonished me one summer evening when I was a +boy,—so thick that you could not see through them. Whether these ever +alight I cannot say. One thing is certain: they cannot all, nor any +considerable portion of them, alight on this rock together,—unless, +indeed, one should roost on another's back.</p> + +<p>But the gannet is not particular about alighting. It is just as cheap +flying, he thinks. His true home, like that of the frigate-bird and one +or two others, is the air. This is indicated in his structure. The skin +is not, as in most animals, strictly connected with the flesh, but is +attached by separate elastic fibres; and, like the frigate-bird, it can +force in under the skin, and into various cellular passages in the body, +air which is rarefied by its animal heat, and contributes greatly to its +buoyancy.</p> + +<p>The gannet is a handsome bird, larger by measurement, though not +heavier, than the largest gulls,—snow-white, save the outer third of +the wing, which is jet-black,—his wings long and sharp,—his motion in +the air not rapid, but singularly home-like and easy. He is unable to +rise from level ground, but must launch himself from a height, probably +owing to his shortness and inelasticity of leg and length of wing; nor, +indeed, can he rise from the water, unless somewhat assisted by its +motion. And this suggests a beautiful provision of Nature: the wings of +all true swimmers and divers are short and-round, to facilitate their +ascent from the water.</p> + +<p>If surprised on land, the gannet neither attempts to fly nor offers +resistance, conscious of helplessness; but when attacked in the water, +where he is more at home, he will fight fiercely. Nuttall, with grange +contradiction, says, that, though web-footed, they do not swim,—yet +elsewhere speaks of looking down from a cliff and seeing them "swimming +and chasing their prey." I cannot testify.</p> + +<p>After lingering an hour or two, "breaking<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_733" id="Page_733">[Pg 733]</a></span> the Sabbath," the schooner +proceeded,—the wind freshening during the afternoon, and the Gulf +growing choppy, as if it could not quite suffer us to pass without +exhibiting somewhat of that peevish quality for which it has an evil +renown. It was but a passing wrinkle of ill-humor, however,—a feeble +hint of what it could do, if it chose.</p> + +<p>And when we recrossed it, two and a half months later, it chose!</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p><i>June 14.</i> "Land ho! Labrador!"</p> + +<p>"Where? Where is it?" cry a chorus of voices.</p> + +<p>"There, a little on the larboard bow."</p> + +<p>A long, silent, rather disconcerted gaze.</p> + +<p>"I don't see it," says one.</p> + +<p>"Nor I."</p> + +<p>"There,—there,"—pointing,—"close down to the sea."</p> + +<p>"You don't mean that cloud?"</p> + +<p>"I mean that land."</p> + +<p>"Humph!"</p> + +<p>There is something occult about this art of seeing land. The landsman's +eyesight is good; he prides himself a little upon it. He looks; and for +him the land isn't there. The seaman's eyesight is no better; he looks, +and for him the land is so plainly in view that he cannot understand +your failure to see it. He is secretly pleased, though,—and may pretend +impatience in order to conceal his pleasure. I have sailed in all, +perhaps, a distance equal to that around the earth, a good proportion of +it along-shore; and I see as far as most men. But once on this very +voyage, during a storm, I had occasion to be convinced that nautical +optics will assert their advantage. Land was pointed out; it had been +some time seen, and we were avoiding it, the weather being thick and our +position uncertain. I did my best to descry it, ready to quarrel with my +eyes for not doing so, and a little annoyed to find myself but a +landsman after all. But see it I couldn't. I did indeed, after a while, +make out to fancy that I perceived an infinitesimal densening of the +mist there; but the illusion was one difficult to sustain.</p> + +<p>At four o'clock in the afternoon we cast anchor in Sleupe Harbor, named +for one Admiral Sleupe, of whom I know just this, that a harbor in +Labrador, Lat. 51°, is named for him. This region, however, is named +generally from Little Mecatina Island, which lies about six miles to the +southwest, considerable in size, and a most wild-looking land, tossed, +tumbled, twisted, and contorted in every conceivable and inconceivable +way. The harbor, too, a snug little hole between islands, was worthy of +Labrador. Its shores were all of gray, unbroken rock, not rising in +cliffs, but sloping to the sea, and dipping under it in regular decline, +like a shore of sand; while not a tree, not a shrub, not a grass-blade, +was to be seen. I never beheld a scene so bleak, bare, and hard. Nor did +I ever see a shore that seemed so completely "master of the situation." +The mightiest cliff confesses the power which it resists. Grand, +enduring, awful, it may be; but many a scar on its face and many a +fragment at its feet tells of what it endures. But this scarless gray +rock, thrusting its hand in a matter-of-course way under the sea, and +seeming to hold it as in a cup, suggested a quality so comfortably +immitigable that one's eyes grew cold in looking at it.</p> + +<p>Suddenly, "I see an inhabitant!" cries one.</p> + +<p>Yes, there he was, moving over the rock. Can you imagine how far away +and foreign he looked? The gray granite beneath him, the gray cloud +above him, seemed nearer akin. Instinctively, one thought of hastening +to a book of natural history for some description of the creature. Then +came the counter-thought, "This is a man!" And the attempt to realize +that fact put him yet farther, put him infinitely away. It was like +rebounding from a wall. No form is so foreign as the human, if a bar be +placed to the sympathy of him who regards it; and for the time this waif +of humanity walked in the circle of an unconquerable strangeness.</p> + +<p>He came on board,—another with<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_734" id="Page_734">[Pg 734]</a></span> him; for their hut was near by. +Canadian French they proved to be; could tatter English a little; and +with the passage of speech the flow of sympathy began, and we felt them +to be human. Through the Word the worlds were made!</p> + +<p>A wilderness of desert islands lies at this point along the coast, +extending out, I judged, not less than fifteen miles. Excepting Little +Mecatina, which is a number of miles in length, and must be some fifteen +hundred feet high, they are not very considerable either in area or +elevation,—from five to five hundred acres in extent, and from thirty +to two hundred feet in height. They are swardless and treeless, though +in two places I found a few blades of coarse, tawny-green grass; and +patches of sombre shrubbery, two and a half feet high, were not wanting. +Little lichen grows on the rock, though in the depressions and on many +of the slopes grows, or at least exists, a boggy greenish-gray moss, +over which it breaks your knees—if, indeed, your spine do not choose to +monopolize that enjoyment—to travel long. The rock is pale granite, +disposed in layers, which vary from two to ten or twelve feet in +thickness. These incline at an angle of from ten to twenty degrees, +giving to the islands, as a predominant characteristic, a regular slope +on one side and a cliff-like aspect on the other; though not a few are +bent up in the middle, perhaps exhibiting there some sharp ridge or +vertical wall, while from this they decline to either side.</p> + +<p>As beheld on the day of our arrival, this scenery was of an incomparable +desolation. Above was the coldest gray sky I remember to have seen; the +sea lay all in pallid, deathly gray beneath; islands in all shades of +grimmer and grimmest gray checkered it; vast drifts of gray old snow +filled the deeper hollows; and a heartless atmosphere pushed in the +sense of this grayness to the very marrow. It was as if all the ruddy +and verdurous juices had died in the veins of the world, and from core +to surface only gray remained. To credit fully the impression of the +scene, one would say that Existence was dead, and that we stood looking +on its corpse, which even in death could never decay. Eternal +Desolation,—Labrador!</p> + +<p>But extremes meet.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THE_PROCESS_OF_SCULPTURE" id="THE_PROCESS_OF_SCULPTURE"></a>THE PROCESS OF SCULPTURE.</h2> + + +<p>I have heard so much, lately, about artists who do not do their own +work, that I feel disposed to raise the veil upon the mysteries of the +studio, and enable those who are interested in the subject to form a +just conception of the amount of assistance to which a sculptor is +fairly entitled, as well as to correct the false, but very general +impression, that the artist, beginning with the crude block, and guided +by his imagination only, hews out his statue with his own hands.</p> + +<p>So far from this being the case, the first labor of the sculptor is upon +a small clay model; in which he carefully studies the composition of his +statue, the proportions, and the general arrangement of the drapery, +without regard to very careful finish of parts. This being accomplished, +and the small model cast in plaster, he employs some one to enlarge his +work to any size which he may require; and this is done by scale, and +with almost as much precision as the full-size and perfectly finished +model is afterwards copied in marble.</p> + +<p>The first step in this process is to form a skeleton of iron, the size +and strength of the iron rods corresponding to the size of the figure to +be modelled; and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_735" id="Page_735">[Pg 735]</a></span> here, not only strong hands and arms are requisite, +but the blacksmith with his forge, many of the irons requiring to be +heated and bent upon the anvil to the desired angle. This solid +framework being prepared, and the various irons of which it is composed +firmly wired and welded together, the next thing is to hang thereon a +series of crosses, often several hundred in number, formed by two bits +of wood, two or three inches in length, fastened together by wire, one +end of which is attached to the framework. All this is necessary for the +support of the clay, which would otherwise fall by its own weight. (I +speak here of Roman clay,—the clay obtained in many parts of England +and America being more properly potter's clay, and consequently more +tenacious.) The clay is then pressed firmly around and upon the irons +and crosses with strong hands and a wooden mallet, until, from a clumsy +and shapeless mass, it acquires some resemblance to the human form. When +the clay is properly prepared, and the work advanced as far as the +artist desires, his own work is resumed, and he then laboriously studies +every part, corrects his ideal by comparison with living models, copies +his drapery from actual drapery arranged upon the lay-figure, and gives +to his statue the last refinement of beauty.</p> + +<p>It will thus be seen that there is an intermediate stage, even in the +clay, when the work passes completely out of the sculptor's hands and is +carried forward by his assistant,—the work on which the latter is +employed, however, obviously requiring not the least exercise of +creative power, which is essentially the attribute of the artist. To +perform the part assigned him, it is not necessary that the assistant, +should be a man of imagination or refined taste,—it is sufficient that +he have simply the skill, with the aid of accurate measurements, to +construct the framework of iron and to copy the small model before him. +But in <i>originating</i> that small model, when the artist had nothing to +work from but the image existing in his own brain, imagination, refined +feeling, and a sense of grace were essential, and were called into +constant exercise. So, again, when the clay model returns into the +sculptor's hands, and the work approaches completion, often after the +labor of many months, it is he alone who infuses into the clay that +refinement and individuality of beauty which constitute his "style," and +which are the test of the greater or less degree of refinement of his +mind, as the force and originality of the conception are the test of his +intellectual power.</p> + +<p>The clay model having at last been rendered as perfect as possible, the +sculptor's work upon the statue is virtually ended; for it is then cast +in plaster and given into the hands of the marble-workers, by whom, +almost entirely, it is completed, the sculptor merely directing and +correcting the work as it proceeds. This disclosure, I am aware, will +shock the many, who often ingeniously discover traces of the sculptor's +hand where they do not exist. It is true, that, in some cases, the +finishing touches are introduced by the artist himself; but I suspect +that few who have accomplished and competent workmen give much of their +time to the mallet or the chisel, preferring to occupy themselves with +some new creation, or considering that these implements may be more +advantageously wielded by those who devote themselves exclusively to +their use. It is also true, that, although the process of transferring +the statue from plaster to marble is reduced to a science so perfect +that to err is almost impossible, yet much depends upon the workmen to +whom this operation is intrusted. Still, their position in the studio is +a subordinate one. They translate the original thought of the sculptor, +written in clay, into the language of marble. The translator may do his +work well or ill,—he may appreciate and preserve the delicacy of +sentiment and grace which were stamped upon the clay, or he may render +the artist's meaning coarsely and unintelligibly. Then it is that the +sculptor<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_736" id="Page_736">[Pg 736]</a></span> himself must reproduce his ideal in the marble, and breathe +into it that vitality which, many contend, only the artist can inspire. +But, whether skilful or not, the relation of these workmen to the artist +is precisely the same as that of the mere linguist to the author who, in +another tongue, has given to the world some striking fancy or original +thought.</p> + +<p>But the question when the clay <i>is</i> "properly prepared" forms the +debatable ground, and has already furnished a convenient basis for the +charge that it is never "properly prepared" for women-artists until it +is ready for the caster. I affirm, from personal knowledge, that this +charge is utterly without foundation,—and as it would be affectation in +me to ignore what has been so freely circulating upon this subject in +print, I take this opportunity of stating that I have never yet allowed +a statue to leave my studio, upon the clay model of which I had not +worked during a period of from four to eight months,—and further, that +I should choose to refer all those desirous of ascertaining the truth to +Mr. Nucci, who "prepares" my clay for me, rather than to my +brother-sculptor, in the <i>Via Margutta</i>, who originated the report that +I was an impostor. So far, however, as my designs are concerned, I +believe even he has not, as yet, found occasion to accuse me of drawing +upon other brains than my own.</p> + +<p>We women-artists have no objection to its being known that we employ +assistants; we merely object to its being supposed that it is a system +peculiar to <i>ourselves</i>. When Thorwaldsen was called upon to execute his +twelve statues of the Apostles, he designed and furnished the small +models, and gave them into the hands of his pupils and assistants, by +whom, almost exclusively, they were copied in their present colossal +dimensions. The great master rarely put his own hand to the clay; yet we +never hear them spoken of except as "Thorwaldsen's statues." When +Vogelberg accepted the commission to model his colossal equestrian +statue of Gustavus Adolphus, physical infirmity prevented the artist +from even mounting the scaffolding; but he made the small model, and +directed the several workmen employed upon the full-size statue in clay, +and we never heard it intimated that Vogelberg was not the sculptor of +that great work. Even Crawford, than whom none ever possessed a more +rapid or facile hand, could never have accomplished half the immense +amount of work which pressed upon him in his later years, had he not had +more than one pair of hands to aid him in giving outward form to the +images in his fertile brain. Nay, not to refer solely to artists who are +no longer among us, I could name many studios, both in Rome and England, +belonging to our brothers in Art, in which the assistant-modeller forms +as necessary a part of studio-"property" as the living model or the +marble-workers,—and many more, on a smaller scale, in which he lends a +helping hand whenever required. If there are a few instances in which +the sculptor himself conducts his clay model through every stage, it is +usually because pecuniary considerations prevent his employing a +professional modeller.</p> + +<p>I do not wish it to be supposed that Thorwaldsen's general practice was +such as I have described in the particular case referred to: probably no +artist ever studied or worked more carefully upon the clay model than +he. What I have stated was only with the view of showing to what extent +he felt himself justified in employing assistance. I am quite persuaded, +however, that, had Thorwaldsen and Vogelberg been women, and employed +one-half the amount of assistance they did in the cases mentioned, we +should long since have heard the great merit of their works attributed +to the skill of their workmen.</p> + +<p>Nor should we forget—to draw for examples upon a kindred art—how +largely the painters of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries relied +upon the mechanical<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_737" id="Page_737">[Pg 737]</a></span> skill of their pupils to assist them in producing +the great works which bear their names. All the painters of note of that +time, like many of the present day, had their pupils, to whom was +intrusted much of the laborious portion of their work, the master +furnishing the design and superintending its execution. Raphael, for +instance, could never have left one half the treasures of Art which +adorn the Vatican and enrich other galleries, had he depended solely +upon the rapidity of his own hand; and of the many frescos which exist +in the Farnese Palace, and are called "Raphael's frescos," there are but +two in which are to be traced the master's hand,—the Galatea, and one +of the compartments in the series representing the story of Cupid and +Psyche.</p> + +<p>It will thus be seen how large a portion of the manual labor which is +supposed to devolve entirely upon the artist is, and has always been, +really performed by other hands than his own. I do not state this fact +in a whisper, as if it were a great disclosure which involved the honor +of the artist; it is no secret, and there is no reason why it should be +so. The disclosure, it is true, will be received by all who regard +sculpture as simply a mechanical art with a feeling of disappointment. +They will brand the artist who cannot lay claim to the entire +manipulation of his statue, whether in clay or marble, as an +impostor,—nor will they resign the idea that the truly conscientious +sculptor will carve every ornament upon his sandals and polish every +button upon his drapery. But those who look upon sculpture as an +intellectual art, requiring the exercise of taste, imagination, and +delicate feeling, will never identify the artist who conceives, +composes, and completes the design with the workman who simply relieves +him from great physical labor, however delicate some portion of that +labor may be. It should be a recognized fact, that the sculptor is as +fairly entitled to avail himself of mechanical aid in the execution of +his work as the architect to call into requisition the services of the +stone-mason in the erection of his edifice, or the poet to employ the +printer to give his thoughts to the world. Probably the sturdy mason +never thinks much about proportion, nor the type-setter much about +harmony; but the master-minds which inspire the strong arm and cunning +finger with motion think about and study both. It is high time that some +distinction should be made between the labor of the hand and the labor +of the brain. It is high time, in short, that the public should +understand in what the sculptor's work properly consists, and thus +render less pernicious the representations of those who, either from +thoughtlessness or malice, dwelling upon the fact that assistance has +been employed in certain cases, without defining the limits of that +assistance, imply the guilt of imposture in the artists, and deprive +them, and more particularly women-artists, of the credit to which, by +talent or conscientious labor, they are justly entitled.</p> + +<p class="right"><span class="smcap">Harriet Hosmer.</span></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_738" id="Page_738">[Pg 738]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="BRYANTS_SEVENTIETH_BIRTHDAY" id="BRYANTS_SEVENTIETH_BIRTHDAY"></a>BRYANT'S SEVENTIETH BIRTHDAY.</h2> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O even-handed Nature! we confess<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This life that men so honor, love, and bless<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Has filled thine olden measure. Not the less<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">We count the precious seasons that remain;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Strike not the level of the golden grain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But heap it high with years, that earth may gain<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">What heaven can lose,—for heaven is rich in song:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Do not all poets, dying, still prolong<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Their broken chants amid the seraph throng,<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Where, blind no more, Ionia's bard is seen,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And England's heavenly minstrel sits between<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Mantuan and the wan-cheeked Florentine?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">This was the first sweet singer in the cage<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of our close-woven life. A new-born age<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Claims in his vesper song its heritage:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Spare us, oh, spare us long our heart's desire!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Moloch, who calls our children through the fire,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Leaves us the gentle master of the lyre.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">We count not on the dial of the sun<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The hours, the minutes, that his sands have run;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Rather, as on those flowers that one by one<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">From earliest dawn their ordered bloom display<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till evening's planet with her guiding ray<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Leads in the blind old mother of the day,<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">We reckon by his songs, each song a flower,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The long, long daylight, numbering hour by hour,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Each breathing sweetness like a bridal bower.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">His morning glory shall we e'er forget?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His noontide's full-blown lily coronet?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">His evening primrose has not opened yet;<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Nay, even if creeping Time should hide the skies<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In midnight from his century-laden eyes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Darkened like his who sang of Paradise,<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Would not some hidden song-bud open bright<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As the resplendent cactus of the night<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That floods the gloom with fragrance and with light?<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_739" id="Page_739">[Pg 739]</a></span><br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">How can we praise the verse whose music flows<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With solemn cadence and majestic close,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Pure as the dew that filters through the rose?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">How shall we thank him that in evil days<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He faltered never,—nor for blame, nor praise,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor hire, nor party, shamed his earlier lays?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But as his boyhood was of manliest hue,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So to his youth his manly years were true,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">All dyed in royal purple through and through!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">He for whose touch the lyre of Heaven is strung<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Needs not the flattering toil of mortal tongue:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let not the singer grieve to die unsung!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Marbles forget their message to mankind:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In his own verse the poet still we find,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In his own page his memory lives enshrined,<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">As in their amber sweets the smothered bees,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As the fair cedar, fallen before the breeze,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lies self-embalmed amidst the mouldering trees.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Poets, like youngest children, never grow<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Out of their mother's fondness. Nature so<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Holds their soft hands, and will not let them go,<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Till at the last they track with even feet<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her rhythmic footsteps, and their pulses beat<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Twinned with her pulses, and their lips repeat<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The secrets she has told them, as their own:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thus is the inmost soul of Nature known,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And the rapt minstrel shares her awful throne!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">O lover of her mountains and her woods,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her bridal chamber's leafy solitudes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where Love himself with tremulous step intrudes,<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Her snows fall harmless on thy sacred fire:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Far be the day that claims thy sounding lyre<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To join the music of the angel choir!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Yet, since life's amplest measure must be filled,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Since throbbing hearts must be forever stilled,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And all must fade that evening sunsets gild,<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Grant, Father, ere he close the mortal eyes<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That see a Nation's reeking sacrifice,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Its smoke may vanish from these blackened skies!<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_740" id="Page_740">[Pg 740]</a></span><br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then, when his summons comes, since come it must,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And, looking heavenward with unfaltering trust,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">He wraps his drapery round him for the dust,<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">His last fond glance will show him o'er his head<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Northern fires beyond the zenith spread<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In lambent glory, blue and white and red,—<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The Southern cross without its bleeding load,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The milky way of peace all freshly strowed,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And every white-throned star fixed in its lost abode!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class="smcap">November</span> 3, 1864.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="LEAVES_FROM_AN_OFFICERS_JOURNAL" id="LEAVES_FROM_AN_OFFICERS_JOURNAL"></a>LEAVES FROM AN OFFICER'S JOURNAL.</h2> + + +<h3>II.</h3> + +<p class="right"><span class="smcap">Camp Saxton</span>, near Beaufort, S.C.<br /> +<i>December 11, 1862.</i></p> + +<p>Haroun Alrashid, wandering in disguise through his imperial streets, +scarcely happened upon a greater variety of groups than I, in my evening +strolls among our own camp-fires.</p> + +<p>Beside some of these fires, the men are cleaning their guns or +rehearsing their drill,—beside others, smoking in silence their very +scanty supply of the beloved tobacco,—beside others, telling stories +and shouting with laughter over the broadest mimicry, in which they +excel, and in which the officers come in for a full share. The +everlasting "shout" is always within hearing, with its mixture of piety +and polka, and its castanet-like clapping of the hands. Then there are +quieter prayer-meetings, with pious invocations, and slow psalms, +"deaconed out" from memory by the leader, two lines at a time, in a sort +of wailing chant. Elsewhere, there are <i>conversazioni</i> around fires, +with a woman for queen of the circle,—her Nubian face, gay head-dress, +gilt necklace, and white teeth, all resplendent in the glowing light. +Sometimes the woman is spelling slow monosyllables out of a primer, a +feat which always commands all ears,—they rightly recognizing a mighty +spell, equal to the overthrowing of monarchs, in the magic assonance of +<i>cat</i>, <i>hat</i>, <i>pat</i>, <i>bat</i>, and the rest of it. Elsewhere, it is some +solitary old cook, some aged Uncle Tiff, with enormous spectacles, who +is perusing a hymn-book by the light of a pine splinter, in his deserted +cooking-booth of palmetto-leaves. By another fire there is an actual +dance, red-legged soldiers doing right-and-left, and +"now-lead-de-lady-ober," to the music of a violin which is rather +artistically played, and which may have guided the steps, in other days, +of Barnwells and Hugers. And yonder is a stump-orator perched on his +barrel, pouring out his exhortations to fidelity in war and in religion. +To-night for the first time I have heard an harangue in a different +strain, quite saucy, skeptical, and defiant, appealing to them in a sort +of French materialistic style, and claiming some personal experience of +warfare. "You don't know notin' about it, boys. You tink you's brave +enough; how you tink, if you stan' clar in de open field,—here you, an' +dar de Secesh? You's got to hab de right ting inside o' you.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_741" id="Page_741">[Pg 741]</a></span> You must +hab it 'served [preserved] in you, like dese yer sour plums dey 'serve +in de barr'l; you's got to harden it down inside o' you, or it's +notin'." Then he hit hard at the religionists:—"When a man's got de +sperit ob de Lord in him, it weakens him all out, can't hoe de corn." He +had a great deal of broad sense in his speech; but presently some others +began praying vociferously close by, as if to drown this free-thinker, +when at last he exclaimed, "I mean to fight de war through, an' die a +good sojer wid de last kick,—dat's <i>my</i> prayer!" and suddenly jumped +off the barrel. I was quite interested at discovering this reverse side +of the temperament, the devotional side preponderates so enormously, and +the greatest scamps kneel and groan in their prayer-meetings with such +entire zest. It shows that there is some individuality developed among +them, and that they will not become too exclusively pietistic.</p> + +<p>Their love of the spelling-book is perfectly inexhaustible,—they +stumbling on by themselves, or the blind leading the blind, with the +same pathetic patience which they carry into everything. The chaplain is +getting up a school-house, where he will soon teach them as regularly as +he can. But the alphabet must always be a very incidental business in a +camp.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p class="right"> +<i>December 14.</i> +</p> + +<p>Passages from prayers in the camp:—</p> + +<p>"Let me so lib dat when I die I shall <i>hab manners</i>, dat I shall know +what to say when I see my Heabenly Lord."</p> + +<p>"Let me lib wid de musket in one hand, an' de Bible in de oder,—dat if +I die at de muzzle ob de musket, die in de water, die on de land, I may +know I hab de bressed Jesus in my hand, an' hab no fear."</p> + +<p>"I hab lef' my wife in de land o' bondage; my little ones dey say eb'ry +night, Whar is my fader? But when I die, when de bressed mornin' rises, +when I shall stan' in de glory, wid one foot on de water an' one foot on +de land, den, O Lord, I shall see my wife an' my little chil'en once +more."</p> + +<p>These sentences I noted down, as best I could, beside the glimmering +camp-fire last night. The same person was the hero of a singular little +<i>contre-temps</i> at a funeral in the afternoon. It was our first funeral. +The man had died in hospital, and we had chosen a picturesque +burial-place above the river, near the old church, and beside a little +nameless cemetery, used by generations of slaves. It was a regular +military funeral, the coffin being draped with the American flag, the +escort marching behind, and three volleys fired over the grave. During +the services there was singing, the chaplain deaconing out the hymn in +their favorite way. This ended, he announced his text,—"This poor man +cried, and the Lord heard him, and delivered him out of all his +trouble." Instantly, to my great amazement, the cracked voice of the +chorister was uplifted, intoning the text, as if it were the first verse +of another hymn. So calmly was it done, so imperturbable were all the +black countenances, that I half began to conjecture that the chaplain +himself intended it for a hymn, though I could imagine no prospective +rhyme for <i>trouble</i>, unless it were approximated by <i>debbil</i>,—which is, +indeed, a favorite reference, both with the men and with his Reverence. +But the chaplain, peacefully awaiting, gently repeated his text after +the chant, and to my great relief the old chorister waived all further +recitative and let the funeral discourse proceed.</p> + +<p>Their memories are a vast bewildered chaos of Jewish history and +biography; and most of the great events of the past, down to the period +of the American Revolution, they instinctively attribute to Moses. There +is a fine bold confidence in all their citations, however, and the +record never loses piquancy in their hands, though strict accuracy may +suffer. Thus, one of my captains, last Sunday, heard a colored exhorter +at Beaufort proclaim, "Paul may plant, <i>and may polish wid water</i>, but +it won't do," in which the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_742" id="Page_742">[Pg 742]</a></span> sainted Apollos would hardly have recognized +himself.</p> + +<p>Just now one of the soldiers came to me to say that he was about to be +married to a girl in Beaufort, and would I lend him a dollar and +seventy-five cents to buy the wedding outfit? It seemed as if matrimony +on such moderate terms ought to be encouraged, in these days; and so I +responded to the appeal.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p class="right"> +<i>December 16.</i> +</p> + +<p>To-day a young recruit appeared here, who had been the slave of Colonel +Sammis, one of the leading Florida refugees. Two white companions came +with him, who also appeared to be retainers of the Colonel, and I asked +them to dine. Being likewise refugees, they had stories to tell, and +were quite agreeable: one was English-born, the other Floridian, a dark, +sallow Southerner, very well-bred. After they had gone, the Colonel +himself appeared. I told him that I had been entertaining his white +friends, and after a while he quietly let out the remark,—</p> + +<p>"Yes, one of those white friends of whom you speak is a boy raised on +one of my plantations; he has travelled with me to the North and passed +for white, and he always keeps away from the negroes."</p> + +<p>Certainly no such suspicion had ever crossed my mind.</p> + +<p>I have noticed one man in the regiment who would easily pass for +white,—a little sickly drummer, aged fifty at least, with brown eyes +and reddish hair, who is said to be the son of one of our commodores. I +have seen perhaps a dozen persons as fair or fairer, among fugitive +slaves, but they were usually young children. It touched me far more to +see this man, who had spent more than half a lifetime in this low +estate, and for whom it now seemed too late to be anything but a +"nigger." This offensive word, by the way, is almost as common with them +as at the North, and far more common than with well-bred slave-holders. +They have meekly accepted it. "Want to go out to de nigger-houses, Sah," +is the universal impulse of sociability, when they wish to cross the +lines. "He hab twenty house-servants, an' two hundred head o' nigger," +is a still more degrading form of phrase, in which the epithet is +limited to the field-hands, and they estimated like so many cattle. This +want of self-respect of course interferes with the authority of the +non-commissioned officers, which is always difficult to sustain, even in +white regiments. "He needn't try to play de white man ober me," was the +protest of a soldier against his corporal the other day. To counteract +this, I have often to remind them that they do not obey their officers +because they are white, but because they are their officers; and +guard-duty is an admirable school for this, because they readily +understand that the sergeant or corporal of the guard has for the time +more authority than any commissioned officer who is not on duty. It is +necessary also for their superiors to treat the non-commissioned +officers with careful courtesy, and I often caution the line-officers +never to call them "Sam" or "Will," nor omit the proper handle to their +names. The value of the habitual courtesies of the regular army is +exceedingly apparent with these men: an officer of polished manners can +wind them round his finger, while white soldiers seem rather to prefer a +certain roughness. The demeanor of my men to each other is very +courteous, and yet I see none of that sort of upstart conceit which is +sometimes offensive among free negroes at the North, the dandy-barber +strut. This is an agreeable surprise, for I feared that freedom and +regimentals would produce precisely that.</p> + +<p>They seem the world's perpetual children, docile, gay, and lovable, in +the midst of this war for freedom on which they have intelligently +entered. Last night, before "taps," there was the greatest noise in camp +that I had ever heard, and I feared some riot. On going out, I found the +most tumultuous<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_743" id="Page_743">[Pg 743]</a></span> sham-fight proceeding in total darkness, two companies +playing like boys, beating tin cups for drums. When some of them saw me +they seemed a little dismayed, and came and said, +beseechingly,—"Cunnel, Sah, you hab no objection to we playin', +Sah?"—which objection I disclaimed; but soon they all subsided, rather +to my regret, and scattered merrily. Afterward I found that some other +officer had told them that I considered the affair too noisy, so that I +felt a mild self-reproach when one said, "Cunnel, wish you had let we +play a little longer, Sah." Still I was not sorry, on the whole; for +these sham-fights between companies would in some regiments lead to real +ones, and there is a latent jealousy here between the Florida and +South-Carolina men, which sometimes makes me anxious.</p> + +<p>The officers are more kind and patient with the men than I should +expect, since the former are mostly young, and drilling tries the +temper; but they are aided by hearty satisfaction in the results already +attained. I have never yet heard a doubt expressed among the officers as +to the <i>superiority</i> of these men to white troops in aptitude for drill +and discipline, because of their imitativeness and docility, and the +pride they take in the service. One captain said to me to-day, "I have +this afternoon taught my men to load-in-nine-times, and they do it +better than we did it in my former company in three months." I can +personally testify that one of our best lieutenants, an Englishman, +taught a part of his company the essential movements of the "school for +skirmishers" in a single lesson of two hours, so that they did them very +passably, though I feel bound to discourage such haste. However, I +"formed square" on the third battalion-drill. Three-fourths of drill +consist of attention, imitation, and a good ear for time; in the other +fourth, which consists of the application of principles, as, for +instance, performing by the left flank some movement before learned by +the right, they are perhaps slower than better-educated men. Having +belonged to five different drill-clubs before entering the army, I +certainly ought to know something of the resources of human awkwardness, +and I can honestly say that they astonish me by the facility with which +they do things. I expected much harder work in this respect.</p> + +<p>The habit of carrying burdens on the head gives them erectness of +figure, even where physically disabled. I have seen a woman, with a +brimming water-pail balanced on her head,—or perhaps a cup, saucer, and +spoon,—stop suddenly, turn round, stoop to pick up a missile, rise +again, fling it, light a pipe, and go through many evolutions with +either hand or both, without spilling a drop. The pipe, by the way, +gives an odd look to a well-dressed young girl on Sunday, but one often +sees that spectacle. The passion for tobacco among our men continues +quite absorbing, and I have piteous appeals for some arrangement by +which they can buy it on credit, as we have yet no sutler. Their +imploring, "Cunnel, we can't <i>lib</i> widout it, Sah," goes to my heart; +and as they cannot read, I cannot even have the melancholy satisfaction +of supplying them with the excellent anti-tobacco tracts of Mr. Trask.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p class="right"> +<i>December 19.</i> +</p> + +<p>Last night the water froze in the adjutant's tent, but not in mine. +To-day has been mild and beautiful. The blacks say they do not feel the +cold so much as the white officers do, and perhaps it is so, though +their health evidently suffers more from dampness. On the other hand, +while drilling on very warm days, they have seemed to suffer more from +heat than their officers. But they dearly love fire, and at night will +always have it, if possible, even on the minutest scale,—a mere handful +of splinters, that seems hardly more efficacious than a friction-match. +Probably this is a natural habit for the short-lived coolness of an +out-door country; and then there is something delightful in this rich +pine, which burns like<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_744" id="Page_744">[Pg 744]</a></span> a tar-barrel. It was perhaps encouraged by the +masters, as the only cheap luxury the slaves had at hand.</p> + +<p>As one grows more acquainted with the men, their individualities emerge; +and I find first their faces, then their characters, to be as distinct +as those of whites. It is very interesting the desire they show to do +their duty and to improve as soldiers; they evidently think about it, +and see the importance of the thing; they say to me that we white men +cannot stay and be their leaders always, and that they must learn to +depend on themselves, or else relapse into their former condition.</p> + +<p>Beside the superb branch of uneatable bitter oranges which decks my +tent-pole, I have to-day hung up a long bough of finger-sponge, which +floated to the riverbank. As winter advances, butterflies gradually +disappear: one species (a <i>Vanessa</i>) lingers; three others have vanished +since I came. Mocking-birds are abundant, but rarely sing; once or twice +they have reminded me of the red thrush, but are inferior, as I have +always thought. The colored people all say that it will be much cooler; +but my officers do not think so, perhaps because last winter was so +unusually mild,—with only one frost, they say.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p class="right"> +<i>December 20.</i> +</p> + +<p>Philoprogenitiveness is an important organ for an officer of colored +troops; and I happen to be well provided with it. It seems to be the +theory of all military usages, in fact, that soldiers are to be treated +like children; and these singular persons, who never know their own age +till they are past middle life, and then choose a birthday with such +precision,—"Fifty year old, Sah, de fus' last April,"—prolong the +privilege of childhood.</p> + +<p>I am perplexed nightly for counter-signs,—their range of proper names +is so distressingly limited, and they make such amazing work of every +new one. At first, to be sure, they did not quite recognize the need of +any variation: one night some officer asked a sentinel whether he had +the countersign yet, and was indignantly answered,—"Should tink I hab +'em, hab 'em for a fortnight"; which seems a long epoch for that magic +word to hold out. To-night I thought I would have "Fredericksburg," in +honor of Burnside's reported victory, using the rumor quickly, for fear +of a contradiction. Later, in comes a captain, gets the countersign for +his own use, but presently returns, the sentinel having pronounced it +incorrect. On inquiry, it appears that the sergeant of the guard, being +weak in geography, thought best to substitute the more familiar word, +"Crockery-ware"; which was, with perfect gravity, confided to all the +sentinels, and accepted without question. O life! what is the fun of +fiction beside thee?</p> + +<p>I should think they would suffer and complain, these cold nights; but +they say nothing, though there is a good deal of coughing. I should +fancy that the scarlet trousers must do something to keep them warm, and +wonder that they dislike them so much, when they are so much like their +beloved fires. They certainly multiply fire-light, in any case. I often +notice that an infinitesimal flame, with one soldier standing by it, +looks like quite a respectable conflagration, and it seems as if a group +of them must dispel dampness.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p class="right"> +<i>December 21.</i> +</p> + +<p>To a regimental commander no book can be so fascinating as the +consolidated Morning Report, which is ready about nine, and tells how +many in each company are sick, absent, on duty, and so on. It is one's +newspaper and daily mail; I never grow tired of it. If a single recruit +has come in, I am always eager to see how he looks on paper.</p> + +<p>To-night the officers are rather depressed by rumors of Burnside's being +defeated, after all. I am fortunately equable and undepressible; and it +is very convenient that the men know too little of the events of the war +to feel excitement or fear. They know General Saxton<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_745" id="Page_745">[Pg 745]</a></span> and me,—"de +General" and "de Cunnel,"—and seem to ask no further questions. We are +the war. It saves a great deal of trouble, while it lasts, this +childlike confidence; nevertheless, it is our business to educate them +to manhood, and I see as yet no obstacle. As for the rumor, the world +will no doubt roll round, whether Burnside is defeated or succeeds.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0"><i>Christmas Day.</i><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">"We'll fight for liberty<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till de Lord shall call us home;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">We'll soon be free<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till de Lord shall call us home."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>This is the hymn which the slaves at Georgetown, South Carolina, were +whipped for singing when President Lincoln was elected. So said a little +drummer-boy, as he sat at my tent's edge last night and told me his +story; and he showed all his white teeth as he added,—"Dey tink '<i>de +Lord</i>' meant for say de Yankees."</p> + +<p>Last night, at dress-parade, the adjutant read General Saxton's +Proclamation for the New-Year's Celebration. I think they understood it, +for there was cheering in all the company-streets afterwards. Christmas +is the great festival of the year for this people; but, with New-Year's +coming after, we could have no adequate programme for to-day, and so +celebrated Christmas Eve with pattern simplicity. We omitted, namely, +the mystic curfew which we call "taps," and let them sit up and burn +their fires and have their little prayer-meetings as late as they +desired; and all night, as I waked at intervals, I could hear them +praying and "shouting" and clattering with hands and heels. It seemed to +make them very happy, and appeared to be at least an innocent Christmas +dissipation, as compared with some of the convivialities of the +"superior race" hereabouts.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p class="right"> +<i>December 26.</i> +</p> + +<p>The day passed with no greater excitement for the men than +target-shooting, which they enjoyed. I had the private delight of the +arrival of our much-desired surgeon and his nephew, the captain, with +letters and news from home. They also bring the good tidings that +General Saxton is not to be removed, as had been reported.</p> + +<p>Two different stands of colors have arrived for us, and will be +presented at New-Year's,—one from friends in New York, and the other +from a lady in Connecticut. I see that "Frank Leslie's Illustrated +Weekly" of December twentieth has a highly imaginative picture of the +muster-in of our first company, and also of a skirmish on the late +expedition.</p> + +<p>I must not forget the prayer overheard last night by one of the +captains:—"O Lord! when I tink ob dis Kismas and las' year de Kismas. +Las' Kismas he in de Secesh, and notin' to eat but grits, and no salt in +'em. Dis year in de camp, and too much victual!" This "too much" is a +favorite phrase out of their grateful hearts, and did not in this case +denote an excess of dinner,—as might be supposed,—but of thanksgiving.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p class="right"> +<i>December 29.</i> +</p> + +<p>Our new surgeon has begun his work most efficiently: he and the chaplain +have converted an old gin-house into a comfortable hospital, with ten +nice beds and straw pallets. He is now, with a hearty professional +faith, looking round for somebody to put into it. I am afraid the +regiment will accommodate him; for, although he declares that these men +do not sham sickness, as he expected, their catarrh is an unpleasant +reality. They feel the dampness very much, and make such a coughing at +dress-parade that I have urged him to administer a dose of +cough-mixture, all round, just before that pageant. Are the colored race +<i>tough</i>? is my present anxiety; and it is odd that physical +insufficiency, the only discouragement not thrown in our way by the +newspapers, is the only discouragement which finds any place in our +minds. They are used to sleeping in-doors<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_746" id="Page_746">[Pg 746]</a></span> in winter, herded before +fires, and so they feel the change. Still, the regiment is as healthy as +the average, and experience will teach us something.<a name="FNanchor_B_2" id="FNanchor_B_2"></a><a href="#Footnote_B_2" class="fnanchor">[B]</a></p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p class="right"> +<i>December 30.</i> +</p> + +<p>On the first of January we are to have a slight collation, ten oxen or +so, barbecued,—or not properly barbecued, but roasted whole. Touching +the length of time required to "do" an ox, no two housekeepers appear to +agree. Accounts vary from two hours to twenty-four. We shall happily +have enough to try all gradations of roasting, and suit all tastes, from +Miss A.'s to mine. But fancy me proffering a spare-rib, well done, to +some fair lady! What ever are we to do for spoons and forks and plates? +Each soldier has his own, and is sternly held responsible for it by +"Army Regulations." But how provide for the multitude? Is it customary, +I ask you, to help to tenderloin with one's fingers? Fortunately, the +Major is to see to that department. Great are the advantages of military +discipline: for anything perplexing, detail a subordinate.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p class="right"> +<i>New-Year's Eve.</i> +</p> + +<p>My housekeeping at home is not, perhaps, on any very extravagant scale. +Buying beefsteak, I usually go to the extent of two or three pounds. Yet +when, this morning at daybreak, the quartermaster called to inquire how +many cattle I would have killed for roasting, I turned over in bed, and +answered composedly, "Ten,—and keep three to be fatted."</p> + +<p>Fatted, quotha! Not one of the beasts at present appears to possess an +ounce of superfluous flesh. Never were seen such lean kine. As they +swing on vast spits, composed of young trees, the fire-light glimmers +through their ribs, as if they were great lanterns. But no matter, they +are cooking,—nay, they are cooked.</p> + +<p>One at least is taken off to cool, and will be replaced to-morrow to +warm up. It was roasted three hours, and well done, for I tasted it. It +is so long since I tasted fresh beef that forgetfulness is possible; but +I fancied this to be successful. I tried to imagine that I liked the +Homeric repast, and certainly the whole thing has been far more +agreeable than was to be expected. The doubt now is, whether I have made +a sufficient provision for my household. I should have roughly guessed +that ten beeves would feed as many million people, it has such a +stupendous sound; but General Saxton predicts a small social party of +five thousand, and we fear that meat will run short, unless they prefer +bone. One of the cattle is so small, we are hoping it may turn out veal.</p> + +<p>For drink, we aim at the simple luxury of molasses-and-water, a barrel +per company, ten in all. Liberal housekeepers may like to know that for +a barrel of water we allow three gallons of molasses, half a pound of +ginger, and a quart of vinegar,—this last being a new ingredient for my +untutored palate, though all the rest are amazed at my ignorance. Hard +bread, with more molasses, and a dessert of tobacco, complete the +festive repast, destined to cheer, but not inebriate.</p> + +<p>On this last point, of inebriation, this is certainly a wonderful camp. +For us, it is absolutely omitted from the list of vices. I have never +heard of a glass of liquor in the camp, nor of any effort either to +bring it in or to keep it out. A total absence of the circulating-medium +might explain the abstinence,—not that it seems to have that effect +with white soldiers,—but it would not explain the silence. The craving +for tobacco is constant and not to be allayed, like that of a mother for +her children; but I have<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_747" id="Page_747">[Pg 747]</a></span> never heard whiskey even wished for, save on +Christmas Day, and then only by one man, and he spoke with a hopeless +ideal sighing, as one alludes to the Golden Age. I am amazed at this +total omission of the most inconvenient of all camp-appetites. It +certainly is not the result of exhortation, for there has been no +occasion for any, and even the pledge would scarcely seem efficacious +where hardly anybody can write.</p> + +<p>I do not think there is a great visible eagerness for to-morrow's +festival: it is not their way to be very jubilant over anything this +side of the New Jerusalem. They know also that those in this Department +are nominally free already, and that the practical freedom has to be +maintained, in any event, by military success. But they will enjoy it +greatly, and we shall have a multitude of people.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p class="right"> +<i>January 1, 1863</i> (evening). +</p> + +<p>A happy New-Year to civilized, people,—mere white folks. Our festival +has come and gone, with perfect success, and our good General has been +altogether satisfied. Last night the great fires were kept smouldering +in the pits, and the beeves were cooked more or less, chiefly +more,—during which time they had to be carefully watched, and the great +spits turned by main force. Happy were the merry fellows who were +permitted to sit up all night, and watch the glimmering flames that +threw a thousand fantastic shadows among the great gnarled oaks. And +such a chattering as I was sure to hear, whenever I awoke, that night!</p> + +<p>My first greeting to-day was from one of the most stylish sergeants, who +approached me with the following little speech, evidently the result of +some elaboration:—</p> + +<p>"I tink myself happy, dis New-Year's Day, for salute my own Cunnel. Dis +day las' year I was servant to a Cunnel ob Secesh; but now I hab de +privilege for salute my own Cunnel."</p> + +<p>That officer, with the utmost sincerity, reciprocated the sentiment.</p> + +<p>About ten o'clock the people began to collect by land, and also by +water,—in steamers sent by General Saxton for the purpose; and from +that time all the avenues of approach were thronged. The multitude were +chiefly colored women, with gay handkerchiefs on their heads, and a +sprinkling of men, with that peculiarly respectable look which these +people always have on Sundays and holidays. There were many white +visitors also,—ladies on horseback and in carriages, superintendents +and teachers, officers and cavalry-men. Our companies were marched to +the neighborhood of the platform, and allowed to sit or stand, as at the +Sunday services; the platform was occupied by ladies and dignitaries, +and by the band of the Eighth Maine, which kindly volunteered for the +occasion; the colored people filled up all the vacant openings in the +beautiful grove around, and there was a cordon of mounted visitors +beyond. Above, the great live-oak branches and their trailing moss; +beyond the people, a glimpse of the blue river.</p> + +<p>The services began at half-past eleven o'clock, with prayer by our +chaplain, Mr. Fowler, who is always, on such occasions, simple, +reverential, and impressive. Then the President's Proclamation was read +by Dr. W. H. Brisbane, a thing infinitely appropriate, a +South-Carolinian addressing South-Carolinians; for he was reared among +these very islands, and here long since emancipated his own slaves. Then +the colors were presented to us by the Rev. Mr. French, a chaplain who +brought them from the donors in New York. All this was according to the +programme. Then followed an incident so simple, so touching, so utterly +unexpected and startling, that I can scarcely believe it on recalling, +though it gave the key-note to the whole day. The very moment the +speaker had ceased, and just as I took and waved the flag, which now for +the first time meant anything to these poor people, there suddenly +arose, close beside the platform, a strong male voice, (but rather +cracked and elderly,) into<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_748" id="Page_748">[Pg 748]</a></span> which two women's voices instantly blended, +singing, as if by an impulse that could no more be repressed than the +morning note of the song-sparrow,—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"My Country, 'tis of thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sweet land of liberty,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of thee I sing!"<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>People looked at each other, and then at us on the platform, to see +whence came, this interruption, not set down in the bills. Firmly and +irrepressibly the quavering voices sang on, verse after verse; others of +the colored people joined in; some whites on the platform began, but I +motioned them to silence. I never saw anything so electric; it made all +other words cheap; it seemed the choked voice of a race at last +unloosed. Nothing could be more wonderfully unconscious; art could not +have dreamed of a tribute to the day of jubilee that should be so +affecting; history will not believe it; and when I came to speak of it, +after it was ended, tears were everywhere. If you could have heard how +quaint and innocent it was! Old Tiff and his children might have sung +it; and close before me was a little slave-boy, almost white, who seemed +to belong to the party, and even he must join in. Just think of it!—the +first day they had ever had a country, the first flag they had ever seen +which promised anything to their people, and here, while mere spectators +stood in silence, waiting for my stupid words, these simple souls burst +out in their lay, as if they were by their own hearths at home! When +they stopped, there was nothing to do for it but to speak, and I went +on; but the life of the whole day was in those unknown people's song.</p> + +<p>Receiving the flags, I gave them into the hands of two fine-looking men, +jet-black, as color-guard, and they also spoke, and very +effectively,—Sergeant Prince Rivers and Corporal Robert Sutton. The +regiment sang "Marching Along," and then General Saxton spoke, in his +own simple, manly way, and Mrs. Frances D. Gage spoke very sensibly to +the women, and Judge Stickney, from Florida, added something; then some +gentlemen sang an ode, and the regiment the John Brown song, and then +they went to their beef and molasses. Everything was very orderly, and +they seemed to have a very gay time. Most of the visitors had far to go, +and so dispersed before dress-parade, though the band stayed to enliven +it. In the evening we had letters from home, and General Saxton had a +reception at his house, from which I excused myself; and so ended one of +the most enthusiastic and happy gatherings I ever knew. The day was +perfect, and there was nothing but success.</p> + +<p>I forgot to say, that, in the midst, of the services, it was announced +that General Fremont was appointed Commander-in-Chief,—an announcement +which was received with immense cheering, as would have been almost +anything else, I verily believe, at that moment of high-tide. It was +shouted across by the pickets above,—a way in which we often receive +news, but not always trustworthy.</p> + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_B_2" id="Footnote_B_2"></a><a href="#FNanchor_B_2"><span class="label">[B]</span></a> A second winter's experience removed all this solicitude, +for they learned to take care of themselves. During the first February +the sick-list averaged about ninety, during the second about +thirty,—this being the worst month in the year, for blacks. Charity +ought, perhaps, to withhold the information that during the first winter +we had three surgeons, and during the second only one.</p></div> +</div> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_749" id="Page_749">[Pg 749]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="ENGLAND_AND_AMERICA" id="ENGLAND_AND_AMERICA"></a>ENGLAND AND AMERICA.</h2> + + +<p>I came to America to see and hear, not to lecture. But when I was +invited by the Boston "Fraternity" to lecture in their course, and +permitted to take the relations between England and America as my +subject, I did not feel at liberty to decline the invitation. England is +my country. To America, though an alien by birth, I am, as an English +Liberal, no alien in heart. I deeply share the desire of all my +political friends in England and of the leaders of my party to banish +ill-feeling and promote good-will between the two kindred nations. My +heart would be cold, if that desire were not increased by the welcome +which I have met with here. More than once, when called upon to speak, +(a task little suited to my habits and powers,) I have tried to make it +understood that the feelings of England as a nation towards you in your +great struggle had not been truly represented by a portion of our press. +Some of my present hearers may, perhaps, have seen very imperfect +reports of those speeches. I hope to say what I have to say with a +little more clearness now.</p> + +<p>There was between England and America the memory of ancient quarrels, +which your national pride did not suffer to sleep, and which sometimes +galled a haughty nation little patient of defeat. In more recent times +there had been a number of disputes, the more angry because they were +between brethren. There had been disputes about boundaries, in which +England believed herself to have been overreached by your negotiators, +or, what was still more irritating, to have been overborne because her +main power was not here. There had been disputes about the Right of +Search, in which we had to taste the bitterness, now not unknown to you, +of those whose sincerity in a good cause is doubted, when, in fact, they +are perfectly sincere. You had alarmed and exasperated us by your Ostend +manifesto and your scheme for the annexation of Cuba. In these +discussions some of your statesmen had shown towards us the spirit which +Slavery does not fail to engender in the domestic tyrant; while, +perhaps, some of our statesmen had been too ready to presume bad +intentions and anticipate wrong. In our war with Russia your sympathies +had been, as we supposed, strongly on the Russian side; and we—even +those among us who least approved the war—had been scandalized at +seeing the American Republic in the arms of a despotism which had just +crushed Hungary, and which stood avowed as the arch-enemy of liberty in +Europe. In the course of that war an English envoy committed a fault by +being privy to recruiting in your territories. The fault was +acknowledged; but the matter was pressed by your Government in a temper +which we thought showed a desire to humiliate, and a want of that +readiness to accept satisfaction, when frankly tendered, which renders +the reparation of an unintentional offence easy and painless between men +of honor. These wounds had been inflamed by the unfriendly criticism of +English writers, who visited a new country without the spirit of +philosophic inquiry, and who in collecting materials for the amusement +of their countrymen sometimes showed themselves a little wanting in +regard for the laws of hospitality, as well as in penetration and in +largeness of view.</p> + +<p>Yet beneath this outward estrangement there lay in the heart of England +at least a deeper feeling, an appeal to which was never unwelcome, even +in quarters where the love of American institutions least prevailed. I +will venture to repeat some words from a lecture addressed a short time +before this war to the University of Oxford, which at that time had +among its students an English Prince. "The loss of the American<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_750" id="Page_750">[Pg 750]</a></span> +Colonies," said the lecturer, speaking of your first Revolution, "was +perhaps in itself a gain to both countries. It was a gain, as it +emancipated commerce and gave free course to those reciprocal streams of +wealth which a restrictive policy had forbidden to flow. It was a gain, +as it put an end to an obsolete tutelage, which tended to prevent +America from learning betimes to walk alone, while it gave England the +puerile and somewhat dangerous pleasure of reigning over those whom she +did not and could not govern, but whom she was tempted to harass and +insult. A source of military strength colonies can scarcely be. You +prevent them from forming proper military establishments of their own, +and you drag them, into your quarrels at the price of undertaking their +defence. The inauguration of free trade was in fact the renunciation of +the only solid object for which our ancestors clung to an invidious and +perilous supremacy, and exposed the heart of England by scattering her +fleet and armies over the globe. It was not the loss of the Colonies, +but the quarrel, that was one of the greatest, perhaps the greatest +disaster that ever befell the English race. Who would not give up +Blenheim and Waterloo, if only the two Englands could have parted from +each other in kindness and in peace,—if our statesmen could have had +the wisdom, to say to the Americans generously and at the right season, +'You are Englishmen, like ourselves; be, for your own happiness and for +our honor, like ourselves, a nation'? But English statesmen, with all +their greatness, have seldom known how to anticipate necessity; too +often the sentence of history on their policy has been, that it was +wise, just, and generous, but too late. Too often have they waited for +the teaching of disaster. Time will heal this, like other wounds. In +signing away his own empire, George III. did not sign away the empire of +English liberty, of English law, of English literature, of English +religion, of English blood, or of the English tongue. But though the +wound will heal,—and that it may heal ought to be the earnest desire of +the whole English name,—history can never cancel the fatal page which +robs England of half the glory and half the happiness of being the +mother of a great nation." Such, I say, was the language addressed to +Oxford in the full confidence that it would be well received.</p> + +<p>And now all these clouds seemed to have fairly passed away. Your +reception of the Prince of Wales, the heir and representative of George +III., was a perfect pledge of reconciliation. It showed that beneath a +surface of estrangement there still remained the strong tie of blood. +Englishmen who loved the New England as well as the Old were for the +moment happy in the belief that the two were one again. And, believe me, +joy at this complete renewal of our amity was very deeply and widely +felt in England. It spread far even among the classes which have shown +the greatest want of sympathy for you in the present war.</p> + +<p>England has diplomatic connections—she has sometimes diplomatic +intrigues—with the Great Powers of Europe. For a real alliance she must +look here. Strong as is the element of aristocracy in her Government, +there is that in her, nevertheless, which makes her cordial +understandings with military despotisms little better than smothered +hate. With you she may have a league of the heart. We are united by +blood. We are united by a common allegiance to the cause of freedom. You +may think that English freedom falls far short of yours. You will allow +that it goes beyond any yet attained by the great European nations, and +that to those nations it has been and still is a light of hope. I see it +treated with contempt here. It is not treated with contempt by +Garibaldi. It is not treated with contempt by the exiles from French +despotism, who are proud to learn the English tongue, and who find in +our land, as they think, the great asylum of the free. Let England and +America quarrel. Let your weight be cast into the scale against us, when +we struggle with the great conspiracy<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_751" id="Page_751">[Pg 751]</a></span> of absolutist powers around us, +and the hope of freedom in Europe would be almost quenched. Hampden and +Washington in arms against each other! What could the Powers of Evil +desire more? When Americans talk lightly of a war with England, one +desires to ask them what they believe the effects of such a war would be +on their own country. How many more American wives do they wish to make +widows? How many more American children do they wish to make orphans? Do +they deem it wise to put a still greater strain on the already groaning +timbers of the Constitution? Do they think that the suspension of trade +and emigration, with the price of labor rising and the harvests of +Illinois excluded from their market, would help you to cope with the +financial difficulties which fill with anxiety every reflecting mind? Do +they think that four more years of war-government would render easy the +tremendous work of reconstruction? But the interests of the great +community of nations are above the private interests of America or of +England. If war were to break out between us, what would become of +Italy, abandoned without help to her Austrian enemy and her sinister +protector? What would become of the last hopes of liberty in France? +What would become of the world?</p> + +<p>English liberties, imperfect as they may be,—and as an English Liberal +of course thinks they are,—are the source from which your liberties +have flowed, though the river may be more abundant than the spring. +Being in America, I am in England,—not only because American +hospitality makes me feel that I am still in my own country, but because +our institutions are fundamentally the same. The great foundations of +constitutional government, legislative assemblies, parliamentary +representation, personal liberty, self-taxation, the freedom of the +press, allegiance to the law as a power above individual will,—all +these were established, not without memorable efforts and memorable +sufferings, in the land from which the fathers of your republic came. +You are living under the Great Charter, the Petition of Eight, the +Habeas Corpus Act, the Libel Act. Perhaps you have not even yet taken +from us all that, if a kindly feeling continues between us, you may find +it desirable to take. England by her eight centuries of constitutional +progress has done a great work for you, and the two nations may yet have +a great work to do together for themselves and for the world. A student +of history, knowing how the race has struggled and stumbled onwards +through the ages until now, cannot believe in the finality and +perfection of any set of institutions, not even of yours. This vast +electioneering apparatus, with its strange machinery and discordant +sounds, in the midst of which I find myself,—it may be, and I firmly +believe it is, better for its purpose than anything that has gone before +it; but is it the crowning effort of mankind? If our creed—the Liberal +creed—be true, American institutions are a great step in advance of the +Old World; but they are not a miraculous leap into a political +millennium. They are a momentous portion of that continual onward effort +of humanity which it is the highest duty of history to trace; but they +are not its final consummation. Model Republic! How many of these models +has the course of ages seen broken and flung disdainfully aside! You +have been able to do great things for the world because your forefathers +did great things for you. The generation will come which in its turn +will inherit the fruits of your efforts, add to them a little of its +own, and in the plenitude of its self-esteem repay you with ingratitude. +The time will come when the memory of the Model Republicans of the +United States, as well as that of the narrow Parliamentary Reformers of +England, will appeal to history, not in vain, to rescue it from the +injustice of posterity, and extend to it the charities of the past.</p> + +<p>New-comers among the nations, you desire, like the rest, to have a +history. You seek it in Indian annals, you seek it<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_752" id="Page_752">[Pg 752]</a></span> in Northern sagas. +You fondly surround an old windmill with the pomp of Scandinavian +antiquity, in your anxiety to fill up the void of your unpeopled past. +But you have a real and glorious history, if you will not reject +it,—monuments genuine and majestic, if you will acknowledge them as +your own. Yours are the palaces of the Plantagenets,—the cathedrals +which enshrined our old religion,—the illustrious hall in which the +long line of our great judges reared, by their decisions, the fabric of +our law,—the gray colleges in which our intellect and science found +their earliest home,—the graves where our heroes and sages and poets +sleep. It would as ill become you to cultivate narrow national memories +in regard to the past as it would to cultivate narrow national +prejudices at present. You have come out, as from other relics of +barbarism which still oppress Europe, so from the barbarism of jealous +nationality. You are heirs to all the wealth of the Old World, and must +owe gratitude for a part of your heritage to Germany, France, and Spain, +as well as to England. Still, it is from England that you are sprung; +from her you brought the power of self-government which was the talisman +of colonization and the pledge of your empire here. She it was, that, +having advanced by centuries of effort to the front of the Old World, +became worthy to give birth to the New. From England you are sprung; and +if the choice were given you among all the nations of the world, which +would you rather choose for a mother?</p> + +<p>England bore you, and bore you not without a mother's pangs. For the +real hour of your birth wag the English Revolution of the seventeenth +century, at once the saddest and the noblest period of English +history,—the noblest, whether we look to the greatness of the +principles at stake, or to the grandeur of the actors who fill the +scene. This is not the official version of your origin. The official +version makes you the children of the revolutionary spirit which was +abroad in the eighteenth century and culminated in the French +Revolution. But this robs you of a century and a half of antiquity, and +of more than a century and a half of greatness. Since 1783 you have had +a marvellous growth of population and of wealth,—things not to be +spoken of, as cynics have spoken of them, without thankfulness, since +the added myriads have been happy, and the wealth has flowed not to a +few, but to all. But before 1783 you had founded, under the name of an +English Colony, a community emancipated from feudalism; you had +abolished here and doomed to general abolition hereditary aristocracy, +and that which is the essential basis of hereditary aristocracy, +primogeniture in the inheritance of land. You had established, though +under the semblance of dependence on the English crown, a virtual +sovereignty of the people. You had created the system of common schools, +in which the sovereignty of the people has its only safe foundation. You +had proclaimed, after some misgivings and backslidings, the doctrine of +liberty of conscience, and released the Church from her long bondage to +the State. All this you had achieved while you still were, and gloried +in being, a colony of England. You have done great things, since your +quarrel with George III., for the world as well as for yourselves. But +for the world, perhaps, you had done greater things before.</p> + +<p>In England the Revolution of the seventeenth century failed. It failed, +at least, as an attempt to establish social equality and liberty of +conscience. The feudal past, with a feudal Europe to support it, sat too +heavy on us to be cast off. By a convulsive effort we broke loose, for a +moment, from the hereditary aristocracy and the hierarchy. For a moment +we placed a popular chief in power, though Cromwell was obliged by +circumstances, as well as impelled by his own ambition, to make himself +a king. But<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_753" id="Page_753">[Pg 753]</a></span> when Cromwell died before his hour, all was over for many a +day with the party of religious freedom and of the people. The nation +had gone a little way out of the feudal and hierarchical Egypt; but the +horrors of the unknown Wilderness, and the memory of the flesh-pots, +overpowered the hope of the Promised Land; and the people returned to +the rule of Pharaoh and his priests amidst the bonfires of the +Restoration. Something had been gained. Kings became more careful how +they cut the subject's purse; bishops, how they clipped the subject's +ears. Instead of being carried by Laud to Rome, we remained Protestants +after a sort, though without liberty of conscience. Our Parliament, such +as it was, with a narrow franchise and rotten boroughs, retained its +rights; and in time we secured the independence of the judges and the +integrity of an aristocratic law. But the great attempt had miscarried. +English society had made a supreme effort to escape from feudalism and +the hierarchy into social justice and religious freedom, and that effort +had failed.</p> + +<p>Failed in England, but succeeded here. The yoke which in the +mother-country we had not strength to throw off, in the colony we +escaped; and here, beyond the reach of the Restoration, Milton's vision +proved true, and a free community was founded, though in a humble and +unsuspected form, which depended on the life of no single chief, and +lived on when Cromwell died. Milton, when the night of the Restoration +closed on the brief and stormy day of his party, bated no jot of hope. +He was strong in that strength of conviction which assures spirits like +his of the future, however dark the present may appear. But, could he +have beheld it, the morning, moving westward in the track of the Puritan +emigrants, had passed from his hemisphere only to shine again in this +with no fitful ray, but with a steady brightness which will one day +reillumine the feudal darkness of the Old World.</p> + +<p>The Revolution failed in England. Yet in England the party of Cromwell +and Milton still lives. It still lives; and in this great crisis of your +fortunes, its heart turns to you. On your success ours depends. Now, as +in the seventeenth century, the thread of our fate is twined with the +thread of yours. An English Liberal comes here, not only to watch the +unfolding of your destiny, but to read his own.</p> + +<p>Even in the Revolution of 1776 Liberal England was on your side. Chatham +was your spokesman, as well as Patrick Henry. We, too, reckon Washington +among our heroes. Perhaps there may have been an excuse even for the +King. The relation of dependence which you as well as he professed to +hold sacred, and which he was bound to maintain, had long become +obsolete. It was time to break the cord which held the child to its +mother; and probably there were some on your side, from the first, or +nearly from the first, resolved to break it,—men instinct with the +revolutionary spirit, and bent on a Republic. All parties were in a +false position; and they could find no way out of it better than civil +war. Good-will, not hatred, is the law of the world; and seldom can +history—even the history of the conqueror—look back on the results of +war without regret. England, scarcely guilty of the offence of her +monarch, drank the cup of shame and disaster to the dregs. That war +ruined the French finances, which till then might have been retrieved, +past the hope of redemption, and precipitated the Revolution which +hurled France through anarchy into despotism, and sent Lafayette to a +foreign dungeon, and his master to the block. You came out victorious; +but, from the violence of the rupture, you took a political bias not +perhaps entirely for good; and the necessity of the war blended you, +under equivocal conditions, with other colonies of a wholly different +origin and character, which then "held persons to service," and are now +your half-dethroned tyrant, the Slave Power. This Revolution will lead +to a revision of many things,—perhaps to a partial revision of your +history. Meantime,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_754" id="Page_754">[Pg 754]</a></span> let me repeat, England counts Washington among her +heroes.</p> + +<p>And now as to the conduct of England towards you in this civil war. It +is of want of sympathy, if of anything, on our part, not of want of +interest, that you have a right to complain. Never, within my memory, +have the hearts of Englishmen been so deeply moved by any foreign +struggle as by this civil war,—not even, if I recollect aright, by the +great European earthquake of 1848. I doubt whether they were more moved +by the Indian mutiny or by our war with Russia. It seemed that history +had brought round again the great crisis of the Thirty Years' War, when +all England throbbed with the mortal struggle waged between the powers +of Liberty and Slavery on their German battle-field; for expectation can +scarcely have been more intense when Gustavus and Tilly were approaching +each other at Leipsic than it was when Meade and Lee were approaching +each other at Gettysburg. Severed from us by the Atlantic, while other +nations are at our door, you are still nearer to us than all the world +beside.</p> + +<p>It is of want of sympathy, not of want of interest, that you have to +complain. And the sympathy which has been withheld is not that of the +whole nation, but that of certain classes, chiefly of the class against +whose political interest you are fighting, and to whom your victory +brings eventual defeat. The real origin of your nation is the key to the +present relations between you and the different parties in England. This +is the old battle waged again on a new field. We will not talk too much +of Puritans and Cavaliers. The soldiers of the Union are not Puritans, +neither are the planters Cavaliers, But the present civil war is a vast +episode in the same irrepressible conflict between Aristocracy and +Democracy; and the heirs of the Cavalier in England sympathize with your +enemies, the heirs of the Puritan with you.</p> + +<p>The feeling of our aristocracy, as of all aristocracies, is against you. +It does not follow, nor do I believe, that as a body they would desire +or urge their Government to do you a wrong, whatever spirit may be shown +by a few of the less honorable or more violent members of their order. +With all their class sentiments, they are Englishmen, trained to walk in +the paths of English policy and justice. But that their feelings should +be against you is not strange. You are fighting, not for the restoration +of the Union, not for the emancipation of the negro, but for Democracy +against Aristocracy; and this fact is thoroughly understood by both +parties throughout the Old World. As the champions of Democracy, you may +claim, and you receive, the sympathy of the Democratic party in England +and in Europe; that of the Aristocratic party you cannot claim. You must +bear it calmly, if the aristocracies mourn over your victories and +triumph over your defeats. Do the friends of Democracy conceal their joy +when a despotism or an oligarchy bites the dust?</p> + +<p>The members of our aristocracy bear you no personal hatred. An American +going among them even now meets with nothing but personal courtesy and +kindness. Under ordinary circumstances they are not indifferent to your +good-will, nor unconscious of the tie of blood. But to ask them entirely +to forget their order would be too much. In the success of a +commonwealth founded on social and political equality all aristocracies +must read their doom. Not by arms, but by example, you are a standing +menace to the existence of political privilege. And the thread of that +existence is frail. Feudal antiquity holds life by a precarious tenure +amidst the revolutionary tendencies of this modern world. It has gone +hard with the aristocracies throughout Europe of late years, though the +French Emperor, as the head of the Reaction, may create a mock nobility +round his upstart throne. The Roman aristocracy was an aristocracy of +arms and law. The feudal aristocracy of the Middle Ages was an +aristocracy of arms and in some measure of law; it served the cause of +political progress in its hour<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_755" id="Page_755">[Pg 755]</a></span> and after its kind; it confronted +tyrannical kings when the people were as yet too weak to confront them; +it conquered at Runnymede, as well as at Hastings. But the aristocracies +of modern Europe are aristocracies neither of arms nor of law. They are +aristocracies of social and political privilege alone. They owe, and are +half conscious that they owe, their present existence only to factitious +weaknesses of human nature, and to the antiquated terrors of communities +long kept in leading-strings and afraid to walk alone. If there were +nothing but reason to dispel them, these fears might long retain their +sway over European society. But the example of a great commonwealth +flourishing here without a privileged class, and of a popular +sovereignty combining order with progress, tends, however remotely, to +break the spell. Therefore, as a class, the English nobility cannot +desire the success of your Republic. Some of the order there are who +have hearts above their coronets, as there are some kings who have +hearts above their crowns, and who in this great crisis of humanity +forget that they are noblemen, and remember that they are men. But the +order, as a whole, has been against you, and has swayed in the same +direction all who were closely connected with it or dependent on it. It +could not fail to be against you, if it was for itself. Be charitable to +the instinct of self-preservation. It is strong, sometimes violent, in +us all.</p> + +<p>In truth, it is rather against the Liberals of England than against you +that the feeling of our aristocracy is directed. Liberal leaders have +made your name odious by pointing to your institutions as the +condemnation of our own. They did this too indiscriminately perhaps, +while in one respect your institutions were far below our own, inasmuch +as you were a slaveholding nation. "Look," they were always saying, "at +the Model Republic,—behold its unbroken prosperity, the harmony of its +people under the system of universal suffrage, the lightness of its +taxation,—behold, above all, its immunity from war!" All this is now +turned upon us as a taunt; but the taunt implies rather a sense of +escape on the part of those who utter it than malignity, and the answer +to it is victory.</p> + +<p>What has been said of our territorial aristocracy may be said of our +commercial aristocracy, which is fast blending with the territorial into +a government of wealth. This again is nothing new. History can point to +more cases than one in which the sympathies of rich men have been +regulated by their riches. The Money Power has been cold to your cause +throughout Europe,—perhaps even here. In all countries great +capitalists are apt to desire that the laborer should be docile and +contented, that popular education should not be carried dangerously +high, that the right relations between capital and labor should be +maintained. The bold doctrines of the slave-owner as to "free labor and +free schools" may not be accepted in their full strength; yet they touch +a secret chord. But we have friends of the better cause among our +English capitalists as well as among our English peers. The names of Mr. +Baring and Mr. Thomas Bayley Potter are not unknown here. The course +taken by such men at this crisis is an earnest of the essential unity of +interest which underlies all class-divisions,—which, in our onward +progress toward the attainment of a real community, will survive all +class-distinctions, and terminate the conflict between capital and +labor, not by making the laborer the slave of the capitalist, nor the +capitalist the slave of the laborer, but by establishing between them +mutual good-will, founded on intelligence and justice.</p> + +<p>And let the upper classes of England have their due. The Lancashire +operatives have been upon the other side; yet not the less have they +received ready and generous help in their distress from all ranks and +orders in the land.</p> + +<p>It would be most unworthy of a student of history to preach vulgar +hatred of an historic aristocracy. The aristocracy<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_756" id="Page_756">[Pg 756]</a></span> of England has been +great in its hour, probably beneficent, perhaps indispensable to the +progress of our nation, and so to the foundation of yours. Do you wish +for your revenge upon it? The road to that revenge is sure. Succeed in +your great experiment. Show by your example, by your moderation and +self-control through this war and after its close, that it is possible +for communities, duly educated, to govern themselves without the control +of an hereditary order. The progress of opinion in England will in time +do the rest. War, forced by you upon the English nation, would only +strengthen the worst part of the English aristocracy in the worst way, +by bringing our people into collision with a Democracy, and by giving +the ascendancy, as all wars not carried on for a distinct moral object +do, to military passions over political aspirations. Our war with the +French Republic threw back our internal reforms, which till then had +been advancing, for a whole generation. Even the pockets of our +land-owners would not suffer, but gain, by the war; for their rents +would be raised by the exclusion of your corn, and the price of labor +would be lowered by the stoppage of emigration. The suffering would +fall, as usual, on the people.</p> + +<p>The gradual effect of your example may enable European society finally +to emerge from feudalism, in a peaceful way, without violent +revolutions. Every one who has studied history must regard violent +revolutions with abhorrence. A European Liberal ought to be less +inclined to them than ever, when he has seen America, and received from +the sight, as I think he may, a complete assurance of the future.</p> + +<p>I have spoken of our commercial aristocracy generally. Liverpool demands +word by itself. It is the stronghold of the Southern party in England: +from it hostile acts have proceeded, while from other quarters there +have proceeded only hostile words. There are in Liverpool men who do +honor to the name of British merchant; but the city as a whole is not +the one among all our commercial cities in which moral chivalry is most +likely to be found. In Manchester, cotton-spinning though it be, there +is much that is great,—a love of Art, displayed in public +exhibitions,—a keen interest in great political and social +questions,—literature,—even religious thought,—something of that high +aspiring spirit which made commerce noble in the old English merchant, +in the Venetian and the Florentine. In Liverpool trade reigns supreme, +and its behests, whatever they may be, are pretty sure to be eagerly +obeyed. And the source of this is to be found, perhaps, partly in the +fact that Liverpool is an old centre of the Slavery interest in England, +one of the cities which have been built with the blood of the slave. As +the great cotton port, it is closely connected with the planters by +trade,—perhaps also by many personal ties and associations. It is not +so much an English city as an offset and outpost of the South, and a +counterpart to the offsets and outposts of the South in some of your +great commercial cities here. No doubt, the shame of Liverpool Alabamas +falls on England. England must own that she has produced merchants who +disgrace their calling, contaminated by intercourse with the +slave-owner, regardless of the honor and interest of their country, +ready to plunge two kindred nations into a desolating war, if they can +only secure the profits of their own trade. England must own that she +has produced such men; but does this disgrace attach to her alone?</p> + +<p>The clergy of the State Church, like the aristocracy, have probably been +as a body against you in this struggle. In their case too, not hatred of +America, but the love of their own institution, is the cause. If you are +a standing menace to aristocracies, you are equally a standing menace to +State Churches. A State Church rests upon the assumption that religion +would fall, if it were not supported by the State. On this ground it is +that the European nations endure the startling anomalies of their State +Churches,—the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_757" id="Page_757">[Pg 757]</a></span> interference of irreligious politicians in religion, the +worldliness of ambitious ecclesiastics, the denial of liberty of +conscience, the denial of truth. Therefore it is that they will see the +canker of doubt slowly eating into faith beneath the outward uniformity +of a political Church, rather than risk a change, which, as they are +taught to believe, would bring faith to a sudden end. But the success of +the voluntary system here is overthrowing this assumption. Shall I +believe that Christianity deprived of State support must fall, when I +see it without State support not only standing, but advancing with the +settler into the remotest West? Will the laity of Europe long remain +under their illusion in face of this great fact? Already the State +Churches of Europe are placed in imminent peril by the controversies +which, since religious life has reawakened among us, rend them from +within, and by their manifest inability to satisfy the craving of +society for new assurance of its faith. I cannot much blame the +High-Church bishop who goes to Lord Palmerston to ask for intervention +in company with Lord Clanricarde and Mr. Spence. You express surprise +that the son of Wilberforce is not with you; but Wilberforce was not, +like his son, a bishop of the State Church. Never in the whole course of +history has the old order of things yielded without a murmur to the new. +You share the fate of all innovators: your innovations are not received +with favor by the powers which they threaten ultimately to sweep away.</p> + +<p>To come from our aristocracy and landed gentry to our middle class. We +subdivide the middle class into upper and lower. The upper middle class, +comprising the wealthier tradesmen, forms a sort of minor aristocracy in +itself, with a good deal of aristocratic feeling towards those beneath +it. It is not well educated, for it will not go to the common schools, +and it has few good private schools of its own; consequently, it does +not think deeply on great political questions. It is at present very +wealthy; and wealth, as you know, does not always produce high moral +sentiment. It is not above a desire to be on the genteel side. It is not +free from the worship of Aristocracy. That worship is rooted in the +lower part of our common nature. Is fibres extend beyond the soil of +England, beyond the soil of Europe. America has been much belied, if she +is entirely free from this evil, if there are not here also men careful +of class-distinctions, of a place in fashionable society, of factitious +rank which parodies the aristocracy of the Old World. There is in the +Anglo-Saxon character a strange mixture of independence and servility. +In that long course of concessions by which your politicians +strove—happily for the world and for yourselves they strove in vain—to +conciliate the slave owning aristocracy of the South, did not something +of social servility mingle with political fear?</p> + +<p>In the lower middle class religious Non-Conformity prevails; and the +Free Churches of our Non-Conformists are united by a strong bond of +sympathy with the Churches under the voluntary system here. They are +perfectly stanch on the subject of Slavery, and so far as this war has +been a struggle against that institution, it may, I think, be +confidently said that the hearts of this great section of our people +have been upon your side. Our Non-Conformist ministers came forward, as +you are aware, in large numbers, to join with the ministers of +Protestant Churches on the Continent in an Anti-Slavery address to your +Government and people.</p> + +<p>And as to the middle classes generally, upper or lower, I see no reason +to think that they are wanting in good-will to this country, much less +that they desire that any calamity should befall it. The journals which +I take to be the chief organs of the upper middle class, if they have +not been friendly, have been hostile not so much to the American people +as to the war. And in justice to all classes of Englishmen, it must be +remembered that hatred of the war is not hatred of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_758" id="Page_758">[Pg 758]</a></span> the American people. +No one hated the war at its commencement more heartily than I did. I +hated it more heartily than ever after Bull Run, when, by the accounts +which reached England, the character of this nation seemed to have +completely broken down. I believed as fully as any one, that the task +which you had undertaken was hopeless, and that you were rushing on your +ruin. I dreaded the effect on your Constitution, fearing, as others did, +that civil war would bring you to anarchy, and anarchy to military +despotism. All historical precedents conspired to lead me to this +belief. I did not know—for there was no example to teach me—the power +of a really united people, the adamantine strength of institutions which +were truly free. Watching the course of events with an open mind, and a +deep interest, such as men at a distance can seldom be brought to feel, +in the fortunes of this country, I soon revised my opinion. Yet, many +times I desponded, and wished with all my heart that you would save the +Border States, if you could, and let the rest go. Numbers of +Englishmen,—Englishmen of all classes and parties,—who thought as I +did at the outset, remain rooted in this opinion. They still sincerely +believe that this is a hopeless war, which can lead to nothing but waste +of blood, subversion of your laws and liberties, and the destruction of +your own prosperity and that of the nations whose interests are bound up +with yours. This belief they maintain with as little of ill-feeling +towards you as men can have towards those who obstinately disregard +their advice. And, after all, though you may have found the wisest as +well as the bravest counsellors in your own hearts, he need not be your +enemy who somewhat timidly counsels you against civil war. Civil war is +a terrible thing,—terrible in the passions which it kindles, as well as +in the blood which it sheds,—terrible in its present effects, and +terrible in those which it leaves behind. It can be justified only by +the complete victory of the good cause. And Englishmen, at the +commencement of this civil war, if they were wrong in thinking the +victory of the good cause hopeless, were not wrong in thinking it +remote. They were not wrong in thinking it far more remote than you did. +Years of struggle, of fear, of agony, of desolated homes, have passed +since your statesmen declared that a few months would bring the +Rebellion to an end. In justice to our people, put the question to +yourselves,—if at the outset the veil which hid the future could have +been withdrawn, and the conflict which really awaited you, with all its +vicissitudes, its disasters, its dangers, its sacrifices, could have +been revealed to your view, would you have gone into the war? To us, +looking with anxious, but less impassioned eyes, the veil was half +withdrawn, and we shrank back from the prospect which was revealed. It +was well for the world, perhaps, that you were blind; but it was +pardonable in us to see.</p> + +<p>We now come to the working-men of England, the main body of our people, +whose sympathy you would not the less prize, and whom you would not the +less shrink from assailing without a cause, because at present the +greater part of them are without political power,—at least of a direct +kind. I will not speak of the opinions of our peasantry, for they have +none. Their thoughts are never turned to a political question. They +never read a newspaper. They are absorbed in the struggle for daily +bread, of which they have barely enough for themselves and their +children. Their condition, in spite of all the benevolent effort that is +abroad among us, is the great blot of our social system. Perhaps, if the +relation between the two countries remains kindly, the door of hope may +be opened to them here; and hands now folded helplessly in English +poor-houses may joyfully reap the harvests of Iowa and Wisconsin. +Assuredly, they bear you no ill-will. If they could comprehend the +meaning of this struggle, their hearts as well as their interests would +be upon your side. But it is not<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_759" id="Page_759">[Pg 759]</a></span> in them, it is in the working-men of +our cities, that the intelligence of the class resides. And the sympathy +of the working-men of our cities, from the moment when the great issue +between Free Labor and Slavery was fairly set before them, has been +shown in no doubtful form. They have followed your wavering fortunes +with eyes almost as keen and hearts almost as anxious as your own. They +have thronged the meetings held by the Union and Emancipation Societies +of London and Manchester to protest before the nation in favor of your +cause. Early in the contest they filled to overflowing Exeter Hall, the +largest place of meeting in London. I was present at another immense +meeting of them, held by their Trades Unions in London, where they were +addressed by Mr. Bright; and had you witnessed the intelligence and +enthusiasm with which they followed the exposition of your case by their +great orator, you would have known that you were not without sympathy in +England,—not without sympathy such as those who look rather to the +worth of a friend than to his rank may most dearly prize. Again I was +present at a great meeting called in the Free-Trade Hall at Manchester +to protest against the attacks upon your commerce, and saw the same +enthusiasm displayed by the working-men of the North. But Mr. Ward +Beecher must have brought back with him abundant assurance of the +feelings of our working-men. Our opponents have tried to rival us in +these demonstrations. They have tried with great resources of personal +influence and wealth. But, in spite of their personal influence and the +distress caused by the cotton famine, they have on the whole signally +failed. Their consolation has been to call the friends of the Federal +cause obscurities and nobodies. And true it is that the friends of the +Federal cause are obscurities and nobodies. They are the untitled and +undistinguished mass of the English people.</p> + +<p>The leaders of our working-men, the popular chiefs of the day, the men +who represent the feelings and interests of the masses, and whose names +are received with ringing cheers wherever the masses are assembled, are +Cobden and Bright. And Cobden and Bright have not left you in doubt of +the fact that they and all they represent are on your side.</p> + +<p>I need not say,—for you have shown that you know it well,—that, as +regards the working-men of our cotton-factories, this sympathy was an +offering to your cause as costly as it was sincere. Your civil war +paralyzed their industry, brought ruin into their houses, deprived them +and their families not only of bread, but, so far as their vision +extended, of the hope of bread. Yet they have not wavered in their +allegiance to the Right. Your slave-owning aristocracy had made up their +minds that chivalry was confined to aristocracies, and that over the +vulgar souls of the common people Cotton must be King. The working-man +of Manchester, though he lives not like a Southern gentleman by the +sweat of another's brow, but like a plebeian by the sweat of his own, +has shown that chivalry is not confined to aristocracies, and that even +over vulgar souls Cotton is not always King. I heard one of your +statesmen the other day, after speaking indignantly of those who had +fitted out the Alabama, pray God to bless the working-men of England. +Our nation, like yours, is not a single body animated by the same +political sentiments, but a mixed mass of contending interests and +parties. Beware how you fire into that mass, or your shot may strike a +friend.</p> + +<p>When England in the mass is spoken of as your enemy on this occasion, +the London "Times" is taken for the voice of the country. The "Times" +was in former days a great popular organ. It led vehemently and even +violently the struggle for Parliamentary Reform. In that way it made its +fortune; and having made its fortune, it takes part with the rich. Its +proprietor in those days was a man with many faults, but he was a man of +the people. Aristocratic society disliked and excluded him; he<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_760" id="Page_760">[Pg 760]</a></span> lived at +war with it to the end. Affronted by the Whigs, he became in a certain +sense a Tory; but he united his Toryism with Chartism, and was sent to +Parliament for Nottingham by Tories and Chartists combined. The +opposition of his journal to our New Poor-Law evinced, though in a +perverse way, his feeling for the people. But his heir, the present +proprietor, was born in the purple. He is a wealthy landed gentleman. He +sits in Parliament for a constituency of landlords. He is thought to +have been marked out for a peerage. It is accusing him of no crime to +suppose, that, so far as he controls the "Times," it takes the bias of +his class, and that its voice, if it speaks his sentiments, is not that +of the English people, but of a rich conservative squire.</p> + +<p>The editor is distinct from the proprietor, but his connections are +perhaps still more aristocratic. A good deal has been said among us of +late about his position. Before his time our journalism was not only +anonymous, but impersonal. The journalist wore the mask not only to +those whom he criticized, but to all the world. The present editor of +the "Times" wears the mask to the objects of his criticism, but drops +it, as has been remarked in Parliament, in "the gilded saloons" of rank +and power. Not content to remain in the privacy which protected the +independence of his predecessors, he has come forth in his own person to +receive the homage of the great world. That homage has been paid in no +stinted measure, and, as the British public has been apprised in rather +a startling manner, with a somewhat intoxicating effect. The lords of +the Money Power, the thrones and dominions of Usury, have shown +themselves as assiduous as ministers and peers; and these potentates +happen, like the aristocracy, to be unfriendly to your cause. Caressed +by peers and millionnaires, the editor of the "Times" could hardly fail +to express the feelings of peers and millionnaires towards a Republic in +distress. We may be permitted to think that he has rather overacted his +part. English peers, after all, are English gentlemen; and no English +gentleman would deliberately sanction the torrent of calumny and insult +which the "Times" has poured upon this nation. There are penalties for +common offenders: there are none for those who scatter firebrands among +nations. But the "Times" will not come off unscathed. It must veer with +victory. And its readers will be not only prejudiced, but idiotic, if it +does not in the process leave the last remnant of its authority behind.</p> + +<p>Two things will suffice to mark the real political position of the +"Times." You saw that a personal controversy was going on the other day +between its editor and Mr. Cobden. That controversy arose out of a +speech made by Mr. Bright, obliquely impugning the aristocratic law of +inheritance, which is fast accumulating the land of England in a few +hands, and disinheriting the English people of the English soil. For +this offence Mr. Bright was assailed by the "Times" with calumnies so +outrageous that Mr. Cobden could not help springing forward to vindicate +his friend. The institution which the "Times" so fiercely defended on +this occasion against a look which threatened it with alteration is +vital and sacred in the eyes of the aristocracy, but is not vital or +sacred in the eyes of the whole English nation. Again, the "Times" hates +Garibaldi; and its hatred, generally half smothered, broke out in a loud +cry of exultation when the hero fell, as it hoped forever, at +Aspromonte. But the English people idolize Garibaldi, and receive him +with a burst of enthusiasm unexampled in fervor. The English people love +Garibaldi, and Garibaldi's name is equally dear to all American hearts. +Is not this—let me ask in passing—a proof that there is a bond of +sympathy, after all, between the English people and you, and that, if as +a nation we are divided from you, it is not by a radical estrangement, +but by some cloud of error which will in time pass away?</p> + +<p>The wealth of the "Times," the high<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_761" id="Page_761">[Pg 761]</a></span> position which it has held since +the period when it was the great Liberal journal, the clever writing and +the early intelligence which its money and its secret connections with +public men enable it to command, give it a circulation and an influence +beyond the class whose interests it represents. But it has been thrust +from a large part of its dominion by the cheap London and local press. +It is exceeded in circulation more than twofold by the London +"Telegraph," a journal which, though it has been against the war, has, I +think, by no means shown in its leading articles the same spirit of +hostility to the American people. The London "Star," which is strongly +Federal, is also a journal of wide circulation. The "Daily News" is a +high-priced paper, circulating among the same class as the "Times"; its +circulation is comparatively small, but it is on the increase, and the +journal, I have reason to believe, is prosperous. The Manchester +"Examiner and Times," again,—a great local paper of the North of +England,—nearly equals the London "Times" in circulation, and is +favorable to your cause. I live under the dominion of the London +"Times," and I will not deny that it is a great power of evil. It will +be a great power of evil indeed, if it succeeds in producing a fatal +estrangement between two kindred nations. But no one who knows England, +especially the northern part of England, in which Liberalism prevails, +would imagine the voice of the "Times" to be that of the English people.</p> + +<p>Of the part taken by the writers of England it would be rash to speak in +general terms, Stuart Mill and Cairns have supported your cause as +heartily as Cobden and Bright. I am not aware that any political or +economical writer of equal eminence has taken the other side. The +leading reviews and periodicals have exhibited, as might have been +expected, very various shades of opinion; but, with the exception of the +known organs of violent Toryism, they have certainly not breathed hatred +of this nation. In those which specially represent our rising intellect, +the intellect which will probably govern us ten years hence, I should +say the preponderance of the writing had been on the Federal side. In +the University of Oxford the sympathies of the High-Church clergy and of +the young Tory gentry are with the South; but there is a good deal of +Northern sentiment among the young fellows of our more liberal colleges, +and generally in the more active minds. At the University Debating Club, +when the question between the North and the South was debated, the vote, +though I believe in a thin house, was in favor of the North. Four +Professors are members of the Union and Emancipation Society. And if +intellect generally has been somewhat coldly critical, I am not sure +that it has departed from its true function. I am conscious myself that +I may be somewhat under the dominion of my feelings, that I may be even +something of a fanatic in this matter. There may be evil as well as good +in the cause which, as the good preponderates, claims and receives the +allegiance of my heart. In that case, intellect, in pointing out the +evil, only does its duty.</p> + +<p>One English writer has certainly raised his voice against you with +characteristic vehemence and rudeness. As an historical painter and a +humorist Carlyle has scarcely an equal: a new intellectual region seemed +to open to me when I read his "French Revolution." But his philosophy, +in its essential principle, is false. He teaches that the mass of +mankind are fools,—that the hero alone is wise,—that the hero, +therefore, is the destined master of his fellow-men, and that their only +salvation lies in blind submission to his rule,—and this without +distinction of time or circumstance, in the most advanced as well as in +the most primitive ages of the world. The hero-despot can do no wrong. +He is a king, with scarcely even a God above him; and if the moral law +happens to come into collision with his actions, so much the worse for +the moral law. On this theory,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_762" id="Page_762">[Pg 762]</a></span> a Commonwealth such as yours ought not +to exist; and you must not be surprised, if, in a fit of spleen, the +great cynic grasps his club and knocks your cause on the head, as he +thinks, with a single blow. Here is the end of an unsound, though +brilliant theory,—a theory which had always latent in it the worship of +force and fraud, and which has now displayed its tendency at once in the +portentous defence of the robber-policy of Frederic the Great and in the +portentous defence of the Slave Power. An opposite theory of human +society is, in fact, finding its confirmation in these events,—that +which tells us that we all have need of each other, and that the goal +towards which society actually moves is not an heroic despotism, but a +real community, in which each member shall contribute his gifts and +faculties to the common store, and the common government shall become +the work of all. For, if the victory in this struggle has been won, it +has been won, not by a man, but by the nation; and that it has been won +not by a man, but by the nation, is your glory and the pledge of your +salvation. We have called for a Cromwell, and he has not come; he has +not come, partly because Cromwells are scarce, partly, perhaps, because +the personal Cromwell belonged to a different age, and the Cromwell of +this age is an intelligent, resolute, and united people.</p> + +<p>I might mention other eccentricities of opinion quite distinct from the +general temper of the English nation, such as that of the +ultra-scientific school, which thinks it unscientific philanthropy to +ascribe the attributes of humanity to the negro,—a school some of the +more rampant absurdities of which had, just before I left England, +called down the rebuke of real science in the person of Mr. Huxley. And +I might note, if the time would allow, many fluctuations and +oscillations which have taken place among our organs of opinion as the +struggle went on. But I must say on the whole, both with reference to +our different classes and with reference to our literature, that, +considering the complexity of the case, the distance from which our +people viewed it, and the changes which it has undergone since the war +broke out, I do not think there is much room for disappointment as to +the sympathies of our people. Parties have been divided on this question +much as they are on great questions among ourselves, and much as they +were in the time of Charles I., when this long strife began. The England +of Charles and Laud has been against you: the England of Hampden, +Milton, and Cromwell has in the main been on your side.</p> + +<p>I say there has not been much ground for disappointment: I do not say +there has been none. England at present is not in her noblest mood. She +is laboring under a reaction which extends over France and great part of +Europe, and which furnishes the key at this moment to the state of +European affairs. This movement, like all great movements, reactionary +or progressive, is complex in its nature. In the political sphere it +presents itself as the lassitude and despondency which, as usual, have +ensued after great political efforts, such as were made by the +Continental nations in the abortive revolutions of 1848, and by England +in a less degree in the struggle for Parliamentary Reform. In the +religious sphere it presents itself in an analogous shape: there, +lassitude and despondency have succeeded to the efforts of the religious +intellect to escape from the decaying creeds of the old State Churches +and push forward to a more enduring faith; and the priest as well as the +despot has for a moment resumed his sway—though not his uncontested +sway—over our weariness and our fears. The moral sentiment, after high +tension, has undergone a corresponding relaxation. All liberal measures +are for the time at a discount. The Bill for the Abolition of +Church-Rates, once carried in the House of Commons by large majorities, +is now lost. The nominal leaders of the Liberal party themselves have +let their principles fall into abeyance, and almost coalesced with their +Tory opponents. The Whig nobles<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_763" id="Page_763">[Pg 763]</a></span> who carried the Reform Bill have owned +once more the bias of their order, and become determined, though covert, +enemies of Reform. The ancient altars are sought again for the sake of +peace by fainting spirits and perplexed minds; and again, as after our +Reformation, as after our great Revolution, we see a number of +conversions to the Church of Rome. On the other hand, strange physical +superstitions, such as mesmerism and spirit-rapping, have crept, like +astrology under the Roman Empire, into the void left by religious faith. +Wealth has been pouring into England, and luxury with wealth. Our public +journals proclaim, as you may perhaps have seen, that the society of our +capital is unusually corrupt. The comic as well as the serious signs of +the reaction appear everywhere. A tone of affected cynicism pervades a +portion of our high intellect; and a pretended passion for +prize-fighting shows that men of culture are weary of civilization, and +wish to go back to barbarism for a while. The present head of the +Government in England is not only the confederate, but the counterpart, +of the head of the French Empire; and the rule of each denotes the +temporary ascendancy of the same class of motives in their respective +nations. An English Liberal is tempted to despond, when he compares the +public life of England in the time of Pym and Hampden with our public +life now. But there is greatness still in the heart of the English +nation.</p> + +<p>And you, too, have you not known in the course of your history a +slack-tide of faith, a less aspiring hour? Have not you, too, known a +temporary ascendancy of material over spiritual interests, a lowering of +the moral tone, a readiness, for the sake of ease and peace and secure +enjoyment, to compromise with evil? Have not you, too, felt the tyranny +of wealth, putting the higher motives for a moment under its feet? What +else has brought these calamities upon you? What else bowed your necks +to the yoke which you are now breaking at so great a cost? Often and +long in the life of every nation, though the tide is still advancing, +the wave recedes. Often and long the fears of man overcome his hopes; +but in the end the hopes of man overcome his fears. Your regeneration, +when it is achieved, will set forward the regeneration of the European +nations. It is the function which all nations, which all men, in their +wavering progress towards perfection, perform in turn for each other.</p> + +<p>This temporary lowering of the moral tone in English society has +extended to the question of Slavery. It has deadened our feelings on +that subject, though I hope without shaking our principles. You ask +whether England can have been sincere in her enmity to Slavery, when she +refuses sympathy to you in your struggle with the Slave Power. +Talleyrand, cynic as he was, knew that she was sincere, though he said +that not a man in France thought so but himself. She redeemed her own +slaves with a great price. She sacrificed her West-Indian interest. She +counts that achievement higher than her victories. She spends annually +much money and many lives and risks much enmity in her crusade against +the slave-trade. When your Southern statesmen have tried to tamper with +her, they have found her true. If they had bid us choose between a +concession to their designs and war, all aristocratic as we are, we +should have chosen war. Every Englishman who takes the Southern side is +compelled by public opinion to preface his advocacy with a disclaimer of +all sympathy with Slavery. The agent of the slave-owners in England, Mr. +Spence, pleads their cause to the English people on the ground of +gradual emancipation. Once the "Times" ventured to speak in defence of +Slavery, and the attempt was never made again. The principle, I say, +holds firm among the mass of the people; but on this, as on other moral +questions, we are not in our noblest mood.</p> + +<p>In justice to my country, however, let me remind you that you did +not—perhaps you could not—set the issue between Freedom and Slavery +plainly before<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_764" id="Page_764">[Pg 764]</a></span> us at the outset; you did not—perhaps you could +not—set it plainly before yourselves. With the progress of the struggle +your convictions have been strengthened, and the fetters of legal +restriction have been smitten off by the hammer of war. But your rulers +began with disclaimers of Anti-Slavery designs. You cannot be surprised, +if our people took your rulers at their word, or if, notwithstanding +your change,—a change which they imagined to be wrought merely by +expediency,—they retained their first impression as to the object of +the war, an impression which the advocates of the South used every art +to perpetuate in their minds. That the opponents of Slavery in England +should desire the restoration of the Union with Slavery, and with +Slavery strengthened, as they expected it would be, by new concessions, +was what you could not reasonably expect. And remember—I say it not +with any desire to trench on American politics or to pass judgment on +American parties—that the restoration of the Union with Slavery is what +a large section of your people, and one of the candidates for your +Presidency, are in fact ready to embrace now.</p> + +<p>Had you been able to say plainly at the outset that you were fighting +against Slavery, the English people would scarcely have given ear to the +cunning fiction of Mr. Spence. It would scarcely have been brought to +believe that this great contest was only about a Tariff. It would have +seen that the Southern planter, if he was a Free-Trader, was a +Free-Trader not from enlightenment, but because from the degradation of +labor in his dominions he had no manufactures to support; and that he +was in fact a protectionist of his only home production which feared +competition,—the home-bred slave. I have heard Mr. Spence's book called +the most successful lie in history. Very successful it certainly was, +and its influence in misleading England ought not to be overlooked. It +was written with great skill, and it came out just at the right time, +before people had formed their opinions, and when they were glad to have +a theory presented to their minds. But its success would have been +short-lived, had it not received what seemed authoritative confirmation +from the language of statesmen here.</p> + +<p>I might mention many other things which have influenced opinion in the +wrong way: the admiration felt by our people, and, to your honor, +equally felt by you, for the valor and self-devotion which have been +shown by the Southerners, and which, when they have submitted to the +law, will entitle them to be the fellow-citizens of freemen; a careless, +but not ungenerous, sympathy for that which, by men ignorant of the +tremendous strength of a Slave Power, was taken to be the weaker side; +the doubt really, and, considering the conflict of opinion here, not +unpardonably, entertained as to the question of State Sovereignty and +the right of Secession. All these motives, though they operate against +your cause, are different from hatred of you. But there are two points +to which in justice to my country I must especially call attention.</p> + +<p>The first is this,—that you have not yourselves been of one mind in +this matter, nor has the voice of your own people been unanimous. No +English speaker or journal has denounced the war or reviled the conduct +of your Government more bitterly than a portion of American politicians +and a section of the American press. The worst things said in England of +your statesmen, of your generals, of your armies, of your contractors, +of your social state and character as a people, have been but the echo +of things which have been said here. If the New-York correspondents of +some English journals have been virulent and calumnious, their virulence +and their calumnies have been drawn, to a great extent, from the +American circles in which they have lived. No slanders poured by English +ignorance or malevolence on American society have been so foul as those +which came from a renegade American writing in one of our Tory journals +under the name of "Manhattan." No lamentations<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_765" id="Page_765">[Pg 765]</a></span> over the subversion of +the Constitution and the destruction of personal liberty have been +louder than those of your own Opposition. The chief enemies of your +honor have been those of your own household. The crime of a great mass +of our people against you has, in fact, consisted in believing +statements about America made by men whom they knew to be Americans, and +did not know to be disloyal to the cause of their country. I have seen +your soldiers described in an extract from one of your own journals as +jail-birds, vagabonds, and foreigners. I have seen your President +accused of wishing to provoke riots in New York that he might have a +pretence for exercising military power. I have seen him accused of +sending to the front, to be thinned, a regiment which was likely to vote +against him. I have seen him accused of decoying his political opponents +into forging soldiers' votes in order to discredit them. What could the +"Times" itself say more?</p> + +<p>The second point is this. Some of your journals did their best to +prevent our people from desiring your success by declaring that your +success would be followed by aggression on us. The drum, like strong +wine, is apt to get into weak heads, especially when they are +unaccustomed to the sound. An Englishman coming among you is soon +assured that you do not wish to attack Canada. Apart from considerations +of morality and honor, he finds every man of sense here aware that +extent of territory is your danger, if you wish to be one nation,—and +further, that freedom of development, and not procrustean +centralization, is the best thing for the New as well as for the Old +World. But the mass of our people have not been among you; nor do they +know that the hot words sedulously repeated to them by our Southern +press are not authentic expressions of your designs. They are doubly +mistaken,—mistaken both in thinking that you wish to seize Canada, and +in thinking that a division of the Union into two hostile nations, which +would compel you to keep a standing army, would render you less +dangerous to your neighbors. But your own demagogues are the authors of +the error; and the Monroe doctrine and the Ostend manifesto are still +ringing in our ears. I am an adherent of the Monroe doctrine, if it +means, as it did on the lips of Canning, that the reactionary influence +of the old European Governments is not to be allowed to mar the hopes of +man in the New World; but if it means violence, every one must be +against it who respects the rights of nations. When you contrast the +feelings of England towards you with those of other nations, Italy for +example, you must remember that Italy has no Canada. I hope Canada will +soon cease to be a cause of mistrust between us. The political dominion +of England over it, since it has had a free constitution of its own, has +dwindled to a mere thread. It is as ripe to be a nation as these +Colonies were on the eve of the American Revolution. As a dependency, it +is of no solid value to England since she has ceased to engross the +Colonial trade. It distracts her forces, and prevents her from acting +with her full weight in the affairs of her own quarter of the world. It +belongs in every sense to America, not to Europe; and its peculiar +institutions—its extended suffrage, its freedom from the hereditary +principle, its voluntary system in religion, its common schools—are +opposed to those of England, and identical with those of the neighboring +States. All this the English nation is beginning to feel; and it has +tried in the case of the Ionian Islands the policy of moderation, and +found that it raises, instead of lowering, our solid reputation and our +real power. The confederation which is now in course of formation +between the North-American Colonies tends manifestly to a further +change; it tends to a further change all the more manifestly because +such a tendency is anxiously disclaimed. Yes, Canada will soon cease to +trouble and divide us. But while it is England's, it is England's;<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_766" id="Page_766">[Pg 766]</a></span> and +to threaten her with an attack on it is to threaten a proud nation with +outrage and an assault upon its honor.</p> + +<p>Finally, if our people have misconstrued your acts, let me conjure you +to make due allowance for our ignorance,—an ignorance which, in many +cases, is as dark as night, but which the progress of events here begins +gloriously to dispel. We are not such a nation of travellers as you are, +and scarcely one Englishman has seen America for a hundred Americans +that have seen England. "Why does not Beauregard fly to the assistance +of Lee?" said a highly educated Englishman to an American in England. +"Because," was the reply, "the distance is as great as it is from Rome +to Paris." If these three thousand miles of ocean that lie between us +could be removed for a few days, and the two great branches of the +Anglo-Saxon race could look each other in the face, and speak their +minds to each other, there would be an end, I believe, of all these +fears. When an Englishman and an American meet, in this country or in +England, they are friends, notwithstanding all that has passed; why not +the two nations?</p> + +<p>I have not presumed, and shall not presume, to touch on any question +that has arisen or may arise between the Executive Government of my +country and the Executive Government of yours. In England, Liberals have +not failed to plead for justice to you, and, as we thought, at the same +time, for the maintenance of English honor. But I will venture to make, +in conclusion, one or two brief remarks as to the general temper in +which these questions should be viewed.</p> + +<p>In the first place, when great and terrible issues hang upon our acts, +perhaps upon our words, let us control our fancies and distinguish +realities from fictions. There hangs over every great struggle, and +especially over every civil war, a hot and hazy atmosphere of excited +feeling which is too apt to distort all objects to the view. In the +French Revolution, men were suspected of being objects of suspicion, and +sent to the guillotine for that offence. The same feverish and delirious +fancies prevailed as to the conduct of other nations. All the most +natural effects of a violent revolution—the depreciation of the +assignats, the disturbance of trade, the consequent scarcity of +food—were ascribed by frantic rhetoricians to the guineas of Pitt, +whose very limited amount of secret-service money was quite inadequate +to the performance of such wonders. When a foreign nation has given +offence, it is turned by popular imagination into a fiend, and its +fiendish influence is traced with appalling clearness in every natural +accident that occurs. I have heard England accused of having built the +Chicago Wigwam, with the building of which she had as much to do as with +the building of the Great Pyramid. I have heard it insinuated that her +policy was governed by her share in the Confederate Cotton-Loan. The +Confederate Cotton-Loan is, I believe, four millions and a half. There +is an English nobleman whose estates are reputed to be worth a larger +sum. "She is very great," says a French writer, "that odious England." +Odious she may be, but she is great,—too great to be bribed to baseness +by a paltry fee.</p> + +<p>In the second place, let us distinguish hostile acts, of which an +account must of course be demanded, from mere words, which great +nations, secure of their greatness, may afford to let pass. Your +President knows the virtue of silence; but silence is so little the +system on either side of the water, that in the general flux of rhetoric +some rash things are sure to be said. One of our statesmen, while +starring it in the Provinces, carelessly throws out the expression that +Jeff Davis has made the South a nation; another says that you are +fighting for Empire, and the South for Independence. Our Prime-Minister +is sometimes offensive in his personal bearing towards you,—as, to our +bitter cost, he has often been towards other nations. On the other hand, +your statesmen have said hard things of England;<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_767" id="Page_767">[Pg 767]</a></span> and one of your +ambassadors to a great Continental state published, not in his private, +but in his official capacity, language which made the Northern party in +England for a moment hang their heads with shame. A virulence, +discreditable to England, has at times broken forth in our House of +Commons,—as a virulence, not creditable to this country, has at times +broken forth in your Congress. But what has the House of Commons done? +Threatening motions were announced in favor of Recognition,—in defence +of the Confederate rams. They were all set aside by the good sense of +the House and of the nation. It ended in a solemn farce,—in the +question being put very formally to the Government whether it intended +to recognize the Confederate States, to which the Government replied +that it did not.</p> + +<p>And when the actions of our Government are in question, fair allowance +must be made for the bad state of International Law. The very term +itself is, in fact, as matters at present stand, a dangerous fiction. +There can be no law, in a real sense, where there is no law-giver, no +tribunal, no power of giving legal effect to a sentence,—but where the +party on whose side the law is held to be must after all be left to do +himself right with the strong hand. And one consequence is that +governments are induced to rest in narrow technicalities, and to be +ruled by formal precedents, when the question ought to be decided on the +broadest grounds of right. The decision of Lord Stowell, for example, +that it is lawful for the captor to burn an enemy's vessel at sea rather +than suffer her to escape, though really applying only to a case of +special necessity, has been supposed to cover a system of burning prizes +at sea, which is opposed to the policy and sentiment of all civilized +nations, and which Lord Stowell never could have had in view. And it +must be owned that this war, unexampled in all respects, has been +fruitful of novel questions respecting belligerent rights, on which a +Government meaning no evil might easily be led astray. Among its results +we may hope that this revolution will give birth to a better system of +International Law. Would there were reason to hope that it might lead to +the erection of some high tribunal of justice among nations to supersede +forever the dreadful and uncertain ordeal of war! Has the Government of +England, in any case where your right was clear, really done you a +wrong? If it has, I trust that the English nation, temperately and +respectfully approached, as a proud nation requires to be, will surely +constrain its Government to make the reparation which becomes its honor.</p> + +<p>But let it not be forgotten, that, in the worst of times, at the moment +of your lowest depression, England has refused to recognize the +Confederate States, or in any way to interfere in their behalf; and that +the steadiness of this refusal has driven the Confederate envoy, Mr. +Mason, to seek what he deems a more hospitable shore. The inducement of +cotton for our idle looms and our famishing people has been a strong one +to our statesmen as well as to our people, and the Tempter has been at +their side. Despotism, like Slavery, is necessarily propagandist. It +cannot bear the contagion, it cannot bear the moral rebuke, of +neighboring freedom. The new French satrapy in Mexico needs some more +congenial and some weaker neighbor than the United Republic, and we have +had more than one intimation that this need is felt.</p> + +<p>And this suggests one closing word as to our blockade-running. Nothing +done on our side, I should think, can have been more galling, as nothing +has been so injurious to your success. For myself, in common with all +who think as I do on these questions, I abhor the blockade-runners; I +heartily wish that the curse of ill-gotten gain may rest on every piece +of gold they make; and never did I feel less proud of my country than +when, on my way hither, I saw those vessels in Halifax sheltered under +English guns. But blockade-running is the law; it is the test, in fact, +of an effective blockade.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_768" id="Page_768">[Pg 768]</a></span> And Englishmen are the blockade-runners, not +because England as a nation is your enemy, but because her merchants are +more adventurous and her seamen more daring than those of any nation but +your own. You, I suspect, would not be the least active of +blockade-runners, if we were carrying on a blockade. The nearness of our +fortresses at Halifax and Nassau to your shores, which makes them the +haunt of blockade-runners, is not the result of malice, but of +accident,—of most unhappy accident, as I believe. We have not planted +them there for this purpose. They have come down to us among the general +inheritance of an age of conquest, when aggression was thought to be +strength and glory,—when all kings and nations were alike +rapacious,—and when the prize remained with us, not because we were +below our neighbors in morality, but because we were more resolute in +council and mightier in arms. Our conquering hour was yours. You, too, +were then English citizens. You welcomed the arms of Cromwell to +Jamaica. Your hearts thrilled at the tidings of Blenheim and Ramillies, +and exulted in the thunders of Chatham. You shared the laurels and the +conquests of Wolfe. For you and with you we overthrew France and Spain +upon this continent, and made America the land of the Anglo-Saxon race. +Halifax will share the destinies of the North-American +confederation,—destinies, as I said before, not alien to yours. Nassau +is an appendage to our West-Indian possessions. Those possessions are +and have long been, and been known to every reasoning Englishman to be, +a mere burden to us. But we have been bound in honor and humanity to +protect our emancipated slaves from a danger which lay near. An ocean of +changed thought and feeling has rolled over the memory of this nation +within the last three years. You forget that but yesterday you were the +Great Slave Power.</p> + +<p>You, till yesterday, were the great Slave Power. And England, with all +her faults and shortcomings, was the great enemy of slavery. Therefore +the slave-owners who had gained possession of your Government hated her, +insulted her, tried to embroil you with her. They represented her, and I +trust not without truth, as restlessly conspiring against the existence +of their great institution. They labored, not in vain, to excite your +jealousy of her maritime ambition, when, in enforcing the right of +search and striving to put down the slave-trade, she was really obeying +her conscience and the conscience of mankind. They bore themselves +towards her in these controversies as they bore themselves towards +you,—as their character compels them to bear themselves towards all +whom they have to deal. Living in their own homes above law, the +proclaimed doctrines of lawless aggression which alarmed and offended +not England alone, but every civilized nation. And this, as I trust and +believe, has been the main cause of the estrangement between us, so far +as it has been an estrangement between the nations, not merely between +certain sections and classes. It is a cause which will henceforth +operate no more. A Scandinavian hero, as the Norse legend tells, waged a +terrible combat through a whole night with the dead body of his +brother-in-arms, animated by a Demon; but with the morning the Demon +fled.</p> + +<p>Other thoughts crowd upon my mind,—thoughts of what the two nations +have been to each other in the past, thoughts of what they may yet be to +each other in the future. But these thoughts will rise in other minds as +well as in mine, if they are not stifled by the passion of the hour. If +there is any question to be settled between us, let us settle it without +disparagement to the just claims or the honor of either party, yet, if +possible, as kindred nations. For if we do not, our posterity will curse +us. A century hence, the passions which caused the quarrel will be dead, +the black record of the quarrel will survive and be detested. Do what we +will now, we shall not cancel the tie of blood, nor prevent it from +hereafter asserting its undying power.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_769" id="Page_769">[Pg 769]</a></span> The Englishmen of this day will +not prevent those who come after them from being proud of England's +grandest achievement, the sum of all her noblest victories,—the +foundation of this the great Commonwealth of the New World. And you will +not prevent the hearts of your children's children from turning to the +birth-place of their nation, the land of their history and of their +early greatness, the land which holds the august monuments of your +ancient race, the works of your illustrious fathers, and their graves.</p> + +<p class="right"><span class="smcap">Goldwin Smith</span>.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="WE_ARE_A_NATION" id="WE_ARE_A_NATION"></a>WE ARE A NATION.</h2> + + +<p>The great national triumph we have just achieved renders that foggy and +forlorn Second Tuesday of November the most memorable day of this most +memorable year of the war. Under the heavy curtain of mist that brooded +low over the scene, under the sombre clouds of uncertainty that hung +drizzling and oppressive above the whole land, was enacted a drama whose +grandeur has not been surpassed in history. The deep significance of +that event it is not easy for the mind to fathom. As the accumulating +majorities for the Union came rolling in, like billows succeeding +billows, heaping up the waters of victory, it was not alone the ship of +state that was lifted bodily over the bar, but all her costly freight of +human liberties and human hopes was upborne, and floated some leagues +onward towards the fair haven of the Future.</p> + +<p>The first uprising of the nation, when its existence was assailed, was +truly a sublime spectacle. But the last uprising of the same, to confirm +with cool deliberation the judgment it pronounced in its heat, is a +spectacle of far higher moral sublimity. That sudden wildfire-blaze of +patriotism, if it was simply a blaze, had long since had time to expire. +The Red Sea we had passed through was surely sufficient to quench any +light flame kindled merely in the leaves and brushwood of our national +character. Instead of a brisk and easy conquest of a rash rebellion, +such as seemed at first to be pretty generally anticipated, we had +closed with a powerful antagonist in a struggle which was all the more +terrible because it was unforeseen. The country had soon digested its +hot cakes of enthusiasm, and come to the tougher article, the +ostrich-diet of iron determination. If we were a race of flunkies, ample +opportunities had been afforded to have our flunky-ism whipped out of +us. If Jonathan was but another blustering Sir Andrew Aguecheek, he +would long before have elicited laughter from the world's aristocratic +dress-circle, and split the ears of the groundlings, by turning from the +foe that would fight, and bellowing forth that worthy gentleman's +sentiments:—"An I thought he had been valiant, and so cunning in fence, +I'd have seen him damned ere I'd have challenged him!" But those who +looked hopefully for this conclusion have been disappointed. Even Mr. +Carlyle may now perceive that we have something more than a foul chimney +burning itself out over here:—strange that a seer should thus mistake +the glare of a mountain-torch! We have not made war from a mere +ebullition of spite, or as an experiment, or for any base and temporary +purpose; but this is a war for humanity, and for all time. That we are +in deadly earnest, that the heart of the nation is in it, and that this +is no effervescent and fickle heart, the momentous Tuesday stands before +the world as the final proof.</p> + +<p>True, in that day's winnowing of the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_770" id="Page_770">[Pg 770]</a></span> national grain, which had been +some four years threshing, plenty of chaff and grit were found. The +opposition to the Administration was made up of three classes. The +smallest, but by far the most active class, consisted of reckless +politicians,—those Northern men with Southern principles (if they have +anything that can properly be called principles) who sympathize with the +Rebels in arms,—who hold the interests of party to be supreme, and +shrink from no acts that bid fair to advance those interests. They are +the grit in the machine. The second class comprised the sheep which +those bad shepherds led,—sheep with a large proportion of swine +intermixed, and many a fanged and dangerous cur, as ignorant as they, +doing the will of his masters,—the brutish class, without enlightenment +or moral perception, goaded by prejudice, and deceived by lies so +shallow and foolish that the wonder was how anybody could be duped by +them. Side by side with these, and often mingling with them, was the +third class, the so-called "Conservatives," whose numbers and +respectability could alone have kept the warlike young Falstaff of the +expedition in countenance, and induced him to march through Coventry (or +rather into it, for he got no farther) with his motley crew of +followers.</p> + +<p>This last-named class, when analyzed, is found to be composed of a great +variety of elements. The downright "Hunker" Conservative, who is very +likely to pass over to and identify himself with the first class, hates +with a natural, ineradicable hate all political and spiritual +advancement. He takes material and selfish, and consequently low and +narrow views of things,—and having secured for himself and his wife, +for his son John and his wife, privilege to eat and sleep and cohabit, +he cannot see the necessity of any further progress. If he is +enterprising, it is to increase his blessings in this world; if devout, +it is to perpetuate them in the next: for sincere religion he has +none,—since religion is but another name for Love, inspiring hope, +charity, and a zeal for the welfare of all mankind.—Others are +conservative from timidity, or because they are wedded to tranquility. +"Oh yes," they say, "no doubt the cause you are fighting for is just; +but then fighting is so dreadful! Let us have peace,—peace at any +cost!" Good-hearted people as far as they go, but lacking in +constitution. To them the fiery torrents of generosity and heroism are +unknown. Numbers of these, it is true, were swept away by the flood of +enthusiasm which prevailed during the first days of the Rebellion; but +when it appeared that the insurgents were not to be overawed and put +down by noise,—that making speeches and hanging out flags would not do +the business,—they became alarmed: the thought of actual bloodshed, and +taxes, and a disturbance of trade developed the Aguecheek. "Good +heavens!" said they, picking up the hats they has tossed with cheers +into the sky, and carefully brushing down the ruffled nap to its former +respectable smoothness, "this will never do! we can't frighten 'em!" So +they concluded to be frightened themselves, and ran back to their +comfortable apron-strings of opinion held by their grandmothers. Strange +as it seems, many of these are persons of piety, taste, and culture. Yet +their culture is retrospective, their taste mere dillettanteism, and +their piety conventional: to whatever is new in theology, or vital in +literature, (at least until the cobwebs of age begin to gather upon it,) +and especially to whatever tends to overthrow or greatly modify the +ancient order of things, they are unalterably opposed. If occasionally +one of them becomes desirous of keeping up with the times, or is forced +along momentarily by the stream of events, some defect of mental or +moral constitution prevents his progress; and you are sure to find him +soon or late returning to the point from which he started, like those +bits of drift-wood which are always bobbing up and down close under the +fall or circling round and round in the eddies. The trouble is, such +sticks float too lightly on<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_771" id="Page_771">[Pg 771]</a></span> the surface of things; if they carried more +heart-ballast, and would sink deeper, the current would bear them +on.—Another variety of the Conservative is the man who is really +progressive and right-minded, but extremely slow. Give him time, and he +is certain to form a just judgment, and range himself on the right side +at last. He goes with the rest only so far as they travel his road, and +his lagging is pretty sure to be atoned for by earnest endeavor in the +end. With these are to be classed numerous other varieties: those who +are "Hunkerish" on account of some strange spiritual obtuseness, or from +misanthropy, or perverseness, or self-conceit, or a cold and sluggish +temperament, or from weak, human sympathies governed by strong political +prejudice,—together with those countless larvæ and tadpoles, the +small-fry of sons and nephews, of individuality yet undeveloped, who are +conservative because their fathers and uncles are conservative.</p> + +<p>Such was the Opposition, to which we have devoted so many words, +because, though signally defeated, much of its power and influence +survives. The fact that it proved to be as large as it was is by no +means discouraging: that there should have been so much flabby and +diseased flesh on the body-politic was to have been expected; and that +it would show itself chiefly in the large cities, where foul humors and +leprosy are sure to break out, if anywhere, upon slight irritation, +(contrast the corrupt vote of New York City with Missouri and Maryland +giving their voices for freedom!) was likewise foreseen. That the malady +continues, and by what curative process it is to be subdued and rendered +harmless,—this is what concerns us now.</p> + +<p>We have at last demonstrated, to the satisfaction of our arrogant +Southern friends, let us trust, that the despised Yankee, the +dollar-worshipper, is as prompt to fight for a principle as they for +power and a mistaken right of property,—ready to give blood and +treasure without stint, all for an idea; and that, having reluctantly +set his foot in gore, to draw back is not possible to him, for his heart +is indomitable, and his soul relentless,—in his soul sits Nemesis +herself. We have taught the slaveholding insolence the final lesson, +that there is absolutely nothing to hope from the pusillanimity it +counted upon. To the world abroad, also, that Tuesday's portentous +snow-storm of ballots, covering every vestige of treason here, to the +trail of the Copperhead, and whitening the face of the whole land with a +purer faith, will be more convincing than our victories in the field. +The bubble of Republicanism, which was to display such alacrity at +bursting, is not the childish thing it was deemed, but granitic, with a +fiery, throbbing core; its outward form no mere flashy film, blown out +of chimeras and dreams, but a creation from the solid strata of human +experience, upheaved here by the birth-throes of a new era:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"With inward fires and pain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It rose a bubble from the plain,"<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>secure and enduring as Monadnock or Mount Washington.</p> + +<p>We have proved that we are a nation equal to the task of self-discipline +and self-control,—a new thing on this planet. Hitherto, on the stage of +history, kings and princes have been the star-actors: in them all the +interest of the scene has centred: they and a few grand favorites were +everything, and all the rest supernumeraries, "a level immensity of +foolish small people," of no utility except to support them in their +pompous parts. But we have found that "Hamlet" does very well with +Hamlet left out. In place of the prince we will have a principle. +Persons are of no account: the President is of no account simply as a +man. Here, at last, Humanity has flowered; here has blossomed a new race +of men, capable of postponing persons to uses, and private preferences +to the public good, of subjecting its wildest passions to a sense of +justice,—qualities so rare, that, when they are most strikingly +manifested in us, foreign observers stand astonished and incredulous. +Accustomed to seeing other races carried away by<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_772" id="Page_772">[Pg 772]</a></span> their own frenzy the +moment they break free from despotic restraint and attempt to act for +themselves, they cannot believe that Americans actually have that +uncommon virtue, self-control. The predictions of the London "Times" +with regard to us have always proved such ludicrous failures, because +they have been based upon this false estimate of our temper. Taking for +granted that we are a mob, and that a mob is an idiot, whose speech and +actions are void of reason, "full of sound and fury, signifying +nothing," the Thunderer continues to prophesy evil of us; and when, +where madness was most confidently looked for, we exhibit the coolest +sense, it can think of nothing better to do than to denounce us for our +inconsistencies! Yet the self-control we claim for ourselves comes from +no lack of caloric: caloric we possess in abundance, though of a stiller +sort than that with which the world has been hitherto acquainted. Our +friend from the backwoods thought there was no fire in the coal-furnace, +because he could not hear it roar and crackle, and was afterwards amazed +at its steady intensity of heat. Our misguided Southern brethren had the +same opinion of Northern character, and burned their hands most +deplorably when they laid hold of it.</p> + +<p>They have discovered their mistake. Our Transatlantic neighbors have +also, by this time, discovered theirs. Moreover, we (and this is the +main thing) have caught a glimpse of ourselves in the glass of the last +election. Henceforth let us have faith in our destiny. Let us once more +open our maps, and, by the light of that day's revelation, look at the +grand outlines and limitless possibilities of our country. Look at the +old States and the new, and at the future States! Behold the vast plains +of Texas and the Indian Territory,—the rivers of Arizona, Dakotah, and +Utah,—Montana, Idaho, Colorado, and New Mexico, with their magnificent +mountain-chains,—Nevada, and the Pacific States,—Washington, Oregon, +and California, each alone capable of becoming another New England! What +a home is this for the nation that is to be! Let us consider well our +advantages, be true to the inspiration that is in us, put aside at once +and forever the thought of failure, and advance with firm and confident +steps to the accomplishment of the grandest mission ever yet intrusted +to any people.</p> + +<p>True, great humiliations may be still in store for us; for what do we +not deserve? When we consider the inhumanity, the cowardice, the stolid +selfishness, of which this people has been guilty, especially on the +subject of negro slavery, we can find no refuge from despair but in the +comforting assurance that God is a God of mercy, as well as of justice.</p> + +<p>Let us hasten to atone for our sins, and forward the work of national +purification, by doing our duty—our whole duty—now. One thing is +certain: we cannot look for help to other nations, nor to the amiable +disposition of a foe whose pith and pluck are consanguineous with our +own, nor to the agency of individuals. It was written in the beginning +that the people which aspired to make its own laws should also work out +its own salvation. For this reason great leaders have not been given us, +and we shall not need them. It is for a nation unstable in its purposes, +and incapable of self-moderation, that the steady hand of a strong ruler +is necessary. The first Napoleon was no more a natural product of the +first French Revolution than the present Emperor is of the last. They +might each have sat for the picture of the tyrant springing to the neck +of an unbridled Democracy, drawn by Plato in the eighth book of the +"Republic": just as his description of the excesses which necessitate +despotic rule might pass for a description of the frenzy of +'Ninety-Three:—"When a State thirsts after liberty, <i>and happens to +have bad cup-bearers appointed it, and gets immoderately drunk with an +unmixed draught, thereof</i>, it punishes even the governors." No such +inebriety has resulted from the moderate draughts of that nectar in +which this new Western<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_773" id="Page_773">[Pg 773]</a></span> race has indulged; and only the southern and +more passionate portion of it is in any danger of converting its acute +"State-Rights" distemper into chronic despotism. The nation in its +childhood needed a paternal Washington; but now it has arrived at +manhood, and it requires, not a great leader, but a magistrate willing +himself to be led. Such a man is Mr. Lincoln: an able, faithful, +hard-working citizen, overseeing the affairs of all the citizens, +accepting the guidance of Providence, and conscientiously yielding +himself to be the medium of a people's will, the agent of its destinies. +That is all we have any right to expect of him; and if we expect more, +we shall be disappointed. He cannot stretch forth his hand and save us, +although we have now twice elected him to his high place. Upon +ourselves, and upon ourselves alone, under God, success and victory +still depend.</p> + +<p>What outward duties are to be fulfilled it is needless to recapitulate +here,—for have they not been taught in every loyal pulpit and in every +loyal print, in sermon, story, and song, until there is not a school-boy +but knows the lesson? Treason must be defeated in the field, its armies +annihilated, its power destroyed forever. In order to accomplish this, +our own armies must be kept constantly recruited with numbers and with +confidence. As for American slavery, it perishes from the face of the +earth utterly. We have had enough of the serpent which the young +Republic warmed in its too kind bosom. Now it dies; there is no help for +it: if you object to the heel upon its head, and place your own head +there to sheild it, God pity you, my friend, for you will have need of +more than human pity! This war is to be brought to a triumphant close, +and the cause of the war extirpated, whether you like it or not. You can +accept destruction and ignominy with it, or you may live to rejoice over +the most glorious victory and reform of the age: take your choice: but +understand, once for all, that complaint is puerile, and expostulation +but an idle wind in the face of inexorable Fate. Shall we remember our +martyred heroes, our noble, our beloved, who have gone down in this +conflict, and sit gloomily content while the devouring monster survives? +Is it nothing that they have fallen, and yet such a wrong that the +fetters of the bondman should fall? Is the claim of property in man so +sacred, and the blood of our brothers so cheap? Have done with this +heartless cant,—this prating about the constitutional rights of +traitors! When the Moslem chief was marching to the chastisement of a +revolted tribe, the insurgents, seeing disaster inevitable in a fair +field, resorted to the device of elevating the Koran upon the shafts of +their spears, and bearing it before them into battle. The stratagem +succeeded. The fanatical Arabs were filled with horror on finding that +they had lifted their swords against the Book of the Holy Prophet, and +fled in confusion,—defeated, not by the foe, but by their own blind +reverence for the letter and outward symbol of the Law. Thus the first +attempt at secession from the Moslem Empire became successful; and the +decadence of that empire was the fatal fruit of that day's folly. In +like manner we have had the letter of the Constitution thrust between us +and victory. The leaders of the Opposition carried it before them, with +ostentation and loud pharisaical rant, in the late political battle. +But, much as it has embarrassed and retarded our cause, terrifying and +bewildering weak minds, the device has not availed in the past, and it +shall avail still less in the future. The spirit of the Constitution we +shall remember and obey; but the sword of justice, edged with common +sense, must cut its way through everything else, to the very heart of +the Rebellion.</p> + +<p>Only from ourselves have we anything to fear. Self-distrust is more to +be dreaded than foreign interference or Rebel despotism. The deportment +of Great Britain has become more and more respectful<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_774" id="Page_774">[Pg 774]</a></span> towards us as we +have shown ourselves worthy of respect; and even France has of late +grown discreetly reticent on the subject of intervention. But it is said +the Rebels will arm their slaves. Very well; if they think to save their +boat by taking the bottom out, in order to make paddles of it, they are +welcome to try the experiment. Are three or four hundred thousand negro +soldiers going to accept from their masters the boon of freedom for +themselves only, and not demand it for their race? Or think you their +gratitude towards those masters is so extraordinary, that they will take +arms against their brothers already in the field, and not be liable to +commit the slight error of passing over and fighting by their side? In +either case, Mr. Davis's proposition, if carried out, is practical +abolitionism; and we have yet to learn how a tottering edifice can be +rendered any more stable by the removal of its acknowledged +"cornerstone." The plan is violently opposed by the slave-owning +classes: for, whatever may be proclaimed to the contrary, they have +risked this war, and devoted themselves to it, believing it to be a war +for the aggrandizement of their peculiar institution; and if that +succumbs, where is the gain? Already their new Government has become to +them an object of dread and detestation, and they are beginning to look +back with regretful hearts to the beneficent Union which they were in +such rash haste to destroy. Only the leaders of the Rebellion can hope +to gain anything by so perilous an expedient; for Slavery has become +with them a secondary consideration,—no doubt Mr. Davis is sincere in +asserting this,—and they are now ready to sacrifice it to their private +ambition. They are in the position of men who, driven to extremity, will +give up everything else in order to preserve their power, and their +necks with it. But let us indulge in no useless apprehensions on this +point. Such a proposition, seriously entertained by the Richmond +Government, is of itself the strongest evidence we could have of the +exhaustion of their resources. Every other means has failed, and this is +their last resort. We are reminded of that vivid description, in one of +Cooper's novels, of an Indian in his canoe drawn into the rapids of +Niagara and swept over the falls,—who, in his wild efforts to save +himself, continued <i>paddling in the air</i> even after he had passed the +verge of the cataract. So the Confederate craft has reached the brink of +destruction, and we may now look to see some frantic paddling in their +air. Or shall we liken it to Milton's bad angel, flying to his new +empire, but dropping into an unexpected "vast vacuity"?</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Fluttering his pennons vain, plumb down he drops<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ten thousand fathom deep, and to this hour<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Down had been falling, had not by ill chance<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This strong rebuff of some tumultuous cloud<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Instinct with fire and nitre hurried him<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As many miles aloft."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>That "ill chance" has been averted by the last election; and no such +"tumultuous cloud" will gather again, to bear up the lost Anarch, if we +courageously act our part. The danger now is from our own weakness, not +from the enemy's strength.</p> + +<p>A great and most important work still remains for us. It is not enough +to perform simply the external and obvious duties of the hour. What we +would insist on here is the internal and moral work to be done. Men have +never yet given full credit to the power of an idea. With faith, ye +shall remove mountains. A pebble of truth, in the hand of the +shepherd-boy of Israel, is mightier to prevail than the spear like a +weaver's beam. How long were the little band of Abolitionists despised! +But they were the cutwater of the national ship. With their +revolutionary idea, so opposed to the universal prejudice, they +succeeded at last in moving the entire country, just as one cog-wheel +set against another overcomes its resistance and puts the whole +machinery in motion. The rills of thought, shooting from the heights of +a few pure and lofty minds, have spread out into this sea of practical +Abolitionism which<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_775" id="Page_775">[Pg 775]</a></span> now covers the whole land,—although the sea may be +inclined to deny its source. May we, then, charge the pioneers of the +Anti-Slavery sentiment with having caused this war? In the same manner +we may regard the coming of Christ as being the cause of all the wars +and persecutions of Christianity.</p> + +<p>If such is the force of earnest conviction, consider what we too may do. +We have gone to the polls and voted for the accomplishment of a certain +object: far more intelligently than at the beginning of the war, (for +few knew then what we were fighting for,) we have met the enemies of our +country, and defeated them at the ballot-box. But there is another and +no less important vote to be cast. The Twentieth Presidential Election +is not the last, even for this year. We are to continue casting our +ballots, every day, and day after day,—nay, year after year, if +necessary,—to the end. We have had political suffrage; but moral +suffrage is now called for. Here woman realizes her rights, so long +talked about, and so little understood; here, too, even the intelligent, +patriotic boy and girl can exert an influence. We know something of what +words can do; but how little we appreciate the power which is behind +words! By the wishes of your heart, by the aspirations of your soul, by +the energies of your mind and will, you form about you an atmosphere as +real as the air you breathe, although, like that, invisible. Not a +prayer is lost; not a throb of patriotish goes for nothing; never a wave +of impulse dies upon the ethereal deep in which we live and move and +have our being. Be filled with the truth as with life itself; let the +divine aura exhale from you wherever you move; and thus you may do more +to overcome the opposition to our cause than when you deposited your +ticket in the box. You may, perhaps, breathe the breath of life into the +nostrils of the coldest clay of conservatism you know: for true it is +that men not only catch manners, as they do diseases, one from another, +but that they catch unconscious inspiration also. Boswell, when absent +from London and his hero, acknowledged himself to be empty, vapid; and +he became somewhat only when "impregnated with the Johnsonian ether." So +the ether of your own earnest, fervent, patriotic character may +impregnate the spiritless and help to sustain the brave. Consider, +moreover, what an element may be thus generated by the combined hopes +and prayers of a whole loyal people! This is the atmosphere which is to +sustain the President and his advisers in their work: this, although we +may not know it, and although they may be unaware, is the vital breath +they need to give them wisdom and power equal to the great crisis; while +even the soldiers, in the far-off fields of conflict, shall feel the +agitations of this subtile fluid, this life-supporting oxygen, buoying +up their hopes, and wafting their banners on to victory.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_776" id="Page_776">[Pg 776]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="REVIEWS_AND_LITERARY_NOTICES" id="REVIEWS_AND_LITERARY_NOTICES"></a>REVIEWS AND LITERARY NOTICES.</h2> + + +<div class="blockquot"><p><i>Dissertations and Discussions: Political, Philosophical, and +Historical.</i> By <span class="smcap">John Stuart Mill</span>. In Three Volumes. 12mo. +Boston: W. V. Spencer.</p></div> + +<p>At a time of deep national emotion, like the present, it is impossible +that we Americans should not feel some bias of personal affection in +reading the works of those great living Englishmen who have been true to +us in the darkest hour. Were it only for his faithful friendship to +freedom and to us, Mr. Mill has a right to claim an attentive audience +for every word he has ever written; and this collection of his +miscellaneous writings, covering a period of thirty years, has a special +interest as showing the successive steps by which he has risen to this +high attitude of nobleness.</p> + +<p>But apart from these special ties, Mr. Mill claims attention as the most +advanced of English minds, and the ablest, all things considered, of +contemporary English writers. His detached works have long since found a +very large American audience,—larger, perhaps, than even their +home-circle of readers; and the sort of biographical interest which +attaches to a collection of shorter essays—giving, as it does, a +glimpse at the training of the writer—will more than compensate for the +want of continuity in these volumes, and for the merely local interest +which belongs to many of the subjects treated. Church-rates and the +English currency have not to us even the interest of heraldry, for that +at least can offer pictures of mermaids, and great ingenuity in Latin +puns; but, on the other hand, every discussion of the British +university-system has a positive value, in the exceedingly crude and +undeveloped condition of American collegiate methods. There is the same +disparity of interest in the different critical essays. Bentham has +hardly exerted an appreciable influence on American thought, and the +transitory authority of Coleridge is now merged in more potent agencies; +yet when the essays bearing those great names were first printed in the +periodical then edited by Mill, they made an era in contemporary English +literature, and therefore indirectly modified our own.</p> + +<p>Thus, in one way or another, almost all these essays have a value. The +style is always clear, always strong, sometimes pointed, seldom +brilliant, never graceful; it is the best current sample, indeed, of +that good, manly, rather colorless English which belongs naturally to +Parliamentary Speeches and Quarterly Reviews. Not being an American, the +author may use novel words without the fear of being called provincial; +so that <i>understandable</i>, <i>evidentiary</i>, <i>desiderate</i>, <i>leisured</i>, and +<i>inamoveability</i> stalk at large within his pages. As a controversialist, +he is a trifle sharp, but never actually discourteous; and it is +pleasant to see that his chivalry makes him gentlest in dealing with the +humblest, while his lance rings against the formidable shield of a +Cambridge Professor or a Master of Trinity as did that of the disguised +Ivanhoe upon the shield of Bois-Guilbert.</p> + +<p>The historical essays in this collection are exceedingly admirable, +especially the defence of Pericles and the Athenians, in the second +paper on Crete's History. In reading the articles upon ethical and +philosophical questions, one finds more drawbacks. The profoundest +truths can hardly be reached, perhaps, by one who, at the end of his +life, as at the beginning, is a sensationalist in metaphysics and a +utilitarian in ethics. It is only when dealing with these themes that he +seems to show any want of thoroughness: unfairness he never shows. In +the closing tract on "Utilitarianism," which the American publishers +have added to the English collection, one feels especially this +drawback. As the theory of universal selfishness falls so soon as one +considers that a man is capable of resigning everything that looks like +happiness, and of plunging into apparent misery, because he thinks it +right,—so the theory of utilitarianism falls, when one considers that a +man is capable of abstaining from an action that would apparently be +useful to all around him, from a secret conviction that it is wrong in +itself. There are many things which are intrinsically wrong, although, +so far as one can see,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_777" id="Page_777">[Pg 777]</a></span> they would do good to all around. To assassinate +a bad neighbor,—to rob a miser and distribute his goods,—to marry +Rochester, while his insane wife is living, (for Jane Eyre,)—to put to +death an imbecile and uncomfortable grandmother, (for a +Feegeean,)—these are actions which are indefensible, though the balance +of public advantages might seem greatly in their favor. It is probable +that at this moment a great good would be done to this nation and to the +world by the death of Jefferson Davis; yet the bare suggestion of his +assassination, in the case of Colonel Dahlgren, was received with a +universal shudder, and disavowed as an atrocious slander. But Mr. Mill +can meet such ethical problems only by reverting to that general +principle of Kant, which he elsewhere repudiates: "So act that the rule +on which thou actest would admit of being adopted as a law for all +rational beings." Mr. Mill says of such instances, "The action is of a +class which, if practised generally, would be generally injurious, and +this is the ground of the obligation to abstain from it." But under the +rule of utilitarianism, it is the injuriousness itself which should be +the principle of classification, and to prove an action innoxious is at +once to separate it from that class; so that the objection falls. By his +own principles, a murder which would benefit the community is by that +very attribute differenced from ordinary and injurious murders, nor can +any good argument be found against its commission. The possible bad +precedent is at best a possible misapprehension, to be sufficiently +averted by concealment, where concealment is practicable.</p> + +<p>In dealing with contemporary and practical questions, Mr. Mill shows +always pre-eminent ability, with less of the Insular traits than any +living Englishman. While there is perhaps no single passage in these +volumes so thoroughly grand as his argument for religions freedom in his +essay on Liberty,—an argument which the most heretical theologians of +either Continent could hardly have put so boldly or so well,—yet +through the whole series of essays there runs the same fine strain. He +repeatedly renews his clear and irresistible appeal for the equal +political rights of the sexes: a point on which there is coming to be +but one opinion among the most advanced minds of Europe and America,—a +unanimity which, after the more immediate problem of Slavery is disposed +of, must erelong bring about some practical application of the +principle, in our republican commonwealths. It is interesting to notice +in this connection, that Mr. Mill has included with his own essays the +celebrated article by his wife, on "The Enfranchisement of Women," and +has prefixed to it one of the noblest eulogies ever devoted to any wife +by any husband.</p> + +<p>He deals with strictly American subjects in the best criticism ever +written upon De Tocqueville, where he shows conclusively the error of +that great writer, in attributing to democracy, as such, many social +phenomena which are equally observable under the English monarchy. These +volumes also include—what the English edition of 1859 of course did not +contain—the later essays on "The Contest in America," "The Slave +Power," and "Non-Intervention." In treating of Slavery and of the War, +the author rarely commits an error; in dealing with other American +questions, he is sometimes misled by defective information, and cites +gravely, with the prelude, "It is admitted," or "It is understood," +statements which have their sole origin in the haste of travellers or in +the croaking of disappointed egotists. The government of the majority +does not end in tyranny: cultivated Americans are not cowards: the best +heads are not excluded from public life: free schools do not tend to +stifle free thought, but infinitely to multiply it: individuality of +character is not checked, but healthily trained, by political equality. +Six months in this country would do more to disabuse Mr. Mill, in these +matters, than years of mere reading; and it is a positive injury to his +large ideas that he should not take the opportunity of testing them on +the only soil where they are being put in practice. Whenever he shall +come, his welcome is secure. In the mean time, all that we Americans can +do to testify to his deserts is to reprint his writings beautifully, as +these are printed,—and to read them universally, as these will be read.</p> + + +<div class="blockquot"><p><i>Narrative of Privations and Sufferings of United States +Officers and Soldiers while Prisoners of War in the Hands of +the Rebel Authorities.</i> Being the Report of a Commission<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_778" id="Page_778">[Pg 778]</a></span> of +Inquiry, appointed by the United States Sanitary Commission. +With an Appendix, containing the Testimony. Printed by the U.S. +Sanitary Commission. Philadelphia.</p></div> + +<p>That uniform thoroughness and accuracy which have marked all that has +been done by the Sanitary Commission, not in the field alone, but in the +committee-room and the printing-office, were never better shown than in +this Report. It attempts something which, unless done thoroughly, was +not worth doing; since, on a subject which appeals so strongly to the +feelings, mere generalities and gossip do more harm than good. It is the +work of a special Commission of Inquiry, composed of three physicians, +(Drs. Mott, Delafield, and Wallace,) two lawyers, (Messrs. Wilkins and +Hare,)and one clergyman (Mr. Walden). This commission has performed a +great amount of labor, and has digested its result into a form so +systematic as to be logically irresistible. The facts on which the +statement rests are a large body of evidence, taken under oath, from +prisoners of both armies, and confirmed by the admissions, carefully +collated, of the Rebel press. The conclusion is, that, in the Southern +prisons, "tens of thousands of helpless men have been, and are now +being, disabled and destroyed by a process as certain as poison, and as +cruel as the torture or burning at the stake, because nearly as +agonizing and more prolonged."</p> + +<p>The next step is to fix the responsibility for all these horrors. All +theories of apology—as that the sufferings were accidental or +exceptional, or that, badly as our soldiers may have fared, the Rebel +soldiers fared little better—are taken up and conclusively refuted, the +last-named with especial thoroughness. The inevitable inference drawn by +the Commission is, that these inhumanities were "designedly inflicted on +the part of the Rebel Government," and were <i>not</i> "due to causes which +such authorities could not control."</p> + +<p>The immediate preparation of this able report is understood to be due to +the Rev. Treadwell Walden, an Episcopal clergyman of Philadelphia, not +unknown to the readers of the "Atlantic." His present work will be the +permanent authority for the facts which it records, and will justify to +future generations the suggestion with which it ends, that these +cruelties are the legitimate working of a form of government which takes +human slavery for its basis. The record of such a government is fitly +written in these pages: it is as appropriate as is, for a king of +Dahomey, his funeral pyramid of skulls.</p> + + +<div class="blockquot"><p><i>Freedom of Mind in Willing</i>; or, Every Being that Wills a +Creative First Cause. By <span class="smcap">Rowland G. Hazard</span>. New York: D. +Appleton & Co. 12mo. pp. 455.</p></div> + +<p>The State of Rhode Island is the most metaphysically inclined of all the +sisterhood, not excepting South Carolina. A superficial observer or a +passing traveller might take just the opposite view of her tendencies. +The stranger who should complete a cycle of sumptuous suppers in +Providence, or spend but a day or two in Newport at the height of the +season, might conclude that Matter with its most substantial appliances, +or Fashion with her most fascinating excitements, had combined to +exclude all thoughts of the spiritual from the few square miles over +which this least of the States holds dominion. Should he leave the two +capitals of luxurious wealth and giddy fashion and seek for the haunts +of Philosophy among the quiet nooks which her few valleys and her +splendid sea-coast afford, he might judge that meditation had been +effectually frightened from them all, for nowhere can he escape the whir +of countless spindles and the clash of thousands of looms.</p> + +<p>But inferences like these may not be trusted, as history demonstrates. +The most admirable of modern treatises in the subtile science, that +masterpiece of speculation in matter and style, "The Minute Philosopher" +of Bishop Berkeley, was composed in Rhode Island, and the place is still +indicated where the musing metaphysician is said to have written the +greater portion of the work. That Berkeley's genius did not abandon the +region, when he left it, is manifest from the direction taken by the +late Judge Durfee, whose "Pan-Idea," if it cannot be accepted as in all +respects a satisfactory theory of the relations of the spiritual +universe, may be safely taken as an indication of the lofty and daring +Platonism of the ingenious<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_779" id="Page_779">[Pg 779]</a></span> author. The anonymous author of "Language by +a Heteroscian" is another thinker of somewhat similar tastes. If common +report do not greatly err, it is the same thinker who in the volume +before us solicits the attention of the philosophic world to his views +of the Will. It adds greatly to the interest of the volume itself, in +our view, and we trust will do so in the view of our readers, to know +that he is no studious recluse nor professional philosopher, but active, +shrewd, and keen-sighted, both in his mills, when at home in a fitly +named valley, and upon Change, when in Boston or New York.</p> + +<p>Surely Roger Williams, that boldest of idealists, did not live in vain, +in that he not only set apart the State which he founded as a place of +refuge for all persons given to free and daring speculation, but made it +a kind of Prospero's Isle, that should never cease to be haunted by some +metaphysical spell.</p> + +<p>The appearance of such a work from such a source is of itself most +refreshing, as an indication that a life of earnest devotion to material +pursuits is not inconsistent with an ardent appreciation of the +surpassing importance of speculative inquiries. One such example as this +is enough to refute the oft-repeated assertion that in America all +philosophy must of course give way before the absorbing interest in the +pursuit of wealth. A few years since we chanced to send a copy of an +American edition of Plato's "Phaedo" to a German Professor. "<i>Eine +wirkliche Erscheinung</i>," was his reply in acknowledgment, "to see an +edition of a work of Plato from America." What would be his amazement at +receiving a copy of a disquisition on the Will written by an American +mill-owner!</p> + +<p>It is still more refreshing to find the author so sincere and so earnest +an advocate of the elevating tendency of philosophical studies. There is +a charming simplicity in the words with which his Preface is +concluded:—"Whatever opinion may be formed of the success or failure of +any effort to elucidate this subject, I trust it will be admitted that +the arguments I have presented at least <i>tend</i> to show that the +investigation may open more elevated and more elevating views of our +position and our powers, and may reveal new modes of influencing our own +intellectual and moral character, and thus have a more immediate, +direct, and practical bearing on the progress of our race in virtue and +happiness than any inquiry in physical science." Such testimony, coupled +with the impression made by his argument, is most gratifying, not only +in consideration of the source from which it comes, but also as +contrasted with the course of so much of the speculative philosophy of +the day, towards Materialism in Psychology, Necessarianism in Morals, +Naturalism in Philosophy, and Pantheism in Theology.</p> + +<p>The doctrine of the writer, or rather his position with respect to +theories of the Will, is distinctly indicated by the title of his +volume. It is obvious that he must be a decided asserter of Liberty as +opposed to Necessity who dares to throw down the gauntlet in support of +the thesis that "every being who wills is a creative first cause." All +his views of the soul and of its doings are entirely consistent with the +direction which is required by this audacious assertion. That the soul +is an originator in most of its activities is his perpetually asserted +theme. To maintain this he is ready almost to question the reality, as +he more than questions the necessity, of the existence of matter, +verging occasionally, on this point, upon Berkeley's views and style of +thinking. The constructive capacities of the intellect are inferred from +the variety of mathematical creations which it originates, as well as +from the more diverse and interesting structures which the never wearied +and ever aspiring fantasy is always building. Should any one question +the right of these creations to be, or seek to detract from their +importance, our author is ready to defend them to the utmost in contrast +with matter and its claims. Indeed, the author's exposition of his +doctrine of the Will is by itself an inconsiderable source of interest, +when separated from the views of all the functions of the spirit, which +are interwoven with it. In discussing the Will he is necessarily led to +treat of its relations to the other powers and functions of the spirit, +and hence by necessity to give his philosophy of the Soul. This +philosophy, briefly described, is one which regards the soul in its +nature and its acts, in its innermost structure and its outmost +energies, as capable of and destined to action. This in also its dignity +and its glory. The soul or<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_780" id="Page_780">[Pg 780]</a></span> spirit, so far from being the subject of +material forces, or the outgrowth of successive series of material +agencies, or the subtile product or potence of material laws, is herself +the conscious mistress and sovereign of them all, giving to matter and +development and law all their importance, as she condescends to use +these either as the mirror in which her own creations are reflected or +the vehicle by which her acts can be expressed.</p> + +<p>How the author maintains and defends this position the limits of this +brief notice will not allow us to specify. The views expressed which +have the closest pertinency to the will are those which lay especial +stress upon the soul as capable of <i>wants</i>, and as thus impelled to +action. Emotion and sensibility neither of them qualifies for action. +<i>Want</i> must supervene, to point to the unattained future, to excite to +change; and to this want knowledge also must be added, in order to +direct the activity. Under the stimulus thus furnished, the future must +be created, as it were, by the will of the soul itself, before it is +made real in fact.</p> + +<p>We are not quite sure that we understand the author's doctrine of Want, +and its relations to the activities of the will, nor that, so far as we +do understand it, we should accept it. But we agree with him entirely, +that it is precisely by means of and in connection with a correct +analysis of these impelling forces that the real nature and import of +the will can be satisfactorily evolved. Mr. Hazard seems to us to make +too little difference between the power of the soul to act and its power +to will or choose. He conceives the will as the capacity which qualifies +for effort of every kind, as the conative power in general, instead of +emphasizing it as the capacity for a special kind of effort, namely, +that of moral selection.</p> + +<p>The second part of the volume is devoted to a criticism of Edwards, the +author on whose "steel cap," as on that of Hobbes of old, every advocate +of liberty is impelled to try the strength and temper of his weapons. +For a critical antagonist, Edwards is admirable, his use of language +being far from precise and consistent, and his definitions and +statements, through his extreme wariness, being vague and vacillating +enough to allow abundant material for comment. Of these advantages Mr. +Hazard knows how to avail himself, and shows not a little acuteness in +exposing the untenable positions and the inconsequent reasoning of the +New-England dialectician. The most ingenious of the chapters upon +Edwards is that in which he refutes the conclusions drawn from the +foreknowledge of God. His position is the following:—If we concede that +the foreknowledge of God were inconsistent with liberty, and involved +the necessity of human volitions, we may suppose the Supreme Being to +forego the exercise of foreknowledge in respect to such events. But it +would not therefore follow that God would be thereby taken by surprise +by any such volitions, or would be incompetent to regulate His own +actions or to control the issues of them in governing the universe. This +he seeks to show, very ingeniously, by asserting that the Supreme Being +must be competent to foresee not the actual volition that will be made, +but every variety that is possible; and as a consummate chess-player +provides by comprehensive forecast against every possible move which his +antagonist can make, and has ready a counter-move, so may we, on the +supposition suggested, conceive the Supreme Being as fully competent, +without the foreknowledge of the actual, by means of His foreknowledge +of the possible, to control and govern the course of the future. This +solution is certainly ingenious, and doubtless original with the author. +It has in all probability occurred to other minds; but, inasmuch as the +advocate for freedom does not usually allow that he is shut up to the +alternative of either denying the divine purpose or abandoning human +freedom, the suggestion of the author has not often, if ever, been +seriously urged before. But we have no space for critical comments.</p> + +<p>The style of the author is good. With some diffuseness, he is usually +clear and animated. The circumstances that he has approached the subject +in his own way, independently of the method of books and the technics of +the schools, has lent great freshness to his thoughts and illustrations. +The occasional observations which he throws in are always ingenious and +sometimes profound. He shows himself at every turn to be an acute +observer, a comprehensive thinker, and deeply imbued with the meditative +spirit. The defects incidental to his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_781" id="Page_781">[Pg 781]</a></span> peculiar training are more than +compensated by the freshness of his manner and the directness of his +language. More interesting still is the imaginative tendency which gives +to many of his passages the charm of poetic feeling, and elevates them +to the truly Platonic rhythm. There are single sentences, and now and +then entire paragraphs, which are gems in their way, that sparkle none +the less for the plain setting of common sense and unpretending diction +by which they are relieved.</p> + +<p>We ought to add that the attitude of the author in respect to moral and +religious truth is truly, but not obtrusively, reverent. Though he +asserts for man the dignity that pertains to a creator, yet he never +forgets the limits under which and the materials out of which his +creations are wrought. His Theism is outspoken and sincere.</p> + +<p>Whatever judgment may be passed upon this volume in the schools of +philosophy or theology, all truth-loving men will agree that it brings +honor to the literature and thought of the country. No man can read a +few of the many passages of refined thought and sagacious observation +with which the volume abounds, without acknowledging the presence of +philosophic genius. No one can read the passages with which each +principal division of the work concludes, without admiring the fine +strains which indicate the presence of genius inspired by poetic feeling +and elevated by adoring reverence. We are sure that the fit, though +scanty, audience from whom the author craves a kindly judgment will +cheerfully render to him far more than this, even their unfeigned +admiration.</p> + + +<div class="blockquot"><p><i>Military Bridges:</i> With Suggestions of New Expedients and +Constructions for crossing Streams and Chasms; including, also, +Designs for Trestle and Truss Bridges for Military Railroads. +Adapted especially to the Wants of the Service in the United +States. By <span class="smcap">Hermann Haupt</span>, late Chief of Bureau in Charge of the +Construction and Operation of United States Military Railways, +etc. New York: D. Van Nostrand. 8vo. pp. 310.</p></div> + +<p>There is in the War Department at Washington a series of splendid +photographs, illustrative of scenes along the line of march of our +armies in Virginia, and depicting minutely the great pioneer labor of +transporting troops and ammunition, giving evidence of the greatest +engineering genius, and the illimitable resource that has been evoked by +this dreadful War of Rebellion.</p> + +<p>The book before us is the result of these operations reduced to form. +The author's name has for the last twenty-five years been associated +with most of the great works of internal improvement in this country, +and is familiar to every Massachusetts man as connected with the great +railroad-enterprise of the State,—the Hoosac Tunnel.</p> + +<p>The professional reputation of the author of "The General Theory of +Bridge-Construction" would of itself be a sufficient guaranty that a new +work from the same source would be entitled to consideration. General +Haupt does not often appear before the public as an author: his works +are few, but of rare merit. The first which appeared, "The General +Theory of Bridge-Construction," was the fruit of many years of +experiment, observation, and calculation, and at once established his +reputation in Europe and America, as unequalled in the specialty of +Bridges. This work was not only the first, but up to the present time is +the only publication in which the action of the parts in a complicated +system is explained, and the direction and intensity of each and every +strain brought within the reach of mathematical formulas, and rendered +accurately determinable. Before the appearance of this book it is +probable that not another engineer in the world could be found able to +calculate the strain upon every sort of bridge-truss, but only on +certain simple forms and combinations. Now, such calculations can be +made by any student in any institution where civil engineering is taught +thoroughly, and where "Haupt on Bridges" is used as a text-book. +Professor Gillespie, writing from Europe, remarked that the greatest +engineer of the age, Robert Stephenson, and his distinguished +associates, had spoken of this book in terms of the highest +commendation.</p> + +<p>After the publication of the controversial papers between Messrs. +Stephenson and Fairbairn in regard to the Britannia Bridge, it became +apparent that neither<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_782" id="Page_782">[Pg 782]</a></span> of these gentlemen, with all their calculations +and expenditures in experiments, had determined the proper distribution +of the strains, and the size and strength required for the side-plates +of tubular bridges, but only for those at the top and bottom. General +Haupt solved the problem mathematically, and sent a communication on the +subject to the American Association for the Advancement of Science, +which has been extensively copied into the scientific journals of +Europe, and has added largely to the reputation of its author. In the +Victoria Bridge at Montreal, the distribution of material in the +vertical plates conforms to the proportions given by General Haupt.</p> + +<p>About the year 1853, General Haupt, then Chief Engineer of the +Pennsylvania Railroad, reviewed the work of Charles Ellett on the Ohio +and Mississippi Rivers, with other plans of improvement that had been +suggested, and, in a pamphlet of about a hundred pages, proposed a +novel, bold, and simple method for the improvement of these rivers, +costing scarcely a tenth as much as the estimated expense of some of the +other methods, and promising greater durability and efficacy. The +Pittsburg Board of Trade recently appointed a scientific commission to +investigate the whole subject; and their report, which is thorough and +exhaustive, gives unanimously the preference to the plan of General +Haupt, as the only practicable mode of improving the Ohio River, so as +to insure a permanent depth of water of not less than six feet. In +passing, we would remark that one of the greatest difficulties the War +Department has had to contend with has been the lack of suitable +navigation on the Ohio River, and it is to be regretted that Government +did not at once seize upon the plans of General Haupt and carry them +into execution.</p> + +<p>In the spring of 1862, General Haupt was solicited to take charge of the +reconstruction of the railroad from Acquia Creek to Fredericksburg. +Without material other than that furnished by forests two miles distant, +and without skilled mechanics, but simply by the aid of common soldiers +who had no previous instruction, he erected, in nine days, a structure +eighty feet high and four hundred feet long, which for more than a year +carried the immense railroad-trains supplying the Army of the Potomac. +It was visited and critically examined by officers in the foreign +service, as a remarkable specimen of bold and successful military +engineering.</p> + +<p>Major-General McDowell, in his defence before the Court of Inquiry, made +the following statement in regard to the Potomac-Creek Bridge, on the +line of the Richmond, Fredericksburg, and Potomac Railroad.</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"The large railroad-bridge over the Rappahannock, some six +hundred feet long by sixty-five feet high, and the larger part +of the one over Potomac Creek, some four hundred feet long by +eighty feet high, were built from the trees cut down by the +troops in the vicinity, and this without those troops losing +their discipline or their instruction as soldiers. The work +they did excited, to a high degree, the wonder and admiration +of several distinguished foreign officers, who had never +imagined such constructions possible by such means, and in such +a way, in the time in which they were done.</p> + +<p>"The Potomac-Run Bridge is a most remarkable structure. When it +is considered, that, in the campaigns of Napoleon, +trestle-bridges of more than one story, even of moderate +height, were regarded as impracticable, and that, too, for +common military roads, it is not difficult to understand why +distinguished Europeans should express surprise at so bold a +specimen of American military engineering. It is a structure +which ignores all the rules and precedents of military science +as laid down in books. It is constructed chiefly of round +sticks cut from the woods, and not even divested of bark; the +legs of the trestles are braced with round poles. It is in four +stories, three of trestles and one of crib-work. The total +height from the deepest part of the stream to the rail is +nearly eighty feet. It carries daily from ten to twenty heavy +railway-trains in both directions, and has withstood several +severe freshets and storms without injury.</p> + +<p>"This bridge was built in May, 1862, in nine working-days, +during which time the greater part of the material was cut and +hauled. It contains more than two million feet of lumber. The +original structure, which it replaced, required as many months +as this did days. It was constructed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_783" id="Page_783">[Pg 783]</a></span> by the common soldiers of +the Army of the Rappahannock, (command of Major-General +McDowell,) under the supervision of his aide-de-camp, Colonel, +now Brigadier-General, Hermann Haupt, Chief of Railroad +Construction and Transportation."</p></div> + +<p>A fine lithographic drawing of this bridge, taken from a photograph, +forms the frontispiece to the volume before us.</p> + +<p>Previous to the Battle of Chancellorsville, General Haupt received +instructions to prepare for a rapid advance of the Army of the Potomac +towards Richmond. He provided a sufficient amount of material to rebuild +all the bridges between Fredericksburg and Richmond, and adopted the +bold and novel expedient of portable railroad-bridge trusses. These +trusses were built in advance, in spans of sixty feet; they were to be +carried whole on cars to the end of the track, then dragged like logs, +with the aid of timber-wheels and oxen, to the sites of the bridges, +where they were to be raised bodily on wooden piers, and the rails laid +over them. The reverse at Chancellorsville prevented this plan from +being carried into effect; but four of these spans were used to replace +the trestle-bridge across the Acquia Creek, where they were tested in +actual use, and answered perfectly.</p> + +<p>When informed of the contemplated advance on Richmond, General Haupt +concluded to replace the trestle-bridge across Potomac Creek by the +military truss-bridge, which was of a more permanent character. The +trestle-bridge had performed good service for more than a year, but, as +it obstructed the water-way of the stream too much, and as the +preservation of the communications would become of even greater +importance after the advance than it had previously been, it was thought +best to take it down. General Hooker, having heard of this +determination, sent for General Haupt in much alarm, and inquired if the +report as to the proposed rebuilding of the bridge was true, and +protested against having it disturbed, saying that he needed all the +supplies that could be run forward, and could not allow a suspension of +transportation even for a day. General Haupt replied, that he was +willing to be held responsible for results, but must be permitted to +control his own means; he did not ask for a suspension of +transportation; he would take down the high bridge and build a permanent +bridge on the piers, and would not detain a single train even for an +hour. General Hooker and staff declared that they did not believe such a +feat possible; yet it was actually accomplished without any detention to +the trains whatever, and in a period of time so brief as to be almost +incredible. <i>In less than two days</i> the trusses of the three spans were +placed in position.</p> + +<p>If there is any one faculty which General Haupt appears to possess in a +preëminent degree, it is <i>resource</i>. He never finds an engineering +problem so difficult that some satisfactory mode of solution does not +present itself to his mind. He seems to comprehend intuitively the +difficulties of a position, and the means of surmounting them. He never +waits; if he cannot readily obtain the material he desires, he takes +that at hand. His new work on "Military Bridges" exhibits this power of +resource in a remarkable degree; it is full of expedients, novel, +practical, and useful, among which may be mentioned expedients for +crossing streams in front of the enemy by means of +blanket-boats,—ingenious substitutes for pontoon-bridges, floats, and +floating-bridges,—plans for the <i>complete</i> destruction of railroad +bridges and track, and for reconstructing track,—modes of defence for +lines of road, etc.: for the book, be it observed, is not limited in its +contents to the single subject indicated by its title.</p> + +<p>The design of the author, as stated in the Introduction, appears to have +been to give to the army a practically useful book. He has not failed to +draw from other sources where suitable material was furnished, an +indebtedness which he has gracefully acknowledged; but a great part of +the book contains new and original plans and expedients, the fruits of +the experience and observation of the author while in charge of the +construction and transportation for the armies of the Rappahannock, of +Virginia, and of the Potomac, under Generals McDowell, Pope, McClellan, +Burnside, Hooker, and Meade. It is a book no officer can afford to be +without; and to the general reader who wishes to be thoroughly versed in +the operations of the war, it will commend itself as replete with +information on this subject.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_784" id="Page_784">[Pg 784]</a></span></p> + + +<div class="blockquot"><p><i>Meditations on the Essence of Christianity, and on the +Religious Questions of the Day.</i> By <span class="smcap">M. Guizot</span>. Translated from +the French under the Superintendence of the Author. London: +<span class="smcap">John Murray</span>.</p></div> + +<p>Whoever is familiar with religious controversies, past and present, has +not failed to notice of late an improvement in their tone, for which we +cannot be too deeply thankful. This does not arise solely from the +neglect which now prevails of the ancient and highly recommended plan of +imprisoning, torturing, and roasting such obstinate heretics as are too +obtuse or too sharp-sighted to yield to milder methods of treatment. +Such incidents in history as the exposure of Christians to hungry beasts +in the Colosseum, a Smithfield burnt-offering of persistent saints, or a +Spanish auto-da-fe, with attending civic, ecclesiastical, and sometimes +even royal functionaries, and wide-encircling half-rejoicing and +half-compassionate multitudes, were not without their charms and +compensations for victims blessed with a fervid fancy or a deathless +purpose. These cruel scenes associated such with the illustrious dead +who have held life cheaper than truth, and gave them an opportunity of +saying to countless multitudes such as no pulpit-orator could attract +and sway,—"See how Christians die!" The liability to such trials turned +away the fickle from the assembly of the faithful and attracted the +magnanimous. When grim Puritans, in our early history, broke the +stubborn necks of peace-preaching Quakers, the latter often thought it a +special favor from Providence that they were permitted to bear so +striking a testimony against religious fanaticism. They felt, like John +Brown in his Virginian prison, that the best service they could render +to the cause they had loved so well was to love it even unto death. +Indeed, martyrs in mounting the scaffold have ever felt the sentiment,—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Yet that scaffold sways the future, and behind the dim unknown<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Standeth God within the shadow, keeping watch above His own."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Such heroic treatment always relieves any cause from contemptuous +neglect, the one thing which is always harder to bear than the fires of +martyrdom. Every reader of Bunyan knows that he complains far less of +his twelve years' imprisonment than he exults over the success of his +prison born, world-ranging Pilgrim. He would doubtless have preferred +lying in that "den," Bedford jail, other twelve years to being unable to +say,—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"My Pilgrim's book has travelled sea and land,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet could I never come to understand<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That it was slighted or turned out of door<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By any kingdom, were they rich or poor."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>The dreariest period in religious discussion commonly occurs when men +have just ceased to inflict legal penalties upon the heterodox, but have +not yet learned those amenities which lend so sweet and gentle a dignity +to debate. In looking over the dusty pamphlets which entomb so many +clerical controversies of our Colonial times, it has often seemed as +though we had lighted on some bar-room wrangle, translated out of its +original billingsgate into scholarly classical quotations and wofully +wrested tests of Holy Writ. This illusion seems all the more probable +when we remember that the potations which inspired the loose jester and +the ministerial pamphleteer of that period but too often flowed from the +same generous tap. This phase of theological dispute is best typified in +that eminent English divine who wrote,—"I say, without the least heat +whatever, that Mr. Wesley lies." The manner in which such reverend +disputants sought to force their conclusions on the reluctant has not +infrequently reminded us of sturdy old Grimshawe, the predecessor of +Bronté at Haworth, of whom Mrs. Gaskell reports, that, finding so many +of his parishioners inclined to loiter away their Sundays at the +ale-house as greatly to thin the attendance upon his ministry, he was +wont to rush in upon them armed with a heavy whip, and scourge them with +many a painful stroke to church, where, doubtless, he scourged them +again with still more painful sermons.</p> + +<p>But, bad as were the controversial habits of the clergy, those of their +skeptical opponents were still worse. That was surely a strange state of +things where such freethinking as the "Age of Reason" could win a wide +circulation and considerable credit. But it was not merely the vulgar +among freethinkers who then substituted sophistry and declamation for +honesty and sense. The philosophers of the Institute<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_785" id="Page_785">[Pg 785]</a></span> caught the manners +of the rabble. What a revolting scene does M. Martin sketch in his +"Essay on the Life and Works of Bernardin de Saint-Pierre"! "The +Institute had proposed this as a prize-question:—'What institutions are +best adapted to establish the morals of a nation?' Bernardin was to +offer the report. The competitors had treated the theme in the spirit of +their judges. Terrified at the perversity of their opinions, the author +of "Studies of Nature" wished to oppose to them more wholesome and +consoling ideas, and he closed his report with one of those morsels of +inspiration into which his soul poured the gentle light of the Gospel. +On the appointed day, in the assembled Institute, Bernardin read his +report. The analysis of the memoirs was heard at first with calmness; +but, at the first words of the exposition of the principles of a +theistical philosopher, a furious outcry arose from every part of the +hall. Some mocked him, asking where he had seen God, and what form He +bore. Others styled him weak, credulous, superstitious; they threatened +to expel him from the assembly of which he had proved himself unworthy; +they even pushed madness so far as to challenge him to single combat, in +order to prove, sword in hand, that there is no God. Cabanis, celebrated +by Carlyle for his dogma, 'Thought is secreted, like bile, somewhere in +the region of the small intestines,' cried out, 'I swear that there is +no God, and I demand that His name shall never be spoken in this place.' +The reporter left the members in grave dispute, not whether there is a +God, but whether the mention of His name should be permitted."</p> + +<p>We have fallen upon better days. The high debate which is now engaging +the attention of Christendom is conducted, for the most part, on both +sides, with distinguished courtesy. Not that the question at issue is, +or is felt to be, any less vital than former ones. The aim of modern +free-inquiry is to remove religious life from the dogmatic basis, upon +which, in Christian lands, it has hitherto stood. Denying the existence, +and sometimes the possibility, of a supernatural revelation, now +admitting, now doubting, and now rejecting the personal immortality of +the soul, our freethinkers profess a high regard for the religious +culture of the race. They would found a new scientific faith, and make +spiritual life an outgrowth of the soul's devout sensibilities. The soul +is to draw its nutriment from Nature, science, and all inspired books; +so that, if preaching is as fashionable in the new dispensation as under +the old, the future saints will be in as bad a plight as, according to +eminent theological authority, were those of a late celebrated divine:—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"His hearers can't tell you on Sunday beforehand,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If in that day's discourse they'll be Bibled or Koraned."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>But is such a religion possible? M. Guizot thinks not, and comes forward +in full philosophical dignity to repel recent assaults upon supernatural +religion. The chief gravity of these attacks has doubtless consisted in +exegetical and historic criticism. M. Guizot deems these matters of +minor consequence, and believes that the most important thing is to +settle certain fundamental metaphysical questions, and correct prevalent +erroneous ideas respecting the purpose of revelation. His book consists +of eight Meditations: Upon Natural Problems,—Christian Dogmas,—The +Supernatural,—The Limits of Science,—Revelation,—Inspiration of the +Scriptures,—God according to the Bible,—Jesus according to the Gospel. +These themes are presented so skilfully as to attract the interest of +the careless, while challenging the fixed attention of the trained +thinker. The reader will find himself lured on, by the freshness of the +author's method of handling, into the very heart of these profound and +difficult questions. He will be charmed to find them treated with calm +penetration and outspoken frankness. No late writer has displayed a +better comprehension of all phases of and parties to the controversy. +There is a singular absence of controversial tone, a marvellous lucidity +of statement, and a visible honesty of intention, as refreshing as they +are rare,—while a spirit of warm and tender devotion steals in through +the argumentation, like the odor of unseen flowers through a giant and +tangled wood. Yet there is no want of fidelity to personal convictions, +no effort by cunning shifts to bring about an apparent reconciliation of +opponents which the writer knows will not endure. With a firm hand he +touches the errors of contending<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_786" id="Page_786">[Pg 786]</a></span> schools of interpreters, and demands +their abandonment. To Rationalist and Hyper-Inspirationist in their +strife he says, like another Moses, "Why smitest thou thy fellow?"</p> + +<p>Those who have watched carefully the tendencies of these parties for +many years must sometimes have grown despondent. The progressive school +has claimed with unscientific haste the adoption, as a fundamental +principle of Biblical interpretation, of the negation of the +supernatural. Their argument is simply, that human experience disproves +the supernatural. Man, a recent comer upon the globe, who has never kept +a very accurate record of his experience, who comes forth from mystery +for a few days of troubled life, and then vanishes in darkness,—he in +his short stay upon earth has watched the play of its laws, which were +before him and will remain after him, and has learned without any +revelation that God never has changed, never will, never can change or +suspend them! Who shall assure us that our experience of these laws does +not differ from that of Peter and John, the Apostles? How much better to +say of them with Hume, Whatever the fact, we cannot believe it, or to +query with Montaigne, <i>Que sais-je</i>? Far better might we say that human +experience can never overthrow faith in the supernatural, for none can +ever say what has been the experience of the countless dead over whom +oblivion broods. Shall a few <i>savans</i> say, Our experience outweighs the +experience of the Hebrews <i>plus</i> one hundred generations of dead +Gentiles <i>plus</i> one universal instinct of humanity? <i>Credat M. Littré, +non ὁι πολλοι, M. Guizot, vel Agassiz.</i> But the laws of Nature +are uncha——Ah! that is the very point in dispute. Why can they not +alter? Because they are invari——Tut! Well, then, b-e-c-a-u-s-e——When +you find a good argument, put it into that blank. Till then, adieu.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Than are dreamt of in your philosophy."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Those who claim a plenary verbal inspiration as essential to a real +revelation are, according to M. Guizot, equally remote from a truly +scientific spirit. Errors in rhetoric and grammar, passages where the +writers speak of astronomical and geological matters in consonance with +the prevailing, but, in many cases, mistaken theories of their times, +being pointed out in the Bible, these cry out, "There can be no real +errors in an inspired book,"—and we are at once amazed and disgusted to +hear men deny the reality of things which they can but perceive, quite +as sturdily as the Port-Royalists refused to allow the presence of +sundry propositions in their books, which, notwithstanding the Pope's +infallible assertion, they had no recollection of thinking or writing, +which they supposed they had always hated and disavowed, and which they +could by no ingenuity of search discover. Sir Thomas Browne might enjoy, +could he revisit the world, the privilege of seeing many who are reduced +to defend their faith with Tertullian's desperate resolution,—"It is +certain, because it is impossible." If ever we escape from such +ineptitude, it will come about by the diffusion of a more philosophic +temper, and the use of a logic that shall refuse to exclude the facts of +human nature from fair treatment, that shall embrace and account for all +the questions involved, and that shall decline to receive as truth +errors of finite science because found in an inspired book. We welcome +this volume as an example of the right spirit and tendency in these +grave discussions, and shall look eagerly for the promised three +succeeding ones.</p> + +<p>This translation, though "executed under the superintendence of the +author," evidently does no justice to the original. We have not seen the +book in French, but we venture to say that M. Guizot never wrote French +which could answer to this version, awkward, careless, and sometimes +obscure. A certain picture of dull and ancient aspect, which had long +passed for an original from the hand of Leonardo da Vinci, and, despite +the raptures of sentimental people who sought to tickle their own vanity +by pretending to perceive in it the marks of its high origin, had +commonly awakened only a sigh of regret over the transitoriness of +pictorial glory, fell at length into the hands of a skilful artist. By +careful examination, this worthy person became satisfied that the +painting was indeed all that had been claimed, but that its primal +splendors had been obscured by the defacing brush of some incompetent +restorer. With loving care he removed the dimming colors, and to an +admiring world was revealed anew the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_787" id="Page_787">[Pg 787]</a></span> Christ of the Supper. Will not +some American publisher perform a like kindly function for Guizot?</p> + + +<div class="blockquot"><p><i>History of the Anti-Slavery Measures of the Thirty-Seventh and +Thirty-Eighth United States Congress</i>, 1861-64. By <span class="smcap">Henry +Wilson</span>. Boston: Walker, Wise, & Co. 12mo. pp. 384.</p></div> + +<p>Senator Wilson is admirably qualified to record the anti-slavery +legislation in which he has borne so prominent and honorable a part. Few +but those engaged in debates can thoroughly understand their salient +points, and fix upon the precise sentences in which the position, +arguments, and animating spirit of opposite parties are stated and +condensed. The present volume is a labor-saving machine of great power +to all who desire or need a clear view of the course of Congressional +legislation on measures of emancipation, but who prefer to rest in +ignorance rather than wade through the debates as reported in the +"Congressional Globe," striving to catch, amid the waste of words, the +leading ideas or passions on which questions turn.</p> + +<p>The first thing which strikes the reader in Mr. Wilson's well-executed +epitome is the gradual character of this anti-slavery legislation, and +the general subordination of philanthropic to military considerations in +its conduct. The questions were not taken up in the order of their +abstract importance, but as they pressed on the practical judgment for +settlement in exigencies of the Government. When Slavery became an +obstruction to the progress of the national arms, opposition to it was +the dictate of prudence as well as of conscience, and its defenders at +once placed themselves in the position of being more interested in the +preservation of slavery than in the preservation of the nation. The +Republicans, charged heretofore with sacrificing the expedient to the +right, could now retort that their opponents were sacrificing the +expedient to the wrong.</p> + +<p>Senator Wilson's volume gives the history of twenty-three anti-slavery +measures, in the order of their inception and discussion. Among these +are the emancipation of slaves used for insurrectionary purposes,—the +forbidding of persons in the army to return fugitive slaves,—the +abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia,—the President's +proposition to aid States in the abolition of slavery,—the prohibition +of slavery in the Territories,—the confiscation and emancipation bill +of Senator Clark,—the appointment of diplomatic representatives to +Hayti and Liberia,—the bill for the suppression of the African +slave-trade,—the enrolment and pay of colored soldiers,—the +anti-slavery Amendment to the Constitution,—the bill to aid the States +to emancipate their slaves,—and the reconstruction of Rebel States. The +account of the introduction of these and other measures, and the debates +on them, are given by Mr. Wilson with brevity, fairness, and skill. A +great deal of the animation of the discussion, and of the clash and +conflict of individual opinions and passions, is preserved in the +epitome, so that the book has the interest which clings to all accounts +of verbal battles on whose issue great principles are staked. As the +words as well as the arguments of the debates are given, and as the +sentences chosen are those in which the characters of the speakers find +expression, the effect is often dramatic. It cannot fail to be observed, +in reading these reports, that there is a prevailing vulgarity of tone +in the declarations of the champions of Slavery. They boldly avow the +lowest and most selfish views in the coarsest languages and scout and +deride all elevation of feeling and thought in matters affecting the +rights of the poor and oppressed. Their opinions outrage civility as +well as Christianity; and while they make a boast of being gentlemen, +they hardly rise above the prejudices of boors. Principles which have +become truisms, and which it is a disgrace for an educated man not to +admit, they boldly denounce as pestilent paradoxes; and in reading Mr. +Wilson's book an occasional shock of shame must be felt by the most +imperturbable politician, at the spectacle of the legislature of "a +model republic" experiencing a fierce resistance in the attempt to +establish indisputable truths.</p> + +<p>Most of the questions here vehemently discussed should, it might be +supposed, be settled without discussion by the plain average sense and +conscience of any body of men deserving to live in the nineteenth +century; but so completely have the defenders of Slavery substituted +will and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_788" id="Page_788">[Pg 788]</a></span> passion for reason and morality, and so long have they been +accustomed to have their insolent absurdities rule the politics of the +nation, that the passage of the bills whose varying fortunes Mr. Wilson +records must be considered the greatest triumph of liberty and justice +which our legislative annals afford. And in that triumph the historian +of the Anti-Slavery Measures may justly claim to have had a +distinguished part. Honest, able, industrious, intelligent, +indefatigable, zealous for his cause, yet flexible to events, gifted at +once with practical sagacity and strong convictions, and with his whole +heart and mind absorbed in the business of politics and legislation, he +has proved himself an excellent workman in that difficult task by which +facts are made to take the impress of ideas, and the principles of +equity are embodied in the laws of the land.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="RECENT_AMERICAN_PUBLICATIONS" id="RECENT_AMERICAN_PUBLICATIONS"></a>RECENT AMERICAN PUBLICATIONS</h2> + +<h3>RECEIVED BY THE EDITORS OF THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY.</h3> + + +<p>A National Currency. By Sidney George Fisher, Author of "The Trial of +the Constitution," etc. Reprinted from the North American Review for +July, 1864. Philadelphia. J. B. Lippincott & Co. 16mo. paper, pp. 83. 25 +cents.</p> + +<p>Our World: or, First Lessons in Geography, for Children. By Mary L. +Hall. Boston. Crosby & Nichols. 12mo. pp. 177. $1.00.</p> + +<p>The Merchant Mechanic. A Tale of "New England Athens." By Mary A. Howe. +New York. John Bradburn. 12mo. pp. 453. $2.00.</p> + +<p>The American Boy's Book of Sports and Games: A Repository of In- and +Out-Door Amusements for Boys and Youth. Illustrated with over Six +Hundred Engravings, designed by White, Herrick, Wier, and Harvey, and +engraved by N. Orr. New York. Dick & Fitzgerald. 12mo. pp. 600. $3.50.</p> + +<p>Southern Slavery in its Present Aspects: Containing a Reply to a Late +Work of the Bishop of Vermont on Slavery. By Daniel R. Goodwin. +Philadelphia. J. B. Lippincott & Co. 16mo. pp. 343. $1.50.</p> + +<p>Love and Duty. By Mrs. Hubback. Philadelphia. T. B. Peterson & Brothers. +12mo, pp. 446. $2.00.</p> + +<p>Memoirs of Lieutenant-General Scott, LL.D. Written by Himself. In Two +Volumes. New York. Sheldon & Co. 12mo. pp. xxii., 330; iv., 323. $4.00.</p> + +<p>To Be or Not To Be, That is the Question. Boston. Geo. C. Rand and +Avery, Printers. 16mo. pp. 47. 38 cents.</p> + +<p>The Hawaiian Islands: Their Progress and Condition under Missionary +Labors. By Rufus Anderson, D.D. Boston. Gould & Lincoln. 12mo. pp. +xxii., 450.</p> + +<p>Uncle Nat: or, The Good Time which George and Frank had, Trapping, +Fishing, Camping-Out, etc. By Alfred Oldfellow. New York. D. Appleton & +Co. 16mo. pp. 224. $1.25.</p> + +<p>Lyra Anglicana; or, A Hymnal of Sacred Poetry, selected from the Best +English Writers, and arranged after the Order of the Apostles' Creed. By +Rev. George T. Rider, M.A. New York. D. Appleton & Co. 16mo. pp. xiv., +288. $2.00.</p> + +<p>Gunnery Catechism, as applied to the Service of Naval Ordnance. Adapted +to the Latest Official Regulations, and approved by the Bureau of +Ordnance, Navy Department. By J.D. Brandt, formerly of U.S. Navy. New +York. D. Van Nostrand. 18mo. pp. 197. $1.50.</p> + +<p>Ruth: A Song in the Desert. Boston. Gould & Lincoln. 16mo. pp. 64. 60 +cents.</p> + +<p>The Burden of the South, in Verse: or, Poems on Slavery, Grave, +Humorous, Didactic, and Satirical. By Sennoia Rubek. New York. P. +Everardus Warner. 8vo. paper. pp. 96.</p> + +<p>Petersons' New Cook-Book; or, Useful and Practical Receipts for the +Housewife and the Uninitiated. Philadelphia. T. B. Peterson & Brothers, +12mo. pp. 533. $2.00.</p> + +<p>Ancient Law: Its Connection with the Early History of Society, and its +Relation to Modern Ideas. By Henry Sumner Maine. With an Introduction by +Theodore W. Dwight. New York. Charles Scribner. 8vo. pp. lxix., 400. +$3.00.</p> + +<p>The Poems and Ballads of Schiller. Translated by Sir Edward Bulwer +Lytton, Bart. From the Last London Edition. New York. Clark & Maynard. +18mo. pp. 407.</p> + + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. +86, December, 1864, by Various + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ATLANTIC MONTHLY, DECEMBER 1864 *** + +***** This file should be named 29516-h.htm or 29516-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/2/9/5/1/29516/ + +Produced by Joshua Hutchinson, Josephine Paolucci and the +Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net. +(This file was produced from images generously made +available by Cornell University Digital Collections.) + + +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. 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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: The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 86, December, 1864 + +Author: Various + +Release Date: July 27, 2009 [EBook #29516] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ATLANTIC MONTHLY, DECEMBER 1864 *** + + + + +Produced by Joshua Hutchinson, Josephine Paolucci and the +Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net. +(This file was produced from images generously made +available by Cornell University Digital Collections.) + + + + + + + + + + +THE + +ATLANTIC MONTHLY. + +A MAGAZINE OF LITERATURE, ART, AND POLITICS. + + +VOL. XIV.--DECEMBER, 1864.--NO. LXXXVI. + +Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1864, by TICKNOR AND +FIELDS, in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of +Massachusetts. + + + + +THE HIGHLAND LIGHT. + + +This light-house, known to mariners as the Cape Cod or Highland Light, +is one of our "primary sea-coast lights," and is usually the first seen +by those approaching the entrance of Massachusetts Bay from Europe. It +is forty-three miles from Cape Ann Light, and forty-one from Boston +Light. It stands about twenty rods from the edge of the bank, which is +here formed of clay. I borrowed the plane and square, level and +dividers, of a carpenter who was shingling a barn near by, and, using +one of those shingles made of a mast, contrived a rude sort of quadrant, +with pins for sights and pivots, and got the angle of elevation of the +bank opposite the light-house, and with a couple of cod-lines the length +of its slope, and so measured its height on the shingle. It rises one +hundred and ten feet above its immediate base, or about one hundred and +twenty-three feet above mean low water. Graham, who has carefully +surveyed the extremity of the Cape, makes it one hundred and thirty +feet. The mixed sand and clay lay at an angle of forty degrees with the +horizon, where I measured it, but the clay is generally much steeper. No +cow nor hen ever gets down it. Half a mile farther south the bank is +fifteen or twenty-five feet higher, and that appeared to be the highest +land in North Truro. Even this vast clay-bank is fast wearing away. +Small streams of water trickling down it at intervals of two or three +rods have left the intermediate clay in the form of steep Gothic roofs +fifty feet high or more, the ridges as sharp and rugged-looking as +rocks; and in one place the bank is curiously eaten out in the form of a +large semicircular crater. + +According to the light-house keeper, the Cape is wasting here on both +sides, though most on the eastern. In some places it had lost many rods +within the last year, and erelong the light-house must be moved. We +calculated, _from his data_, how soon the Cape would be quite worn away +at this point,--"for," said he, "I can remember sixty years back." We +were even more surprised at this last announcement--that is, at the slow +waste of life and energy in our informant, for we had taken him to be +not more than forty--than at the rapid wasting of the Cape, and we +thought that he stood a fair chance to outlive the former. + +Between this October and June of the next year I found that the bank had +lost about forty feet in one place opposite the light-house, and it was +cracked more than forty feet farther from the edge at the last date, the +shore being strewn with the recent rubbish. But I judged that generally +it was not wearing away here at the rate of more than six feet annually. +Any conclusions drawn from the observations of a few years or one +generation only are likely to prove false, and the Cape may balk +expectation by its durability. In some places even a wrecker's foot-path +down the bank lasts several years. One old inhabitant told us that when +the light-house was built, in 1798, it was calculated that it would +stand forty-five years, allowing the bank to waste one length of fence +each year, "but," said he, "there it is" (or rather another near the +same site, about twenty rods from the edge of the bank). + +The sea is not gaining on the Cape everywhere: for one man told me of a +vessel wrecked long ago on the north of Provincetown whose "_bones_" +(this was his word) are still visible many rods within the present line +of the beach, half buried in sand. Perchance they lie along-side the +_timbers_ of a whale. The general statement of the inhabitants is, that +the Cape is wasting on both sides, but extending itself on particular +points on the south and west, as at Chatham and Monomoy Beaches, and at +Billingsgate, Long, and Race Points. James Freeman stated in his day +that above three miles had been added to Monomoy Beach during the +previous fifty years, and it is said to be still extending as fast as +ever. A writer in the "Massachusetts Magazine," in the last century, +tells us, that, "when the English first settled upon the Cape, there was +an island off Chatham, at three leagues' distance, called Webb's Island, +containing twenty acres, covered with red-cedar or savin. The +inhabitants of Nantucket used to carry wood from it"; but he adds that +in his day a large rock alone marked the spot, and the water was six +fathoms deep there. The entrance to Nauset Harbor, which was once in +Eastham, has now travelled south into Orleans. The islands in Wellfleet +Harbor once formed a continuous beach, though now small vessels pass +between them. And so of many other parts of this coast. + +Perhaps what the ocean takes from one part of the Cape it gives to +another,--robs Peter to pay Paul. On the eastern side the sea appears to +be everywhere encroaching on the land. Not only the land is undermined, +and its ruins carried off by currents, but the sand is blown from the +beach directly up the steep bank, where it is one hundred and fifty feet +high, and covers the original surface there many feet deep. If you sit +on the edge, you will have ocular demonstration of this by soon getting +your eyes full. Thus the bank preserves its height as fast as it is worn +away. This sand is steadily travelling westward at a rapid rate, "more +than a hundred yards," says one writer, within the memory of inhabitants +now living; so that in some places peat-meadows are buried deep under +the sand, and the peat is cut through it; and in one place a large +peat-meadow has made its appearance on the shore in the bank covered +many feet deep, and peat has been cut there. This accounts for that +great pebble of peat which we saw in the surf. The old oysterman had +told us that many years ago he lost a "crittur" by her being mired in a +swamp near the Atlantic side, east of his house, and twenty years ago he +lost the swamp itself entirely, but has since seen signs of it appearing +on the beach. He also said that he had seen cedar-stumps "as big as +cart-wheels" (!) on the bottom of the Bay, three miles off Billingsgate +Point, when leaning over the side of his boat in pleasant weather, and +that that was dry land not long ago. Another told us that a log canoe +known to have been buried many years before on the Bay side at East +Harbor in Truro, where the Cape is extremely narrow, appeared at length +on the Atlantic side, the Cape having rolled over it; and an old woman +said,--"Now, you see, it is true what I told you, that the Cape is +moving." + +The bars along the coast shift with every storm, and in many places +there is occasionally none at all. We ourselves observed the effect of a +single storm with a high tide in the night, in July, 1855. It moved the +sand on the beach opposite the light-house to the depth of six feet, and +three rods in width as far as we could see north and south, and carried +it bodily off no one knows exactly where, laying bare in one place a +large rock five feet high which was invisible before, and narrowing the +beach to that extent. There is usually, as I have said, no bathing on +the back side of the Cape, on account of the undertow; but when we were +there last, the sea had, three months before, cast up a bar near this +light-house, two miles long and ten rods wide, over which the tide did +not flow, leaving a narrow cove, then a quarter of a mile long, between +it and the shore, which afforded excellent bathing. This cove had from +time to time been closed up as the bar travelled northward, in one +instance imprisoning four or five hundred whiting and cod, which died +there, and the water as often turned fresh and finally gave place to +sand. This bar, the inhabitants assured us, might be wholly removed, and +the water be six feet deep there in two or three days. + +The light-house keeper said, that, when the wind blowed strong on to the +shore, the waves ate fast into the bank, but when it blowed off, they +took no sand away; for in the former case the wind heaped up the surface +of the water next to the beach, and to preserve its equilibrium a strong +undertow immediately set back again into the sea, which carried with it +the sand and whatever else was in the way, and left the beach hard to +walk on; but in the latter case the undertow set on, and carried the +sand with it, so that it was particularly difficult for shipwrecked men +to get to land when the wind blowed on to the shore, but easier when it +blowed off. This undertow, meeting the next surface-wave on the bar +which itself has made, forms part of the dam over which the latter +breaks, as over an upright wall. The sea thus plays with the land, +holding a sand-bar in its mouth awhile before it swallows it, as a cat +plays with a mouse; but the fatal gripe is sure to come at last. The sea +sends its rapacious east-wind to rob the land, but before the former has +got far with its prey, the land sends its honest west-wind to recover +some of its own. But, according to Lieutenant Davis, the forms, extent, +and distribution of sand-bars and banks are principally determined, not +by winds and waves, but by tides. + +Our host said that you would be surprised, if you were on the beach when +the wind blew a hurricane directly on to it, to see that none of the +drift-wood came ashore, but all was carried directly northward and +parallel with the shore as fast as a man can walk, by the in-shore +current, which sets strongly in that direction at flood-tide. The +strongest swimmers also are carried along with it, and never gain an +inch toward the beach. Even a large rock has been moved half a mile +northward along the beach. He assured us that the sea was never still on +the back side of the Cape, but ran commonly as high as your head, so +that a great part of the time you could not launch a boat there, and +even in the calmest weather the waves run six or eight feet up the +beach, though then you could get off on a plank. Champlain and +Poitrincourt could not land here in 1606, on account of the swell, (_la +houlle_,) yet the savages came off to them in a canoe. In the Sieur de +la Borde's "Relation des Caraibes," my edition of which was published at +Amsterdam in 1711, at page 530 he says:-- + + "Couroumon a Caraibe, also a star [_i.e._ a god], makes the + great _lames a la mer_, and overturns canoes. _Lames a la mer_ + are the long _vagues_ which are not broken (_entrecoupees_), + and such as one sees come to land all in one piece, from one + end of a beach to another, so that, however little wind there + may be, a shallop or a canoe could hardly land (_aborder + terre_) without turning over, or being filled with water." + +But on the Bay side, the water, even at its edge, is often as smooth and +still as in a pond. Commonly there are no boats used along this beach. +There was a boat belonging to the Highland Light, which the next keeper, +after he had been there a year, had not launched, though he said that +there was good fishing just off the shore. Generally the life-boats +cannot be used when needed. When the waves run very high, it is +impossible to get a boat off, however skilfully you steer it, for it +will often be completely covered by the curving edge of the approaching +breaker as by an arch, and so filled with water, or it will be lifted up +by its bows, turned directly over backwards, and all the contents +spilled out. A spar thirty feet long is served in the same way. + +I heard of a party who went off fishing back of Wellfleet some years +ago, in two boats, in calm weather, who, when they had laden their boats +with fish, and approached the land again, found such a swell breaking on +it, though there was no wind, that they were afraid to enter it. At +first they thought to pull for Provincetown; but night coming on, and +that was many miles distant. Their case seemed a desperate one. As often +as they approached the shore and saw the terrible breakers that +intervened, they were deterred. In short, they were thoroughly +frightened. Finally, having thrown their fish overboard, those in one +boat chose a favorable opportunity, and succeeded, by skill and good +luck, in reaching the land; but they were unwilling to take the +responsibility of telling the others when to come in, and as the other +helmsman was inexperienced, their boat was swamped at once, yet all +managed to save themselves. + +Much smaller waves soon make a boat "nail-sick," as the phrase is. The +keeper said that after a long and strong blow there would be three large +waves, each successively larger than the last, and then no large ones +for some time, and that, when they wished to land in a boat, they came +in on the last and largest wave. Sir Thomas Browne, (as quoted in +Brand's "Popular Antiquities," p. 372,) on the subject of the tenth wave +being "greater or more dangerous than any other," after quoting Ovid,-- + + "Qui venit hic fluctus, fluctus supereminet omnes: + Posterior nono est, undecimoque prior,"-- + +says, "Which, notwithstanding, is evidently false; nor can it be made +out by observation either upon the shore or the ocean, as we have with +diligence explored in both. And surely in vain we expect a regularity in +the waves of the sea, or in the particular motions thereof, as we may in +its general reciprocations, whose causes are constant, and effects +therefore correspondent; whereas its fluctuations are but motions +subservient, which winds, storms, shores, shelves, and every +interjacency irregulates." + +We read that the Clay Pounds were so called "because vessels have had +the misfortune to be pounded against them in gales of wind," which we +regard as a doubtful derivation. There are small ponds here, upheld by +the clay, which were formerly called the Clay Pits. Perhaps this, or +Clay Ponds, is the origin of the name. Water is found in the clay quite +near the surface; but we heard of one man who had sunk a well in the +sand close by, "till he could see stars at noonday," without finding +any. + +Over this bare highland the wind has full sweep. Even in July it blows +the wings over the heads of the young turkeys, which do not know enough +to head against it; and in gales the doors and windows are blown in, and +you must hold on to the light-house to prevent being blown into the +Atlantic. They who merely keep out on the beach in a storm in the winter +are sometimes rewarded by the Humane Society. If you would feel the full +force of a tempest, take up your residence on the top of Mount +Washington, or at the Highland Light in Truro. + +It was said in 1794 that more vessels were cast away on the east shore +of Truro than anywhere in Barnstable County. Notwithstanding this +light-house has since been erected, after almost every storm we read of +one or more vessels wrecked here, and sometimes more than a dozen wrecks +are visible from this point at one time. The inhabitants hear the crash +of vessels going to pieces as they sit round their hearths, and they +commonly date from some memorable shipwreck. If the history of this +beach could be written from beginning to end, it would be a thrilling +page in the history of commerce. + +Truro was settled in the year 1700 as _Dangerfield_. This was a very +appropriate name, for I read on a monument in the graveyard near Pamet +River the following inscription:-- + + Sacred + to the memory of + 57 citizens of Truro, + who were lost in seven + vessels, which + foundered at sea in + the memorable gale + of Oct. 3d, 1841. + +Their names and ages by families were recorded on different sides of the +stone. They are said to have been lost on George's Bank, and I was told +that only one vessel drifted ashore on the back side of the Cape, with +the boys locked into the cabin and drowned. It is said that the homes of +all were "within a circuit of two miles." Twenty-eight inhabitants of +Dennis were lost in the same gale; and I read that "in one day, +immediately after this storm, nearly or quite one hundred bodies were +taken up and buried on Cape Cod." The Truro Insurance Company failed for +want of skippers to take charge of its vessels. But the surviving +inhabitants went a-fishing again the next year as usual. I found that it +would not do to speak of shipwrecks there, for almost every family has +lost some of its members at sea. "Who lives in that house?" I inquired. +"Three widows," was the reply. The stranger and the inhabitant view the +shore with very different eyes. The former may have come to see and +admire the ocean in a storm; but the latter looks on it as the scene +where his nearest relatives were wrecked. When I remarked to an old +wrecker, partially blind, who was sitting on the edge of the bank +smoking a pipe, which he had just lit with a match of dried beach-grass, +that I supposed he liked to hear the sound of the surf, he answered, +"No, I do not like to hear the sound of the surf." He had lost at least +one son in "the memorable gale," and could tell many a tale of the +shipwrecks which he had witnessed there. + +In the year 1717, a noted pirate named Bellamy was led on to the bar off +Wellfleet by the captain of a snow which he had taken, to whom he had +offered his vessel again, if he would pilot him into Provincetown +Harbor. Tradition says that the latter threw over a burning tar-barrel +in the night, which drifted ashore, and the pirates followed it. A storm +coming on, their whole fleet was wrecked, and more than a hundred dead +bodies lay along the shore. Six who escaped shipwreck were executed. "At +times to this day," (1793,) says the historian of Wellfleet, "there are +King William and Queen Mary's coppers picked up, and pieces of silver +called cob-money. The violence of the seas moves the sands on the outer +bar, so that at times the iron caboose of the ship [that is, Bellamy's] +at low ebbs has been seen." Another tells us, that, "for many years +after this shipwreck, a man of a very singular and frightful aspect used +every spring and autumn to be seen travelling on the Cape, who was +supposed to have been one of Bellamy's crew. The presumption is that he +went to some place where money had been secreted by the pirates, to get +such a supply as his exigencies required. When he died, many pieces of +gold were found in a girdle which he constantly wore." + +As I was walking on the beach here in my last visit, looking for shells +and pebbles, just after that storm which I have mentioned as moving the +sand to a great depth, not knowing but I might find some cob-money, I +did actually pick up a French crown-piece, worth about a dollar and six +cents, near high-water mark, on the still moist sand, just under the +abrupt, caving base of the bank. It was of a dark slate-color, and +looked like a flat pebble, but still bore a very distinct and handsome +head of Louis XV., and the usual legend on the reverse, "_Sit Nomen +Domini Benedictum_," (Blessed be the Name of the Lord,)--a pleasing +sentiment to read in the sands of the sea-shore, whatever it might be +stamped on,--and I also made out the date, 1741. Of course, I thought at +first that it was that same old button which I have found so many times, +but my knife soon showed the silver. Afterward, rambling on the bars at +low tide, I cheated my companion by holding up round shells (_Scutellae_) +between my fingers, whereupon he quickly stripped and came off to me. + +In the Revolution, a British ship-of-war, called the Somerset, was +wrecked near the Clay Pounds, and all on board, some hundreds in number, +were taken prisoners. My informant said that he had never seen any +mention of this in the histories, but that at any rate he knew of a +silver watch, which one of those prisoners by accident left there, which +was still going to tell the story. But this event is noticed by some +writers. + +The next summer I saw a sloop from Chatham dragging for anchors and +chains just off this shore. She had her boats out at the work while she +shuffled about on various tacks, and, when anything was found, drew up +to hoist it on board. It is a singular employment, at which men are +regularly hired and paid for their industry, to hunt to-day in pleasant +weather for anchors which have been lost,--the sunken faith and hope of +mariners, to which they trusted in vain: now, perchance, it is the rusty +one of some old pirate's ship or Norman fisherman, whose cable parted +here two hundred years ago; and now the best bower-anchor of a Canton or +a California ship, which has gone about her business. If the roadsteads +of the spiritual ocean could be thus dragged, what rusty flukes of hope +deceived and parted chain-cables of faith might again be windlassed +aboard! enough to sink the finder's craft, or stock new navies to the +end of time. The bottom of the sea is strown with anchors, some deeper +and some shallower, and alternately covered and uncovered by the sand, +perchance with a small length of iron cable still attached,--of which +where is the other end? So many unconcluded tales to be continued +another time. So, if we had diving-bells adapted to the spiritual deeps, +we should see anchors with their cables attached, as thick as eels in +vinegar, all wriggling vainly toward their holding-ground. But that is +not treasure for us which another man has lost; rather it is for us to +seek what no other man has found or can find,--not be Chatham men, +dragging for anchors. + +The annals of this voracious beach! who could write them, unless it were +a shipwrecked sailor? How many who have seen it have seen it only in the +midst of danger and distress, the last strip of earth which their mortal +eyes beheld! Think of the amount of suffering which a single strand has +witnessed! The ancients would have represented it as a sea-monster with +open jaws, more terrible than Scylla and Charybdis. An inhabitant of +Truro told me that about a fortnight after the St. John was wrecked at +Cohasset he found two bodies on the shore at the Clay Pounds. They were +those of a man and a corpulent woman. The man had thick boots on, though +his head was off, but "it was along-side." It took the finder some weeks +to get over the sight. Perhaps they were man and wife, and whom God had +joined the ocean-currents had not put asunder. Yet by what slight +accidents at first may they have been associated in their drifting! Some +of the bodies of those passengers were picked up far out at sea, boxed +up and sunk; some brought ashore and buried. There are more consequences +to a shipwreck than the underwriters notice. The Gulf Stream may return +some to their native shores, or drop them in some out-of-the-way cave of +ocean, where time and the elements will write new riddles with their +bones.--But to return to land again. + +In this bank, above the clay, I counted in the summer two hundred holes +of the bank-swallow within a space six rods long, and there were at +least one thousand old birds within three times that distance, +twittering over the surf. I had never associated them in my thoughts +with the beach before. One little boy who had been a-bird's-nesting had +got eighty swallows' eggs for his share. Tell it not to the Humane +Society! There were many young birds on the clay beneath, which had +tumbled out and died. Also there were many crow-blackbirds hopping about +in the dry fields, and the upland plover were breeding close by the +light-house. The keeper had once cut off one's wing while mowing, as she +sat on her eggs there. This is also a favorite resort for gunners in the +fall to shoot the golden plover. As around the shores of a pond are seen +devil's-needles, butterflies, etc., so here, to my surprise, I saw at +the same season great devil's-needles of a size proportionably larger, +or nearly as big as my finger, incessantly coasting up and down the edge +of the bank, and butterflies also were hovering over it, and I never saw +so many dor-bugs and beetles of various kinds as strewed the beach. They +had apparently flown over the bank in the night, and could not get up +again, and some had perhaps fallen into the sea and were washed ashore. +They may have been in part attracted by the light-house lamps. + +The Clay Pounds are a more fertile tract than usual. We saw some fine +patches of roots and corn here. As generally on the Cape, the plants had +little stalk or leaf, but ran remarkably to seed. The corn was hardly +more than half as high as in the interior, yet the ears were large and +full, and one farmer told us that he could raise forty bushels on an +acre without manure, and sixty with it. The heads of the rye also were +remarkably large. The shadbush, (_Amelanchier_,) beach-plums, and +blueberries, (_Vaccinium Pennsylvanicum_,) like the apple-trees and +oaks, were very dwarfish, spreading over the sand, but at the same time +very fruitful. The blueberry was but an inch or two high, and its fruit +often rested on the ground, so that you did not suspect the presence of +the bushes, even on those bare hills, until you were treading on them. I +thought that this fertility must be owing mainly to the abundance of +moisture in the atmosphere, for I observed that what little grass there +was was remarkably laden with dew in the morning, and in summer dense +imprisoning fogs frequently last till mid-day, turning one's beard into +a wet napkin about his throat, and the oldest inhabitant may lose his +way within a stone's-throw of his house, or be obliged to follow the +beach for a guide. The brick house attached to the light-house was +exceedingly damp at that season, and writing-paper lost all its +stiffness in it. It was impossible to dry your towel after bathing, or +to press flowers without their mildewing. The air was so moist that we +rarely wished to drink, though we could at all times taste the salt on +our lips. Salt was rarely used at table, and our host told us that his +cattle invariably refused it when it was offered them, they got so much +with their grass and at every breath; but he said that a sick horse, or +one just from the country, would sometimes take a hearty draught of salt +water, and seemed to like it and be the better for it. + +It was surprising to see how much water was contained in the terminal +bud of the sea-side golden-rod, standing in the sand early in July, and +also how turnips, beets, carrots, etc., flourished even in pure sand. A +man travelling by the shore near there not long before us noticed +something green growing in the pure sand of the beach, just at +high-water mark, and on approaching found it to be a bed of beets +flourishing vigorously, probably from seed washed out of the Franklin. +Also beets and turnips came up in the sea-weed used for manure in many +parts of the Cape. This suggests how various plants may have been +dispersed over the world to distant islands and continents. Vessels, +with seeds in their cargoes, destined for particular ports, where +perhaps they were not needed, have been cast away on desolate islands, +and though their crews perished, some of their seeds have been +preserved. Out of many kinds a few would find a soil and climate adapted +to them, become naturalized, and perhaps drive out the native plants at +last, and so fit the land for the habitation of man. It is an ill wind +that blows nobody any good, and for the time lamentable shipwrecks may +thus contribute a new vegetable to a continent's stock, and prove on the +whole a lasting blessing to its inhabitants. Or winds and currents might +effect the same without the intervention of man. What, indeed, are the +various succulent plants which grow on the beach but such beds of beets +and turnips, sprung originally from seeds which perhaps were cast on the +waters for this end, though we do not know the Franklin which they came +out of? In ancient times some Mr. Bell (?) was sailing this way in his +ark with seeds of rocket, saltwort, sandwort, beach-grass, samphire, +bayberry, poverty-grass, etc., all nicely labelled with directions, +intending to establish a nursery somewhere; and did not a nursery get +established, though he thought that he had failed? + +About the light-house I observed in the summer the pretty _Polygala +polygama_, spreading ray-wise flat on the ground, white +pasture-thistles, (_Cirsium pumilum_,) and amid the shrubbery the +_Smilax glauca_, which is commonly said not to grow so far north. Near +the edge of the banks about half a mile southward, the broom-crowberry, +(_Empetrum Conradii_,) for which Plymouth is the only locality in +Massachusetts usually named, forms pretty green mounds four or five feet +in diameter by one foot high,--soft, springy beds for the wayfarer: I +saw it afterward in Provincetown. But prettiest of all, the scarlet +pimpernel, or poor-man's weather-glass, (_Anagallis arvensis_,) greets +you in fair weather on almost every square yard of sand. From Yarmouth I +have received the _Chrysopsis falcata_, (golden aster,) and _Vaccinium +stamineum_, (deer-berry or squaw-huckleberry,) with fruit not edible, +sometimes as large as a cranberry (Sept. 7). + +The Highland Light-house,[A] where we were staying, is a +substantial-looking building of brick, painted white, and surmounted by +an iron cap. Attached to it is the dwelling of the keeper, one story +high, also of brick, and built by Government. As we were going to spend +the night in a light-house, we wished to make the most of so novel an +experience, and therefore told our host that we should like to accompany +him when he went to light up. At rather early candle-light he lighted a +small Japan lamp, allowing it to smoke rather more than we like on +ordinary occasions, and told us to follow him. He led the way first +through his bedroom, which was placed nearest to the light-house, and +then through a long, narrow, covered passage-way, between whitewashed +walls, like a prison-entry, into the lower part of the light-house, +where many great butts of oil were arranged around; thence we ascended +by a winding and open iron stairway, with a steadily increasing scent of +oil and lamp-smoke, to a trap-door in an iron floor, and through this +into the lantern. It was a neat building, with everything in apple-pie +order, and no danger of anything rusting there for want of oil. The +light consisted of fifteen argand lamps, placed within smooth concave +reflectors twenty-one inches in diameter, and arranged in two horizontal +circles one above the other, facing every way excepting directly down +the Cape. These were surrounded, at a distance of two or three feet, by +large plate-glass windows, which defied the storms, with iron sashes, on +which rested the iron cap. All the iron work, except the floor, was +painted white. And thus the light-house was completed. We walked slowly +round in that narrow space as the keeper lighted each lamp in +succession, conversing with him at the same moment that many a sailor on +the deep witnessed the lighting of the Highland Light. His duty was to +fill and trim and light his lamps, and keep bright the reflectors. He +filled them every morning, and trimmed them commonly once in the course +of the night. He complained of the quality of the oil which was +furnished. This house consumes about eight hundred gallons in a year, +which cost not far from one dollar a gallon; but perhaps a few lives +would be saved, if better oil were provided. Another light-house keeper +said that the same proportion of winter-strained oil was sent to the +southernmost light-house in the Union as to the most northern. Formerly, +when this light-house had windows with small and thin panes, a severe +storm would sometimes break the glass, and then they were obliged to put +up a wooden shutter in haste to save their lights and reflectors,--and +sometimes in tempests, when the mariner stood most in need of their +guidance, they had thus nearly converted the light-house into a +dark-lantern, which emitted only a few feeble rays, and those commonly +on the land or lee side. He spoke of the anxiety and sense of +responsibility which he felt in cold and stormy nights in the winter, +when he knew that many a poor fellow was depending on him, and his lamps +burned dimly, the oil being chilled. Sometimes he was obliged to warm +the oil in a kettle in his house at midnight, and fill his lamps over +again,--for he could not have a fire in the light-house, it produced +such a sweat on the windows. His successor told me that he could not +keep too hot a fire in such a case. All this because the oil was poor. A +government lighting the mariners on its wintry coast with +summer-strained oil, to save expense! That were surely a summer-strained +mercy! + +This keeper's successor, who kindly entertained me the next year, stated +that one extremely cold night, when this and all the neighboring lights +were burning summer oil, but he had been provident enough to reserve a +little winter oil against emergencies, he was waked up with anxiety, and +found that his oil was congealed, and his lights almost extinguished; +and when, after many hours' exertion, he had succeeded in replenishing +his reservoirs with winter oil at the wick-end, and with difficulty had +made them burn, he looked out, and found that the other lights in the +neighborhood, which were usually visible to him, had gone out, and he +heard afterward that the Pamet River and Billingsgate Lights also had +been extinguished. + +Our host said that the frost, too, on the windows caused him much +trouble, and in sultry summer nights the moths covered them and dimmed +his lights; sometimes even small birds flew against the thick +plate-glass, and were found on the ground beneath in the morning with +their necks broken. In the spring of 1855 he found nineteen small +yellow-birds, perhaps goldfinches or myrtle-birds, thus lying dead +around the light-house; and sometimes in the fall he had seen where a +golden plover had struck the glass in the night, and left the down and +the fatty part of its breast on it. + +Thus he struggled, by every method, to keep his light shining before +men. Surely the light-house keeper has a responsible, if an easy, +office. When his lamp goes out, _he_ goes out; or, at most, only one +such accident is pardoned. + +I thought it a pity that some poor student did not live there, to profit +by all that light, since he would not rob the mariner. "Well," he said, +"I do sometimes come up here and read the newspaper when they are noisy +down below." Think of fifteen argand lamps to read the newspaper by! +Government oil!--light enough, perchance, to read the Constitution by! I +thought that he should read nothing less than his Bible by that light. I +had a classmate who fitted for college by the lamps of a light-house, +which was more light, methinks, than the University afforded. + +When we had come down and walked a dozen rods from the light-house, we +found that we could not get the full strength of its light on the narrow +strip of land between it and the shore, being too low for the focus, +and we saw only so many feeble and rayless stars; but at forty rods +inland we could see to read, though we were still indebted to only one +lamp. Each reflector sent forth a separate "fan" of light: one shone on +the windmill, and one in the hollow, while the intervening spaces were +in shadow. This light is said to be visible twenty nautical miles and +more, to an observer fifteen feet above the level of the sea. We could +see the revolving light at Race Point, the end of the Cape, about nine +miles distant, and also the light on Long Point, at the entrance of +Provincetown Harbor, and one of the distant Plymouth Harbor Lights, +across the Bay, nearly in a range with the last, like a star in the +horizon. The keeper thought that the other Plymouth Light was concealed +by being exactly in a range with the Long Point Light. He told us that +the mariner was sometimes led astray by a mackerel-fisher's lantern, who +was afraid of being run down in the night, or even by a cottager's +light, mistaking them for some well-known light on the coast,--and, when +he discovered his mistake, was wont to curse the prudent fisher or the +wakeful cottager without reason. + +Though it was once declared that Providence placed this mass of clay +here on purpose to erect a light-house on, the keeper said that the +light-house should have been erected half a mile farther south, where +the coast begins to bend, and where the light could be seen at the same +time with the Nauset Lights, and distinguished from them. They now talk +of building one there. It happens that the present one is the more +useless now, so near the extremity of the Cape, because other +light-houses have since been erected there. + +Among the many regulations of the Light-House Board, hanging against the +wall here, many of them excellent, perhaps, if there were a regiment +stationed here to attend to them, there is one requiring the keeper to +keep an account of the number of vessels which pass his light during the +day. But there are a hundred vessels in sight at once, steering in all +directions, many on the very verge of the horizon, and he must have more +eyes than Argus, and be a good deal farther-sighted, to tell which are +passing his light. It is an employment in some respects best suited to +the habits of the gulls which coast up and down here and circle over the +sea. + +I was told by the next keeper, that on the eighth of June following, a +particularly clear and beautiful morning, he rose about half an hour +before sunrise, and, having a little time to spare, for his custom was +to extinguish his lights at sunrise, walked down toward the shore to see +what he might find. When he got to the edge of the bank, he looked up, +and, to his astonishment, saw the sun rising, and already part way above +the horizon. Thinking that his clock was wrong, he made haste back, and, +though it was still too early by the clock, extinguished his lamps, and +when he had got through and come down, he looked out of the window, and, +to his still greater astonishment, saw the sun just where it was before, +two-thirds above the horizon. He showed me where its rays fell on the +wall across the room. He proceeded to make a fire, and when he had done, +there was the sun still at the same height. Whereupon, not trusting to +his own eyes any longer, he called up his wife to look at it, and she +saw it also. There were vessels in sight on the ocean, and their crews, +too, he said, must have seen it, for its rays fell on them. It remained +at that height for about fifteen minutes by the clock, and then rose as +usual, and nothing else extraordinary happened during that day. Though +accustomed to the coast, he had never witnessed nor heard of such a +phenomenon before. I suggested that there might have been a cloud in the +horizon invisible to him, which rose with the sun, and his clock was +only as accurate as the average; or perhaps, as he denied the +possibility of this, it was such a looming of the sun as is said to +occur at Lake Superior and elsewhere. Sir John Franklin, for instance, +says in his "Narrative," that, when he was on the shore of the Polar +Sea, the horizontal refraction varied so much one morning that "the +upper limb of the sun twice appeared at the horizon before it finally +rose." + +He certainly must be a son of Aurora to whom the sun looms, when there +are so many millions to whom it _glooms_ rather, or who never see it +till an hour _after_ it has risen. But it behooves us old stagers to +keep our lamps trimmed and burning to the last, and not trust to the +sun's looming. + +This keeper remarked that the centre of the flame should be exactly +opposite the centre of the reflectors, and that accordingly, if he was +not careful to turn down his wicks in the morning, the sun falling on +the reflectors on the south side of the building would set fire to them, +like a burning-glass, in the coldest day, and he would look up at noon +and see them all lighted! When your lamp is ready to give light, it is +readiest to receive it, and the sun will light it. His successor said +that he had never known them to blaze in such a case, but merely to +smoke. + +I saw that this was a place of wonders. In a sea-turn or shallow fog, +while I was there the next summer, it being clear overhead, the edge of +the bank twenty rods distant appeared like a mountain-pasture in the +horizon. I was completely deceived by it, and I could then understand +why mariners sometimes ran ashore in such cases, especially in the +night, supposing it to be far away, though they could see the land. Once +since this, being in a large oyster-boat two or three hundred miles from +here, in a dark night, when there was a thin veil of mist on land and +water, we came so near to running on to the land before our skipper was +aware of it, that the first warning was my hearing the sound of the surf +under my elbow. I could almost have jumped ashore, and we were obliged +to go about very suddenly to prevent striking. The distant light for +which we were steering, supposing it a light-house five or six miles +off, came through the cracks of a fisherman's bunk not more than six +rods distant. + +The keeper entertained us handsomely in his solitary little ocean-house. +He was a man of singular patience and intelligence, who, when our +queries struck him, rang as clear as a bell in response. The light-house +lamps a few feet distant shone full into my chamber, and made it as +bright as day, so I knew exactly how the Highland Light bore all that +night, and I was in no danger of being wrecked. Unlike the last, this +was as still as a summer night. I thought, as I lay there, half awake +and half asleep, looking upward through the window at the lights +above my head, how many sleepless eyes from far out on the +ocean-stream--mariners of all nations spinning their yarns through the +various watches of the night--were directed toward my couch. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[A] The light-house has since been rebuilt, and shows a _Fresnel_ light. + + + + +ENGLISH AUTHORS IN FLORENCE. + + +Bella Firenze, "Flower of all Cities and City of all Flowers," is not +only the garden of Italy's intellect, but the hot-house to which many a +Northern genius has been transplanted. The house where Milton resided is +still pointed out and held sacred by his venerators; and Casa Guidi, +gloomier and grayer now that the grand light has gone out of it, is of +especial interest to every cultivated traveller. A gratified smile, born +of sorrow, passes over the stranger's face, as he reads the inscription +upon the tablet that makes Casa Guidi historical,--a tablet inserted by +the municipality of Florence as a grateful tribute to the memory of a +truly great woman, great enough to love Truth "more than Plato and +Plato's country, more than Dante and Dante's country, more even than +Shakspeare and Shakspeare's country." + + Qui scrisse e mori + Elisabetta Barrett Browning + Che in cuore di donna conciliava + Scienza di dotto o spirito di poeta + E fece del suo verso aureo anello + Fra Italia e Inghilterra + Pone questa memoria + Firenze grata + 1861 + +Here wrote and died Elizabeth Barrett Browning! + +Tradition says that years ago Casa Guidi was the scene of several dark +deeds; and after having wandered through the great rooms, for the most +part perpetually in shadow, one's imagination puts full faith in a +time-worn story. Whatever may have been the stain left upon the old +palace by the Guidi, it has been removed by an alien woman,--by her who +sat "By the Fireside," and toiled unceasingly for the good of man and +the love, of God. Casa Guidi heard the whispering of "One Word More," +the echo of which is growing fainter and fainter to the ear, but +subtiler to the soul; and looking up at _her_ house, we hear the murmur +of a poet's voice, saying,-- + + "God be thanked, the meanest of His creatures + Boasts two soul-sides, one to face the world with, + One to show a woman when he loves her." + +The unsuspected prophecy of "One Word More" has been fulfilled,-- + + "Lines I write the first time and the last time,"-- + +for Destiny has given to them other than the author's meaning: because +of this destiny, we pass from the shadow of Casa Guidi with bowed head. + +It is a beautiful custom, this of Italy, marking the spot where noble +souls have lived or died, that coming generations may learn to venerate +the greatness of the past, and become inspired thereby to exalted deeds +in the present. We of America, eagerly busy jostling the elbows of +To-Day, have not even a turn of the head for the haunts of dead men whom +we honor. No tablets mark their homes; and indeed they would be of +little profit to a country where mementos of "lang syne" are never +spared, when the requirements of commerce or of real estate issue their +universal mandate, "Destroy and build anew!" America shakes all dust +from off her feet, even that of great men's bones; though indeed Boston, +which is not wanting in esteem for its respectable antecedents, has made +a feeble attempt to do honor to the Father of his Country. The tablet is +but an attempt, however, which has become thoroughly demoralized by +keeping company with attorneys' signs and West-India goods; the bouquet +of law-papers, _plus_ coffee and tobacco, has deprived the salt of its +savor. + +Far different is it in Florence, where the identical houses still +remain. Almost every street bears the record of a great man. To walk +there is to hold intimate communion with departed genius. What traveller +has not mused before Dante's stone? The most careless cannot pass +Palazzo Buonarotti without giving a thought to Michel Angelo and his +art. An afternoon's stroll along the Lung' Arno to drink in the warmth +of an Italian sunset is made doubly suggestive by a glance at the house +where set another sun when the Piedmontese poet-patriot, Alfieri, died. +We never passed through the Via Guicciardini, as clingy, musty, and +gloomy as the writings of the old historian whose palace gives name to +the street, without looking up at the weather-beaten _casa_ dedicated to +the memory of that wonderfully subtile Tuscan, Niccolo Macchiavelli; and +by dint of much looking we fancied ourselves drawn nearer to the +Florence of 1500, and read "The Prince," with a gusto and an +apprehension which nothing but the old house could have inspired. This, +at least, we believed, and our faith in the fancy remains unshaken, now +that Mr. Denton, the geologist, has expounded the theory of +"Psychometry," which he tells us is the divination of soul through the +contact of matter with a psychometrical mind. Had we in those days been +better versed in this theory of "the soul of things," we should have +made a gentle application of forehead to the door-step of Macchiavelli's +mundane residence, and doubtless have arisen thoroughly pervaded with +the true spirit of the man whose feet were familiar to a stone now +desecrated by wine-flasks, onions, cabbages, and _contadini_. + +Mrs. Somerville, to whom the world is indebted for several developments +in physical geography, is almost as fixed a Florentine celebrity as the +Palazzo Vecchio; and Villino Trollope has become endeared to many +_forestieri_ from the culture and hospitality of its inmates. It is the +residence of Mr. and Mrs. Thomas Adolphus Trollope, earnest contributors +to the literature of England, and active friends of Cavour's Italy. +Justice prompts us to say that no other foreigner of the present day has +done so much as Mr. Trollope to familiarize the Anglo-Saxon mind with +the genius and aspirations of Italy. A constant writer for the liberal +press of London, Mr. Trollope is also the author of several historical +works that have taken their place in a long-neglected niche. "A Decade +of Italian Women" has woven new interest around ten females of renown, +while his later works of "Filippo Strozzi" and "Paul the Pope and Paul +the Friar," have thrown additional light upon three vigorous historical +characters, as well as upon much Romish iniquity. "Tuscany in '48 and +'59" is the most satisfactory book of the kind that has been published, +Mr. Trollope's constant residence in Florence having made him perfectly +familiar with the actual _status_ of Tuscany during these important eras +in her history. The old saying, "Merit is its own reward," to which it +is usually necessary to give a Pre-Raphaelite interpretation, has had a +broader signification to Mr. Trollope, whose efforts in Italy's behalf +have been appreciated by the _Re Galantuomo_, Victor Emanuel, by whom he +has been knighted with the Order of Saints Maurice and Lazarus. As the +decoration was entirely unsolicited,--for Mr. Trollope is a true +democrat,--and as he is nearly, if not quite, the only Englishman +similarly honored, the compliment is as pleasing as it is flattering. + +Historian though he be, Mr. Trollope has more recently made his mark as +a novelist. "La Beata," an Italian story, published three years ago, is +greatly praised by London critics, one strong writer describing it as a +"beatific book." The character of the heroine has been drawn with a +pathos rare and heart-rending, nor can the reader fail to be impressed +with the nobility of the mind that could conceive of such exceeding +purity and self-sacrifice in woman. Mr. Trollope's later novels of +"Marietta" and "Giulio Malatesta" have also met with great success, and, +although not comparable with "La Beata," give most accurate pictures of +Italian life and manners,--and truth is ordinarily left out of +Anglo-Italian stories. "Giulio Malatesta" is of decided historical +interest, giving a side-view of the Revolution of '48 and of the Battle +of Curtatone, which was fought so nobly by Tuscan volunteers and +students. It is a matter of regret to all lovers of Italy that Mr. +Trollope's works have not been republished in America, as no American +has labored in the same field, nor do Americans _en masse_ possess very +correct ideas of a country whose great future is creating an additional +interest in her promising present and wonderful past. Mr. Trollope's +"History of Florence," upon which he is now at work, will be his most +valuable contribution to literature. + +Mrs. Trollope, who from her polyglot accomplishments may be called a +many-sided woman, has been, both by Nature and education, most liberally +endowed with intellectual gifts. The depressing influence of continual +invalidism alone prevents her from taking that literary position which +good health and application would soon secure for her. Nevertheless, +Mrs. Trollope has for several years been a constant correspondent of the +London "Athenaeum," and in all seasons Young Italy has found an +enthusiastic friend in her. Many are the machinations of the clerical +and Lorraine parties that have been revealed to the English reader by +Mrs. Trollope; and when, some time since, her letters upon the "Social +Aspects of Revolution in Italy," were collected and published in +book-form, they met with the cordial approbation of the critics. These +letters are marked by purity of style, quaint picturesqueness, and an +admirable _couleur locale_. As a translator, Mrs. Trollope possesses +very rare ability. Her natural aptitude for language is great. A +residence in Italy of seventeen years has made her almost as familiar +with the mother-tongue of Dante as with that of Shakspeare; and we make +bold to say that Giovan Battista Niccolini's most celebrated tragedy, +"Arnaldo da Brescia," loses none of its Italian lustre in Mrs. +Trollope's setting of English blank-verse,--Ah! we cannot soon forget +the first time that we saw this same Niccolini, the greatest poet of +modern Italy! It was in the spring of 1860, upon the memorable +inauguration of the Theatre Niccolini,--_ci-devant_ Cocomero, +(water-melon,)--when Florence gave its first public reception to the +poet, who was not only Tuscan, but Italianissimo, and rendered more than +a passing homage to his name in the new baptism of a charming theatre. +Since 1821 Niccolini had been fighting for the good cause with pen as +cutting as Damascus blade; the goal was not reached until the veteran of +eighty-two, paralyzed in body and mind, was borne into the presence of +an enthusiastic audience to receive its bravos. So lately as the +previous year the Ducal government had suppressed a demonstration in +Niccolini's favor: _this_ night must have atoned for the persecutions of +the past. It was then that we heard Rossi, the great actor, declaim +entire scenes from "Arnold of Brescia"; and though he stood before us as +plain citizen Rossi in a lustrous suit of broadcloth, the fervor and +intensity with which he interpreted the master-thoughts of Niccolini +forced the audience to see in him the embodiment of the grand +patriot-priest. We have witnessed but few greater dramatic performances; +never have we been present at so impassioned a political demonstration. +Freedom of speech was but just born to Italy, and Florence drew a long +breath in the presence of a national teacher. Eighteen months later +Niccolini gazed for the last time upon Italy, and saw the fulfilment of +his prophecies. + +We wish there were a copy of Mrs. Trollope's translation of "Arnaldo da +Brescia" in America, that we might make noble extracts, and cause other +eyes to glisten with the fire of its passion. We can recall but one +passage, a speech made by Arnaldo to the recreant Pope Adrian. It is as +strong and fearless as was the monk himself. + + "Adrian, thou dost deceive thyself. The dread + Of Roman thunderbolts is growing faint, + And Reason slacks the bonds thou'dst have eternal. + She'll break them; yet she is not well awake. + Already human thought so far rebels, + That tame it thou canst not: Christ cries to it, + As to the sick of old, '_Arise and walk!_' + 'T will trample thee, if thou precede it not: + The world has other truths than of the altar, + Nor will endure a church which hideth Heaven. + Thou wast a shepherd,--be a father: men + Are tired at last of being called a flock; + Too long have they stood trembling in the path + Smit by your pastoral staff. Why in the name + Of Heaven dost trample on the race of man, + The latest offspring of the Thought Divine?" + +It is not strange that the emancipated Florentines grow wild with +delight when Rossi declaimed such heresy as this. + +Mrs. Trollope's later translations of the patriotic poems of Dall' +Ongaro, the clever Venetian, are very spirited; nor is she unknown as an +original poet. "Baby Beatrice," a poem inscribed to her own fairy child, +that appeared several years ago in "Household Words," is exceedingly +charming; and one of her fugitive pieces, having naturally transformed +itself into "_la lingua del si_," has ever been attributed to her friend +Niccolini. + +It was as a poet that Mrs. Trollope, then Miss Garrow, began to +write,--and indeed she may be called a _protegee_ of Walter Savage +Landor, for through his encouragement and instrumentality she first made +her appearance in print as a contributor to Lady Blessington's "Book of +Beauty." There are few who remember the old lion-poet's lines to Miss +Garrow, and their insertion here cannot be considered _mal-a-propos_. + +"TO THEODOSIA GARROW. + + "Unworthy are these poems of the lights + That now run over them, nor brief the doubt + In my own breast if such should interrupt + (Or follow so irreverently) the voice + Of Attic men, of women such as thou, + Of sages no less sage than heretofore, + Of pleaders no less eloquent, of souls + Tender no less, or tuneful, or devout. + Unvalued, even by myself, are they,-- + Myself, who reared them; but a high command + Marshalled them in their station; here they are; + Look round; see what supports these parasites. + Stinted in growth and destitute of odor, + They grow where young Ternissa held her guide, + Where Solon awed the ruler; there they grow, + Weak as they are, on cliffs that few can climb. + None to thy steps are inaccessible, + Theodosia! wakening Italy with song + Deeper than Filicaia's, or than his, + The triple deity of plastic art. + Mindful of Italy and thee, fair maid! + I lay this sear, frail garland at thy feet." + +Mrs. Trollope is still a young woman, and it is sincerely to be hoped +that improved health will give her the proper momentum for renewed +exertions in a field where nobly sowing she may nobly reap. + +Ah, this Villino Trollope is quaintly fascinating, with its marble +pillars, its grim men in armor, starting like sentinels from the walls, +and its curiosities greeting you at every step. The antiquary revels in +its _majolica_, its old Florentine bridal chests and carved furniture, +its beautiful terra-cotta of the Virgin and Child by Orgagna, its +hundred _oggetti_ of the Cinque Cento. The bibliopole grows silently +ecstatic, as he sinks quietly into a mediaeval chair and feasts his eyes +on a model library, bubbling over with five thousand rare books, many +wonderfully illuminated and enriched by costly engravings. To those who +prefer (and who does not?) an earnest talk with the host and hostess on +politics, art, religion, or the last new book, there is the cozy +_laisser-faire_ study where Miss Puss and Bran, the honest dog, lie side +by side on Christian terms, and where the sunbeam Beatrice, when _very_ +beaming, will sing to you the _canti popolari_ of Tuscany, like a young +nightingale in voice, though with more than youthful expression. Here +Anthony Trollope is to be found, when he visits Florence; and it is no +ordinary pleasure to enjoy simultaneously the philosophic reasoning of +Thomas Trollope,--looking half Socrates and half Galileo,--whom Mrs. +Browning was wont to call "Aristides the Just," and the almost boyish +enthusiasm and impulsive argumentation of Anthony Trollope, who is a +noble specimen of a thoroughly frank and loyal Englishman. The unity of +affection existing between these brothers is as charming as it is rare. + +Then in spring, when the soft winds kiss the budding foliage and warm it +into bloom, the beautiful terrace of Villino Trollope is transformed +into a reception-room. Opening upon a garden, with its lofty pillars, +its tessellated marble floor, its walls inlaid with terra-cotta, +bas-reliefs, inscriptions, and coats-of-arms, with here and there a +niche devoted to some antique Madonna, the terrace has all the charm of +a _campo santo_ without the chill of the grave upon it; or were a few +cowled monks to walk with folded arms along its space, one might fancy +it the cloister of a monastery. And here of a summer's night, burning no +other lights than the stars, and sipping iced lemonade, one of the +specialties of the place, the intimates of Villino Trollope sit and talk +of Italy's future, the last _mot_ from Paris, and the last allocution at +Rome. + +Many charming persons have we met at the Villino, the recollection of +whom is as bright and sunny to us as a June day,--persons whose lives +and motive-power have fully convinced us that the world is not quite as +hollow as it is represented, and that all is not vanity of vanities. In +one corner we have melodiously wrangled, in a _tempo_ decidedly _allegro +vivace_, with enthusiastic Mazzinians, who would say clever, sharp, +cruel things of Cavour, the man of all men to our way of thinking, "the +one man of three men in all Europe," according to Louis Napoleon. +Gesticulation grew as rampant at the mention of the French Emperor, who +was familiarly known as "_quel volpone_," (that fox,) as it becomes +to-day in America at the mention of Wendell Phillip's name to one of the +"Chivalry." Politics ran high in Italy in these days of the +_Renaissance_, and to have a pair of stout fists shaken in one's face in +a drawing-room for a difference of opinion is not as much "out of order" +as it would be on this more phlegmatic side of the Atlantic, where fists +have a deep significance not dreamed of by expansive Italians. In +another corner we have had many a _tete-a-tete_ with Dall' Ongaro, the +poet, who is as quick at an _impromptu_ as at a malediction against "_il +Papa_," and whose spirited recitations of his own patriotic poems have +inspired his private audiences with a like enthusiasm for Italian +liberty. Not unlike Garibaldi in appearance, he is a Mazzini-Garibaldian +at heart, and always knowing in the ways of that mysterious prophet of +the "Reds" who we verily believe fancies himself author not only of the +phrase "_Dio ed il Popolo_," but of the reality as well. When Mazzini +was denied entrance into Tuscany under pain of imprisonment, and yet, in +spite of Governor Ricasoli's decree, came to Florence _incognito_, it +was Dall' Ongaro who knew his hiding-place, and who conferred with him +much to the disgust and mortification of the Governor and his police, +who were outwitted by the astute republican. Mazzini is an incarnation +of the _Sub Rosa_, and we doubt whether he could live an hour, were it +possible to fulminate a bull for the abolition of intrigue and secret +societies. Dall' Ongaro was a co-laborer of Mazzini's in Rome in '48; +and when the downfall of the Republic forced its partisans to seek +safety in exile, he travelled about Europe with an American passport. "I +could not be an Italian," he said to us, "and I became, ostensibly, the +next best thing, a citizen of the United States. I sought shelter under +a republican flag." + +It was at Villino Trollope that we first shook hands with Colonel +Peard,--"_l'Inglese con Garibaldi_," as the Italians used to call +him,--about whose exploits in sharp-shooting the newspapers manufactured +such marvellous stories. Colonel Peard assured us that he never _did_ +keep a written account of the men he killed, for we were particular in +our inquiries on this interesting subject; but we know that as a +volunteer he fought under Garibaldi throughout the Lombard campaign and +followed his General into Sicily, where, facing the enemy most manfully, +Garibaldi promoted him from the rank of Captain to that of +Lieutenant-Colonel. It is good to meet a person like Colonel Peard,--to +see a man between fifty and sixty years of age, with noble head and gray +hair and a beard that any patriarch might envy surmounting a figure of +fine proportions endowed with all the robustness of healthy +maturity,--to see intelligence and years and fine appearance allied to +great amiability and a youthful enthusiasm for noble deeds, an +enthusiasm which was ready to give blood and treasure to the cause it +espoused from love. Such a reality is most exhilarating and delightful, +a fact that makes us take a much more hopeful view of humanity. We value +our photograph of Colonel Peard almost as highly as though the +picturesque _poncho_ and its owner had seen service in America instead +of Italy. His battle-cry is ours,--"Liberty!" + +There, too, we met Frances Power Cobbe, author of that admirable book, +"Intuitive Morals." In her preface to the English edition of Theodore +Parker's works, of which she is the editor, Miss Cobbe has shown herself +as large by the heart as she is by the head. That sunny day in Florence, +when she, one of a chosen band, followed the great Crusader to his +grave, is a sad remembrance to us, and it seemed providentially ordained +that the apostle who had loved the man's _soul_ for so many years should +be brought face to face with the _man_ before that soul put on +immortality. Great was Miss Cobbe's interest in the bust of Theodore +Parker executed by the younger Robert Hart from photographs and casts, +and which is without doubt the best likeness of Parker that has yet been +taken. Its merits as a portrait-bust have never been appreciated, and +the artist, whose sad death occurred two years ago, did not live to +realize his hope of putting it into marble. The clay model still remains +in Florence. + +Miss Cobbe is the embodiment of genial philanthropy, as delightful a +companion as she is heroic in her great work of social reform. A true +daughter of Erin, she excels as a _raconteur_, nor does her philanthropy +confine itself to the human race. Italian maltreatment of animals has +almost reduced itself to a proverb, and often have we been witness to +her righteous indignation at flagrant cruelty to dumb beasts. Upon +expostulating one day with a coachman who was beating his poor straw-fed +horse most unmercifully, the man replied, with a look of wonderment, +"_Ma, che vole, Signora? non e Cristiano!_" (But what would you have, +Signora? he is not a Christian!) Not belonging to the Church, and having +no soul to save, why should a horse be spared the whip? The reasoning is +not logical to our way of thinking, yet it is Italian, and was delivered +in good faith. It will require many Miss Cobbes to lead the Italians out +of their Egypt of ignorance. + +It was at Villino Trollope that we first saw the wonderfully clever +author, George Eliot. She is a woman of forty, perhaps, of large frame +and fair Saxon coloring. In heaviness of jaw and height of cheek-bone +she greatly resembles a German; nor are her features unlike those of +Wordsworth, judging from his pictures. The expression of her face is +gentle and amiable, while her manner is particularly timid and retiring. +In conversation Mrs. Lewes is most entertaining, and her interest in +young writers is a trait which immediately takes captive all persons of +this class. We shall not forget with what kindness and earnestness she +addressed a young girl who had just begun to handle a pen, how frankly +she related her own literary experience, and how gently she _suggested_ +advice. True genius is always allied to humility, and in seeing Mrs. +Lewes do the work of a good Samaritan so unobtrusively, we learned to +respect the woman as much as we had ever admired the writer. "For +years," said she to us, "I wrote reviews because I knew too little of +humanity." In the maturity of her wisdom this gifted woman has startled +the world with such novels as "Scenes from Clerical Life," "Adam Bede," +"Mill on the Floss," and "Silas Marner," making an era in English +fiction, and raising herself above rivalry. Experience has been much to +her: her men are men, her women women, and long did English readers rack +their brains to discover the sex of George Eliot. We do not aver that +Mrs. Lewes has actually encountered the characters so vividly portrayed +by her. Genius looks upon Nature, and then creates. The scene in the +pot-house in "Silas Marner" is as perfect as a Dutch painting, yet the +author never entered a pot-house. Her strong _physique_ has enabled her +to brush against the world, and in thus brushing she has gathered up the +dust, fine and coarse, out of which human beings great and small are +made. It is a powerful argument in the "Woman Question," that--without +going to France for George Sand--"Adam Bede" and the wonderfully unique +conception "Paul Ferroll" are women's work and yet real. Men cannot know +women by knowing men; and a discriminating public will soon admit, if it +has not done so already, that women are quite as capable of drawing male +portraits as men are of drawing female. Half a century ago a woman +maintained that genius had no sex;--the dawn of this truth is only now +flashing upon the world. + +We know not whether George Eliot visited Florence _con intenzione_, yet +it almost seems as though "Romola" were the product of that fortnight's +sojourn. It could scarce have been written by one whose eye was +unfamiliar with the _tone_ of Florentine localities. As a novel, +"Romola" is not likely to be popular, however extensively it may be +read; but viewed as a sketch of Savonarola and his times, it is most +interesting and valuable. The deep research and knowledge of mediaeval +life and manners displayed are cause of wonderment to erudite +Florentines, who have lived to learn from a foreigner. "_Son +rimasti_" to use their own phraseology. The _couleur locale_ is +marvellous;--nothing could be more delightfully real, for example, than +the scenes which transpire in Nello's barber's-shop. Her _dramatis +personae_ are not English men and women in fancy-dress, but true Tuscans +who express themselves after the manner of natives. It would be +difficult to find a greater contrast than exists between "Romola" and +the previous novels of George Eliot: they have little in common but +genius; and genius, we begin to think, has not only no sex, but no +nationality. "Romola" has peopled the streets of Florence still more +densely to our memory. + +It would seem as though the newly revived interest in Savonarola, after +centuries of apathy, were a sign of the times. Uprisings of peoples and +wars for "ideas" have made such a market for martyrs as was never known +before. Could we jest upon what is a most encouraging trait in present +humanity, we should say that martyrs were fashionable; for even +Toussaint L'Ouverture has found a biographer, and _Frenchmen_ are +writing Lives of Jesus. Yet Orthodoxy stigmatizes this age of John +Browns as irreligious:--rather do we think it the dawn of the true +faith. It is to another _habitue_ of Villino Trollope, Pasquale Villari, +Professor of History at Pisa, that we owe in great part the revival of +Savonarola's memory; and it must have been no ordinary love for his +noble aspirations that led the young Neopolitan exile to bury the ten +best years of his life in old Florentine libraries, collecting material +for a full life of the friar of San Marco. So faithfully has he done his +work, that future writers upon Savonarola will go to Villari, and not to +Florentine manuscripts for their facts. This history was published in +1859, and it may be that "Romola" is the flower of the sombre Southern +plant. Genius requires but a suggestion to create,--though, indeed, Mr. +Lewes, who is a wonderfully clever man, _au fait_ in all things, from +acting to languages, living and dead, and from languages to natural +history, may have anticipated Villari in that suggestion. + +Villino Trollope introduced us to "Owen Meredith," the poet from +melody,--one far older in experience than in years, looking like his +poetry, just so polished and graceful, just so sweetly in tune, just so +Gallic in taste, and--shall we say it?--just so _blase_! We doubt +whether Robert Lytton, the diplomate, will ever realize the best +aspirations of "Owen Meredith," the poet. Good came out of Nazareth, but +it is not in our faith to believe that foreign courts can bear the rare +fruit of ideal truth and beauty.--Then there was Blumenthal, the +composer, who talked Buckle in admirable English, and played his own +Reveries most daintily,--Reveries that are all languor, sighs, and +tears, whose fitting home is the boudoirs of French marquises. +Blumenthal is a Thalberg in small.--We have pleasant recollections of +certain clever Oxonians, "Double-Firsts," potential in the classics and +mathematics. A "Double-First" is the incarnation of Oxford, a +masterpiece of Art. All that he knows he knows profoundly, nor does it +require an Artesian bore to bring that knowledge bubbling to the +surface. His mastery over his intellect is as great as that of Liszt +over the piano-forte,--it is a slave to do his bidding. He is the result +of a thousand years of culture. A "Double-First" never gives way to +enthusiasms; his heart never gets into his head. Impulse is snubbed as +though it were a poor relation; and argument is carried on by clear, +acute reason, independent of feeling. Woe unto the American who loses +his temper while duelling mentally with a "Double-First"! Oxford phlegm +will triumph. Of course a "Double-First" is conservative; he disbelieves +in republics and universal suffrage, attends the Established Church, and +won't publicly deny the Thirty-Nine Articles, whatever maybe his _very_ +private opinion of them. He writes brilliant articles for the "Saturday +Review," (familiarly known among Liberals as the "Saturday Reviler,") +and ends by being a learned and successful barrister, or a Gladstone, or +both. Genius will rarely subscribe to the Thirty-Nine Articles. With all +his conservatism and want of what the French call _effusion_, a +"Double-First" can be a delightful companion and charming man,--even to +a democratic American. + +We well remember with what admiring curiosity the Italians regarded Mrs. +Stowe one evening that she passed at Villino Trollope. "_E +la Signora Stowe?_"--"_Davvero?_"--"_L'autrice di 'Uncle +Tom'?_"--"_Possibile?_"--were their oft-repeated exclamations; for +"Uncle Tom's Cabin" is the one American book in which Italians are +deeply read. To most of them, Byron and "Uncle Tom" comprehend the whole +of English literature. However poorly informed an Italian may be as +regards America in other respects, he has a very definite idea of +slavery, thanks to Mrs. Stowe. To read "Uncle Tom's Cabin" aloud in +Italian to an Italian audience is productive of queer sensations. This +office an American woman took upon herself for the enlightenment of some +_contadine_ of Fiesole with whom she was staying. She appealed to a +thoroughly impartial jury. The verdict would have been balm of Gilead to +long-suffering Abolitionists. So admirable an idea of justice had these +acute peasant-women, so exalted was their opinion of America, which they +believed to be a model republic where all men were born free and equal, +that it was long before the reader could impress upon her audience the +fact of the existence of slavery there. When this fact _did_ take root +in their simple minds, their righteous indignation knew no bounds, and, +unlike the orator of the Bird o' Freedom, they thanked God that they +were _not_ Americans. + +Then----But our recollections are too numerous for the patience of those +who do not know Villino Trollope; and we shut up in our thoughts many +"pictures beautiful that hang on Memory's walls," turning their faces so +that we, at least, may see and enjoy them. + +But ere turning away, we pause before one face, now no longer of the +living, that of Mrs. Frances Trollope. Knowing how thoroughly erroneous +an estimate has been put upon Mrs. Trollope's character in this country, +we desire to give a glimpse of the real woman, now that her death has +removed the seal of silence. + +Frances Trollope, daughter of the Reverend William Milton, a fellow of +New College, Oxford, was born at Stapleton, near Bristol, where her +father had a curacy. She died in Florence, on the sixth of October, +1863, at the advanced age of eighty-three. In 1809 she married Thomas +Anthony Trollope, barrister-at-law, by whom she had six children: Thomas +Adolphus, now of Florence,--Henry, who died unmarried at Bruges, in +Flanders, in 1834,--Arthur, who died under age,--Anthony, the well-known +novelist,--Cecilia, who married John Tilley, Assistant-Secretary of the +General Post-Office, London,--and Emily, who died under age. + +Mr. Thomas Anthony Trollope married and became the father of a family as +presumptive heir to the good estate of an uncle. The latter, however, on +becoming a widower, unexpectedly married a second time, and in his old +age was himself a father. The sudden change thus caused in the position +and fortune of Mr. Trollope so materially deranged his affairs as to +necessitate the breaking-up of his establishment at Harrow-on-the-Hill, +near London. It was at this time that Miss Fanny Wright (whom Mr. and +Mrs. Trollope met at the country-house of Lafayette, when visiting the +General in France) persuaded Mrs. Trollope to proceed to America with +the hope of providing a career for her second son, Henry. Miss Wright +was then bent on founding an establishment, in accordance with her +cherished principles, at Nashaba, near Memphis, and the career marked +out for Henry Trollope was in connection with this scheme, the fruit of +which was disappointment to all the parties concerned. Mrs. Trollope +afterwards endeavored to establish her son in Cincinnati; but these +attempts were ill managed, and consequently proved futile. Both mother +and son then returned to England, the former taking with her a mass of +memoranda and notes which she had made during her residence in the +United States. These were shown to Captain Basil Hall, whose then recent +work on America had encountered bitterly hostile criticism and denial +with respect to many of its statements. Finding that Mrs. Trollope's +account of various matters was corroborative of his own, Basil Hall for +this reason, as also from friendly motives, urged Mrs. Trollope to bring +out a work on America. "The Domestic Manners of the Americans" was the +result, and so immense was its success that at the age of fifty Mrs. +Trollope adopted literature as a profession. + +In the eyes of the patriots of thirty years ago Mrs. Trollope committed +the unpardonable sin, when she published her book on America; and +certainly no country ever rendered itself more ridiculous than did ours, +when it made the welkin ring with cries of indignation. The sensible +American of to-day reads this same book and wonders how his countrymen +lashed themselves into such a violent rage. In her comments upon America +Mrs. Trollope is certainly frequently at fault, but unintentionally. She +firmly believed all that she wrote, and did _not_ romance, as Americans +were wont to declare. When she finds fault with the disgusting practice +of tobacco-chewing, assails the too common custom of dram-drinking, and +complains of a want of refinement in some parts of the country, she +certainly has the right on her side. When she speaks of Jefferson's +_dictum_, "All men are born free and equal," as a phrase of mischievous +sophistry, and refers to his posthumous works as a mass of mighty +mischiefs,--when she accuses us of being drearily cold and lacking +enthusiasm, and regards the American women as the most beautiful in the +world, but the least attractive,--we may naturally differ from her, but +we have no right to tyrannize over her convictions. That she bore us no +malice is the verdict of every one who knew her ever so slightly; and +her sons, who were greatly subjected to her influence, entertain the +kindest and most friendly sentiments towards the United States. + +Mrs. Trollope's works, beginning with the "Domestic Manners of the +Americans," published in 1832, and ending with "Paris and London," which +appeared in 1856, amount to _one hundred and fourteen_ volumes, all, be +it remembered, written after her fiftieth year. Of her novels perhaps +the most successful and widely known were the "Vicar of Wrexhill," a +violent satire on the Evangelical religionists, published in +1837,--"Widow Barnaby," in 1839,--and "The Ward of Thorpe Combe," in +1847. "Michael Armstrong," printed in 1840, was written with a view to +assist the movement in favor of protection to the factory-operatives, +which resulted in the famous "Ten-Hour Bill." The descriptions were the +fruits of a personal visit to the principal seats of factory-labor. At +the time, this book created considerable sensation. + +Two works of travel and social sketches, "Paris and the Parisians," and +"Vienna and the Austrians," were also very extensively read. With regard +to the second we deem it proper to observe that Mrs. Trollope suffered +herself to be so far dazzled by the very remarkable cordiality of her +reception in the exclusive society of Vienna, and by the flattering +intimacy with which she was honored by Prince Metternich and his circle, +as to have been led to regard the then dominant Austrian political and +social system in a more favorable light than was consistent with the +generally liberal tone of her sentiments and opinions. + +Though late in becoming an author, Mrs. Trollope had at all periods of +her life been inclined to literary pursuits, and in early youth enjoyed +the friendship of many distinguished men, among whom were Mathias, the +well-known author of the "Pursuits of Literature," Dr. Nott, the Italian +scholar, one of the few foreigners who have been members of the Della +Crusca,--General Pepe, the celebrated defender of Venice, whom she knew +intimately for many years,--General Lafayette,--and others. + +Both before and after she achieved literary celebrity, Mrs. Trollope was +very popular in society, for the pleasures of which she was especially +fitted by her talents. In Florence she gathered around her persons of +eminence, both foreign and native, and her interest in men and things +remained undiminished until within a very few years of her death. Even +at an advanced age her mind was ready to receive new ideas and to deal +with them candidly. We have in our possession letters written by her in +'54 and '55 on the much-abused subject of Spiritualism, which was then +in its infancy. They are addressed to an American literary gentleman +then resident in Florence, and give so admirable an idea of Mrs. +Trollope's clearness of mental vision and the universally inquisitive +tendency of her mind that we insert them at large.--Dec. 21st, 1854, +Mrs. Trollope writes: "I am afraid, my dear Sir, that I am about to take +an unwarrantable liberty by thus intruding on your time, but I must +trust to your indulgence for pardon. During the few minutes that I had +the pleasure of speaking with you, the other evening, on the subject of +spiritual visitations, there was in your conversation a tone so equally +removed from enthusiasm on one side and incredulity on the other that I +felt more satisfaction in listening to you than I have ever done when +this subject has been the theme. That so many thousands of educated and +intelligent people should yield their belief to so bold a delusion as +this must be, if there be _no_ occult cause at work, is inconceivable. +By _occult_ cause I mean, of course, nothing at all analogous to hidden +_trickery_, but to the interference of some power with which the earth +has been hitherto unacquainted. If it were not taking too great a +liberty, I would ask you to call upon me,... that I might have the +pleasure and advantage of having your opinion more at length upon one or +two points connected with this most curious subject." The desired +interview took place, and a week later Mrs. Trollope returned a pamphlet +on spiritual manifestations with the following note: "Many thanks, my +dear Sir, for your kindness in permitting me a leisurely perusal of the +inclosed. It is a very curious and interesting document, and I think it +would be impossible to read it without arriving at the conviction that +the writer deserves to be listened to with great attention and great +confidence. But as yet I feel that we have no sure ground under our +feet. The only idea that suggests itself to me is that the medium is in +a mesmeric condition; and after giving considerable time and attention +to these mysterious mesmeric symptoms, I am persuaded that a patient +liable to such influence is in a diseased state. It has often appeared +to me that the soul was _partially_, as it were, disentangled from the +body. I have watched the ---- sisters (the well-known patients of Dr. +Elliotson) for more than a year, during which interval they were +perfectly, as to the mind, in an abnormal state,--not recognizing +father, mother, or brothers, or remembering _anything_ connected with +the year preceding their mesmeric condition. They learned everything +which was submitted to their _intellect_ during this interval with +something very like _supernatural_ intelligence. Emma, another +well-known patient of Dr. Elliotson, constantly described herself, when +in a mesmeric state, as 'greatly better than well,' and this was always +said with a countenance expressive of very sublime happiness,--but as if +her hearers were not capable of comprehending it. I shall feel very +anxious to hear the results of your own experience; for it appears to me +that you are in a state of mind equally unlikely to mistake truth for +falsehood, or falsehood for truth." Upon receiving a second pamphlet +treating on the same subject, Mrs. Trollope wrote as follows: "The +document you have sent me, my dear Sir, is indeed full of interest. Had +it been less so, I should not have retained it so long. In speaking of a +state of mesmerism as being one of disease, I by no means infer that the +mesmeric influence is either the cause or effect of disease, but that +only diseased persons are liable to it. I have listened to statements +from more than one physician in great practice tending very clearly to +show that the manifestations of this semi-spiritual state are never +observed in perfectly healthy persons. One gentleman in large practice +told me that he had almost constantly perceived in the last stage of +pulmonary consumption a manifest brightening of the intellect; and +children, at the moment of passing from this state to that which follows +it, will often (as I well know) speak with a degree of high intelligence +that strongly suggests the idea that _there are moments when the two +conditions touch_. That the region next above us is occupied by the +souls of men about to be made perfect, I have not the shadow of a doubt. +The puzzling part of the present question is this,--Why do we get a dark +and uncertain peep at this stage of existence, when philosophy has so +long been excluded from it? and I am inclined to say in reply, 'Be +patient and be watchful, and we shall all know more anon.'"--Such is the +character of notes that Mrs. Trollope wrote at the age of seventy-five. + +Mrs. Trollope realized from her writings the large sum of one hundred +thousand dollars; but generous tastes and a numerous family created as +large a demand as there was supply, and kept her pen constantly busy. +She wrote with a rapidity which seems to have been inherited by both her +sons, more particularly by Anthony Trollope. One of her novels was +written in three weeks; another she wrote at the bedside of a son dying +of consumption, she being bound by contract to finish the work at a +given time. Acting day and night as nurse, the overtasked mother was +obliged to stimulate her nervous system by a constant use of strong +coffee, and betweenwhiles would turn to the unfinished novel and write +of fictitious joys and sorrows while her own heart was bleeding for the +beloved son dying beside her. It was no doubt owing to this constant +taxation of the brain that her intellect was but a wreck of its former +self during the last four years of her life. During this time her +condition was but a living death, though she was physically well. She +was watched over and cared for with the most unselfish devotion by her +son Thomas Adolphus and his wife, who gave up all pleasures away from +home to be near their mother. The favorite reading in these last days +was her son Anthony's novels. + +And Thomas Trollope, writing of his mother's death, says: "Though we +have been so long prepared for it, and though my poor dear mother has +been in fact dead to us for many months past, and though her life, free +from suffering as it was, was such as those who loved her could not have +wished prolonged, yet for all this the last separation brings a pang +with it. She was as good and dear a mother as ever man had; and few sons +have passed so large a portion of their lives in such intimate +association with their mother as I have for more than thirty years." + +This is a noble record for both mother and son. To her children Mrs. +Trollope was a providence and support in all time of sorrow or +trouble,--a cause of prosperity, a confidant, a friend, and a companion. + +A grateful American makes this humble offering to her memory in the name +of justice. + +There is a villa too, near Florence, "on the link of Bellosguardo," as +dear from association as Villino Trollope. It has for a neighbor the +Villa Mont' Auto, where Hawthorne lived, and which he transformed by the +magic of his pen into the Monte Bene of the "Marble Faun." Not far off +is the "tower" wherein Aurora Leigh sought peace,--and found it. The +inmate of this villa was a little lady with blue-black hair and +sparkling jet eyes, a writer whose dawn is one of promise, a chosen +friend of the noblest and best, and on her terrace the Brownings, Walter +Savage Landor, and many choice spirits have sipped tea while their eyes +drank in such a vision of beauty as Nature and Art have never equalled +elsewhere. + + "No sun could die, nor yet be born, unseen + By dwellers at my villa: morn and eve + Were magnified before us in the pure + Illimitable space and pause of sky, + Intense as angels' garments blanched with God, + Less blue than radiant. From the outer wall + Of the garden dropped the mystic floating gray + Of olive-trees, (with interruptions green + From maize and vine,) until 't was caught and torn + On that abrupt line of dark cypresses + Which signed the way to Florence. Beautiful + The city lay along the ample vale,-- + Cathedral, tower and palace, piazza and street; + The river trailing like a silver cord + Through all, and curling loosely, both before + And after, over the whole stretch of land, + Sown whitely up and down its opposite slopes + With farms and villas." + +What Aurora Leigh saw from her tower is almost a counterpart of what +Mrs. Browning gazed upon so often from the terrace of Villa Brichieri. + +Florence without the Trollopes and our Lady of Bellosguardo would be +like bread without salt. A blessing, then, upon houses which have been +spiritual asylums to many forlorn Americans!--a blessing upon their +inmates, whose hearts are as large and whose hands are as open as their +minds are broad and catholic! + + + + +A TOBACCONALIAN ODE. + + + O plant divine! + Not to the tuneful Nine, + Who sit where purple sunlight longest lingers, + Twining the bay, weaving with busy fingers + The amaranth eterne and sprays of vine, + Do I appeal. Ah, worthier brows than mine + Shall wear those wreaths! But thou, O potent plant, + Of thy broad fronds but furnish me a crown, + Let others sing the yellow corn, the vine, + And others for the laurel-garland pant, + Content with my rich meed, I'll sit me down, + Nor ask for fame, nor heroes' high renown, + Nor wine. + And ye, ye airy sprites, + Born of the Morning's womb, sired of the Sun, + Who cull with nice acumen, one by one, + All gentle influences from the air, + And from within the earth what most delights + The tender roots of springing plants, whose care + Distils from gross material its spirit + To paint the flower and give the fruit its merit, + Apply to my dull sense your subtile art! + When ye, with nicest, finest skill, had wrought + This chiefest work, the choicest blessings brought + And stored them at its roots, prepared each part, + Matured the bud, painted the dainty bloom, + Ye stood and gazed until the fruit should come. + Ah, foolish elves! + Look ye that yon frail flower should be sublimed + To fruit commensurate with all your power + And cunning art? Was it for such ye climbed + The slanting sunbeams, coaxing many a shower + From the coy clouds? Ye did exceed yourselves; + And as ye stand and gaze, lo, instantly + The whole etherealized ye see: + From topmost golden spray to lowest root, + The whole is fruit. + Well have ye wrought, + And in your honor now shall incense rise. + The oaken chair, the cheerful blaze, invite + Calm meditation, while the flickering light + Casts strange, fantastic shadows on the wall, + Where goodly tomes, with ample lading fraught + Of gold of wit and gems of fancy rare, + Poet and sage, mute witnesses of all, + Smile gently on me, as, with sober care, + I reach the pipe and thoughtfully prepare + The sacrifice. + + O fragile clay! + Erst white as e'er a lily of old Nile, + But now imbrowned and ambered o'er and through + With richest tints and ever-deepening hue, + Quintessence of rare essences the while + Uphoarding, as thou farest day by day, + Thou mind'st me of a genial face I knew. + At first it was but fair, nought but a face; + But as I read and learned it, wondrous grace + And beauty marvellous did grow and grow, + Till every hue of the sweet soul did show + Most beautiful from brow and lip and eye. + And thus, O clay, + Child of the sea-foam, nursed amid the spray, + Thy visage changes, ever grows more fair + As the fine spirit works expression there! + Blest be the tide that rapt thee from the roar + And cast thee on the far Danubian shore, + And blest the art that shaped thee daintily! + And thou, O fragrant tube attenuate! + No more in the sweet-blooming cherry-grove, + Where the shy bulbul plaintive mourns her love, + Shalt thou uplift thy blossoms to the sky, + Or wave them o'er the waters rippling by; + No more thy fruit shall stud with jewels red + The leafy crown thou fashionedst for thy head. + Not this thy fate. + When the swart damsel from thy parent tree + Did lop thee with thy fellows, and did strip + From off thee, bleeding, leaf and bud and blossom, + And bind the odorous fagot carefully, + And bear thee in to whom should fashion thee + And set new fruit of amber on thy tip, + More grateful than the old to eye and lip, + Ambrosial odors thou didst then exhale, + Leaving thy fragrance in her tawny bosom. + Thou still dost hold it. Nothing may avail + To rob thee of the odorous memory + Thou sweetly bearest of the cherry-grove, + Where blossoms bloom and lovers tell their love. + Bright amber, fragrant wood, enamelled clay, + Help me to burn the incense worthily! + Thou fire, assist! Promethean fire, unbound, + The azure clouds go wreathing round and round, + Float slowly up, then gently melt away; + And in their circling wreaths I dimly spy + Full many a fleeting vision's fantasy. + Alas! alas! + How bright soe'er before my view they pass, + Whether it be that Memory, pointing back, + Doth show each flower along the devious track + By which I came forth from the fields of youth,-- + Or bright-robed Hope doth deck the sober truth + With many-colored garments, pointing on + To lighter days and envied honors won,-- + Or Fancy, taking many a meaner thing, + Doth gild it o'er with bright imagining,-- + Alas! alas! + Light as the circling smoke, they fade and pass, + What time the last thin wreath hath faintly sped + Up from the embers dying, dying, dead! + So earth's best blessings fade and fleet away,-- + Nought left but ashes, smoke, and empty clay. + + Awake, my soul! 't is time thou wert awaking! + For radiant spirits, innocent and fair, + Walking beside thee, hovering in the air + Adown the past, thronging thy future way, + Wait but thy calling and the thraldom's breaking, + Which, all unworthily, to sense hath bound thee, + To bless thy days and make the night around thee + As bright and beautiful and fair as day. + Call thou on these, my soul, and fix thee there! + Name nought divine which hath not godlike in it; + And if thou burnest incense, let it be + That of the heart, enkindled thankfully; + And if thine eye offend thee, pluck it out, + Nor let it poison all thy sight forever; + Whate'er thou hast to do of worth, begin it, + Nor leave the issue free to any doubt, + Forgetting never what thou art, and never + Whither thou goest, to the far Forever. + And then shall gentle Memory, pointing back, + Show blessings scattered all along thy track; + And bright-robed Hope, shaming thy dreams of youth, + Shall lead thee up from dreaming to the truth; + And Fancy, leaving every meaner thing, + Shall see fulfilled each bright imagining. + Then shall the ashes of thy musing be + Only the ashes of thy naughtiness; + The smoke, the remnant of thy vanity + And thorny passions, which entangled thee + Till thou didst pray deliverance; the clay, + That empty clay e'en, hath a power to bless,-- + Empty for that a gem hath passed away, + To shine forever in eternal day. + + + + +HALCYON DAYS. + + "Peace and good-will." + + +Who hath enchanted Goliath? He sleeps with a smile on his face, but his +secret is hid from the charmer. The treacherous will looks abashed on +the calm of his slumber, and laments, "The thing that I would I do not!" + +Now while the halcyon broods through the Sabbath-days of winter, and, +looking from her nest, sees the waves of a summer calm and +brightness,--now while she meditates, with the eggs under her wings, of +a fast-approaching time when she shall teach her song to the little +flock that's coming,--let us also dream. The thing that hath been shall +be. Contentment, peace, and love! Fairy folk shall not personate this +blessedness for us. Who is your next-door neighbor? One face shines +serenely before me, and says, "The world is redeemed!" One voice, +sounding clear through all discords, has an echo, fine, true, and +eternal, in the midst of the Seraphim's praise. + +Therefore, thou blue-winged halcyon, shall I sit beneath the dead +sycamore in whose topmost branches thy great nest is built,--finding +death crowned here, as everywhere, with life; here shall be told the +Christmas tale of contentment, peace, and love. + +No tremulous tale of sorrow, of wrong endured and avenged; no report of +that Orthodox anguish which, renouncing the present, hopes only by the +hereafter; no story of desperate heroic achievement, or of +long-suffering patience, or even of martyrdom's glory. The sea is calm, +and the halcyon broods, and only love is eternal. + +Let us not stint thee, as selfishness must; nor shame thee with praise +inadequate; nor walk with shod feet, as the base-bred, into thy palaces; +nor as the weak, nor as the wise, who so often profane thee, but as the +loving who love thee, holy Love, may we take thy name on our lips, and +lay our gift on thine altar! It is a Christmas offering, fashioned, +however rudely, from an absolute truth. If thou deem the ointment +precious, when I break the unjewelled box, I pour it on thy feet. Let +others crown, I would only refresh thee. + +Children play on this white, shining, sandy beach, under the leafless +sycamore; they look for no shade, they would find no shade; there is +neither rock, nor shrub, nor evergreen-tree,--nothing but the white +sand, and the dead sycamore, and in the topmost branches the halcyon's +great nest. + +Is it not a place for children? A little flourish of imagination, and we +see them,--Silas, who beats the drum, and Columbia, who carries the +flag, manifest leaders of the wild little company, mermen and mermaids +all; and the music is fit for the Siren, and the beauty would shame not +Venus. + +Suppose we stroll home to their fathers, like respectable earth-keeping +creatures: the depths of human hearts have sometimes proved full of +mystery as the sea; and human faces sometimes glisten with a majesty of +feeling or of thought that reduces ocean-splendor to the subordinate +part of a similitude. + +There is Andrew, father of Silas,--Andrew Swift, says the sign. He +dwells in Salt Lane, you perceive, and he deals in ship-stores,--a +husband and father by no means living on sea-weed. A yellow-haired +little man, shrewd, and a ready reckoner. Of a serious turn of mind. +Deficient in self-esteem; his anticipations of the most humble +character. A sinner, because fearful and unbelieving: for what right has +a man to be such a man as to inspire himself with misgiving? But his +offences offset each other: for, if he doubted, Andrew was also +obstinate. And obstinacy alone led him into ventures whose failure he +expected: as when he laid out the savings of years in the purchase of +goods, wherewith he opened those ship-stores in Salt Lane. Ship-stores! +that sounds well. One might suppose I referred to blocks of marble-faced +buildings, instead of three shelves, three barrels, and their contents! +The obstinacy of Andrew Swift was the foundation of his fortune. Men +have built on worse. + +His opposite neighbor was one Silas Dexter, a flag- and banner-maker, +who went into business in Salt Lane sometime during that memorable year +of Andrew's venture. Apparently this young man was no better off than +Swift, between whom and himself a friendly intercourse was at once +established; but he had the advantage of a quick imagination and a +sanguine temperament; also the manly courage to look at Fortune with +respectful recognition, as we all look at royalty,--even as though he +had sometime been presented,--not with a snobbish conceit which would +seem to defy her Highness. + +Indeed, he was such a man as would find exhilaration of spirit even in +the uncertainties of his position. The sight of his banners waving from +the sign-post, showing all sorts of devices, the flags flowing round the +walls of his shop, enlivening the little dark place with their many +gorgeous colors, sufficed for his encouragement. Utter ruin could not +have ruined the man. He could not have failed with failure. Some sense +of this fact he had, and he lived like one who has had his life insured. + +Not a creature looked upon him but was free to the good he might derive. +The sparkling eyes, quick smile, and manly voice, the active limbs and +generous heart, seemed at the service of every soul that breathed. +Trashy thought and base utterance could not cheat his soul of her +integrity; the vileness of Salt Lane had nothing to do with him. + +And I cannot account for this by bringing his wife forward. For how came +he by this wife, except by the excellence and soundness of the virtue +which preferred her to the world, and made him preferred of her? Still, +you see the ripe cherry, one half full, beautiful, luscious, the other a +patch of skin stretched over the pit, worthless and sad to view. This, +but for his choice and hers, might have served as an emblem of Dexter. + +She was her husband's partner in a twofold sense: for it was DEXTER & +CO. on the sign-board, and Jessie was represented by the Company. Of +that woman I cannot refrain from saying what was so gracefully said of +"the fair and happy milkmaid,"--"All the excellences stand in her so +silently, as if they had stolen upon her without her knowledge." + +The effect of these diverse influences, his wife Jessie in the house, +and his neighbor Andrew to the opposite, kept the spirit of Silas Dexter +at work like a ploughing Pegasus. He was full of pranks as a boy, but +malice found poor encouragement of him. Andrew was his garden, and he +was Andrew's sun: he shone across the lane with a brightness and a +warmth sufficient to quicken the poorest earth; and the crops he +perfected were various, all of the kind that flourish in heavy soil, but +various and good. Do you think the good Samaritan could take the +leprosy? + +The sort of connection a man is bound to make between the everlasting +spirit-world and this transient mortal state Dexter proved in his humble +way. I doubt if spiritualists would have accepted his service as a +medium. He was neither profane nor imbecile; but he sat at the foot of a +ladder the pure ones could not fail to see, and by which they would not +disdain to descend. If they chose to come his way, the white robes would +take no taint. + +Success attended Dexter with a modest grace, and Swift shared in the +good fortune. I do not say the profits of either shop were forty +millions a year. "Keep the best of everything," said Silas to Andrew; +"don't be too hard on 'em; they'll come after they've found your way." +And Swift proved the wisdom of such counsel, and tried to get the better +of his grim countenance while waiting on the customers Dexter directed +to his side: gradually succeeding,--proving down there in Salt Lane the +truth of that ancient saying, "Art is the perfection of Nature." + +So these two men lived like brothers; and if it was a pleasant thing to +listen to Dexter's jokes and laughter, scarcely less profitable was it +to hear Swift praise the flag- and banner-maker when he was out of +sight. + +Dexter's popularity had a varied character. Sea-captains and +ship-builders, circus-men, aeronauts, politicians, engineers, +target-companies, firemen, the military, deputies of all sorts, looked +over his goods, consulted his taste, left their orders. His interest in +the several occupations represented by the men who frequented his shop, +his ingenuity in devising designs, his skill and expedition in supplying +orders, his cheerful speech, and love of talk, and fun, gave the shopman +troops of "friends." He could read the common mass of men at a glance, +and he was justifiable in the devices he made use of in order to bring +his customers into the buying mood: for what he said was true,--they +could satisfy themselves in his store, if anywhere. + +Dexter understood himself, and Jessie understood him: such folk make no +pretences; they are ineffably real. + +"Principles, not Men," was the banner-maker's motto. You might have seen +the flag on which it was painted with a mighty flourish (and very poor +result) in his old shop in the old time. That painting was his first +great effort, that flag his first possession; he could not have parted +with it, so he _said_, and so he believed, for any sum whatever. + +"Principles, not Men": he studied that sentiment in all his graver +moments, when he chanced to be alone in his shop,--you may guess with +what result, moral and philosophical. + +Andrew Swift used to say to his wife, that, when Dexter was studying his +thoughts, it was better to hear him than the minister: and verily he did +put time-serving to shame by the distinct integrity of his warm speech, +and his eloquence of action. + +Dexter married Jessie the day before he opened his flag-shop. She had +long been employed by his employer, and when she promised to be his, she +drew her earnings from the bank, and invested all with him. This was not +prudence, certainly, but it was love. Dexter might have failed in +business the first year,--might have died, you know, in six months, or +even in three, as men do sometimes. It was not prudence; but +Jessie--young lady determined on settlements!--Jessie was looking for +life and prosperity, as the honest and earnest and young have a right to +look in a world God created and governs. And if failure and death had in +fact choked the path that promised so fair, clear of regret, free of +reproaches, glad even of the losses that proved how love had once +blessed her, she would have buried the dead, and worked for the +retrieval of fortune. + +They began their housekeeping-romance back of the shop in two little +rooms. Do you require the actual measurement? There have been wider +walls that could contain greatly less. + + "How big was Alexander, pa? + The people called him _great_." + +They considered the sixpences of their outlay and income with a purpose +and a spirit that made a miser of neither. But there was no delusion +indulged about the business. Jessie never mistook the hilarity of Silas +for an indication of incalculable prosperity. Silas never understood her +gravity for that of discontent and envy. They never spent in any week +more than they earned. They counted the cost of living, and were +therefore free and rich. "She was never alone," as Sir Thomas Overbury +said of that happy milkmaid, "but still accompanied with old songs, +honest thoughts, and prayers, but short ones." And Dexter loved her with +a valiant constancy that spoke volumes for both. + +His days were spent, according to the promise advertised, in endeavors +to please the public; but, oh, if the public that traded with and liked +to patronize him, if the young lads and the old boys who hung about his +counters, could have seen him when he shut his shop-door behind him, and +went into the back-room where Jessie and he devised the patterns, where +she embroidered and lived, where she cooked and washed and ironed, where +she nursed Columbia, their daughter, one glance at all this, made with +the heart and the understanding, would--ah! _might_, have been to some +of them worth more than all Dexter's pleasant stones, and all the +contents of the shop, and all the profits the flag-maker would ever make +by trading. + +For I can hardly believe, though this story be but of "_common_ life," +when I take up the newspapers and glance along the items I am +constrained to doubt, that such people as Silas and Jessie live in every +house, in every alley, lane, and street, in every square and avenue, on +every farm, wherever walls inclose those divine temples of which +Apostles talked as belonging to God, which temples, said they, are holy! +I can hardly believe that Love, void of fear and of selfishness, speaks +through all our domestic policy, and devises those curious arrangements, +political, theological, social, whose result has approval and praise, it +may be, in the regions of outer darkness. + +Dark faces, whose sleekness hides a gulf of waters more dead than those +of the dreadful Dead Sea, rise between me and the honest, brave face of +Silas,--dreary flats, whose wastes are not figured in utter barrenness +by the awful African deserts, where ranks upon ranks of women, like +Jessie at least in love and fidelity, must stand, or--"where is the +promise of His coming?" + +The daughter of Silas and Jessie was called Columbia in honor of some +valiant enterprise, nautical or other, which charmed the patriotic +spirit of the father; and as he was not a fighting man or a speaking +man, he offered this modest comment on the brilliant event by way of +showing his appreciation. + +Columbia Dexter was a great favorite with the children of Salt Lane for +various reasons, and among them this, that in all parades and +processions she supplied the banners. Columbia's friend of friends was +Silas, son of Andrew Swift,--and thus we come among the children of the +neighbors. + +They were not dependent on Salt Lane for a play-ground. They had the +Long Wharf. Ships from the most distant foreign shores deposited their +loads of freightage there, and the children were free to read the +foreign brands, to guess the contents, and to watch the sailors,--free +to all brain-puzzling calculations, and to clothes-soiling, +clothes-rending feats, among the treasures of the ship-hold and the +wharf: no mean privileges, with the roar of ocean in their ears, and +great ships with their towering masts before their eyes. They had the +wharf for bustle, confusion, excitement,--and for this they loved it; +but the beach that stretched beyond they had for quiet, and there, for +miles and miles, curious shells and pretty pebbles, fish-bones and crabs +and sand, sea-weed fine and fair, and the old sycamores, the old dead +trees, in the tops of whose white branches the halcyon built its nest. +Well the children knew the winter days, so bright and mild, when the +brave birds were breeding. Well they knew when the young kingfisher +would begin to make his royal progress, with such safe dignity +descending, branch by branch, until he could no longer resist Nature, +but must dash out in a "fine frenzy" for the bounding waves! + +Silas Swift, Dexter's namesake, was a grave, sturdy, somewhat +heavy-looking fellow, whose brain teemed with thoughts and projects of +which his slow-moving body offered no suggestion. Whoever prophesied of +them did so at his hazard. Let him play at his will, and the children +even were amazed. But this could not happen every day. Set him at work, +and the sanguine were in despair. This was because, when work must be +done, he deliberated, and did the thing that must be; so that, while +misapprehension fretted gently sometimes because of his dulness, he was +preparing for that which was not hoped. Celerity enough when he had come +to a decision, but no sign or token till he had come to that. + +The first exercise of his imagination trusted to the inspection of +others was in behalf of Columbia Dexter, with intent to moderate her +grief over a dead kitten which they buried in the sand under the +sycamore-tree, the procession carrying banners furled and decorated with +badges of mourning. Silas made a monument then and there in the high +noon of a halcyon day: carved on a pine board which had served for a +bier was the face of Tabby, surrounded with devices intended to +represent the duration of her virtues. His work consoled Columbia, and +inspired him to a more ambitious enterprise, namely, the carving of the +same in a block of gypsum, which work of art Dexter obtaining sight of +declared that it would have done credit to an artist, and set it on his +mantel-shelf between two precious household cards lettered in gilt as +follows "_Union is Strength_," and "_Principles, not Men_." + +I suppose no children ever led a happier life,--the special joy of +childhood being in sport, and food, and liberty, and the love of those +who own them. They basked in the sun; they were busy with sport, fretted +by no cares; kind words directed them. They lived in the midst of +illusions, like princes, or fairies, or spirits,--like _children_. They +followed about with processions, training in the rear of every +train-band, keeping time with the march of the happy Sunday-schools, +when they had their celebrations. Young Silas could be trusted with the +care of Columbia, and hand in hand, like brother and sister, they went. +Especially were they proud, if the procession carried one of Dexter's +flags. Silas, no doubt, had suggested a point of the device, or Columbia +had worked a corner. + +When Dexter would go on board ship, or to some lodge, with the flags +which had been ordered of him, in anticipation of voyages and +processions, the children often accompanied him. I see them walking +shyly in the rear, and looking up to the father of the little girl with +the reverence he deserved. By-and-by would they grow wise and feel +ashamed of this? Will you see the fair Columbia, whom the captain pats +so kindly on the head, smiling broadly when he hears her name, will you +see her, a woman grown, attending her father on such errands? And if you +see her not, will the reason be such as proves her worthy to be old +Dexter's daughter? Will you hear her saying to her friends, as now, +"Guess who worked those flowers," while the target-shooters march past, +carrying their blue silk banner, royal with red roses? She and Silas +often run panting in the wake of great processions; they would not for +the world miss seeing the wide, fluttering folds of the Stars and +Stripes, or it might be the conquering St. George, or the transparencies +they were all so busy over a day or two ago. Their speed will soon +abate, and why? + +Human beings are not children forever. Maturity must not manifest itself +as childhood does. Ah, but "Principles, not Men"! Is any truth involved +in that beyond what Silas recognizes in his trade? Is there another +reason which shall have power to make Columbia some day stand coolly on +the sidewalk, while her heart is beating fast,--which shall induce her +to point out the mottoes on the banners, and the various devices, to +another, without trembling in the voice or tears in the eye? If ever she +shall glide along the streets, she whose early race-course was Salt +Lane, if ever like a lady she shall walk there, will it be at the price +of forgetfulness of all this humble sport and joy,--as a sustainer of +feeble "social fictions," and a violator of the great covenant? + +To the boy and girl it was not a question whether all their lives these +relations should continue, and this play go on; but even to them, as +children, a question that seriously concerned them, and in whose +discussion they bore serious part, arose. + +The old building Dexter occupied was becoming unfit for tenants. It had +been patched over and over, until it was no longer safe, and agents +refused to insure it. The proprietor accordingly determined to pull it +down. + +A change to a better locality had often been suggested to Dexter; but +his invariable reply was, that "people shouldn't try to run before they +were able to walk,--he was satisfied with Salt Lane and his neighbors": +though of late he had made such replies with gravity, thinking of his +daughter. + +And now that the necessity was facing him, he met it like a man. He +talked the matter over with his wife, and the claim of their child was +urgent in the heart of each while they talked, and it could not have +surprised either when suddenly their hopes met in her benediction. For +Columbia's sake they must find a pleasant place for the new nest, some +nook where beauty would be welcome, and gentle grace, and quiet, and +light, and fair colors, and sweet odors would be possible; so pure and +fair a child she seemed to father Dexter, so did the mother's heart +desire to protect her from all odious influences and surroundings, that, +when the prospect of change was before them, it was in reference to her, +as well as trade, that the Company would make it. + +Swift was taken into their confidence, and he walked with the pair +around the streets one evening to see the shop Dexter's eyes had fixed +on. It was a modest tenement in a crowded quarter, on whose door and +windows "_To Let_" was posted. Silas had been out house-hunting in the +afternoon, and this place appeared to meet his wishes; he had inquired +about the rent, it did not seem too high for a house so comfortable, and +it was probable that by to-morrow night the family would, after a +fashion, be settled within those walls. + +They sat down on the door-step and talked about the change with serious +gravity, mindful that the old tenement they were about to leave had +sheltered them since their marriage-day, that they had prospered in Salt +Lane, and that the change they were about to make would be attended with +some risk. Andrew Swift sighed dolefully while Jessie or Silas Dexter +alluded to these matters of past experience: it was no easy matter to +talk him into a cheerful mood again; but the brave pair accomplished it +on their way home, when certainly either of them had as much need of a +comforter as he. + +To have heard them, one might have supposed that no tears would be shed +when the tenement so long occupied by the flag-maker should come down. +Old Mortality will not be hindered in his thinking. + +Andrew offered his son Silas to assist his neighbors in the labor of +removal, and his wife came with her service; and the rest of Salt Lane +was ready at the door to lend a helping hand, when it was understood +that the life and soul of the lane was going away to High Street. + +Dexter's face was unusually bright while the work of packing went on. He +knew that for everybody's sake more light than usual must be diffused by +him that day. You know how it is that the brave win the notable +victories, when their troops have fallen back in despair, and would fain +beat a retreat. It is the living voice and the flashing eye, the courage +and the will. What is he, indeed, that he should surrender,--above all, +in the worst extremity? + +How is death even swallowed up in victory, when the beleaguered spirit +dashes across the breach, and, unarmed, possesses life! + +Dexter told Andrew Swift that Silas was worth a dozen draymen, and in +truth he was, that day; for he, and every one, were animated by the +spirit of the leader. Courage! at least for that day, though they dared +not look beyond it. + +Thus these people went to High Street: into the house with many rooms, +four at least; into the rooms with many windows, and high ceilings, +which you could _not_ touch with your uplifted hand,--rooms whose walls +were papered, and whose floors should have carpets, for Dexter said the +house was leased for ten years, and they would make their home +comfortable. What ample scope they had! Many a fancy they had checked +before it became a wish in the old quarters, they were so cramped there, +though never in danger of suffocation, Heaven knows. Grandly the great +arch lifted over the old moss-grown roof. But now they need stifle no +fancy of all that should come to them; there was room in the house, and +behind it,--yes, a strip of ground in the rear, and against the brick +wall an apricot-tree and a grape-vine! Very Garden of Eden: was it big +enough for the Serpent? + +It was a sight to see the happy family while they talked over their +possessions. + +Over the shop, fronting the street, was a large apartment, by common +consent to be used for parlor and show-room: young Swift was to decorate +this, Dexter said, Columbia should be his helper, and he and his wife +would criticize the result. Dexter talked with a purpose when he made +these arrangements, but he kept the purpose secret until the work was +done. + +In the three windows ornamental flags were hung, which should serve for +signs from the street: this was young Swift's design. In the middle +window, Columbia responded, should be the George Washington flag. Yes, +and to the left Lafayette, with Franklin for the right. Even so. Then +above the middle window they secured the gilded American eagle. Oh, the +harmony that prevailed among the young decorators! + +Then "_Principles, not Men_" remained to be disposed of. They did it in +such a way that the gilded motto shone on the white wall. The mantel was +a masterpiece of arrangement, and solely after Columbia's suggestions. +There was the monumental cat for a centre-piece, with the more recent +creations of Silas Swift for immediate surroundings, and a banner at +either end floating from the shelf. + +You can imagine, if your imagination is genial and kindly, how very +queer and fanciful the room looked with these decorations; and the +gentle heart will understand the loving humility, the pleasure, with +which Jessie surveyed all, when the children's work was done. + +It was a pretty scene when Dexter came up, sent by Silas for an opinion, +while the latter kept the shop. At first he laughed a little, and +exclaimed, while he walked about; then Jessie turned away, and gave him +an opportunity to brush the tears from his eyes unobserved; but +presently she began to circle round him, unconsciously it seemed, till +she stood close beside him; then he took her hand and held it, and she +knew what he was thinking, and that he was proud and happy. + +"It beats all!" he said more than once. And Columbia was talking of +Silas, showing his work, and repeating his words, till Dexter broke +out,-- + +"We must keep Silas! We can't get along without Silas! He mustn't go +back to Salt Lane. I'll teach him business in High Street." + +And the father did not seem to notice when his child slipped away down +the stairs, to the shop, to the lad, who was thinking rather sadly, +that, now his work was done, there was no more chance for him here: she +had come to make him smile as much by her own delight as by his +satisfaction. + +But all this excitement must pass off. And in spite of the general +gladness and gratulation, probably a more lonely, homesick party could +not have been easily found than the Dexter family in their new home. + +Dexter could not reproach himself for his removal, as he thought the +matter seriously over. It was a forced removal, and certainly he would +have been without excuse, had he gone into worse quarters instead of +better, since better he could afford. It was not extravagance, but +homesickness, that tormented him. + +He was too generous, when all was done, to torment his wife with such +misgivings as he had; and erelong the trouble, for want of nursing, +died, as most of this life's troubles will, after their shabby fashion. +But, indeed, how can they help it? that, too, is the will of Nature. + +And was not Dexter himself, in the new neighborhood as in the old? His +customers were still of the same class. But his surroundings were of a +superior character,--there was a better atmosphere prevailing in High +Street, and more light in his house. He did not love darkness better. + +Pretty and well-dressed women were to be seen in High Street, and they +never, except by mistake or disaster, wandered through Salt Lane. +Standing in his door, and observing them according to his thoughtful +fashion, Dexter remembered that his daughter was growing rapidly into a +tall, handsome girl, and foresaw that she could not always be a child. +He saw young misses going past with their school-books in their hands, +and if he followed them with his eyes as far as eyes could follow, it +was not for any reason save such as should have made them love and trust +the man. He was thinking so seriously about his daughter, up-stairs at +work with her mother, embroidering scarfs and banners. + +He had only Columbia. She learned fast, when she went with Silas Swift +to the school in Salt Lane,--so they all said, and he knew she was fond +of her book. He had no ambition to make a lady of Columbia,--oh, no! But +he was looking forward, according to his nature, and--who could tell +what future might wait on her? He based his expectations for his child +on his own experience. Neither he nor Jessie had ever looked for such +good fortune as they had; and a step farther, must it not be a step +higher, and accordingly new prospects? + +Prophecy is unceasing. In what does the prescience of love differ from +inspiration? + +One morning Dexter was sent for by the principal of the seminary of the +town, to assist in the decoration of her school-room preparatory to the +examination and exhibition of her pupils. + +While at work there, aided by Silas Swift, who was now his assistant in +business, and notable for his skill as a designer and painter and +painter of transparencies, and whatsoever in that line was desired for +public festivities, processions, illuminations, and general jubilation +of any character,--while at work in the great school-room, Mr. Dexter +was unusually silent. + +This was no occasion for, there was no need of, much speaking or of +merriment. It was not expected of him. He was not dealing with, while he +worked for, others now, but he was dealt with constantly, to an extent +that confounded and embarrassed him. He did not make the demonstrations +people sometimes do in such a case, but was silent, and half sad. +Everything that passed before him he saw, it made an impression rapid +and deep on his mind. The pictures drawn and painted by the pupils, and +hung around the walls for exhibition, the pupils themselves, passing in +and out,--girls of all ages, ladies to look at, all of them,--suggested +anew the question, Why should his daughter be shut off from the +privileges of these? He felt ashamed when he asked. Yet the question +would be answered; and without palliation, self-excusing, or retort, he +meditated. + +Finally he said to Silas Swift, who worked with him in silence broken +only by question and answer that referred merely to their business,-- + +"Look!"--and his eyes followed a young girl who had been hunting for +several minutes among the desks for a book. + +The youth obeyed,--he looked, but seemed not to understand the +flag-maker as quickly or as clearly as was expected of him. + +"Columby," said Dexter, with a wink and a nod, that to his mind +expressed everything. + +"Oh, yes," said Silas, as if he understood. + +His penetration was not put to further proof. The mere supposition of +his apprehension satisfied his employer, who could now go on without +embarrassment. + +"She ought to come to school," said Dexter. + +"Oh!" exclaimed Silas, with surprise sufficient to convince the father +that the young man had not attempted to practise a deceit. + +"Yes," said Dexter, "she ought, she's old enough,"--as if that were all +he had been waiting for. + +"I think so," answered Silas Swift, with a decision encouraging to hear, +and final as to influence. + +"You do? Yes, I ought to afford it, if I lived on a crust to manage the +bills. Why not? What's the difference 'twixt her and the rest, I'd like +to know?" + +"She could beat the whole batch at her books," said Silas, not doubting +that he spoke with moderation. + +"Pretty quick, wasn't she?" said the pleased father. "Yes, I know +Columby!" + +"And she deserves it." + +"Deserves! You don't think I've been waiting to find that out! Well, +Sir, put it that way, I say, Yes, she does deserve it." + +Dexter and young Swift, having spoken thus far, thought on in their +several directions, with serious, steady, strong, far-reaching looks +into the future. + +Thus it was that Columbia Dexter took her place in the great school, +where girls, it was said, were regarded and taught as responsible human +beings. + +Silas Swift looked so grave, whenever the families mentioned Dexter's +resolution, that Columbia, who had made him repeat already many times +his reflections and observations in the school-room that day when he and +her father were employed in its decoration, said to him one morning, +when they happened to be alone together,-- + +"I'm afraid you don't think well of what we're going to do." + +Whereupon he, somewhat proudly for him, answered,-- + +"I told your father, when he asked me, what I thought, before he had +made up his mind." + +"What did you say?" she asked,--though she could have guessed correctly, +had he insisted upon it, but Silas was not in the mood. + +"I said it should be done," he answered, seriously. + +"I should go to school?" + +"Yes, it is but right." + +"Then why do you look so solemn?" + +"You're going away from us." + +Her hand was lying quietly in his, when she answered,-- + +"Going away? I shall see you three times every day. What do you mean?" + +"When there was your father and mother and me, 'us four, and no more,' +there were not dozens to think about. You'll have dozens now." + +"I hope they will be pleasant," she said, looking away, that he should +not see how bright her eyes were, when his were so grave. + +"I hope they will. And I'm sure of it. Never fear. I suppose, too, they +must make you like themselves, some ways. I'd be glad, if I thought +you'd make any of them like you." + +"How's that?" she asked, half laughing, but she trembled as well. What +would honest Silas say next, he was making such a very grave business +out of this school-going? + +"True,--modest,--sensible,--respectful,--a lady, ten times more than +those they make up so fine," said he, slowly. And still he held her hand +as quietly as if it did not thrill with quickening pulses; and his +speech and composure showed what power of self-control the young man +had,--for he was fearful when he looked forward, anticipating the change +this year might bring to pass in and for Columbia Dexter. + +But Dexter and Company looked forward with no forebodings, when they +bought the needful school-books, and saw their daughter fairly occupied +with them. They had not been ashamed to reveal their hopes and fears to +the principal. She really listened in a way that made them love her, you +will know how,--as if she had the interest of the girl at heart,--as +though she would not deal so sacrilegiously with their dear child as to +paste a few flashing ornaments upon her, worthless as dead fish-scales, +and swear she was covered with pearls. Honest and loving sponsors! +virtuous, confiding parents! they were ready to promise for Columbia; +she went from their hands a pure, industrious, obedient girl, only +fourteen; they were sure she would take pride in making good all +deficiencies of her past education. And the woman promised in +turn,--chiefly thinking, I infer, that here at least were responsible +paymasters. Why not? She taught for a living. Only we never like to +suppose that poets sing merely for money, or that kings reign for the +sake of the crown; we do not imagine a statesman delights in his +martyrdom for eight dollars a day. I know one woman who teaches because +it is her vocation; she loves the work God allows her. But even the +worst school that's used as a hot-bed could not have ruined a plant like +this bearing the Dexter label. + +Thus this great fact of the flag-makers' married life transpired,--their +child went to school with the children of gentlemen. Dexter could tell +that figure among dozens of girls; under one modest bonnet was a young +face with brown eyes and brown hair, a fair, sweet countenance, which he +loved with a love we will not dwell upon. In the sacred narrative, as in +the sacred temple, is always a place hid from the eyes and the feet of +the congregation. We may be all Gentiles here. + +Like responsible sentinels, Dexter and Jessie stood at their post. Like +debtors to the great universe, they made their calling sure. They were +living thus peacefully while nations went to war, while panics taught +the people it was not beneath their wisdom to look to the foundations +they built their pride upon,--thus, while great world-events were going +on that must concern every soul under the whole heaven. But never shall +the man be lost in the multitude; and was it not, is it not, of +incalculable importance that mortals by their own firesides should learn +to believe in peace and good-will,--else how shall come the universal +harmony? + +Therefore I dwell thus on Dexter's humble fortunes. Let us not fear too +much reverence, too patient observation; every living creature is one +other evidence, speaking his yea or nay,--by joy or sorrow, shame or +honor, testifying to the eternal laws of God. + +Sometime during the last six months of Columbia's second year at the +seminary among the books and new associates, Silas Swift had some +strange secret experiences, which came to their inevitable expression +when he told Mr. Dexter that he must leave his service. He perceived, he +said, that he could not spend life in a shop,--he must have other +employment. He hinted about the sea, but on that subject was not clear; +but he was clear in this,--tired of his life, sick, and knew not the +physician. Was a serpent distilling poison under the apricot-tree? + +Dexter was amazed. Silas anticipated everything he said,--was prepared +to answer all; and he answered in a manner that showed the flag-maker +something instant and effective must be done. He talked the matter over +accordingly with Andrew Swift, and the two men were at their wits' end; +they did not understand, and knew not what to prescribe for the case, so +desperate it seemed. But Jessie said, "Take him in for a partner, Silas. +Let _him_ stand for Company. You and I are one; so the sign, as it goes, +is a fib, you know." + +The two men looked at Jessie as if she had been an oracle. This very +promotion of their son had long seemed to Swift and his wife the most +desirable issue, of all their expectations; but they had not thought to +look for it these many years. However, Andrew was ready to pay down, any +day, whatever sum Silas Dexter should specify in order that his son +might be admitted to equal partnership. + +So they waited together till young Swift came into the little room back +of the shop, where they were all looking for him. They laid their plan +before him. What could he do? Neither explain himself, nor yet defy them +all. He surrendered; and the next day the old sign, DEXTER & CO., meant +what it had not meant the day before. The word of any one of these +people was as good as a bond to the others; therefore no papers of +agreement were made out, but Andrew paid down the money, because that +was his way of satisfying himself,--and son Silas was now a partner. + +Everybody concerned was so well pleased with this arrangement, that he +whose pleasure in it was specially desired had not the heart to speak +his mind, or to resolve further than that he would do his duty. Indeed, +he soon began to believe that he was satisfied. + +Young Silas thought he saw good reason for bringing forward his +partner's motto into fresh conspicuity in these days: he believed in +that motto, he purposed to work by it, but it was not merely his policy +to give his faith manifestation. He made several efforts, after his own +odd, original style, to impress the pretty Columbia with the +significance of that sentiment. Often his talk with the young lady had +the gravity and weight of a moral essay, and she took it well,--was not +impatient,--would answer him as a child, "I know it is so, Silas,"--did +not imagine how much these very lectures cost him, or that he delivered +them with as much inward composure as an orator might be supposed to +feel on the brink of a precipice, where the awful rocks and depths gave +echo to his utterance. + +Why should he so much disturb himself on her account?--she was so +studious, so blameless, what great need of this oversight he was +exercising continually? + +Young Alexander, now Midshipman Alexander, once a cabin-boy, promoted +step by step on the score of actual merit and brave service +performed,--Midshipman Alexander, son of an old sailor's old widow, who +lived in Salt Lane, to whom Andrew Swift and Silas Dexter and other +well-disposed men had lent a helping hand when poverty had brought her +to some desperate strait,--this young Alexander, who had been coming +home once in every three years since his twelfth birthday, and who in +the course of many years of voyages came to look on Dexter's house as +his home on land, after his mother died,--he interfered with the peace +of Silas Swift. + +He returned from service, after every voyage, a taller, stronger, +nobler, wiser, handsomer man. He had a career open before him; he could +not fail of honorable fortune. Every inch a hero Alexander looked, and +was; nobody ever tired of hearing his adventures; no one grew +unbelieving, when he spoke of the future,--all things seemed so possible +to him; and then he was really not possessed of the demon of vanity, the +ill-shaped evil monster, but was straightforward, and earnest, and +determined, and capable. + +And Dexter, any one could see, was growing dreadfully proud of his +Columbia. + +Silas Swift felt the sands moving under his feet. He dared not build on +a foundation so insecure. But, oh, he wished himself away from High +Street, ten thousand, thousand miles! He fell into dreaming moods that +did not leave him satisfied and cheerful. Surely, other quarters of the +globe had other circumstances than these which kept him to a life so +dull, under skies so leaden. Alas! the waving of the banners did not any +more uplift him, leading him on as a good soldier to battles and +victories. He tried to get the better of himself,--after the last visit +of this Alexander, he was tolerably successful; he studied hard, +ambitious to keep at least on an equality of learning with +Columbia,--and he went far ahead of her, for certain desperate reasons. +But when Dexter began to treat him with profound respect, as a man of +learning should be treated, according to his notions, the poor young +fellow, mortified and miserable, put away his books, and loathed his +false position. + +The old time to which through all prosperity Silas clung with fond +fears, the dear old time was all over, he said to himself one day, when +Columbia called him up into the parlor, clapping her hands ever +suspecting that the theme might please another less,--there was but one +for him as if he had been a slave, a signal he well understood, and was +proud to understand,--when she asked him to bring the step-ladder, and +to help her, for the curtains must come down from the show-room, it was +going to be a parlor now, and no show-room again forever. With heavy +misgivings, with a feeling that they were hard on to "the parting of the +ways," Silas obeyed her. + +Even so, according to her will was it that the drapery, the flags rich +in patriotic portraiture, the Washington, the Franklin, and the +Lafayette, must come down. Some pictures she had painted, some sketches +she had made, were to take their place: her father had insisted on +having them framed, and now they should hang on the walls. + +He assisted Columbia without a word of comment. Now the room, she said, +would no longer look hot and uncomfortable. There would be less dust to +distract one on the walls. But Silas, the stickler for old things, +thought jealously, "There's always a reason ready to excuse every +change. It's pride that's to pay now,--she's getting ashamed of the +shop." + +And he remembered the queer look Alexander had cast around him the last +time he entered that room; and he knew that this same Alexander was now +expected home daily. + +This was the rock, then, against which the sturdy craft of Silas was +destined to strike and go to pieces! This was the whirlpool which should +uproot the fairest tree and swing it to final ingulfing! Dark +foreboding! sad fear! his heart was so concerned about Columbia Dexter. +Alas for the halcyon days! it was winter indeed, but a winter worthy of +Labrador. + +So much she rejoiced in this midshipman's advancement, so proud of it +she seemed,--she was so bold in prophecy where he was concerned, so +manifestly fitted to appreciate a hero's career,--she could talk so long +about him without every suspecting that the theme might please another +less,--there was but one end likely, or desirable, for all this. + +Then Alexander came. And his popularity waxed, instead of waning. So +Silas at last gravely said to himself, after his sensible, moderate +manner of dealing with that unhappy person, "If she and the young man +were only married and settled, there the business would end; _he_ should +no longer be distracted, as he did not deny he had long been, on her +account." That admission was fatal. It compelled him to ask himself +sharply why he should be distracted. "What business was this of his? Did +he not, above all things, desire that Columbia should be happy? Must she +not be the best judge of what could make her happiness?" He tried to +deal honestly with himself. + +This endeavor led him to remark one morning to Columbia,-- + +"You and Alexander seem to be getting on finely." + +"Oh, yes," said she,--"of course." + +"I hope you always will," he continued, with a tragic vehemence of wish. + +"Thank you, Silas; we shall, I think," she replied, with such an excess +of gratitude, so he deemed it, that the poor fellow attempted no more. + +All that day he thought and thought; and at night Silas Swift looked +back from a corner of High Street at a building over whose door a flag +was waving, and said to himself, "I was born as free as others,"--and he +walked on silently, with himself for his dismal company. + +It made no difference to him where he went, which path he took, he said; +but he passed Salt Lane, and crossed Long Wharf, and walked down the +beach, under the old sycamores, and wandered on. There was another +seaport-town some miles down the coast; he was walking in that +direction, but he did not acknowledge a purpose. + +How splendid was the night! a night of magnificent constellations, of +flashing auroras, of many meteors; and he saw the comet, which he and +Columbia had looked for since its first announcement. But the heavens +might as well have been "hung in black." Chilled by more than the wintry +wind, he went his way. When the sun rose, he was still wandering on. +Light, heaven-deep, shone on land and sea. He sat down to rest, and to +order himself for future movements: for the town was now in sight; in an +hour or two he should come to the busy streets; already he could discern +the lofty spires, and the tall masts of the great vessels. + +Yes,--he would find a situation on one of those ships. He would go out +as supercargo to China, or India, or Spain. He could get a situation +without difficulty, for he was well known in the town. Then, after he +had sailed, word could go back to his father and mother. + +So, then, he should go to sea? Of course. It was now arranged,--to +foreign ports. He should see foreign people, and visit ancient places. +The strange would have advantage over the familiar. He did not desire +death. He had not that weakness, not being worn out by sickness, and +having never used this life as abusing it. The friends he loved were +living; his affections were strong. No, he could not think of death +without a shudder, for Love was on the earth. Yet--what had he to do +with Love? By her own election _she_ was no more to him than a hundred +others as good and fair might prove. Must he be so weak as to go through +life regretting? Not he, Silas Swift! + +By-and-by he rose up from the sand. I think his face must have +resembled, then, the face of Elijah when the Lord inquied, with the +still, small voice, "What dost thou here?" For, as he arose, he looked +back on the waste by which he came,--his face turned homewards. Ay, and +his steps likewise; and not with indecision, as though fearing when he +surrendered to himself and One mightier. + +Do they tell us filial reverence is a forgotten virtue? Silas was going +home. Child, do you call him coward? Perhaps he was that,--no, not even +yesterday, for the yesterday was capable of to-day! Do you, then, say, +with a doubting smile, "Love! Love!" Yea, verily, Love! The mount of God +takes up your word, so feebly and falsely spoken, and the echo is like +thunder whose fire can destroy. Yea, _Love_! Two old faces, wrinkled, +anxious. Eyes not so bright as once, dimmer to-day for tears; hair +sprinkled with gray. Prayers broken by sobbing; trust disappointed; +confidence violated. Ay, hearts that loved him first, and would surely +love him always. Smiles first recognized of all he has ever seen, that +could not change to frowns. They call him with tremulous tenderness, and +the heart of Silas breaks with hearing. Bleed, poor heart, but let not +those old hearts bleed! + +The music of the inviting waves is not so soft as the sound of those +feeble voices,--the freedom they promise is not powerful to tempt him; +behold the arms that hang powerless yonder, and the hearts whose tides +are more wondrous than those of the sea! The halcyon days shall never +break through eternal ages on him, if he will walk on now in darkness. + +"I will arise and go to my father." + +The everlasting gates lift up their heads. The full-grown man reenters. +Love drove him forth with stripes; there may have been who rejoiced and +thought of fainting Ishmael. But against no man should this youth's hand +be lifted. No son of the bond-woman he. Isaac, not Ishmael. + +Love drove him forth with stripes; but a holier drew him home. By his +past life's integrity the man was bound,--by the honor of a good name, +that waited to be justified. + +He went home to ask forgiveness of LOVE. Not of Youth and Beauty, but of +Age and Trust. + +He went home to souls which had proved themselves, each one, before the +divine messenger in the hours of his absence. + +Back, once more to break on a little circle gathered in an obscure +corner of the town, talking his case over with distressed perplexity: to +women disturbed with fears incredible to them,--to three, save one who +did not seem distracted, and who looked around her with something like +triumph, as a prophet might gaze when his word was verified. She was the +youngest and the fairest of them all. How many times she had said, "He +can explain. He will come soon. How can you fear for Silas?" + +He went back to the dead silence that fell with his appearing. His +mother was first to break it. With a faltering voice she spoke, but with +the authority of maternal love and faith,--through sobs, but with +authority. + +"There! there! I told you! Now speak, Silas! quick! Did you find +him?"--and, half fainting, she threw her arms about her son. + +The father would fain speak with severity, but he failed in the attempt; +he could no longer harbor his cruel fear, with the lad there before him. + +"Silas, what do you mean, Sir? Here's Mr. Dexter's shop broke in, and +his till robbed, and you off, and the Devil to pay! But Columby, there, +said you had gone in search of the thief. Oh! oh!" + +"Of course!" cried Dexter, the words rolling out as a cloud of smoke +from a conspicuous safety-valve,--"I knew 't was all right. I'd expect +the world to bu'st up as quick as for you to cheat us. I said it, I did, +fifty times." And there Dexter choked, and was silent. + +Ay, time for him to return! "Glory to God!" said Silas, and he looked +around him, scanning every face, as a man might scan the faces of +accusers. + +More than any said or thought he saw in Columbia's eyes. Silent, pale, +she merely sat gazing at him steadfastly. Oh, powers of speech, +surrender! It was a gaze that made the young fellow turn from all, that +the spasm of joy might pass, and leave him breath to declare himself +like a man in the hearing of those present. + +The words he spoke might not disturb the dreaming halcyon, but they must +have brought angels nearer,--so near that not one there in the little +back-room could escape the heavenly atmosphere. + +Was Love born in a stable? Is Nature changed since, that a little room +back of a shop should not be heaven itself, and the inmates kings and +priests, though without the ermine and ephod? + +Shall we sing the halcyon's song? + + + + +ON TRANSLATING THE DIVINA COMMEDIA. + + + Oft have I seen at some cathedral-door + A laborer, pausing in the dust and heat, + Lay down his burden, and with reverent feet + Enter, and cross himself, and on the floor + Kneel to repeat his pater-noster o'er; + Far off the noises of the world retreat; + The loud vociferations of the street + Become an undistinguishable roar. + So, as I enter here from day to day, + And leave my burden at this minster-gate, + Kneeling in prayer, and not ashamed to pray, + The tumult of the time disconsolate + To inarticulate murmurs dies away, + While the eternal ages watch and wait. + + + + +HOUSE AND HOME PAPERS. + +BY CHRISTOPHER CROWFIELD. + + +XI. + +My wife and I were sitting at the open bow-window of my study, watching +the tuft of bright red leaves on our favorite maple, which warned us +that summer was over. I was solacing myself, like all the world in our +days, with reading the "Schoenberg Cotta Family," when my wife made her +voice heard through the enchanted distance, and dispersed the pretty +vision of German cottage-life. + +"Chris!" + +"Well, my dear." + +"Do you know the day of the month?" + +Now my wife knows this is a thing that I never do know, that I can't +know, and, in fact, that there is no need I should trouble myself about, +since she always knows, and what is more, always tells me. In fact, the +question, when asked by her, meant more than met the ear. It was a +delicate way of admonishing me that another paper for the "Atlantic" +ought to be in train; and so I answered, not to the external form, but +to the internal intention. + +"Well, you see, my dear, I haven't made up my mind what my next paper +shall be about." + +"Suppose, then, you let me give you a subject." + +"Sovereign lady, speak on! Your slave hears!" + +"Well, then, take _Cookery_. It may seem a vulgar subject, but I think +more of health and happiness depends on that than on any other one +thing. You may make houses enchantingly beautiful, hang them with +pictures, have them clean and airy and convenient; but if the stomach is +fed with sour bread and burnt coffee, it will raise such rebellions that +the eyes will see no beauty anywhere. Now in the little tour that you +and I have been taking this summer, I have been thinking of the great +abundance of splendid material we have in America, compared with the +poor cooking. How often, in our stoppings, we have sat down to tables +loaded with material, originally of the very best kind, which had been +so spoiled in the treatment that there was really nothing to eat! Green +biscuit with acrid spots of alkali,--sour yeast-bread,--meat slowly +simmered in fat till it seemed like grease itself, and slowly congealing +in cold grease,--and above all, that unpardonable enormity, strong +butter! How often I have longed to show people what might have been done +with the raw material out of which all these monstrosities were +concocted!" + +"My dear," said I, "you are driving me upon delicate ground. Would you +have your husband appear in public with that most opprobrious badge of +the domestic furies, a dish-cloth pinned to his coat-tail? It is coming +to exactly the point I have always predicted, Mrs. Crowfield: you must +write, yourself. I always told you that you could write far better than +I, if you would only try. Only sit down and write as you sometimes talk +to me, and I might hang up my pen by the side of 'Uncle Ned's' fiddle +and bow." + +"Oh, nonsense!" said my wife. "I never could write. I know what ought to +be said, and I could _say_ it to any one; but my ideas freeze in the +pen, cramp in my fingers, and make my brain seem like heavy bread. I was +born for extemporary speaking. Besides, I think the best things on all +subjects in this world of ours are said not by the practical workers, +but by the careful observers." + +"Mrs. Crowfield, that remark is as good as if I had made it myself," +said I. + +"It is true that I have been all my life a speculator and observer in +all domestic matters, having them so confidentially under my eye in our +own household; and so, if I write on a pure woman's matter, it must be +understood that I am only your pen and mouth-piece,--only giving +tangible form to wisdom which I have derived from you." + +So down I sat and scribbled, while my sovereign lady quietly stitched by +my side. And here I tell my reader that I write on such a subject under +protest,--declaring again my conviction, that, if my wife only believed +in herself as firmly as I do, she would write so that nobody would ever +want to listen to me again. + + +COOKERY. + +We in America have the raw material of provision in greater abundance +than any other nation. There is no country where an ample, +well-furnished table is more easily spread, and for that reason, +perhaps, none where the bounties of Providence are more generally +neglected. I do not mean to say that the traveller through the length +and breadth of our land could not, on the whole, find an average of +comfortable subsistence; yet, considering that our resources are greater +than those of any other civilized people, our results are comparatively +poorer. + +It is said, that, a list of the summer vegetables which are exhibited on +New-York hotel-tables being shown to a French _artiste_, he declared +that to serve such a dinner properly would take till midnight. I +recollect how I was once struck with our national plenteousness, on +returning from a Continental tour, and going directly from the ship to a +New-York hotel, in the bounteous season of autumn. For months I had been +habituated to my neat little bits of chop or poultry garnished with the +inevitable cauliflower or potato, which seemed to be the sole +possibility after the reign of green-peas was over; now I sat down all +at once to a carnival of vegetables: ripe, juicy tomatoes, raw or +cooked; cucumbers in brittle slices; rich, yellow sweet-potatoes; broad +Lima-beans, and beans of other and various names; tempting ears of +Indian-corn steaming in enormous piles, and great smoking tureens of the +savory succotash, an Indian gift to the table for which civilization +need not blush; sliced egg-plant in delicate fritters; and +marrow-squashes, of creamy pulp and sweetness: a rich variety, +embarrassing to the appetite, and perplexing to the choice. Verily, the +thought has often impressed itself on my mind that the vegetarian +doctrine preached in America left a man quite as much as he had capacity +to eat or enjoy, and that in the midst of such tantalizing abundance he +really lost the apology which elsewhere bears him out in preying upon +his less gifted and accomplished animal neighbors. + +But with all this, the American table, taken as a whole, is inferior to +that of England or France. It presents a fine abundance of material, +carelessly and poorly treated. The management of food is nowhere in the +world, perhaps, more slovenly and wasteful. Everything betokens that +want of care that waits on abundance; there are great capabilities and +poor execution. A tourist through England can seldom fail, at the +quietest country-inn, of finding himself served with the essentials of +English table-comfort,--his mutton-chop done to a turn, his steaming +little private apparatus for concocting his own tea, his choice pot of +marmalade or slice of cold ham, and his delicate rolls and creamy +butter, all served with care and neatness. In France, one never asks in +vain for delicious _cafe-au-lait_, good bread and butter, a nice omelet, +or some savory little portion of meat with a French name. But to a +tourist taking like chance in American country-fare what is the +prospect? What is the coffee? what the tea? and the meat? and above all, +the butter? + +In lecturing on cookery, as on house-building, I divide the subject into +not four, but five grand elements: first, Bread; second, Butter; third, +Meat; fourth, Vegetables; and fifth, Tea,--by which I mean, generically, +all sorts of warm, comfortable drinks served out in teacups, whether +they be called tea, coffee, chocolate, broma, or what not. + +I affirm, that, if these five departments are all perfect, the great +ends of domestic cookery are answered, so far as the comfort and +well-being of life are concerned. I am aware that there exists another +department, which is often regarded by culinary amateurs and young +aspirants as the higher branch and very collegiate course of practical +cookery, to wit, Confectionery,--by which I mean to designate all +pleasing and complicated compounds of sweets and spices, devised not for +health or nourishment, and strongly suspected of interfering with +both,--mere tolerated gratifications of the palate, which we eat, not +with the expectation of being benefited, but only with the hope of not +being injured by them. In this large department rank all sorts of cakes, +pies, preserves, ices, etc. I shall have a word or two to say under this +head before I have done. I only remark now, that in my tours about the +country I have often had a virulent ill-will excited towards these works +of culinary supererogation, because I thought their excellence was +attained by treading under foot and disregarding the five grand +essentials. I have sat at many a table garnished with three or four +kinds of well-made cake, compounded with citron and spices and all +imaginable good things, where the meat was tough and greasy, the bread +some hot preparation of flour, lard, saleratus, and acid, and the butter +unutterably detestable. At such tables I have thought, that, if the +mistress of the feast had given the care, time, and labor to preparing +the simple items of bread, butter, and meat that she evidently had given +to the preparation of these extras, the lot of a traveller might be much +more comfortable. Evidently, she never had thought of these common +articles as constituting a good table. So long as she had puff pastry, +rich black cake, clear jelly, and preserves, she seemed to consider that +such unimportant matters as bread, butter, and meat could take care of +themselves. It is the same inattention to common things as that which +leads people to build houses with stone fronts and window-caps and +expensive front-door trimmings, without bathing-rooms or fireplaces or +ventilators. + +Those who go into the country looking for summer board in farm-houses +know perfectly well that a table where the butter is always fresh, the +tea and coffee of the best kinds and well made, and the meats properly +kept, dressed, and served, is the one table of a hundred, the fabulous +enchanted island. It seems impossible to get the idea into the minds of +people that what is called common food, carefully prepared, becomes, in +virtue of that very care and attention, a delicacy, superseding the +necessity of artificially compounded dainties. + +To begin, then, with the very foundation of a good table,--_Bread:_ What +ought it to be? It should be light, sweet, and tender. + +This matter of lightness is the distinctive line between savage and +civilized bread. The savage mixes simple flour and water into balls of +paste, which he throws into boiling water, and which come out solid, +glutinous masses, of which his common saying is, "Man eat dis, he no +die,"--which a facetious traveller who was obliged to subsist on it +interpreted to mean, "Dis no kill you, nothing will." In short, it +requires the stomach of a wild animal or of a savage to digest this +primitive form of bread, and of course more or less attention in all +civilized modes of bread-making is given to producing lightness. By +lightness is meant simply that the particles are to be separated from +each other by little holes or air-cells, and all the different methods +of making light bread are neither more nor less than the formation in +bread of these air-cells. + +So far as we know, there are four practicable methods of aerating bread, +namely--by fermentation,--by effervescence of an acid and an +alkali,--by aerated egg, or egg which has been filled with air by the +process of beating,--and lastly, by pressure of some gaseous substance +into the paste, by a process much resembling the impregnation of water +in a soda-fountain. All these have one and the same object,--to give us +the cooked particles of our flour separated by such permanent air-cells +as will enable the stomach more readily to digest them. + +A very common mode of aerating bread, in America, is by the +effervescence of an acid and an alkali in the flour. The carbonic acid +gas thus formed produces minute air-cells in the bread, or, as the cook +says, makes it light. When this process is performed with exact +attention to chemical laws, so that the acid and alkali completely +neutralize each other, leaving no overplus of either, the result is +often very palatable. The difficulty is, that this is a happy +conjunction of circumstances which seldom occurs. The acid most commonly +employed is that of sour milk, and, as milk has many degrees of +sourness, the rule of a certain quantity of alkali to the pint must +necessarily produce very different results at different times. As an +actual fact, where this mode of making bread prevails, as we lament to +say it does to a great extent in this country, one finds five cases of +failure to one of success. It is a woful thing that the daughters of New +England have abandoned the old respectable mode of yeast-brewing and +bread-raising for this specious substitute, so easily made, and so +seldom well made. The green, clammy, acrid substance, called biscuit, +which many of our worthy republicans are obliged to eat in these days, +is wholly unworthy of the men and women of the Republic. Good patriots +ought not to be put off in that way,--they deserve better fare. + +As an occasional variety, as a household convenience for obtaining bread +or biscuit at a moment's notice, the process we earnestly entreat +American housekeepers, in Scriptural language, to stand in the way and +ask for the old paths, and return to the good yeast-bread of their +sainted grandmothers. + +If acid and alkali must be used, by all means let them be mixed in due +proportions. No cook should be left to guess and judge for herself about +this matter. There is an article, called "Preston's Infallible +Yeast-Powder," which is made by chemical rule, and produces very perfect +results. The use of this obviates the worst dangers in making bread by +effervescence. + +Of all processes of aeration in bread-making, the oldest and most +time-honored is by fermentation. That this was known in the days of our +Saviour is evident from the forcible simile in which he compares the +silent permeating force of truth in human society to the very familiar +household process of raising bread by a little yeast. + +There is, however, one species of yeast, much used in some parts of the +country, against which I have to enter my protest. It is called +salt-risings, or milk-risings, and is made by mixing flour, milk, and a +little salt together, and leaving them to ferment. The bread thus +produced is often very attractive, when new and made with great care. It +is white and delicate, with fine, even air-cells. It has, however, when +kept, some characteristics which remind us of the terms in which our old +English Bible describes the effect of keeping the manna of the ancient +Israelites, which we are informed, in words more explicit than +agreeable, "stank, and bred worms." If salt-rising bread does not fulfil +the whole of this unpleasant description, it certainly does emphatically +a part of it. The smell which it has in baking, and when more than a day +old, suggests the inquiry, whether it is the saccharine or the putrid +fermentation with which it is raised. Whoever breaks a piece of it after +a day or two will often see minute filaments or clammy strings drawing +out from the fragments, which, with the unmistakable smell, will cause +him to pause before consummating a nearer acquaintance. + +The fermentation of flour by means of brewer's or distiller's yeast +produces, if rightly managed, results far more palatable and wholesome. +The only requisites for success in it are, first, good materials, and, +second, great care in a few small things. There are certain low-priced +or damaged kinds of flour which can never by any kind of domestic +chemistry be made into good bread; and to those persons whose stomachs +forbid them to eat gummy, glutinous paste, under the name of bread, +there is no economy in buying these poor brands, even at half the price +of good flour. + +But good flour and good yeast being supposed, with a temperature +favorable to the development of fermentation, the whole success of the +process depends on the thorough diffusion of the proper proportion of +yeast through the whole mass, and on stopping the subsequent +fermentation at the precise and fortunate point. The true housewife +makes her bread the sovereign of her kitchen,--its behests must be +attended to in all critical points and moments, no matter what else be +postponed. She who attends to her bread when she has done this, and +arranged that, and performed the other, very often finds that the forces +of Nature will not wait for her. The snowy mass, perfectly mixed, +kneaded with care and strength, rises in its beautiful perfection till +the moment comes for fixing the air-cells by baking. A few minutes now, +and the acetous fermentation will begin, and the whole result be +spoiled. Many bread-makers pass in utter carelessness over this sacred +and mysterious boundary. Their oven has cake in it, or they are skimming +jelly, or attending to some other of the so-called higher branches of +cookery, while the bread is quickly passing into the acetous stage. At +last, when they are ready to attend to it, they find that it has been +going its own way,--it is so sour that the pungent smell is plainly +perceptible. Now the saleratus-bottle is handed down, and a quantity of +the dissolved alkali mixed with the paste,--an expedient sometimes +making itself too manifest by greenish streaks or small acrid spots in +the bread. As the result, we have a beautiful article spoiled,--bread +without sweetness, if not absolutely sour. + +In the view of many, lightness is the only property required in this +article. The delicate, refined sweetness which exists in carefully +kneaded bread, baked just before it passes to the extreme point of +fermentation, is something of which they have no conception, and thus +they will even regard this process of spoiling the paste by the acetous +fermentation, and then rectifying that acid by effervescence with an +alkali, as something positively meritorious. How else can they value and +relish bakers' loaves, such as some are, drugged with ammonia and other +disagreeable things, light indeed, so light that they seem to have +neither weight nor substance, but with no move sweetness or taste than +so much white cotton? + +Some persons prepare bread for the oven by simply mixing it in the mass, +without kneading, pouring it into pans, and suffering it to rise there. +The air-cells in bread thus prepared are coarse and uneven; the bread is +as inferior in delicacy and nicety to that which is well kneaded as a +raw Irish servant to a perfectly educated and refined lady. The process +of kneading seems to impart an evenness to the minute air-cells, a +fineness of texture, and a tenderness and pliability to the whole +substance, that can be gained in no other way. + +The divine principle of beauty has its reign over bread as well as over +all other things; it has its laws of aesthetics; and that bread which is +so prepared that it can be formed into separate and well-proportioned +loaves, each one carefully worked and moulded, will develop the most +beautiful results. After being moulded, the loaves should stand a little +while, just long enough to allow the fermentation going on in them to +expand each little air-cell to the point at which it stood before it was +worked down, and then they should be immediately put into the oven. + +Many a good thing, however, is spoiled in the oven. We cannot but +regret, for the sake of bread, that our old steady brick ovens have been +almost universally superseded by those of ranges and cooking-stoves, +which are infinite in their caprices, and forbid all general rules. One +thing, however, may be borne in mind as a principle,--that the +excellence of bread in all its varieties, plain or sweetened, depends on +the perfection of its air-cells, whether produced by yeast, egg, or +effervescence, that one of the objects of baking is to fix these +air-cells, and that the quicker this can be done through the whole mass +the better will the result be. When cake or bread is made heavy by +baking too quickly, it is because the immediate formation of the top +crust hinders the exhaling of the moisture in the centre, and prevents +the air-cells from cooking. The weight also of the crust pressing down +on the doughy air-cells below destroys them, producing that horror of +good cooks, a heavy streak. The problem in baking, then, is the quick +application of heat rather below than above the loaf, and its steady +continuance till all the air-cells are thoroughly dried into permanent +consistency. Every housewife must watch her own oven to know how this +can be best accomplished. + +Bread-making can be cultivated to any extent as a fine art,--and the +various kinds of biscuit, tea-rusks, twists, rolls, into which bread may +be made, are much better worth a housekeeper's ambition than the +getting-up of rich and expensive cake or confections. There are also +varieties of material which are rich in good effects. Unbolted flour, +altogether more wholesome than the fine wheat, and when properly +prepared more palatable,--rye-flour and corn-meal, each affording a +thousand attractive possibilities,--each and all of these come under the +general laws of bread-stuffs, and are worth a careful attention. + +A peculiarity of our American table, particularly in the Southern and +Western States, is the constant exhibition of various preparations of +hot bread. In many families of the South and West, bread in loaves to be +eaten cold is an article quite unknown. The effect of this kind of diet +upon the health has formed a frequent subject of remark among +travellers; but only those know the full mischiefs of it who have been +compelled to sojourn for a length of time in families where it is +maintained. The unknown horrors of dyspepsia from bad bread are a topic +over which we willingly draw a veil. + + * * * * * + +Next to Bread comes _Butter_,--on which we have to say, that, when we +remember what butter is in civilized Europe, and compare it with what it +is in America, we wonder at the forbearance and lenity of travellers in +their strictures on our national commissariat. + +Butter, in England, France, and Italy, is simply solidified cream, with +all the sweetness of the cream in its taste, freshly churned each day, +and unadulterated by salt. At the present moment, when salt is five +cents a pound and butter fifty, we Americans are paying, I should judge +from the taste, for about one pound of salt to every ten of butter, and +those of us who have eaten the butter of France and England do this with +rueful recollections. + +There is, it is true, an article of butter made in the American style +with salt, which, in its own kind and way, has a merit not inferior to +that of England and France. Many prefer it, and it certainly takes a +rank equally respectable with the other. It is yellow, hard, and worked +so perfectly free from every particle of buttermilk that it might make +the voyage of the world without spoiling. It is salted, but salted with +care and delicacy, so that it may be a question whether even a +fastidious Englishman might not prefer its golden solidity to the white, +creamy freshness of his own. Now I am not for universal imitation of +foreign customs, and where I find this butter made perfectly, I call it +our American style, and am not ashamed of it. I only regret that this +article is the exception, and not the rule, on our tables. When I +reflect on the possibilities which beset the delicate stomach in this +line, I do not wonder that my venerated friend Dr. Mussey used to close +his counsels to invalids with the direction, "And don't eat grease on +your bread." + +America must, I think, have the credit of manufacturing and putting into +market more bad butter than all that is made in all the rest of the +world together. The varieties of bad tastes and smells which prevail in +it are quite a study. This has a cheesy taste, that a mouldy,--this is +flavored with cabbage, and that again with turnip, and another has the +strong, sharp savor of rancid animal fat. These varieties, I presume, +come from the practice of churning only at long intervals, and keeping +the cream meanwhile in unventilated cellars or dairies, the air of which +is loaded with the effluvia of vegetable substances. No domestic +articles are so sympathetic as those of the milk tribe: they readily +take on the smell and taste of any neighboring substance, and hence the +infinite variety of flavors on which one mournfully muses who has late +in autumn to taste twenty firkins of butter in hopes of finding one +which will simply not be intolerable on his winter table. + +A matter for despair as regards bad butter is that at the tables where +it is used it stands sentinel at the door to bar your way to every other +kind of food. You turn from your dreadful half-slice of bread, which +fills your mouth with bitterness, to your beefsteak, which proves +virulent with the same poison; you think to take refuge in vegetable +diet, and find the butter in the string-beans, and polluting the +innocence of early peas,--it is in the corn, in the succotash, in the +squash,--the beets swim in it, the onions have it poured over them. +Hungry and miserable, you think to solace yourself at the dessert,--but +the pastry is cursed, the cake is acrid with the same plague. You are +ready to howl with despair, and your misery is great upon +you,--especially if this is a table where you have taken board for three +months with your delicate wife and four small children. Your case is +dreadful,--and it is hopeless, because long usage and habit have +rendered your host perfectly incapable of discovering what is the +matter. "Don't like the butter, Sir? I assure you I paid an extra price +for it, and it's the very best in the market. I looked over as many as a +hundred tubs, and picked out this one." You are dumb, but not less +despairing. + +Yet the process of making good butter is a very simple one. To keep the +cream in a perfectly pure, cool atmosphere, to churn while it is yet +sweet, to work out the buttermilk thoroughly, and to add salt with such +discretion as not to ruin the fine, delicate flavor of the fresh +cream,--all this is quite simple, so simple that one wonders at +thousands and millions of pounds of butter yearly manufactured which are +merely a hobgoblin-bewitchment of cream into foul and loathsome poisons. + + * * * * * + +The third head of my discourse is that of _Meat_, of which America +furnishes, in the gross material, enough to spread our tables royally, +were it well cared for and served. + +The faults in the meat generally furnished to us are, first, that it is +too new. A beefsteak, which three or four days of keeping might render +practicable, is served up to us palpitating with freshness, with all the +toughness of animal muscle yet warm. In the Western country, the +traveller, on approaching a hotel, is often saluted by the last shrieks +of the chickens which half an hour afterward are presented to him _a la_ +spread-eagle for his dinner. The example of the Father of the Faithful, +most wholesome to be followed in so many respects, is imitated only in +the celerity with which the young calf, tender and good, was transformed +into an edible dish for hospitable purposes. But what might be good +housekeeping in a nomadic Emir, in days when refrigerators were yet in +the future, ought not to be so closely imitated as it often is in our +own land. + +In the next place, there is a woful lack of nicety in the butcher's work +of cutting and preparing meat. Who that remembers the neatly trimmed +mutton-chop of an English inn, or the artistic little circle of +lamb-chop fried in bread-crumbs coiled around a tempting centre of +spinach which can always be found in France, can recognize any +family-resemblance to these dapper civilized preparations in those +coarse, roughly hacked strips of bone, gristle, and meat which are +commonly called mutton-chop in America? There seems to be a large dish +of something resembling meat, in which each fragment has about two or +three edible morsels, the rest being composed of dry and burnt skin, +fat, and ragged bone. + +Is it not time that civilization should learn to demand somewhat more +care and nicety in the modes of preparing what is to be cooked and +eaten? Might not some of the refinement and trimness which characterize +the preparations of the European market be with advantage introduced +into our own? The housekeeper who wishes to garnish her table with some +of those nice things is stopped in the outset by the butcher. Except in +our large cities, where some foreign travel may have created the demand, +it seems impossible to get much in this line that is properly prepared. + +I am aware, that, if this is urged on the score of aesthetics, the ready +reply will be,--"Oh, we can't give time here in America to go into +niceties and French whim-whams!" But the French mode of doing almost all +practical things is based on that true philosophy and utilitarian good +sense which characterize that seemingly thoughtless people. Nowhere is +economy a more careful study, and their market is artistically arranged +to this end. The rule is so to cut their meats that no portion designed +to be cooked in a certain manner shall have wasteful appendages which +that mode of cooking will spoil. The French soup-kettle stands ever +ready to receive the bones, the thin fibrous flaps, the sinewy and +gristly portions, which are so often included in our roasts or +broilings, which fill our plates with unsightly _debris_, and finally +make an amount of blank waste for which we pay our butcher the same +price that we pay for what we have eaten. + +The dead waste of our clumsy, coarse way of cutting meats is immense. +For example, at the beginning of the present season, the part of a lamb +denominated leg and loin, or hind-quarter, sold for thirty cents a +pound. Now this includes, besides the thick, fleshy portions, a quantity +of bone, sinew, and thin fibrous substance, constituting full one-third +of the whole weight. If we put it into the oven entire, in the usual +manner, we have the thin parts overdone, and the skinny and fibrous +parts utterly dried up, by the application of the amount of heat +necessary to cook the thick portion. Supposing the joint to weigh six +pounds, at thirty cents, and that one-third of the weight is so treated +as to become perfectly useless, we throw away sixty cents. Of a piece of +beef at twenty-five cents a pound, fifty cents' worth is often lost in +bone, fat, and burnt skin. + +The fact is, this way of selling and cooking meat in large, gross +portions is of English origin, and belongs to a country where all the +customs of society spring from a class who have no particular occasion +for economy. The practice of minute and delicate division comes from a +nation which acknowledges the need of economy, and has made it a study. +A quarter of lamb in this mode of division would be sold in three nicely +prepared portions. The thick part would be sold by itself, for a neat, +compact little roast; the rib-bones would be artistically separated, and +all the edible matters scraped away would form those delicate dishes of +lamb-chop, which, fried in bread-crumbs to a golden brown, are so +ornamental and so palatable a side-dish; the trimmings which remain +after this division would be destined to the soup-kettle or stew-pan. In +a French market is a little portion for every purse, and the far-famed +and delicately flavored soups and stews which have arisen out of French +economy are a study worth a housekeeper's attention. Not one atom of +food is wasted in the French modes of preparation; even tough animal +cartilages and sinews, instead of appearing burned and blackened in +company with the roast meat to which they happen to be related, are +treated according to their own laws, and come out either in savory +soups, or those fine, clear meat-jellies which form a garnish no less +agreeable to the eye than palatable to the taste. + +Whether this careful, economical, practical style of meat-cooking can +ever to any great extent be introduced into our kitchens now is a +question. Our butchers are against it; our servants are wedded to the +old wholesale wasteful ways, which seem to them easier because they are +accustomed to them. A cook who will keep and properly tend a soup-kettle +which shall receive and utilize all that the coarse preparations of the +butcher would require her to trim away, who understands the art of +making the most of all these remains, is a treasure scarcely to be hoped +for. If such things are to be done, it must be primarily through the +educated brain of cultivated women who do not scorn to turn their +culture and refinement upon domestic problems. + +When meats have been properly divided, so that each portion can receive +its own appropriate style of treatment, next comes the consideration of +the modes of cooking. These may be divided into two great general +classes: those where it is desired to keep the juices within the meat, +as in baking, broiling, and frying,--and those whose object is to +extract the juice and dissolve the fibre, as in the making of soups and +stews. In the first class of operations, the process must be as rapid as +may consist with the thorough cooking of all the particles. In this +branch of cookery, doing quickly is doing well. The fire must be brisk, +the attention, alert. The introduction of cooking-stoves offers to +careless domestics facilities for gradually drying-up meats, and +despoiling them of all flavor and nutriment,--facilities which appear to +be very generally laid hold of. They have almost banished the genuine, +old-fashioned roast-meat from our tables, and left in its stead dried +meats with their most precious and nutritive juices evaporated. How few +cooks, unassisted, are competent to the simple process of broiling a +beefsteak or mutton-chop! how very generally one has to choose between +these meats gradually dried away, or burned on the outside and raw +within! Yet in England these articles _never_ come on table done amiss; +their perfect cooking is as absolute a certainty as the rising of the +sun. + +No one of these rapid processes of cooking, however, is so generally +abused as frying. The frying-pan has awful sins to answer for. What +untold horrors of dyspepsia have arisen from its smoky depths, like the +ghosts from witches' caldrons! The fizzle of frying meat is as a warning +knell on many an ear, saying, "Touch not, taste not, if you would not +burn and writhe!" + +Yet those who have travelled abroad remember that some of the lightest, +most palatable, and most digestible preparations of meat have come from +this dangerous source. But we fancy quite other rites and ceremonies +inaugurated the process, and quite other hands performed its offices, +than those known to our kitchens. Probably the delicate _cotelletes_ of +France are not flopped down into half-melted grease, there gradually to +warm and soak and fizzle, while Biddy goes in and out on her other +ministrations, till finally, when thoroughly saturated, and dinner-hour +impends, she bethinks herself, and crowds the fire below to a roaring +heat, and finishes the process by a smart burn, involving the kitchen +and surrounding precincts in volumes of Stygian gloom. + +From such preparations has arisen the very current medical opinion that +fried meats are indigestible. They are indigestible, if they are greasy; +but French cooks have taught us that a thing has no more need to be +greasy because emerging from grease than Venus had to be salt because +she rose from the sea. + +There are two ways of frying employed by the French cook. One is, to +immerse the article to be cooked in _boiling_ fat, with an emphasis on +the present participle,--and the philosophical principle is, so +immediately to crisp every pore, at the first moment or two of +immersion, as effectually to seal the interior against the intrusion of +greasy particles; it can then remain as long as may be necessary +thoroughly to cook it, without imbibing any more of the boiling fluid +than if it were inclosed in an eggshell. The other method is to rub a +perfectly smooth iron surface with just enough of some oily substance to +prevent the meat from adhering, and cook it with a quick heat, as cakes +are baked on a griddle. In both these cases there must be the most rapid +application of heat that can be made without burning, and by the +adroitness shown in working out this problem the skill of the cook is +tested. Any one whose cook attains this important secret will find fried +things quite as digestible and often more palatable than any other. + +In the second department of meat-cookery, to wit, the slow and gradual +application of heat for the softening and dissolution of its fibre and +the extraction of its juices, common cooks are equally untrained. Where +is the so-called cook who understands how to prepare soups and stews? +These are precisely the articles in which a French kitchen excels. The +soup-kettle, made with a double bottom, to prevent burning, is a +permanent, ever-present institution, and the coarsest and most +impracticable meats distilled through that alembic come out again in +soups, jellies, or savory stews. The toughest cartilage, even the bones, +being first cracked, are here made to give forth their hidden virtues, +and to rise in delicate and appetizing forms. One great law governs all +these preparations: the application of heat must be gradual, steady, +long protracted, never reaching the point of active boiling. Hours of +quiet simmering dissolve all dissoluble parts, soften the sternest +fibre, and unlock every minute cell in which Nature has stored away her +treasures of nourishment. This careful and protracted application of +heat and the skilful use of flavors constitute the two main points in +all those nice preparations of meat for which the French have so many +names,--processes by which a delicacy can be imparted to the coarsest +and cheapest food superior to that of the finest articles under less +philosophic treatment. + +French soups and stews are a study,--and they would not be an +unprofitable one to any person who wishes to live with comfort and even +elegance on small means. + +John Bull looks down from the sublime of ten thousand a year on French +kickshaws, as he calls them:--"Give me my meat cooked so I may know what +it is!" An ox roasted whole is dear to John's soul, and his +kitchen-arrangements are Titanic. What magnificent rounds and sirloins +of beef, revolving on self-regulating spits, with a rich click of +satisfaction, before grates piled with roaring fires! Let us do justice +to the royal cheer. Nowhere are the charms of pure, unadulterated animal +food set forth in more imposing style. For John is rich, and what does +he care for odds and ends and parings? Has he not all the beasts of the +forest, and the cattle on a thousand hills? What does he want of +economy? But his brother Jean has not ten thousand pounds a +year,--nothing like it; but he makes up for the slenderness of his purse +by boundless fertility of invention and delicacy of practice. John began +sneering at Jean's soups and ragouts, but all John's modern sons and +daughters send to Jean for their cooks, and the sirloins of England rise +up and do obeisance to this Joseph with a white apron who comes to rule +in their kitchens. + +There is no animal fibre that will not yield itself up to +long-continued, steady heat. But the difficulty with almost any of the +common servants who call themselves cooks is that they have not the +smallest notion of the philosophy of the application of heat. Such a one +will complacently tell you concerning certain meats, that the harder you +boil them the harder they grow,--an obvious fact, which, under her mode +of treatment, by an indiscriminate galloping boil, has frequently come +under her personal observation. If you tell her that such meat must +stand for six hours in a heat just below the boiling-point, she will +probably answer, "Yes, Ma'am," and go on her own way. Or she will let it +stand till it burns to the bottom of the kettle,--a most common +termination of the experiment. The only way to make sure of the matter +is either to import a French kettle, or to fit into an ordinary kettle a +false bottom, such as any tinman may make, that shall leave a space of +an inch or two between the meat and the fire. This kettle may be +maintained as a constant _habitue_ of the range, and into it the cook +may be instructed to throw all the fibrous trimmings of meat, all the +gristle, tendons, and bones, having previously broken up these last with +a mallet. + +Such a kettle will furnish the basis for clear, rich soups or other +palatable dishes. Clear soup consists of the dissolved juices of the +meat and gelatine of the bones, cleared from the fat and fibrous +portions by straining when cold. The grease, which rises to the top of +the fluid, may thus be easily removed. In a stew, on the contrary, you +boil down this soup till it permeates the fibre which long exposure to +heat has softened. All that remains, after the proper preparation of the +fibre and juices, is the flavoring, and it is in this, particularly, +that French soups excel those of America and England and all the world. + +English and American soups are often heavy and hot with spices. There +are appreciable tastes in them. They burn your mouth with cayenne or +clove or allspice. You can tell at once what is in them, oftentimes to +your sorrow. But a French soup has a flavor which one recognizes at once +as delicious, yet not to be characterized as due to any single +condiment; it is the just blending of many things. The same remark +applies to all their stews, ragouts, and other delicate preparations. No +cook will ever study these flavors; but perhaps many cooks' mistresses +may, and thus be able to impart delicacy and comfort to economy. + +As to those things called hashes, commonly manufactured by unwatched, +untaught cooks, out of the remains of yesterday's repast, let us not +dwell too closely on their memory,--compounds of meat, gristle, skin, +fat, and burnt fibre, with a handful of pepper and salt flung at them, +dredged with lumpy flour, watered from the spout of the tea-kettle, and +left to simmer at the cook's convenience while she is otherwise +occupied. Such are the best performances a housekeeper can hope for from +an untrained cook. + +But the cunningly devised minces, the artful preparations choicely +flavored, which may be made of yesterday's repast,--by these is the true +domestic artist known. No cook untaught by an educated brain ever makes +these, and yet economy is a great gainer by them. + + * * * * * + +As regards the department of _Vegetables_, their number and variety in +America are so great that a table might almost be furnished by these +alone. Generally speaking, their cooking is a more simple art, and +therefore more likely to be found satisfactorily performed, than that of +meats. If only they are not drenched with rancid butter, their own +native excellence makes itself known in most of the ordinary modes of +preparation. + +There is, however, one exception. + +Our stanch old friend, the potato, is to other vegetables what bread is +on the table. Like bread, it is held as a sort of _sine-qua-non_; like +that, it may be made invariably palatable by a little care in a few +plain particulars, through neglect of which it often becomes +intolerable. The soggy, waxy, indigestible viand that often appears in +the potato-dish is a downright sacrifice of the better nature of this +vegetable. + +The potato, nutritive and harmless as it appears, belongs to a family +suspected of very dangerous traits. It is a family-connection of the +deadly-nightshade and other ill-reputed gentry, and sometimes shows +strange proclivities to evil,--now breaking out uproariously, as in the +noted potato-rot, and now more covertly in various evil affections. For +this reason scientific directors bid us beware of the water in which +potatoes are boiled,--into which, it appears, the evil principle is +drawn off; and they caution us not to shred them into stews without +previously suffering the slices to lie for an hour or so in salt and +water. These cautions are worth attention. + +The most usual modes of preparing the potato for the table are by +roasting or boiling. These processes are so simple that it is commonly +supposed every cook understands them without special directions; and yet +there is scarcely an uninstructed cook who can boil or roast a potato. + +A good roasted potato is a delicacy worth a dozen compositions of the +cook-book; yet when we ask for it, what burnt, shrivelled abortions are +presented to us! Biddy rushes to her potato-basket and pours out two +dozen of different sizes, some having in them three times the amount of +matter of others. These being washed, she tumbles them into her oven at +a leisure interval, and there lets them lie till it is time to serve +breakfast, whenever that may be. As a result, if the largest are cooked, +the smallest are presented in cinders, and the intermediate sizes are +withered and watery. Nothing is so utterly ruined by a few moments of +overdoing. That which at the right moment was plump with mealy richness, +a quarter of an hour later shrivels and becomes watery,--and it is in +this state that roast potatoes are most frequently served. + +In the same manner we have seen boiled potatoes from an untaught cook +coming upon the table like lumps of yellow wax,--and the same article, +the day after, under the directions of a skilful mistress, appearing in +snowy balls of powdery lightness. In the one case, they were thrown in +their skins into water, and suffered to soak or boil, as the case might +be, at the cook's leisure, and after they were boiled to stand in the +water till she was ready to peel them. In the other case, the potatoes +being first peeled were boiled as quickly as possible in salted water, +which the moment they were done was drained off, and then they were +gently shaken for a minute or two over the fire to dry them still more +thoroughly. We have never yet seen the potato so depraved and given over +to evil that could not be reclaimed by this mode of treatment. + +As to fried potatoes, who that remembers the crisp, golden slices of the +French restaurant, thin as wafers and light as snow-flakes, does not +speak respectfully of them? What cousinship with these have those +coarse, greasy masses of sliced potato, wholly soggy and partly burnt, +to which we are treated under the name of fried potatoes _a la_ America? +In our cities the restaurants are introducing the French article to +great acceptance, and to the vindication of the fair fame of this queen +of vegetables. + + * * * * * + +Finally, I arrive at the last great head of my subject, to wit, +TEA,--meaning thereby, as before observed, what our Hibernian friend did +in the inquiry, "Will y'r Honor take 'tay tay' or coffee tay?" + +I am not about to enter into the merits of the great tea-and-coffee +controversy, or say whether these substances are or are not wholesome. I +treat of them as actual existences, and speak only of the modes of +making the most of them. + +The French coffee is reputed the best in the world; and a thousand +voices have asked, What is it about the French coffee? + +In the first place, then, the French coffee is coffee, and not chiccory, +or rye, or beans, or peas. In the second place, it is freshly roasted, +whenever made,--roasted with great care and evenness in a little +revolving cylinder which makes part of the furniture of every kitchen, +and which keeps in the aroma of the berry. It is never overdone, so as +to destroy the coffee-flavor, which is in nine cases out of ten the +fault of the coffee we meet with. Then it is ground, and placed in a +coffee-pot with a filter, through which it percolates in clear drops, +the coffee-pot standing on a heated stove to maintain the temperature. +The nose of the coffee-pot is stopped up to prevent the escape of the +aroma during this process. The extract thus obtained is a perfectly +clear, dark fluid, known as _cafe noir_, or black coffee. It is black +only because of its strength, being in fact almost the very essential +oil of coffee. A table-spoonful of this in boiled milk would make what +is ordinarily called a strong cup of coffee. The boiled milk is prepared +with no less care. It must be fresh and new, not merely warmed or even +brought to the boiling-point, but slowly simmered till it attains a +thick, creamy richness. The coffee mixed with this, and sweetened with +that sparkling beet-root sugar which ornaments a French table, is the +celebrated _cafe-au-lait_, the name of which has gone round the world. + +As we look to France for the best coffee, so we must look to England for +the perfection of tea. The tea-kettle is as much an English institution +as aristocracy or the Prayer-Book; and when one wants to know exactly +how tea should be made, one has only to ask how a fine old English +housekeeper makes it. + +The first article of her faith is that the water must not merely be hot, +not merely _have boiled_ a few moments since, but be actually _boiling_ +at the moment it touches the tea. Hence, though servants in England are +vastly better trained than with us, this delicate mystery is seldom left +to their hands. Tea-making belongs to the drawing-room, and high-born +ladies preside at "the bubbling and loud-hissing urn," and see that all +due rites and solemnities are properly performed,--that the cups are +hot, and that the infused tea waits the exact time before the libations +commence. Oh, ye dear old English tea-tables, resorts of the +kindest-hearted hospitality in the world! we still cherish your memory, +even though you do not say pleasant things of us there. One of these +days you will think better of us. Of late, the introduction of English +breakfast-tea has raised a new sect among the tea-drinkers, reversing +some of the old canons. Breakfast-tea must be boiled! Unlike the +delicate article of olden time, which required only a momentary infusion +to develop its richness, this requires a longer and severer treatment to +bring out its strength,--thus confusing all the established usages, and +throwing the work into the hands of the cook in the kitchen. + +The faults of tea, as too commonly found at our hotels and +boarding-houses, are that it is made in every way the reverse of what it +should be. The water is hot, perhaps, but not boiling; the tea has a +general flat, stale, smoky taste, devoid of life or spirit; and it is +served, usually, with thin milk, instead of cream. Cream is as essential +to the richness of tea as of coffee. We could wish that the English +fashion might generally prevail, of giving the traveller his own kettle +of boiling water and his own tea-chest, and letting him make tea for +himself. At all events, he would then be sure of one merit in his +tea,--it would be hot, a very simple and obvious virtue, but one very +seldom obtained. + +Chocolate is a French and Spanish article, and one seldom served on +American tables. We, in America, however, make an article every way +equal to any which can be imported from Paris, and he who buys Baker's +best vanilla-chocolate may rest assured that no foreign land can +furnish anything better. A very rich and delicious beverage may be made +by dissolving this in milk slowly boiled down after the French fashion. + + * * * * * + +I have now gone over all the ground I laid out, as comprising the great +first principles of cookery; and I would here modestly offer the opinion +that a table where all these principles are carefully observed would +need few dainties. The struggle after so-called delicacies comes from +the poorness of common things. Perfect bread and butter would soon drive +cake out of the field: it has done so in many families. Nevertheless, I +have a word to say under the head of _Confectionery_, meaning by this +the whole range of ornamental cookery,--or pastry, ices, jellies, +preserves, etc. The art of making all these very perfectly is far better +understood in America than the art of common cooking. + +There are more women who know how to make good cake than good +bread,--more who can furnish you with a good ice-cream than a +well-cooked mutton-chop; a fair charlotte-russe is easier to come by +than a perfect cup of coffee, and you shall find a sparkling jelly to +your dessert where you sighed in vain for so simple a luxury as a +well-cooked potato. + +Our fair countrywomen might rest upon their laurels in these higher +fields, and turn their great energy and ingenuity to the study of +essentials. To do common things perfectly is far better worth our +endeavor than to do uncommon things respectably. We Americans in many +things as yet have been a little inclined to begin making our shirt at +the ruffle; but, nevertheless, when we set about it, we can make the +shirt as nicely as anybody,--it needs only that we turn our attention to +it, resolved, that, ruffle or no ruffle, the shirt we will have. + +I have also a few words to say as to the prevalent ideas in respect to +French cookery. Having heard much of it, with no very distinct idea what +it is, our people have somehow fallen into the notion that its forte +lies in high spicing,--and so, when our cooks put a great abundance of +clove, mace, nutmeg, and cinnamon into their preparations, they fancy +that they are growing up to be French cooks. But the fact is, that the +Americans and English are far more given to spicing than the French. +Spices in our made dishes are abundant, and their taste is strongly +pronounced. In living a year in France I forgot the taste of nutmeg, +clove, and allspice, which had met me in so many dishes in America. + +The thing may be briefly defined. The English and Americans deal in +_spices_, the French in _flavors_,--flavors many and subtile, imitating +often in their delicacy those subtile blendings which Nature produces in +high-flavored fruits. The recipes of our cookery-books are most of them +of English origin, coming down from the times of our phlegmatic +ancestors, when the solid, burly, beefy growth of the foggy island +required the heat of fiery condiments, and could digest heavy sweets. +Witness the national recipe for plum-pudding, which may be +rendered,--Take a pound of every indigestible substance you can think +of, boil into a cannonball, and serve in flaming brandy. So of the +Christmas mince-pie and many other national dishes. But in America, +owing to our brighter skies and more fervid climate, we have developed +an acute, nervous delicacy of temperament far more akin to that of +France than of England. + +Half of the recipes in our cook-books are mere murder to such +constitutions and stomachs as we grow here. We require to ponder these +things, and think how we in our climate and under our circumstances +ought to live, and in doing so, we may, without accusation of foreign +foppery, take some leaves from many foreign books. + + * * * * * + +But Christopher has prosed long enough. I must now read this to my wife, +and see what she says. + + + + +ON THE COLUMBIA RIVER. + + +I have never known, nor seen any person who did know, why Portland, the +metropolis of Oregon, was founded on the Willamette River. I am unaware +why the accent is on the penult, and not on the ultimate of Willamette. +These thoughts perplexed me more than a well man would have suffered +them, all the way from the Callapooya Mountains to Portland. I had been +laid up in the backwoods of Oregon, in a district known as the Long-Tom +Country,--(and certainly a longer or more tedious Tom never existed +since the days of him additionally hight Aquinas,)--by a violent attack +of pneumonia, which came near terminating my earthly with my Oregon +pilgrimage. I had been saved by the indefatigable nursing of the best +friend I ever travelled with,--by wet compresses, and the impossibility +of sending for any doctor in the region. I had lived to pay +San-Francisco hotel-prices for squatter-cabin accommodations in the +rural residence of an Oregon landholder, whose tender mercies I fell +into from my saddle when the disease had reached its height, and who +explained his unusual charges on the ground that his wife had felt for +me like a mother. In the Long-Tom Country maternal tenderness is a +highly estimated virtue. It cost Bierstadt and myself sixty dollars, +besides the reasonable charge for five days' board and attendance to a +man who ate nothing and was not waited on, with the same amount against +his well companion. We had suffered enough extortion before that to +exhaust all our native grumblery. So we paid the bill, and entered on +our notebooks the following + +_Mem._ "In stopping with anybody in the Long-Tom Country, make a special +contract for maternal tenderness, as it will invariably be included in +the bill." + +I had ridden on a straw-bed in the wagon of the man whose wife +cultivated the maternal virtues, until I was once more able to go along +by myself,--paying, you may be sure, maternal-virtue fare for my +carriage. During the period that I jolted on the straw, I diversified +the intervals between pulmonary spasms with a sick glance at the pages +of Bulwer's "Devereux" and Lever's "Day's Ride." The nature of these +works did not fail to attract the attention of my driver. It aroused in +him serious concern for my spiritual welfare. He addressed me with +gentle firmness,-- + +"D' ye think it's exackly the way for an immortal creatur' to be +spendin' his time, to read them _novels_?" + +"Why is it particularly out of the way for an immortal creature?" + +"Because his higher interests don't give him no time for sich follies." + +"How can an immortal creature be pressed for time?" + +"Wal, you'll find out some day. G' lang, Jennie." + +I thought I had left this excellent man in a metaphysical bog. But he +had not discharged his duty, so he scrambled out and took new ground. + +"Now say,--d' _you_ think it's exackly a Christian way of spendin' time, +yourself?" + +"I know a worse way." + +"Eh? What's that?" + +"In the house of a Long-Tom settler who charges five dollars a day extra +because his wife feels like a mother." + +He did not continue the conversation. I myself did not close it in +anger, but solely to avoid an extra charge, which in the light of +experience seemed imminent, for concern about my spiritual welfare. On +the maternal-tenderness scale of prices, an indulgence in this luxury +would have cleaned out Bierstadt and myself before we effected junction +with our drawers of exchange, and I was discourteous as a matter of +economy. + +We had enjoyed, from the summit of a hill twenty miles south of Salem, +one of the most magnificent views in all earthly scenery. Within a +single sweep of vision were seven snow-peaks, the Three Sisters, Mount +Jefferson, Mount Hood, Mount Adams, and Mount St. Helen's, with the dim +suggestion of an eighth colossal mass, which might be Rainier. All these +rose along an arc of not quite half the horizon, measured between ten +and eighteen thousand feet in height, were nearly conical, and +absolutely covered with snow from base to pinnacle. The Three Sisters, a +triplet of sharp, close-set needles, and the grand masses of Hood and +Jefferson, showed mountainesque and earthly; it was at least possible to +imagine them of us and anchored to the ground we trod on. Not so with +the others. They were beautiful, yet awful ghosts,--spirits of dead +mountains buried in old-world cataclysms, returning to make on the +brilliant azure of noonday blots of still more brilliant white. I cannot +express their vague, yet vast and intense splendor, by any other word +than incandescence. It was as if the sky had suddenly grown white-hot in +patches. When we first looked, we thought St. Helen's an illusion,--an +aurora, or a purer kind of cloud. Presently we detected the luminous +chromatic border,--a band of refracted light with a predominant +orange-tint, which outlines the higher snow-peaks seen at long +range,--traced it down, and grasped the entire conception of the mighty +cone. No man of enthusiasm, who reflects what this whole sight must have +been, will wonder that my friend and I clasped each other's hands before +it, and thanked God we had lived to this day. + +We had followed down the beautiful valley of the Willamette to Portland, +finding everywhere glimpses of autumnal scenery as delicious as the +hills and meadows of the Housatonic. Putting up in Portland at the +Dennison House, we found the comforts of civilization for the first time +since leaving Sisson's, and a great many kind friends warmly interested +in furthering our enterprise. I have said that I do not know why +Portland was built on the Willamette. The point of the promontory +between the Willamette and the Columbia seems the proper place for the +chief commercial city of the State; and Portland is a dozen miles south +of this, up the tributary stream. But Portland does very well as it +is,--growing rapidly in business-importance, and destined, when the +proper railway-communications are established, to be a sort of Glasgow +to the London of San Francisco. When we were there, there was crying +need of a telegraph to the latter place. That need has now been +supplied, and the construction of the no less desirable railroad must +follow speedily. The country between Shasta Peak and Salem is at present +virtually without an outlet to market. No richer fruit and grain region +exists on the Pacific slope of the continent. No one who has not +travelled through it can imagine the exhaustless fertility which will be +stimulated and the results which will be brought forth, when a +continuous line of railroad unites Sacramento or even Tehama with the +metropolis of Oregon. + +Among the friends who welcomed us to Portland were Messrs. Ainsworth and +Thompson, of the Oregon Steamship Company. By their courtesy we were +afforded a trip up the Columbia River, in the pleasantest quarters and +under the most favorable circumstances. + +We left Portland the evening before their steamer sailed, taking a boat +belonging to a different line, that we might pass a night at Fort +Vancouver, and board the Company's boat when it touched at that place +the next morning. We recognized our return from rudimentary society to +civilized surroundings and a cultivated interest in art and literature, +when the captain of the little steamer Vancouver refused to let either +of us buy a ticket, because he had seen Bierstadt on the upper deck at +work with his sketch-book, and me by his side engaged with my journal. + +The banks of the Willamette below Portland are low and cut up by small +tributaries or communicating lagoons which divide them into islands. The +largest of these, measuring its longest border, has an extent of twenty +miles, and is called Sauveur's. Another, called "Nigger Tom's," was +famous as the seigniory of a blind African nobleman so named, living in +great affluence of salmon and whiskey with three or four devoted Indian +wives, who had with equal fervor embraced the doctrine of Mormonism and +the profession of day's-washing to keep their liege in luxury due his +rank. The land along the shore of the river was usually well timbered, +and in the level openings looked as fertile as might be expected of an +alluvial first-bottom frequently overflowed. At its junction with the +Columbia the Willamette is about three-quarters of a mile in width, and +the Columbia may be half a mile wider, though at first sight the +difference seems more than that from the tributary's entering the main +river at an acute angle and giving a diagonal view to the opposite +shore. Before we passed into the Columbia, we had from the upper deck a +magnificent glimpse to the eastward of Hood's spotless snow-cone rosied +with the reflection of the dying sunset. Short and hurried as it was, +this view of Mount Hood was unsurpassed for beauty by any which we got +in its closer vicinity and afterward, though nearness added rugged +grandeur to the sight. + +Six miles' sail between low and uninteresting shores brought us from the +mouth of the Willamette to Fort Vancouver, on the Washington-Territory +side of the river. Here we debarked for the night, making our way, in an +ambulance sent for us from the post, a distance of two minutes' ride, to +the quarters of General Alvord, the commandant. Under his hospitable +roof we experienced, for the first time in several months and many +hundred miles, the delicious sensation of a family-dinner, with a +refined lady at the head of the table and well-bred children about the +sides. A very interesting guest of General Alvord's was Major Lugenbeel, +who had spent his life in the topographical service of the United +States, and combined the culture of a student with an amount of +information concerning the wildest portions of our continent which I +have never seen surpassed nor heard communicated in style more +fascinating. He had lately come from the John-Day, Boise, and +Snake-River Mines, where the Government was surveying routes of +emigration, and pronounced the wealth of the region exhaustless. + +After a pleasant evening and a good night's rest, we took the Oregon +Company's steamer, Wilson G. Hunt, and proceeded up the river, leaving +Fort Vancouver about seven A.M. To our surprise, the Hunt proved an old +acquaintance. She will be remembered by most people who during the last +twelve years have been familiar with the steamers hailing from New York +Bay. Though originally built for river-service such as now employs her, +she came around from the Hudson to the Columbia by way of Cape Horn. By +lessening her top-hamper and getting new stanchions for her perilous +voyage, she performed it without accident. + +Such a vivid souvenir of the Hudson reminded me of an assertion I had +often heard, that the Columbia resembles it. There is some ground for +the comparison. Each of the rivers breaks through a noble +mountain-system in its passage to the sea, and the walls of its avenue +are correspondingly grand. In point of variety the banks of the Hudson +far surpass those of the Columbia,--trap, sandstone, granite, limestone, +and slate succeeding each other with a rapidity which presents ever new +outlines to the eye of the tourist. The scenery of the Columbia, between +Fort Vancouver and the Dalles, is a sublime monotone. Its banks are +basaltic crags or mist-wrapt domes, averaging below the cataract from +twelve to fifteen hundred feet in height, and thence decreasing to the +Dalles, where the escarpments, washed by the river, are low trap bluffs +on a level with the steamer's walking-beam, and the mountains have +retired, bare and brown, like those of the great continental basin +farther south, toward Mount Hood in that direction, and Mount Adams on +the north. If the Palisades were quintupled in height, domed instead of +level on their upper surfaces, extended up the whole navigable course of +the Hudson, and were thickly clad with evergreens wherever they were not +absolutely precipitous, the Hudson would much more closely resemble the +Columbia. + +I was reminded of another Eastern river, which I had never heard +mentioned, in the same company. As we ascended toward the cataract, the +Columbia water assumed a green tint as deep and positive as that of the +Niagara between the Falls and Lake Ontario. Save that its surface was +not so perturbed with eddies and marbled with foam, it resembled the +Niagara perfectly. + +We boarded the Hunt in a dense fog, and went immediately to breakfast. +With our last cup of coffee the fog cleared away and showed us a sunny +vista up the river, bordered by the columnar and mural trap formations +above mentioned, with an occasional bold promontory jutting out beyond +the general face of the precipice, its shaggy fell of pines and firs all +aflood with sunshine to the very crown. The finest of these promontories +was called Cape Horn, the river bending around it to the northeast. The +channel kept mid-stream with considerable uniformity,--but now and then, +as in the highland region of the Hudson, made a _detour_ to avoid some +bare, rocky island. Several of these islands were quite columnar,--being +evidently the emerged capitals of basaltic prisms, like the other +uplifts on the banks. A fine instance of this formation was the stately +and perpendicular "Rooster Rock" on the Oregon side, but not far from +Cape Horn. Still another was called "Lone Rock," and rose from the +middle of the river. These came upon our view within the first hour +after breakfast, in company with a slender, but graceful stream, which +fell into the river over a sheer wall of basalt seven hundred feet in +height. This little cascade reminded us of Po-ho-no, or The Bridal Veil, +near the lower entrance of the Great Yo-Semite. + +As the steamer rounded a point into each new stretch of silent, green, +and sunny river, we sent a flock of geese or ducks hurrying cloudward or +shoreward. Here, too, for the first time in a state of absolute Nature, +I saw that royal bird, the swan, escorting his mate and cygnets on an +airing or a luncheon-tour. It was a beautiful sight, though I must +confess that his Majesty and all the royal family are improved by +civilization. One of the great benefits of civilization is, that it +restricts its subjects to doing what they can do best. Park-swans seldom +fly,--and flying is something that swans should never attempt, unless +they wish to be taken for geese. I felt actually _desillusionne_, when a +princely _cortege_, which had been rippling their snowy necks in the +sunshine, clumsily lifted themselves out of the water and slanted into +the clouds, stretching those necks straight as a gun-barrel. Every line +of grace seemed wire-drawn out of them in a moment. Song is as little +their forte as flight,--barring the poetic license open to moribund +members of their family,--and I must confess, that, if this privilege +indicate approaching dissolution, the most intimate friends of the +specimens we heard have no cause for apprehension. An Adirondack loon +fortifying his utterance by a cracked fish-horn is the nearest approach +to a healthy swan-song. On the whole, the wild swan cannot afford to +"pause in his cloud" for all the encomiums of Mr. Tennyson, and had +better come down immediately to the dreamy water-level where he floats +dream within dream, like a stable vapor in a tangible sky. Anywhere else +he seems a court-beauty wandering into metaphysics. + +Alternating with these swimmers came occasional flocks of shag, a bird +belonging to the cormorant tribe, and here and there a gull, though +these last grew rarer as we increased our distance from the sea. I was +surprised to notice a fine seal playing in the channel, twenty miles +above Fort Vancouver, but learned that it was not unusual for these +animals to ascend nearly to the cataract. Both the whites and Indians +scattered along the river-banks kill them for their skin and +blubber,--going out in boats for the purpose. My informant's boat had on +one occasion taken an old seal nursing her calf. When the dam was towed +to shore, the young one followed her, occasionally putting its +fore-flippers on the gunwale to rest, like a Newfoundland dog, and +behaving with such innocent familiarity that malice was disarmed. It +came ashore with the boat's-crew and the body of its parent; no one had +the heart to drive it away; so it stayed and was a pet of the camp from +that time forward. After a while the party moved its position a +distance of several miles while Jack was away in the river on a +fishing-excursion, but there was no eluding him. The morning after the +shift he came wagging into camp, a faithful and much-overjoyed, but +exceedingly battered and used-up seal. He had evidently sought his +friends by rock and flood the entire night preceding. + +Occasionally the lonely river-stretches caught a sudden human interest +in some gracefully modelled canoe gliding out with a crew of Chinook +Indians from the shadow of a giant promontory, propelled by a square +sail learned of the whites. Knowing the natural, ingrained laziness of +Indians, one can imagine the delight with which they comprehended that +substitute for the paddle. After all, this may perhaps be an ill-natured +thing to say. Who does like to drudge when he can help it? Is not this +very Wilson G. Hunt a triumph of human laziness, vindicating its claim +to be the lord of matter by an ingenuity doing labor's utmost without +sweat? After all, nobody but a fool drudges for other reason than that +he may presently stop drudging. + +At short intervals along the narrow strip of shore under the more +gradual steeps, on the lower ledges of the basaltic precipices, and on +little rock-islands in the river, appeared rude-looking stacks and +scaffoldings where the Indians had packed their salmon. They left it in +the open air without guard, as fearless of robbers as if the fish did +not constitute their almost entire subsistence for the winter. And +within their own tribes they have justification for this fearlessness. +Their standard of honor is in most respects curiously adjustable,--but +here virtue is defended by the necessities of life. + +In the immediate vicinity of the cured article (I say "cured," though +the process is a mere drying without smoke or salt) maybe seen the +apparatus contrived for getting it in the fresh state. This is the +scaffolding from which the salmon are caught. It is a horizontal +platform shaped like a capital A, erected upon a similarly framed, but +perpendicular set of braces, with a projection of several feet over the +river-brink at a place where the water runs rapidly close in-shore. If +practicable, the constructor modifies his current artificially, banking +it inward with large stones, so as to form a sort of sluice in which +passing fish will be more completely at his mercy. At the season of +their periodic ascent, salmon swarm in all the rivers of our Pacific +coast; the Columbia and Willamette are alive with them for a long +distance above the cascades of the one and the Oregon-City fall of the +other. The fisherman stands, nearly or quite naked, at the edge of his +scaffolding, armed with a net extended at the end of a long pole, and so +ingeniously contrived that the weight of the salmon and a little +dexterous management draw its mouth shut on the captive like a purse as +soon as he has entered. A helper stands behind the fisherman to assist +in raising the haul,--to give the fish a tap on the nose, which kills +him instantly,--and finally to carry him ashore to be split and dried, +without any danger of his throwing himself back into the water from the +hands of his captors, as might easily happen by omitting the +_coup-de-grace_. Another method of catching salmon, much in vogue among +the Sacramento and Pitt-River tribes, but apparently less employed by +the Indians of the Columbia, is harpooning with a very clever instrument +constructed after this wise. A hard-wood shaft is neatly, but not +tightly, fitted into the socket of a sharp-barbed spear-head carved from +bone. Through a hole drilled in the spear-head a stout cord of +deer-sinew is fastened by one end, its other being secured to the shaft +near its insertion. The salmon is struck by this weapon in the manner of +the ordinary fish-spear; the head slips off the shaft as soon as the +barbs lodge, and the harpoon virtually becomes a fishing-rod, with the +sinew for a line. This arrangement is much more manageable than the +common spear, as it greatly diminishes the chances of losing fish and +breaking shafts. + +There can scarcely be a more sculpturesque sight than that of a finely +formed, well-grown young Indian struggling on his scaffold with an +unusually powerful fish. Every muscle of his wiry frame stands out in +its turn in unveiled relief, and you see in him attitudes of grace and +power which will not let you regret the Apollo Belvedere or the +Gladiator. The only pity is that this ideal Indian is a rare being. The +Indians of this coast and river are divided into two broad classes,--the +Fish Indians, and the Meat Indians. The latter, _ceteris paribus_, are +much the finer race, derive the greater portion of their subsistence +from the chase, and possess the athletic mind and body which result from +active methods of winning a livelihood. The former are, to a great +extent, victims of that generic and hereditary _tabes mesenterica_ which +produces the peculiar pot-bellied and spindle-shanked type of savage; +their manners are milder; their virtues and vices are done in +water-color, as comports with their source of supply. There are some +tribes which partake of the habits of both classes, living in +mountain-fastnesses part of the year by the bow and arrow, but coming +down to the river in the salmon-season for an addition to their winter +bill-of-fare. Anywhere rather than among the pure Fish Indians is the +place to look for savage beauty. Still these tribes have fortified their +feebleness by such a cultivation of their ingenuity as surprises one +seeing for the first time their well-adapted tools, comfortable lodges, +and, in some cases, really beautiful canoes. In the last respect, +however, the Indians nearer the coast surpass those up the +Columbia,--some of their carved and painted canoes equalling the +"crackest" of shell-boats in elegance of line and beauty of ornament. + +In a former article devoted to the Great Yo-Semite I had occasion to +remark that Indian legend, like all ancient poetry, often contains a +scientific truth embalmed in the spices of metaphor,--or, to vary the +figure, that Mudjekeewis stands holding the lantern for Agassiz and Dana +to dig by. + +Coming to the Falls of the Columbia, we find a case in point. Nearly +equidistant from the longitudes of Fort Vancouver and Mount Hood, the +entire Columbia River falls twenty feet over a perpendicular wall of +basalt, extending, with minor deviations from the right angle, entirely +between-shores, a breadth of about a mile. The height of Niagara and the +close compression of its vast volume make it a grander sight than the +Falls of the Columbia,--but no other cataract known to me on this +continent rivals it for an instant. The great American Falls of Snake +are much loftier and more savage than either, but their volume is so +much less as to counterbalance those advantages. Taking the Falls of the +Columbia all in all,--including their upper and lower rapids,--it must +be confessed that they exhibit every phase of tormented water in its +beauty of color or grace of form, its wrath or its whim. + +The Indians have a tradition that the river once followed a uniform +level from the Dalles to the sea. This tradition states that Mounts Hood +and St. Helen's are husband and wife,--whereby is intended that their +tutelar divinities stand in that mutual relation; that in comparatively +recent times there existed a rocky bridge across the Columbia at the +present site of the cataract, and that across this bridge Hood and St. +Helen's were wont to pass for interchange of visits; that, while this +bridge existed, there was a free subterraneous passage under it for the +river and the canoes of the tribes (indeed, this tradition is so +universally credited as to stagger the skeptic by a mere calculation of +chances); that, on a certain occasion, the mountainous pair, like others +not mountainous, came to high words, and during their altercation broke +the bridge down; falling into the river, this colossal Rialto became a +dam, and ever since that day the upper river has been backed to its +present level, submerging vast tracts of country far above its original +bed. + +I notice that excellent geological authorities are willing to treat this +legend respectfully, as containing in symbols the probable key to the +natural phenomena. Whether the original course of the Columbia at this +place was through a narrow _canyon_ or under an actual roof of rock, the +adjacent material has been at no very remote date toppled into it to +make the cataract and alter the bed to its present level. Both Hood and +St. Helen's are volcanic cones. The latter has been seen to smoke within +the last twelve years. It is not unlikely that during the last few +centuries some intestine disturbance may have occurred along the axis +between the two, sufficient to account for the precipitation of that +mass of rock which now forms the dam. That we cannot refer the cataclysm +to a very ancient date seems to be argued by the state of preservation +in which we still find the stumps of the celebrated "submerged forest," +extending a long distance up the river above the Falls. + +At the foot of the cataract we landed from the steamer on the Washington +side of the river, and found a railroad-train waiting to do our portage. +It was a strange feeling, that of whirling along by steam where so few +years before the Indian and the trader had toiled through the virgin +forest, bending under the weight of their canoes. And this is one of the +characteristic surprises of American scenery everywhere. You cannot +isolate yourself from the national civilization. In a Swiss _chalet_ you +may escape from all memories of Geneva; among the Grampians you find an +entirely different set of ideas from those of Edinburgh: but the same +enterprise which makes itself felt in New York and Boston starts up for +your astonishment out of all the fastnesses of the continent. Virgin +Nature wooes our civilization to wed her, and no obstacles can conquer +the American fascination. In our journey through the wildest parts of +this country, we were perpetually finding patent washing-machines among +the _chaparral_,--canned fruit in the desert,--Voigtlander's +field-glasses on the snow-peak,--lemon-soda in the _canyon_,--men who +were sure a railroad would be run by their cabin within ten years, in +every spot where such a surprise was most remarkable. + +The portage-road is six miles in length, leading nearly all the way +close along the edge of the North Bluff, which, owing to a recession of +the mountains, seems here only from fifty to eighty feet in height. From +the windows of the train we enjoyed an almost uninterrupted view of the +rapids, which are only less grand and forceful in their impression than +those above Niagara. They are broken up into narrow channels by numerous +bold and naked islands of trap. Through these the water roars, boils, +and, striking projections, spouts upward in jets whose plumy top blows +off in sheets of spray. It is tormented into whirlpools; it is combed +into fine threads, and strays whitely over a rugged ledge like old men's +hair; it takes all curves of grace and arrow-flights of force; it is +water doing all that water can do or be made to do. The painter who +spent a year in making studies of it would not throw his time away; when +he had finished, he could not misrepresent water under any phases. + +At the upper end of the portage-road we found another and smaller +steamer awaiting us, with equally kind provision for our comfort made by +the Company and the captain. In both steamers we were accorded +excellent opportunities for drawing and observation, getting seats in +the pilot-house. + +Above the rapids the river-banks were bold and rocky. The stream changed +from its recent Niagara green to a brown like that of the Hudson; and +under its waters, as we hugged the Oregon side, could be seen a +submerged alluvial plateau, studded thick with drowned stumps, here and +there lifting their splintered tops above the water, and measuring from +the diameter of a sapling to that of a trunk which might once have been +one hundred feet high. + +Between Fort Vancouver and the cataract the banks of the river seem +nearly as wild as on the day they were discovered by the whites. On +neither the Oregon nor the Washington side is there any settlement +visible,--a small wood-wharf, or the temporary hut of a salmon-fisher, +being the only sign of human possession. At the Falls we noticed a +single white house standing in a commanding position high up on the +wooded ledges of the Oregon shore; and the taste shown in placing and +constructing it was worthy of a Hudson-River landholder. This is, +perhaps, the first attempt at a distinct country-residence made in +Oregon, and belongs to a Mr. Olmstead, who was one of the earliest +settlers and projectors of public improvements in the State. He was +actively engaged in the building of the first portage-railroad, which +ran on the Oregon side. The entire interests of both have, I believe, +been concentrated in the newer one, and the Oregon road, after building +itself by feats of business-energy and ingenuity known only to American +pioneer enterprise, has fallen into entire or comparative disuse. + +Above the Falls we found as unsettled a river-margin as below. +Occasionally, some bright spot of color attracted us, relieved against +the walls of trap or glacis of evergreen, and this upon nearer approach +or by the glass was resolved into a group of river Indians,--part with +the curiously compressed foreheads of the Flat-head tribe, their serene +nakedness draped with blankets of every variety of hue, from fresh +flaming red to weather-beaten army-blue, and adorned as to their cheeks +with smutches of the cinnabar-rouge which from time immemorial has been +a prime article of import among the fashionable native circles of the +Columbia,--the other part round-headed, and (I have no doubt it appears +a perfect _sequitur_ to the Flat-head conservatives) therefore slaves. +The captive in battle seems more economically treated among these +savages than is common anywhere else in the Indian regions we traversed, +(though I suppose slavery is to some extent universal throughout the +tribes,)--the captors properly arguing, that, so long as they can make a +man fish and boil pot for them, it is a very foolish waste of material +to kill him. + +At intervals above the Falls we passed several small islands of especial +interest as being the cemeteries of river-tribes. The principal, called +"Mimitus," was sacred as the resting-place of a very noted chief. I have +forgotten his name, but I doubt whether his friends see the "Atlantic" +regularly; so that oversight is of less consequence. The deceased is +entombed like a person of quality, in a wooden mausoleum having +something the appearance of a log-cabin upon which pains have been +expended, and containing, with the human remains, robes, weapons, +baskets, canoes, and all the furniture of Indian _menage_, to an extent +which among the tribes amounts to a fortune. This sepulchral idea is a +clear-headed one, and worthy of Eastern adoption. Old ladies with lace +and nieces, old gentlemen with cellars and nephews, might be certain +that the solace which they received in life's decline was purely +disinterested, if about middle age they should announce that their Point +and their Port were going to Mount Auburn with them. + +The river grew narrower, its banks becoming low, perpendicular walls of +basalt, water-worn at the base, squarely cut and castellated at the top, +and bare everywhere as any pile of masonry. The hills beyond became +naked, or covered only with short grass of the _grama_ kind and +dusty-gray sage-brush. Simultaneously they lost some of their previous +basaltic characteristics, running into more convex outlines, which +receded from the river. We could not fail to recognize the fact that we +had crossed one of the great thresholds of the continent,--were once +more east of the Sierra-Nevada axis, and in the great central plateau +which a few months previous, and several hundred miles farther south, we +had crossed amid so many pains and perils by the Desert route to Washoe. +From the grizzly mountains before us to the sources of the Snake Fork +stretched an almost uninterrupted wilderness of sage. The change in +passing to this region from the fertile and timbered tracts of the +Cascades and the coast is more abrupt than can be imagined by one +familiar with our delicately modulated Eastern scenery. This sharpness +of definition seems to characterize the entire border of the plateau. +Five hours of travel between Washoe and Sacramento carry one out of the +nakedest stone heap into the grandest forest of the continent. + +As we emerged from the confinement of the nearer ranges, Mount Hood, +hitherto visible only through occasional rifts, loomed broadly into +sight almost from base to peak, covered with a mantle of perennial snow +scarcely less complete to our near inspection than it had seemed from +our observatory south of Salem. Only here and there toward its lower rim +a tatter in it revealed the giant's rugged brown muscle of volcanic +rock. The top of the mountain, like that of Shasta, in direct sunlight +is an opal. So far above the line of thaw, the snow seems to have +accumulated until by its own weight it has condensed into a more +compactly crystalline structure than ice itself, and the reflections +from it, as I stated of Shasta, seem rather emanations from some +interior source of light. The look is distinctly opaline, or, as a poet +has called the opal, like "a pearl with a soul in it." + +About five o'clock in the afternoon we reached the Oregon town and +mining-depot of Dalles City. A glance at any good War-Department map of +Oregon and Washington Territories will explain the importance of this +place, where considerably previous to the foundation of the present +large and growing settlement there existed a fort and trading-post of +the same name. It stands, as we have said, at the entrance to the great +pass by which the Columbia breaks through the mountains to the sea. Just +west of it occurs an interruption to the navigation of the river, +practically as formidable as the first cataract. This is the upper +rapids and "the Dalles" proper,--presently to be described in detail. +The position of the town, at one end of a principal portage, and at the +easiest door to the Pacific, renders it a natural entrepot between the +latter and the great central plateau of the continent. This it must have +been in any case for fur-traders and emigrants, but its business has +been vastly increased by the discovery of that immense mining-area +distributed along the Snake River and its tributaries as far east as the +Rocky Mountains. The John-Day, Boise, and numerous other tracts both in +Washington and Idaho Territories draw most of their supplies from this +entrepot, and their gold comes down to it either for direct use in the +outfit-market, or to be passed down the river to Portland and the +San-Francisco mint. + +In a late article upon the Pacific Railroad, I laid no particular stress +upon the mines of Washington and Idaho as sources of profit to the +enterprise. This was for the reason that the Snake River seems the +proper outlet to much of the auriferous region, and this route may be +susceptible of improvement by an alternation of portages, roads, and +water-levels, which for a long time to come will form a means of +communication more economical and rapid than a branch to the Pacific +Road. The northern mines east of the Rocky range will find themselves +occupying somewhat similar relations to the Missouri River, which +rises, as one might almost say, out of the same spring as the +Snake,--certainly out of the same ridge of the Rocky Mountains. + +"The Dalles" is a town of one street, built close along the edge of a +bluff of trap thirty or forty feet high, perfectly perpendicular, level +on the top as if it had been graded for a city, and with depth of water +at its base for the heaviest draught boats on the river. In fact, the +whole water-front is a natural quay,--which wants nothing but time to +make it alive with steam-elevators, warehouses, and derricks. To +Portland and the Columbia it stands much as St. Louis to New Orleans and +the Mississippi. There is no reason why it should not some day have a +corresponding business, for whose wharfage-accommodation it has even +greater natural advantages. + +Architecturally, the Dalles cannot be said to lean very heavily on the +side of beauty. The houses are mostly two-story structures of wood, +occupied by all the trades and professions which flock to a new +mining-entrepot. Outfit-merchants, blacksmiths, printing-office, (for +there is really a very well-conducted daily at the Dalles,) are cheek by +jowl with doctors, tailors, and Cheap Johns,--the latter being only less +merry and thrifty over their incredible sacrifices in everything, from +pins to corduroy, than that predominant class of all, the bar-keepers +themselves. The town was in a state of bustle when our steamer touched +the wharf; it bustled more and more from there to the Umatilla House, +where we stopped; the hotel was one organized bustle in bar and +dining-room; and bed-time brought no hush. The Dalles, like the +Irishman, seemed sitting up all night to be fresh for an early start in +the morning. + +We found everybody interested in gold. Crowds of listeners, with looks +of incredulity or enthusiasm, were gathered around the party in the +bar-room which had last come in from the newest of the new mines, and a +man who had seen the late Fort-Hall discoveries was "treated" to that +extent that he might have become intoxicated a dozen times without +expense to himself. The charms of the interior were still further +suggested by placards posted on every wall, offering rewards for the +capture of a person who on the great gold route had lately committed +some of the grimmest murders and most talented robberies known in any +branch of Newgate enterprise. I had for supper a very good omelet, +(considering its distance from the culinary centres of the universe,) +and a Dalles editorial debating the claims of several noted cut-throats +to the credit of the operations ascribed to them,--feeling that in the +_ensemble_ I was enjoying both the exotic and the indigenous luxuries of +our virgin soil. + +After supper and a stroll I returned to the ladies' parlor of the +Umatilla House, rubbed my eyes in vain to dispel the illusion of a piano +and a carpet at this jumping-off place of civilization, and sat down at +a handsome centre-table to write up my journal. I had reviewed my way +from Portland as far as Fort Vancouver, when another illusion happened +to me in the shape of a party of gentlemen and ladies, in ball-dresses, +dress-coats, white kids, and elaborate hair, who entered the parlor to +wait for further accessions from the hotel. They were on their way with +a band of music to give some popular citizen a surprise-party. The +popular citizen never got the fine edge of that surprise. I took it off +for him. If it were not too much like a little Cockney on Vancouver's +Island who used the phrase on all occasions, from stubbing his toe to +the death of a Cabinet Lord, I should say, "I never was more astonished +in me life!" + +None of them had ever seen me before,--and with my books and maps about +me, I may have looked like some public, yet mysterious character. I felt +a pleasant sensation of having interest taken in me, and, wishing to +make an ingenuous return, looked up with a casual smile at one of the +party. Again to my surprise, this proved to be a very charming young +lady, and I timidly became aware that the others were equally pretty in +their several styles. Not knowing what else to do under the +circumstances, I smiled again, still more casually. An equal uncertainty +as to alternative set the ladies smiling quite across the row, and then, +to my relief, the gentlemen joined them, making it pleasant for us all. +A moment later we were engaged in general conversation,--starting from +the bold hypothesis, thrown out by one of the gentlemen, that perhaps I +was going to Boise, and proceeding, by a process of elimination, to the +accurate knowledge of what I was going to do, if it wasn't that. I +enjoyed one of the most cheerful bits of social relaxation I had found +since crossing the Missouri, and nothing but my duty to my journal +prevented me, when my surprise-party left, from accompanying them, by +invitation, under the brevet title of Professor, to the house of the +popular citizen, who, I was assured, would be glad to see me. I +certainly should have been glad to see him, if he was anything like +those guests of his who had so ingenuously cultivated me in a far land +of strangers, where a man might have been glad to form the acquaintance +of his mother-in-law. This is not the way people form acquaintances in +New York; but if I had wanted that, why not have stayed there? As a +cosmopolite, and on general principles of being, I prefer the Dalles +way. I have no doubt I should have found in that circle of spontaneous +recognitions quite as many people who stood wear and improved on +intimacy as were ever vouchsafed to me by social indorsement from +somebody else. We are perpetually blaming our heads of Government +Bureaus for their poor knowledge of character,--their subordinates, we +say, are never pegs in the right holes. If we understood our civilized +system of introductions, we could not rationally expect anything else. +The great mass of polite mankind are trained _not_ to know character, +but to take somebody else's voucher for it. Their acquaintances, most of +their friendships, come to them through a succession of indorsers, none +of whom may have known anything of the goodness of the paper. A sensible +man, conventionally introduced to his fellow, must always wonder why the +latter does not turn him around to look for signatures in chalk down the +back of his coat; for he knows that Brown indorsed him over to Jones, +and Jones negotiated him with Robinson, through a succession in which +perhaps two out of a hundred took pains to know whether he represented +metal. You do not find the people of new countries making mistakes in +character. Every man is his own guaranty,--and if he has no just cause +to suspect himself bogus, there will be true pleasure in a frank opening +of himself to the examination and his eyes for the study of others. Not +to be accused of intruding radical reform under the guise of +belles-lettres, let me say that I have no intention of introducing this +innovation at the East. + +After a night's rest, Bierstadt spent nearly the entire morning in +making studies of Hood from an admirable post of observation at the top +of one of the highest foot-hills,--a point several miles southwest of +the town, which he reached under guidance of an old Indian interpreter +and trapper. His work upon this mountain was in some respects the best +he ever accomplished, being done with a loving faithfulness hardly +called out by Hood's only rival, the Peak of Shasta. The result of his +Hood studies, as seen in the nearly completed painting, has a +superiority corresponding to that of the studies themselves, possessing +excellences not included even in the well-known "Lander's Peak." + +In the afternoon, we were provided, by the courtesy of the Company, with +a special train on the portage-railroad connecting Dalles City with a +station known as Celilo. This road had but recently come into full +operation, and was now doing an immense freight-business between the two +river-levels separated by the intervening "Dalles." It seemed somewhat +longer than the road around the Falls. Its exact length has escaped me, +but I think it about eight or nine miles. + +With several officers of the road, who vied in giving us opportunities +of comfort and information, we set out, about three P.M., from a station +on the water-front below the town, whence we trundled through the long +main street, and were presently shot forth upon a wilderness of sand. An +occasional trap uplift rose on our right, but, as we were on the same +bluff-level as Dalles City, we met no lofty precipices. We were +constantly in view of the river, separated from its Oregon brink at the +farthest by about half a mile of the dreariest dunes of shifting sand +ever seen by an amateur in deserts. The most arid tracts along the +Platte could not rival this. The wind was violent when we left Dalles +City, and possessed the novel faculty of blowing simultaneously from all +points of the compass. It increased with every mile of advance, both in +force and faculty, until at Celilo we found it a hurricane. The +gentlemen of the Company who attended us told us, as seemed very +credible, that the highest winds blowing here (compared with which the +present might be styled a zephyr) banked the track so completely out of +sight with sand that a large force of men had to be steadily employed in +shovelling out trains that had been brought to a dead halt, and clearing +a way for the slow advance of others. I observed that the sides of some +of the worst sand-cuts had been planked over to prevent their sliding +down upon the road. Occasionally, the sand blew in such tempests as to +sift through every cranny of the cars, and hide the river-glimpses like +a momentary fog. But this discomfort was abundantly compensated by the +wonderfully interesting scenery on the Columbia side of our train. + +The river for the whole distance of the portage is a succession of +magnificent rapids, low cataracts, and narrow, sinuous channels,--the +last known to the old French traders as "_Dales_" or "Troughs," and to +us by the very natural corruption of "Dalles." The alternation between +these phases is wonderfully abrupt. At one point, about half-way between +Dalles City and Celilo, the entire volume of the Columbia River (and how +vast that is may be better understood by following up on the map the +river itself and all its tributaries) is crowded over upon the Oregon +shore through a passage not more than fifty yards in width, between +perfectly naked and perpendicular precipices of basalt. Just beyond this +mighty mill-race, where one of the grandest floods of the continent is +sliding in olive-green light and umber shadow, smoothly and resistlessly +as time, the river is a mile wide, and plunges over a ragged wall of +trap blocks, reaching, as at the lower cataract, from shore to shore. In +other neighboring places it attains even a greater width, but up to +Celilo is never out of torment from the obstructions of its bed. Not +even the rapids of Niagara can vie with these in their impression of +power, and only the Columbia itself can describe the lines of grace made +by its water, rasped to spray, churned to froth, tired into languid +sheets that flow like sliding glass, or shot up in fountains frayed away +to rainbows on their edges, as it strikes some basalt hexagon rising in +mid-stream. The Dalles and the Upper Cataracts are still another region +where the artist might stay for a year's University-course in +water-painting. + +At Celilo we found several steamers, in register resembling our second +of the day previous. They measured on the average about three hundred +tons. One of them had just got down from Walla Walla, with a large party +of miners from gold-tracts still farther off, taking down five hundred +thousand dollars in dust to Portland and San Francisco. We were very +anxious to accept the Company's extended invitation, and push our +investigations to or even up the Snake River. But the expectation that +the San-Francisco steamer would reach Portland in a day or two, and that +we should immediately return by her to California, turned us most +reluctantly down the river after Bierstadt and I had made the fullest +notes and sketches attainable. Bad weather on the coast falsified our +expectations. For a week we were rain-bound in Portland, unable to leave +our hotel for an hour at a time without being drenched by the floods +which just now set in for the winter season, and regretting the lack of +that prescience which would have enabled us to accomplish one of the +most interesting side-trips in our whole plan of travel. While this +pleasure still awaited us, and none in particular of any kind seemed +present, save the in-door courtesies of our Portland friends, it was +still among the memories of a lifetime to have seen the Columbia in its +Cataracts and its Dalles. + + + + +OUR LAST DAY IN DIXIE. + + +It was not far from eleven o'clock at night when we took leave of the +Rebel President, and, arm in arm with Judge Ould, made our way through +the silent, deserted streets to our elevated quarters in the Spotswood +Hotel at Richmond. As we climbed the long, rickety stairs which led to +our room in the fourth story, one of us said to our companion,-- + +"We can accomplish nothing more by remaining here. Suppose we shake the +sacred soil from our feet to-morrow?" + +"Very well. At what hour will you start?" he replied. + +"The earlier, the better. As near daybreak as may be,--to avoid the +sun." + +"We can't be ready before ten o'clock. The mules are quartered six miles +out of town." + +That sounded strange, for Jack, our ebony Jehu, had said to me only the +day before, "Dem _is_ mighty foine mules, Massa. I 'tends ter dem mules +myself; _we keeps 'em right round de corner_." Taken together, the +statements of the two officials had a bad look; but Mr. Davis had just +given me a message to his niece, and Mr. Benjamin had just intrusted +Colonel Jaquess with a letter--contraband, because three pages long--for +delivery within the limits of the "United States"; therefore the +discrepancy did not alarm me, for the latter facts seemed to assure our +safe deliverance from Dixie. Merely saying, "Very well,--ten o'clock, +then, let it be,--we'll be ready,"--we bade the Judge good-night at the +landing, and entered our apartment. + +We found the guard, Mr. Javins, stretched at full length on his bed, and +snoring like the Seven Sleepers. Day and night, from the moment of our +first entrance into the Rebel dominions, that worthy, with a revolver in +his sleeve, our door-key in his pocket, and a Yankee in each one of his +eyes, had implicitly observed his instructions,--"Keep a constant watch +upon them"; but overtasked nature had at last got the better of his +vigilance, and he was slumbering at his post. Not caring to disturb him, +we bolted the door, slid the key under his pillow, and followed him to +the land of dreams. + +It was a little after two o'clock, and the round, ruddy moon was looking +pleasantly in at my window, when a noise outside awoke me. Lifting the +sash, I listened. There was a sound of hurrying feet in the neighboring +street, and a prolonged cry of murder! It seemed the wild, strangled +shriek of a woman. Springing to the floor, I threw on my clothes, and +shook Javins. + +"Wake up! Give me the key! They're murdering a woman in the street!" I +shouted, loud enough to be heard in the next world. + +But he did not wake, and the Colonel, too, slept on, those despairing +cries in his ears, as peacefully as if his great dream of peace had been +realized. Still those dreadful shrieks, mingled now with curses hot from +the bottomless pit, came up through the window. No time was to be +lost,--so, giving another and a desperate tug at Javins, I thrust my +hand under his pillow, drew out his revolver and the door-key, and, +three steps at a time, bounded down the stairways. At the outer entrance +a half-drunken barkeeper was rubbing his eyes, and asking, "What's the +row?"--but not another soul was stirring. Giving no heed to him, I +hurried into the street. I had not gone twenty paces, however, before a +gruff voice from the shadow of the building called out,-- + +"Halt! Who goes thar'?" + +"A friend," I answered. + +"Advance, friend, and give the countersign." + +"I don't know it." + +"Then ye carn't pass. Orders is strict." + +"What is this disturbance? I heard a woman crying murder." + +The stifled shrieks had died away, but low moans, and sounds like +hysterical weeping, still came up from around the corner. + +"Oh! nothin',--jest some nigger fellers on a time. Thet's all." + +"And you stood by and saw it done!" I exclaimed, with mingled contempt +and indignation. + +"Sor it? How cud _I_ holp it? I hes my orders,--ter keep my eye on thet +'ar' door; 'sides, thar' war' nigh a dozen on 'em, and these Richmond +nigs, now thet the white folks is away, is more lawless nor old Bragg +himself. My life 'ou'dn't ha' been wuth a hill o' beans among 'em." + +By this time I had gradually drawn the sentinel to the corner of the +building, and looking down the dimly lighted street whence the sounds +proceeded, I saw that it was empty. + +"They are gone now," I said, "and the woman may be dying. Come, go down +there with me." + +"Carn't, Cunnel. I 'ou'dn't do it fur all the women in Richmond." + +"Was your mother a woman?" + +"I reckon, and a right peart 'un,--ye mought bet yer pile on thet." + +"I'll bet my pile she'd disown you, if she knew you turned your back on +a woman." + +He gave me a wistful, undecided look, and then, muttering something +about "orders," which I did not stop to bear, followed me, as I hurried +down the street. + +Not three hundred yards away, in a narrow recess between two buildings, +we found the woman. She lay at full length on the pavement, her neat +muslin gown torn to shreds, and her simple lace bonnet crushed into a +shapeless mass beside her. Her thick, dishevelled hair only +half-concealed her open bosom, and from the corners of her mouth the +blood was flowing freely. She was not dead,--for she still moaned +pitifully,--but she seemed to be dying. Lifting her head as tenderly as +I could, I said to her,-- + +"Are you much hurt? Can't you speak to me?" + +She opened her eyes, and staring at the sentinel with a wild, crazed +look, only moaned,-- + +"Oh! don't! Don't,--any more! Let me die! Oh! let me die!" + +"Not yet. You are too young to die yet. Come, see if you can't sit up." + +Something, it may have been the tone of my voice, seemed to bring her to +her senses, for she again opened her eyes, and, with a sudden effort, +rose nearly to her feet. In a moment, however, she staggered back, and +would have fallen, had not the sentinel caught her. + +"There, don't try again. Rest awhile. Take some of this,--it will give +you strength"; and I emptied my brandy-flask into her mouth. "Our +General" had filled it the morning we set out from his camp; but two +days' acquaintance with the Judge, who declared "_such_ brandy +contraband of war," had reduced its contents to a low ebb. Still, there +was enough to do that poor girl a world of good. She shortly revived, +and sitting up, her head against the sentinel's shoulder, told us her +story. She was a white woman, and served as nursery-maid in a family +that lived hard by. All of its male members being away with the array, +she had been sent out at that late hour to procure medicine for a sick +child, and, waylaid by a gang of black fiends, had been gagged and +outraged in the very heart of Richmond! And this is Southern +civilization under Jefferson I.! + +At the end of a long hour, I returned to the hotel. The sentry was +pacing to and fro before it, and, seating myself on the door-step, I +drew him into conversation. + +"Do such things often happen in Richmond?" I asked him. + +"Often! Ye's strange yere, I reckon," he replied. + +"No,--I've been here forty times, but not lately. Things must be in a +bad way here, now." + +"Wai, they is! Thar' 's nary night but thair' 's lots o' sech doin's. Ye +see, thar' ha'n't more 'n a corporal's-guard o' white men in the hull +place, so the nigs they hes the'r own way, and ye'd better b'lieve they +raise the Devil, and break things, ginerally." + +"I've seen no other able-bodied soldier about town; how is it that you +are here?" + +"I ha'n't able-bodied," he replied, holding up the stump of his left +arm, from which the sleeve was dangling. "I lost thet more 'n a y'ar +ago. I b'long ter the calvary,--Fust Alabama,--and bein' as I carn't +manage a nag now, they 's detailed me fur provost-duty." + +"First Alabama? I know Captains Webb and Finnan of that regiment." + +"Ye does? What! old man Webb, as lives down on Coosa?" + +"Yes, at Gadsden, in Cherokee County. Streight burnt his house, and both +of his mills', on his big raid, and the old man has lost both of his +sons in the war. It has wellnigh done him up." + +"I reckon. Stands ter natur' it sh'u'd. The Yankees is all-fired fiends. +The old man use' ter hate 'em loike----. I reckon he hates 'em wuss 'n +ever now." + +"No, he don't. His troubles seem to have softened him. When he told me +of them, he cried like a child. He reckoned the Lord had brought them on +him because he'd fought against the Union." + +"Wal, I doan't know. This war's a bad business, anyhow. When d'ye see +old Webb last?" + +"About a year ago,--down in Tennessee, nigh to Tullahoma." + +"Was he 'long o' the rigiment?" + +That was a home question, for I had met Captain Webb while he was a +prisoner, in the Court-House at Murfreesboro'. However, I promptly +replied,-- + +"No,--he'd just left it." + +"Wal, I doan't blame him. Pears loike, ef sech things sh'u'd come onter +me, I'd let the war and the kentry go ter the Devil tergether." + +My acquaintance with Captain Webb naturally won me the confidence of the +soldier; and for nearly an hour, almost unquestioned, he poured into my +ear information that would have been of incalculable value to our +generals. Two days later I would have given my right hand for liberty to +whisper to General Grant some things that he said; but honor and honesty +forbade it. + +A neighboring clock struck four when I rose to go. As I did so, I said +to the sentinel,-- + +"I saw no other sentry in the streets; why are you guarding this hotel?" + +"Wal, ye knows old Brown's a-raisin' Cain down thar' in Georgy. Two o' +his men bes come up yere ter see Jeff, and things ha'n't quite +satisfactory, so we's orders ter keep 'em tighter 'n a bull's-eye in +fly-time." + +So, not content with placing a guard in our very bedchamber, the +oily-tongued despot over the way had fastened a padlock over the +key-hole of our outside-door! What _would_ happen, if he should hear +that I had picked the padlock, and prowled about Richmond for an hour +after midnight! The very thought gave my throat a preliminary choke, and +my neck an uneasy sensation. It was high time I sought the embrace of +that hard mattress in the fourth story. But my fears were groundless. +When I crept noiselessly to bed, Javins was sleeping as soundly and +snoring as sweetly as if his sins were all forgiven. + +When I awoke in the morning, breakfast was already laid on the +centre-table, and an army of newsboys were shouting under our windows, +"'Ere's the 'En'quirer' and _the_ 'Dis'patch.' Great news from the +front. Gin'ral Grant mortally killed,--shot with a cannon." Rising, and +beginning my toilet, I said to Javins, in a tone of deep concern,-- + +"When did that happen?" + +"Why, o' Saturday. I hearn of it afore we left the lines. 'Twas all over +town yesterday," he replied, with infinite composure. + +"And you didn't tell us! That was unkind of you, Javins,--very unkind. +How _could_ you do it?" + +"It's ag'in' orders to talk news with you;--besides, I thought you +knowed it." + +"How should we know it?" + +"Why, your boat was only just ahead of his'n, comin' up the river. He +got shot runnin' that battery. Hit in the arm, and died when they +amputated him." + +"Amputated him! Did they cut off his head to save his arm?" + +Whether he saw a quiet twinkle in my eye, or knew that the news was +false, I know not. Whichever it was, he replied,-- + +"I reckon. Then you don't b'lieve it?" + +"Why should I doubt it? Don't your papers always tell the truth?" + +"No, they never do; lyin' 's their trade." + +"Then you suppose they're whistling now to keep up their courage? But +let us see what they say. Oblige me with some of your currency." + +He kindly gave me three dollars for one, and ringing the bell, I soon +had the five dingy half-sheets which every morning, "Sundays excepted," +hold up this busy world, "its fluctuations and its vast concerns," to +the wondering view of beleaguered Richmond. + +"Dey's fifty cents apiece, Massa," said the darky, handing me the +papers, and looking wistfully on the poor specimen of lithography which +remained after the purchase; "what shill I do wid dis?" + +"Oh! keep it. I'd give you more, but that's all the lawful money I have +about me." + +He hesitated, as if unwilling to take my last half-dollar; but self soon +got the better of him. He pocketed the shin-plaster, and said nothing; +but "Poor gentleman! I's sorry for _you_! Libin' at do Spotswood, and no +money about you!" was legible all over his face. + +We opened the papers, and, sure enough, General Grant _was_ dead, and +laid out in dingy sheets, with a big gun firing great volleys over him! +The cannon which that morning thundered Glory! Hallelujah! through the +columns of the "Whig" and the "Examiner" no doubt brought him to life +again. No such jubilation, I believe, disgraced our Northern journals +when Stonewall Jackson fell. + +Breakfast over, the Colonel and I packed our portmanteaus, and sat down +to the intellectual repast. It was a feast, and we enjoyed it. I always +have enjoyed the Richmond editorials. If I were a poet, I should study +them for epithets. Exhausting the dictionary, their authors ransack +heaven, earth, and the other place, and into one expression throw such a +concentration of scorn, hate, fury, or exultation as is absolutely +stunning to a man of ordinary nerves. Talk of their being bridled! They +never had a bit in their mouths. Before the war they ran wild, and now +they ride rough-shod over decorum, decency, and Davis himself. But the +dictator endures it like a philosopher. "He lets it pass," said Judge +Ould to me, "like the idle wind, which it is." + +At last, ten o'clock--the hour when we were to set out from +Dixie--struck from a neighboring steeple, and I laid down the paper, and +listened for the tread of the Judge on the stairs. I had heard it often, +and it had always been welcome, for he is a most agreeable companion, +but I had not _listened_ for it till then. Then I waited for it as "they +that watch for the morning," for he was to deliver us from the "den of +lions,"--from "the hold of every foul and unclean thing." Ten, twenty, +thirty minutes I waited, but he did not come! Why was he late, that +prompt man, who was always "on time,"--who put us through the streets of +Richmond the night before on a trot, lest we should be a second late at +our appointment? Did he mean to bake us brown with the mid-day sun? or +had the mules overslept themselves, or moved their quarters still +farther out of town? Well, I didn't know, and it was useless to +speculate, so I took up the paper, and went to reading again. But the +stinging editorials had lost their sting, and the pointed paragraphs, +though sharper than a meat-axe, fell on me as harmless as if I had been +encased in a suit of mail. + +At length eleven o'clock sounded, and I took out my watch to +count the minutes. One, two, three,--how slow they went! Four, +five,--ten,--fifteen,--twenty! What was the matter with the watch? Even +at this day I could affirm on oath that it took five hours for that +hour-hand to get round to twelve. But at last it got there, and +then--each second seeming a minute, each minute an hour--it crept slowly +on to one; but still no Judge appeared! Why did he not come? The reason +was obvious. The mules were "quartered six miles out of town," because +he had to see Mr. Davis before letting us go. And Davis had heard of my +nocturnal rambling, and concluded we had come as spies. Or he had, from +my cross-questioning the night before, detected _my_ main object in +coming to Dixie. Either way _my_ doom was sealed. If we were taken as +spies, it was hanging. If held on other grounds, it was imprisonment; +and ten days of Castle Thunder, in my then state of health, would have +ended my mortal career. + +I had looked at this alternative before setting out. But then I saw it +afar off; now I stood face to face with it, and--I thought of home,--of +the brave boy who had said to me, "Father, I think you ought to go. If I +was only a man, _I_'d go. If you never come back, _I_'ll take care of +the children." + +These thoughts passing in my mind, I rose and paced the room for a few +moments,--then, turning to Javins, said,-- + +"Will you oblige me by stepping into the hall? My friend and I would +have a few words together." + +As he passed out, I said to the Colonel,-- + +"Ould is more than three hours late! What does it mean?" + +All this while he had sat, his spectacles on his nose, and his chair +canted against the window-sill, absorbed in the newspapers. Occasionally +he would look up to comment on something he was reading; but not a +movement of his face, nor a glance of his eye, had betrayed that he was +conscious of Ould's delay, or of my extreme restlessness. When I said +this, he took off his spectacles, and, quietly rubbing the glasses with +his handkerchief, replied,-- + +"It looks badly, but--_I_ ask no odds of them. We may have to show we +are men. We have tried to serve the country. That is enough. Let them +hang us, if they like." + +"Colonel," I exclaimed, with a strong inclination to hug him, "you are a +trump! the bravest man I ever knew!" + +"I trust in God,--that is all," was his reply. + +This was all he said,--but his words convey no idea of the sublime +courage which shone in his eye and lighted up his every feature. I felt +rebuked, and turned away to hide my emotion. As I did so, my attention +was arrested by a singular spectacle in a neighboring street. Coming +down the hill, hand in hand with a colored woman, were two little boys +of about eight or nine years, one white, the other black. As they neared +the opposite corner, the white lad drew back and struck the black boy a +heavy blow with his foot. The ebony juvenile doubled up his fist, and, +planting it behind the other's ear, felled him to the sidewalk. But the +white lad was on his feet again in an instant, and showering on the +black a perfect storm of kicks and blows. The latter parried the assault +coolly, and, watching his opportunity, planted another blow behind the +white boy's ear, which sent him reeling to the ground again. Meanwhile +the colored nurse stood by, enjoying the scene, and a score or more of +negroes of all ages and sizes gathered around, urging the young ebony on +with cheers and other expressions of encouragement. I watched the combat +till the white lad had gone down a third time, when a rap came at the +door, and Judge Ould entered. + +"Good evening," he said. + +"Good evening," we replied. + +"Well, Gentlemen, if you are ready, we'll walk round to the Libby," he +added, with a hardness of tone I had not observed in his voice before. + +My worst fears were realized! We were prisoners! A cold tremor passed +over me, and my tongue refused its office. A drooping plant turns to the +sun; so, being just then a drooping plant, I turned to the Colonel. He +stood, drawn up to his full height, looking at Ould. Not a feature of +his fine face moved, but his large gray eye was beaming with a sort of +triumph. I have met brave men,--men who have faced death a hundred times +without quailing; but I never met a man who had the moral grandeur of +that man. His look inspired me, for I turned to Ould, and, with a +coolness that amazed myself, said,-- + +"Very well. We are ready. But here is an instructive spectacle"; and I +pointed to the conflict going on in the street. "That is what you are +coming to. Fight us another year, and that scene will be enacted, by +larger children, all over the South." + +"To prevent that is why we are fighting you at all," he replied, dryly. + +We shook Javins by the hand, and took up our portmanteaus to go. Then +our hotel-bill occurred to me, and I said to Ould,-- + +"You cautioned us against offering greenbacks. We have nothing else. +Will you give us some Confederate money in exchange?" + +"Certainly. But what do you want of money?" he asked, resuming the free +and easy manner he had shown in our previous intercourse. + +"To pay our hotel-bill." + +"You have no bill here. It will be settled by the Confederacy." + +"We can't allow that. We are not here as the guests of your Government." + +"Yes, you are, and you can't help yourselves," he rejoined, laughing +pleasantly. "If you offer the landlord greenbacks, he'll have you +jugged, certain,--for it's against the law." + +"That's nothing to us. We are jugged already." + +"So you are!" and he laughed again, rather boisterously. + +His manner half convinced me that he had been playing on our +sensibilities; but I said nothing, and we followed him down the stairs. + +At the outer door stood Jack and the ambulance! Their presence assured +us a safe exit from Dixie, and my feelings found expression somewhat as +follows:-- + +"How are you, Jack? You're the best-looking darky I ever saw." + +"I's bery well, Massa, bery well. Hope you's well," replied Jack, +grinning until he made himself uglier than Nature intended. "I's glad +you tinks I's good-lookin'." + +"Good-looking! You're better-looking than any man, black or white, I +ever met." + +"You've odd notions of beauty," said the Judge, smiling. "That accounts +for your being an Abolitionist." + +"No, it don't." And I added, in a tone too low for Jack to hear, "It +only implies, that, until I saw that darky, I doubted our getting out of +Dixie." + +The Judge gave a low whistle. + +"So you smelt a rat?" + +"Yes, a very big one. Tell us, why were you so long behind time?" + +"I'll tell you when the war is over. Now I'll take you to Libby and the +hospitals, if you'd like to go." + +We said we would, and, ordering Jack to follow with the ambulance, the +Judge led us down the principal thoroughfare. A few shops were open, a +few negro women were passing in and out among them, and a few wounded +soldiers were limping along the sidewalks; but scarcely an able-bodied +man was to be seen anywhere. A poor soldier, who had lost both legs and +a hand, was seated at a street-corner, asking alms of the colored women +as they passed. Pointing to him, the Judge said,-- + +"There is one of our arguments against reunion. If you will walk two +squares, I'll show you a thousand." + +"All asking alms of black women? That is another indication of what you +are coming to." + +He made no reply. After a while, scanning our faces as if he would +detect our hidden thoughts, he said, in an abrupt, pointed way,-- + +"Grant was to have attacked us yesterday. Why didn't he do it?" + +"How should we know?" + +"You came from Foster's only the day before. That's where the attack was +to have been made." + +"Why wasn't it made?" + +"_I_ don't know. Some think it was because you came in, and were +_expected out_ that way." + +"Oh! That accounts for your being so late! You think we are spies, sent +in to survey, and report on the route?" + +"No, I do not. I think you are honest men, and I've _said so_." + +And I have no doubt it was because he "said so" that we got out of +Richmond. + +By this time we had reached a dingy brick building, from one corner of +which protruded a small sign, bearing, in black letters on a white +ground, the words,-- + + LIBBY AND SON, + + _SHIP-CHANDLERS AND GROCERS._ + +It was three stories high, and, I was told, eighty feet in width and a +hundred and ten in depth. In front, the first story was on a level with +the street, allowing space for a tier of dungeons under the sidewalk; +but in the rear the land sloped away till the basement-floor rose +above-ground. Its unpainted walls were scorched to a rusty brown, and +its sunken doors and low windows, filled here and there with a dusky +pane, were cobwebbed and weather-stained, giving the whole building a +most uninviting and desolate appearance. A flaxen-haired boy, in ragged +"butternuts" and a Union cap, and an old man, in gray regimentals, with +a bent body and a limping gait, were pacing to and fro before it, with +muskets on their shoulders; but no other soldiers were in sight. + +"If Ben Butler knew that Richmond was defended by only such men, how +long would it be before he took it?" I said, turning to the Judge. + +"Several years. When these men give out, our women will fall in. Let +Butler try it!" + +Opening a door at the right, he led us into a large, high-studded +apartment, with a bare floor, and greasy brown walls hung round with +battle-scenes and cheap lithographs of the Rebel leaders. Several +officers in "Secession gray" were lounging about this room, and one of +them, a short, slightly-built, youthful-looking man, rose as we entered, +and, in a half-pompous, half-obsequious way, said to Judge Ould,-- + +"Ah! Colonel Ould, I am very glad to see you." + +The Judge returned the greeting with a stateliness that was in striking +contrast with his usual frank and cordial manner, and then introduced +the officer to us as "Major Turner, Keeper of the Libby." I had heard of +him, and it was with some reluctance that I took his proffered hand. +However, I did take it, and at the same time inquired,-- + +"Are you related to Dr. Turner, of Fayetteville?" + +"No, Sir. I am of the old Virginia family." (I never met a negro-whipper +nor a negro-trader who did not belong to that family.) "Are you a +North-Carolinian?" + +"No, Sir"-- + +Before I could add another word, the Judge said,-- + +"No, Major; these gentlemen hail from Georgia. They are strangers here, +and I'd thank you to show them over the prison." + +"Certainly, Colonel, most certainly. I'll do it with great pleasure." + +And the little man bustled about, put on his cap, gave a few orders to +his subordinates, and then led us, through another outside-door, into +the prison. He was a few rods in advance with Colonel Jaquess, when +Judge Ould said to me,-- + +"Your prisoners have belied Turner. You see he's not the hyena they've +represented." + +"I'm not so sure of that," I replied. "These cringing, mild-mannered men +are the worst sort of tyrants, when they have the power." + +"But you don't think _him_ a tyrant?" + +"I do. He's a coward and a bully, or I can't read English. It is written +all over his face." + +The Judge laughed boisterously, and called out to Turner,-- + +"I say, Major, our friend here is painting your portrait." + +"I hope he is making a handsome man of me," said Turner, in a +sycophantic way. + +"No, he isn't. He's drawing you to the life,--as if he'd known you for +half a century." + +We had entered a room about forty feet wide and a hundred feet deep, +with bare brick walls, a rough plank floor, and narrow, dingy windows, +to whose sash only a few broken panes were clinging. A row of tin +wash-basins, and a wooden trough which served as a bathing-tub, were at +one end of it, and half a dozen cheap stools and hard-bottomed chairs +were littered about the floor, but it had no other furniture. And this +room, with five others of similar size and appointments, and two +basements floored with earth and filled with _debris_, compose the +famous Libby Prison, in which, for months together, thousands of the +best and bravest men that ever went to battle have been allowed to rot +and to starve. + +At the date of our visit, not more than a hundred prisoners were in the +Libby, its contents having recently been emptied into a worse sink in +Georgia; but almost constantly since the war began, twelve and sometimes +thirteen hundred of our officers have been hived within those half-dozen +desolate rooms and filthy cellars, with a space of only ten feet by two +allotted to each for all the purposes of living! + +Overrun with vermin, perishing with cold, breathing a stifled, tainted +atmosphere, no space allowed them for rest by day, and lying down at +night "wormed and dovetailed together like fish in a basket,"--their +daily rations only two ounces of stale beef and a small lump of hard +corn-bread, and their lives the forfeit, if they caught but one streak +of God's blue sky through those filthy windows,--they have endured there +all the horrors of the middle-passage. My soul sickened as I looked on +the scene of their wretchedness. If the liberty we are fighting for were +not worth even so terrible a price,--if it were not cheaply purchased +even with the blood and agony of the many brave and true souls who have +gone into that foul den only to die, or to come out the shadows of +men,--living ghosts, condemned to walk the night and to fade away before +the breaking of the great day that is coming,--who would not cry out +for peace, for peace on any terms? + +And while these thoughts were in my mind, the cringing, foul-mouthed, +brutal, contemptible ruffian who had caused all this misery stood within +two paces of me! I could have reached out my hand, and, with half an +effort, have crushed him, and--I did not do it! Some invisible Power +held my arm, for murder was in my heart. + +"This is where that Yankee devil Streight, that raised hell so among you +down in Georgia, got out," said Turner, pausing before a jut in the wall +of the room. "A flue was here, you see, but we've bricked it up. They +took up the hearth, let themselves down into the basement, and then dug +through the wall, and eighty feet underground into the yard of a +deserted building over the way. If you'd like to see the place, step +down with me." + +"We would, Major. We'd be right glad ter," I replied, adopting, at a +hint from the Judge, the Georgia dialect. + +We descended a rough plank stairway, and entered the basement. It was a +damp, mouldy, dismal place, and even then--in hot July weather--as cold +as an ice-house. What must it have been in midwinter! + +The keeper led us along the wall to where Streight and his party had +broken out, and then said,-- + +"It's three feet thick, but they went through it, and all the way under +the street, with only a few case-knives and a dust-pan." + +"Wal, they _war_ smart. But, keeper, whar' wus yer eyes all o' thet +time? Down our way, ef a man couldn't see twenty Yankees a-wuckin' so +fur six weeks, by daylight, in a clar place like this yere, we'd reckon +he warn't fit ter 'tend a pen o' niggers." + +The Judge whispered, "You're overdoing it. Hold in." Turner winced like +a struck hound, but, smothering his wrath, smilingly replied,-- + +"The place wasn't clear then. It was filled with straw and rubbish. The +Yankees covered the opening with it, and hid away among it when any one +was coming. I caught two of them down here one day, but they pulled the +wool over my eyes, and I let them off with a few days in a dungeon. But +that fellow Streight would outwit the Devil. He was the most unruly +customer I've had in the twenty months I've been here. I put him in +keep, time and again, but I never could cool him down." + +"Whar' is the keeps?" I asked. "Ye's got lots o' them, ha'n't ye?" + +"No,--only six. Step this way, and I'll show you." + +"Talk better English," said the Judge, as we fell a few paces behind +Turner on our way to the front of the building. "There are some +schoolmasters in Georgia." + +"Wal, thar' ha'n't,--not in the part I come from." + +The dungeons were low, close, dismal apartments, about twelve feet +square, boarded off from the remainder of the cellar, and lighted only +by a narrow grating under the sidewalk. Their floors were incrusted with +filth, and their walls stained and damp with the rain, which, in wet +weather, had dripped down from the street. + +"And how many does ye commonly lodge yere, when yer hotel's full?" I +asked. + +"I have had twenty in each, but fifteen is about as many as they +comfortably hold." + +"I reckon! And then the comfut moughtn't be much ter brag on." + +The keeper soon invited us to walk into the adjoining basement. I was a +few steps in advance of him, taking a straight course to the entrance, +when a sentinel, pacing to and fro in the middle of the apartment, +levelled his musket so as to bar my way, saying, as he did so,-- + +"Ye carn't pass yere, Sir. Ye must gwo round by the wall." + +This drew my attention to the spot, and I noticed that a space, about +fifteen feet square, in the centre of the room, and directly in front +of the sentinel, had been recently dug up with a spade. While in all +other places the ground was trodden to the hardness and color of +granite, this spot seemed to be soft, and had the reddish-yellow hue of +the "sacred soil." Another sentry was pacing to and fro on its other +side, so that the place was completely surrounded! Why were they +guarding it so closely? The reason flashed upon me, and I said to +Turner;-- + +"I say, how many barr'ls hes ye in thar'?" + +"Enough to blow this shanty to ----," he answered, curtly. + +"I reckon! Put 'em thar' when thet feller Dahlgreen wus a-gwine ter +rescue 'em,--the Yankees?" + +"I reckon." + +He said no more, but that was enough to reveal the black, seething hell +the Rebellion has brewed. Can there be any peace with miscreants who +thus deliberately plan the murder, at one swoop, of hundreds of unarmed +and innocent men? + +In this room, seated on the ground, or leaning idly against the walls, +were about a dozen poor fellows who the Judge told me were hostages, +held for a similar number under sentence of death by our Government. +Their dejected, homesick look, and weary, listless manner disclosed some +of the horrors of imprisonment. + +"Let us go," I said to the Colonel; "I have had enough of this." + +"No,--you must see the up-stairs," said Turner. "It a'n't so gloomy up +there." + +It was not so gloomy, for some little sunlight did come in through the +dingy windows; but the few prisoners in the upper rooms wore the same +sad, disconsolate look as those in the lower story. + +"It is not hard fare, or close quarters, that kills men," said Judge +Ould to me; "it is homesickness; and the strongest and the bravest +succumb to it first." + +In the sill of an attic-window I found a Minie-ball. Prying it out with +my knife, and holding it up to Turner, I said,-- + +"So ye keeps this room fur a shootin'-gallery, does ye?" + +"Yes," he replied, laughing. "The boys practise once in a while on the +Yankees. You see, the rules forbid their coming within three feet of the +windows. Sometimes they do, and then the boys take a pop at them." + +"And sometimes hit 'em? Hit many on 'em?" + +"Yes, a heap." + +We passed a long hour in the Libby, and then visited Castle Thunder and +the hospitals for our wounded. I should be glad to describe what I saw +in those "institutions," but the limits of my paper forbid it. + +It was five o'clock when we bade the Judge a friendly good-bye, and took +our seats in the ambulance. As we did so, he said to us,-- + +"I have not taken your parole, Gentlemen. I shall trust to your honor +not to disclose anything you have seen or heard that might operate +against us in a military way." + +"You may rely upon us, Judge; and, some day, give us a chance to return +the courtesy and kindness you have shown to us. We shall not forget it." + +We arrived near the Union lines just as the sun was going down. Captain +Hatch, who had accompanied us, waved his flag as we halted near a grove +of trees, and a young officer rode over to us from the nearest +picket-station. We despatched him to General Foster for a pair of +horses, and in half an hour entered the General's tent. He pressed us to +remain to dinner, proposing to kill the fatted calf,--"for these my sons +were dead and are alive again, were lost and are found." + +We let him kill it, (it tasted wonderfully like salt pork,) and in half +an hour were on our way to General Butler's head-quarters. + + * * * * * + +Here ended our last day in Dixie, and here, perhaps, should end this +article; but the time has come when I can disclose my real purpose in +seeking an audience of the Rebel leader; and as such a disclosure may +relieve me, in the minds of candid men, from some of the aspersions cast +upon my motives by Rebel sympathizers, I willingly make it. In making +it, however, I wish to be understood as speaking only for myself. My +companion, Colonel Jaquess, while he fully shared in my motives, and +rightly estimated the objects I sought to accomplish, had other, and, it +may be, higher aims. And I wish also to say, that to him attaches +whatever credit is due to any one for the conception and execution of +this "mission." While I love my country as well as any man, and in this +enterprise cheerfully perilled my life to serve it, I was only his +co-worker: I should not have undertaken it alone. + +No reader of this magazine is so young as not to remember, that, between +the first of June and the first of August last, a Peace simoom swept +over the country, throwing dust into the people's eyes, and threatening +to bury the nation in disunion. All at once the North grew tired of the +war. It began to count the money and the blood it had cost, and to +overlook the great principles for which it was waged. Men of all shades +of political opinion--radical Republicans, as well as honest +Democrats--cried out for concession, compromise, armistice,--for +anything to end the war,--anything but disunion. To that the North would +not consent, and peace I knew could not be had without it, I knew that, +because on the sixteenth of June, Jeff. Davis had said to a prominent +Southerner that he would negotiate only on the basis of Southern +Independence, and that declaration had come to me only five days after +it was made. + +The people, therefore, were under a delusion. They were crying out for +peace when there was no peace,--when there _could_ be no peace +consistent with the interest and security of the country. The result of +this delusion, were it not dispelled, would be that the Chicago +Convention, or some other convention, would nominate a man pledged to +peace, but willing to concede Southern independence, and on that tide of +popular frenzy he would sail into the Presidency. Then the deluded +people would learn, too late, that peace meant only disunion. They would +learn it too late, because power would then be in the hands of a Peace +Congress and a Peace President, and it required no spirit of prophecy to +predict what such an Administration would do. It would make peace on the +best terms it could get; and the best terms it could get were Disunion +and Southern Independence. + +The Peace epidemic could be stayed, and the consequent danger to the +country averted, it seemed to me, only by securing in a tangible form, +and before a trustworthy witness, the ultimatum of the Rebel President. +That ultimatum, spread far and wide, would convince every honest +Northern man that war was the only road to lasting peace. + +To get that ultimatum, and to give it to the four winds of heaven, were +my real objects in going to Richmond. + +I did not shut my eyes to the possibility of our paving the way for +negotiations that might end in peace, nor my ears to the blessings a +grateful nation would shower on us, if our visit had such a result; but +I did not _expect_ these things. I expected to be smeared from head to +foot with Copperhead slime, to be called a knight-errant, a seeker after +notoriety, an abortive negotiator, and a meddlesome volunteer +diplomatist; but I expected also, if a good Providence spared our lives, +and my pen did not forget the English language, to be able to tell the +North the truth; and I knew that the _Truth_ would stay the Peace +epidemic, and kill the Peace party. And by the blessing of God, and the +help of the Devil, it did do that. The Devil helped, for he inspired Mr. +Benjamin's circular, and that forced home the bolt we had driven, and +shivered the Peace party into a million of fragments, every fragment now +a good War man until the old flag shall float again all over the +country. + +If we accomplished this, "the scoffer need not laugh, nor the judicious +grieve," for our mountain did not bring forth a mouse,--our "mission to +Richmond" was not a failure. + +It was a difficult enterprise. At the outset it seemed wellnigh +impossible to gain access to Mr. Davis; but we finally did gain it, and +we gained it without official aid. Mr. Lincoln did not assist us. He +gave us a pass through the army-lines, stated on what terms he would +grant amnesty to the Rebels, and said, "Good-bye, good luck to you," +when we went away; and that is all he did. + +It was also a hazardous enterprise,--no holiday adventure, no pastime +for boys. It was sober, serious, dangerous _work_,--and work for _men_, +for cool, earnest, fearless, determined men, who relied on God, who +thought more of their object than of their lives, and who, for truth and +their country, were ready to meet the prison or the scaffold. + +If any one doubts this, let him call to mind what we had to accomplish. +We had to penetrate an enemy's lines, to enter a besieged city, to tell +home truths to the desperate, unscrupulous leaders of the foulest +rebellion the world has ever known, and to draw from those leaders, +deep, adroit, and wary as they are, their real plans and purposes. And +all this we had to do without any official safeguard, while entirely in +their power, and while known to be their earnest and active enemies. One +false step, one unguarded word, one untoward event would have consigned +us to Castle Thunder, or the gallows. + +Can any one believe that men who undertake such work are mere lovers of +adventure, or seekers of notoriety? If any one does believe it, let him +pardon me, if I say that he knows little of human nature, and nothing of +human history. + +I am goaded to these remarks by the strictures of the Copperhead press, +but I make them in no spirit of boasting. God forbid that I should boast +of anything we did! For _we_ did nothing. Unseen influences prompted us, +unseen friends strengthened us, unseen powers were all about our way. We +felt their presence as if they had been living men; and had we been +atheists, our experience would have convinced us that there is a GOD, +and that He means that all men, everywhere, shall be free. + + + + +THE VANISHERS. + + + Sweetest of all childlike dreams + In the simple Indian lore + Still to me the legend seems + Of the Elves who flit before. + + Flitting, passing, seen and gone, + Never reached nor found at rest, + Baffling search, but beckoning on + To the Sunset of the Blest. + + From the clefts of mountain rocks, + Through the dark of lowland firs, + Flash the eyes and flow the locks + Of the mystic Vanishers! + + And the fisher in his skiff, + And the hunter on the moss, + Hear their call from cape and cliff, + See their hands the birch-leaves toss. + + Wistful, longing, through the green + Twilight of the clustered pines, + In their faces rarely seen + Beauty more than mortal shines. + + Fringed with gold their mantles flow + On the slopes of westering knolls; + In the wind they whisper low + Of the Sunset Land of Souls. + + Doubt who may, O friend of mine! + Thou and I have seen them too; + On before with beck and sign + Still they glide, and we pursue. + + More than clouds of purple trail + In the gold of setting day; + More than gleams of wing or sail + Beckon from the sea-mist gray. + + Glimpses of immortal youth, + Gleams and glories seen and lost, + Far-heard voices sweet with truth + As the tongues of Pentecost,-- + + Beauty that eludes our grasp, + Sweetness that transcends our taste, + Loving hands we may not clasp, + Shining feet that mock our haste,-- + + Gentle eyes we closed below, + Tender voices heard once more, + Smile and call us, as they go + On and onward, still before. + + Guided thus, O friend of mine! + Let us walk our little way, + Knowing by each beckoning sign + That we are not quite astray. + + Chase we still with baffled feet + Smiling eye and waving hand, + Sought and seeker soon shall meet, + Lost and found, in Sunset Land! + + + + +ICE AND ESQUIMAUX. + + +CHAPTER I. + +OFF. + +Good bye, Boston! Good bye to State-House and Common, to the "Atlantic +Monthly" and Governor Andrew, memorable institutions all,--to you also, +true Heart of the Commonwealth, and to republican and Saxon America, the +land where a man's a man even in the most inconvenient paucity of pounds +sterling. Still yours, I am weary of work and of war, weary of spinning +out ten yards of strength-fibre to twenty yards' length. And so when an +angel in moustache comes to me out of unknown space, with a card from +the "Atlantic Monthly," on a corner of which is written a mysterious +"Go, if you can," and says, "Come with me to Labrador," what can I do +but accept the omen? Therefore, after due delay, and due warning from +dear friends, and due consultations of the connubial Delphi, not +forgetting to advise with Dr. Oramel, the discreet lip obeys the instant +indiscreet wish, and says, "I go." + + +_June 5, 1864._ Provincetown. Came in here to get cheated in buying a +boat, and succeeded admirably! It was taken on board, not quite breaking +beneath its own weight; the anchor soon followed; we were away. Past the +long spit of sand on the north and west; past the new batteries, over +which floated the flag that for months would not again gladden our eyes, +save at the mast-head of some wandering ship; then, with change of +course, past the long curving neck of the desert cape; and so out upon +the open ocean we sped, with a free wind, a crested wave, and a white +wake. The land grew a low, blue cloud in the west, then melted into the +horizon. But before it faded, the heart of one man clung to it, +regretful, penitent, saying, "It was not well to go; it were better to +have stayed and suffered, as you, O Land, must suffer." + +But when it was gone; then the Before built to itself also a cloudland +and drew me on. The mystic North reached forth the wand by which it had +fascinated me so often, and renewed its spell. Who has not felt it? +Thoreau wrote of "The Wild" as he alone could write; but only in the +North do you find it,--unless you make it, as he did, by your +imagination. And even he could in this but partially succeed. Talk of +finding it in a ten-acre swamp! Why, man, you are just from a cornfield, +the echoes of your sister's piano are still in your ears, and you called +at the post-office for a letter as you came! Verdure and a mild heaven +are above; _clunking_ frogs and plants that keep company with man are +beneath. But in the North Nature herself is wild. Of man she has never +so much as heard. She has seen, perchance, a biped atomy creeping +through her snows; but he is not Man, lording it in power of thought and +performance; he is a muffled imbecility, that can do nothing but hug and +hide its existence, lest some careless breath of hers should blow it +out; his pin-head taper must be kept under a bushel, or cease to be even +the covert pettiness it is. The wildness of the North is not scenic and +pictorial merely, but goes to the very heart of things, immeasurable, +immitigable, infinite; deaf and blind to all but itself and its own, it +prevails, it is, and it is all. + +The desert and the sea are indeed untamable, but the North is more. They +hold their own, and Civilization is but a Mrs. Partington, trying to +sweep _in_ at their doors. But Commerce, though it cannot subdue, +stretches its arms across them; while Culture and Travel go and come, +still wearing their plumes, still redolent with odors of civilized +lands. The North reigns more absolutely. Commerce is but a surf on its +shores. Travel creeps guardedly, fearfully in, only to turn and creep +still more fearfully out. + +We, indeed, are feeble even in our purposes of travel. Not Kanes, +Parrys, Franklins, not intrepid to brave the presence of the Arctic +Czar, and look on his very face, with its half-year lights and +shades,--we go only to see the skirts of his robe, blown southward by +summer-seeking winds. But even the hope of this fills the Before with +enchantment, and lures us like a charm. + +Lures the ship, too, one would think: for how she flies! Fair wind and +fog we had, where clear skies were looked for,--fair wind and clear +skies, where we had expected to plough fog; Cape Sable forbears for once +to hide itself; the shores of Nova Scotia are seen through an atmosphere +of crystal and under an azure without stain, and on the third day the +Gut of Canso is reached, and anchor cast in the little harbor of a +little, dirty, bluenose villagette, ycleped "Port Mulgrave." + +Port Mulgrave? Port Filth, Port Rum, Port Dirk-Knife, Port Prostitution, +Port Fish-Gurry, Port everything unsavory and unconscionable! + +"What news from the war?" asks Bradford of the first man, on landing. + +Answer prompt. "Good news! Grant has been beaten, lost seventeen +thousand men, and is making for Washington as fast as he can run!" + +Respondent's visage questionable, however,--too dirty, and too happy. +Hence further researches; and at last a man is found who (under +prospects of trade) can contrive to tell the truth; and he acknowledges +that even the Canadian telegraph has told no such story. + +In the evening, as some of us go on shore, there is a drunken fight. +Knives are drawn, great gashes given, blood runs like rain; the +combatants tumble together into a shallow dock, stab in the mud and +water, creep out and clench and roll over and over in the ooze, stabbing +still, with beast-like, unintelligible yells, and half-intelligible +curses. A great, nasty mob huddles round,--doing what, think you? +Roaring with laughter, and hooting their fish-gurry happiness up to the +welkin! Suddenly there is a surging among them; then Smith, our young +parson, ploughs through, springs upon the fighters, who owe to nothing +but extreme drunkenness their escape from the crime of murder. He +clutches them,--jerks one this way, the other that, heedless of the +still plunging knives,--fastens upon the worst hurt of the two, and +drags him off. Are the lookers-on abashed? Never think it! They +remonstrate! Smith jets at them fine sentences of fiery, rebuking +eloquence. "Bah!" they say, "this is nothing; we are used to it!" It was +their customary theatricals, their Spanish bull-fight; and they were +little inclined to be robbed of their show. + +"Smith, you ran great risk of your life," said one, as the intrepid man +stepped on board, with a great gout of blood on his sleeve; "and your +life is surely worth more by many times than that of the creatures you +rescued." + +"I know nothing about that; I only know that they have immortal souls, +and are not fit to die." + +"Nor to live either, unhappily," said another. + +There was cod- and cunner-fishing while here. Trout, also, were caught +in a pond a little inland,--good trout, too, though nothing, of course, +to what we shall find in Labrador! Enjoy, while ye may, short pleasures, +O trouters! for long tramps--and faces--are to succeed! + + +_June 11._ After prolonged northeast rain a bright day, and with it the +setting of sail, a many-handed seesaw at the windlass, and departure. + +"Well rid of that vile hole!" says one and another. + +"Oh, but you'll be glad enough to see it three months hence," answers +the experienced Bradford. + +And we were! + +The wind blew briskly down the Gut; the tide also, which, especially on +the ebb, runs with force, helping to carry off the waters of the St. +Lawrence, was against us; and the deer-footed schooner made haste slowly +toward the west. Slower vessels failed, and were swept down by the tide; +we crept on, crept past the noble Porcupine Head, which rises abruptly +six hundred and forty feet from the sea, and at last, ceasing to tack, +made a straight line out into the Gulf of St. Lawrence, beautiful, most +beautiful, this day, if never before. It was a sweet sail we had across +that gulf, well-named and ill-reputed. The sun shone like southern +summer; the summer breeze blew mild; the rising shores and rich red soil +of Cape-Breton Isle, patched here and there with dark evergreen-forests, +and elsewhere by the lighter green of deciduous woods, lay on the +starboard side, warm-looking and welcome to the eyes. This shore, as +then seen, reminded me more than any other ever did of the Spanish coast +on the approach to Gibraltar,--the spruce woods answering in hue to +olive-groves, the other to the green of vines. Meanwhile, the +palpitating sheen on the land, the star-sprinkled blueness of the sea, +together with the softness of the delicious day, brought vividly to mind +those days in the Aegean when not even the disabilities of an invalid +could prevent his leaping over and swimming along by the ship's side. + +It was a great surprise, this climate and scene. I had expected chill +skies and bleak shores: I found the perfect pleasantness of summer in +the air, and a coast-scenery with which that of New England in general +cannot vie. + +Cape-Breton Isle is worthy of respect. With a population, if I remember +rightly, of some thirty thousand, and an area of more than three +thousand square miles, embracing an inland sea, or salt lake, deep +enough for ships-of-the-line, it has, in addition to its great mineral +wealth, a soil capable of large crops. Wheat and corn do not thrive, but +barley, oats, potatoes, and many root-crops grow abundantly. And I may +add, in passing, that Nova Scotia, over which I travelled on my return, +is worthy of a better repute. On the ocean side there is, indeed, a +strip from twenty to forty miles wide which is barren as the "Secesh" +heart of Halifax. The rock here is metamorphic, the soil worthless, the +scenery rugged, yet mean. Gold is found,--in such quantities that the +labor of each man yields a _gross_ result of two hundred and fifty-six +dollars a year! Deduct the cost of crushing the quartz, (for it is found +only in quartz,) and there is left--how much? But the Gulf-coast, and +the side of the province next the Bay of Fundy, have a carboniferous and +red-sandstone formation, with a soil often deep and rich, faultless +meads and river-intervals, and a tender shore-scenery, relieved by ruddy +cliffs, and high, broken, burnt-umber islands. + +But we are sailing up the Gulf. And while the day shines and wanes, and +the shades of evening, suffused with tender color, fall gently, and the +Gulf to the west is deeply touched with veiled, but glowing crimson, +when the sun is down, and on the other hand Cape-Breton Isle puts forth, +close to our course, two small representative islands, red sandstone, +charmingly ruddy under the sunset light,--while a mild wind, sinking, +but not ceasing, bears us on through daylight, twilight, starlight, each +perfect of its kind,--let me introduce our voyagers severally to the +reader. + +First, the ship, surely a voyager as much as any of us! + +"Benjamin S. Wright," fore-and-aft schooner, one hundred and thirty-six +tons, built by McKay, and worthy of him,--deep, sharp, broad of beam, a +fine seaboat, swift as the wind, a little long-masted for regular +sea-voyaging, but, with this partial exception, faultless. + +Next will naturally come the responsible originator and operator of the +expedition. + +William Bradford, artist,--slight in stature, delicate, though marked, +in feature,--sensitive, pious, ardent, absorbed,--not of distinguished +mental power, though of active mind, aside from his profusion, but +within it a proper man of genius, with no superior, so far as I know, +but Turner, and no equal but Stanfield, in his power to render the sea +in action. + +The passengers were twelve in number; but with them I include two +others, who have a claim to that company. Here they are. + +A----, "the Colonel,"--a lieutenant in the regular army, retired on +account of illness,--brave, intelligent, cultivated, a Churchman +undeveloped in spiritual sense, rough in his sports, proud as a Roman, +his whole being, indeed, built up on manly, Roman pride,--a Greenland +voyager, and better read than any man I have met in the literature of +Northern travel. + +H----, "the Judge,"--cool-headed, warm-hearted, compassionate, +irascible, liberal, witty, easy speaker and fine conversationist, with +an inexhaustible fund of sense, anecdote, candor, and good heart. + +L----, navy-surgeon,--also retired on account of extreme illness,--a +sensible, quiet, good man and gentleman. + +A. S. Packard, Jr., _Magister Artium_, scientist,--devoting his +attention chiefly to Insecta, Mollusca, and Radiata, but giving +penetrating glances at geology and physical geography,--attracted to the +North, where he had been before,--imperturbable, equal in humor and +good-humor, companionable, a boon to the party, and richly meriting the +thanks I here offer him. + +M----, ornithologist,--young, unripe, inattentive to his person, but +very intelligent, and bound to be a man of mark. + +S----, "the Parson,"--Episcopal, twenty-five years old, active in mind, +naturally eloquent, pious, social, genial, generous, and frank as the +day. + +P----, graduate of college and law-school,--handsome, companionable, +fluent in writing or talk, and excellent at trolling a stave. + +L----, quietest mouse in the world, but seen at once to be a gentleman, +and found afterwards to be a man of thought and culture. + +C----, with the gravest, maturest, most thoughtful and balanced mind, +and one of the happiest appetites I ever found in a boy of fourteen, +singularly ingenuous and high-minded, a rare spirit. + +P----, photographer, skilful, and a good fellow. + +W----, whose wife is enviable among women. + +Captain H----, employed by Bradford, not as master, but as general +ally,--old whaler, one of Nature's noblemen, to whom experience has been +a university and the world a book, strong as the strongest of men, +tender as the tenderest of women. + +Ph----, fine Greek and Latin scholar, rich as Croesus and simple in +his habits as Ochiltree,--passionately fond of travel,--as well read, I +will undertake to say, in the literature of travel in Egypt, Arabia, +Syria, and Turkey, as any other man twenty-five years old in Europe or +America,--full of facts, strong in mind, deep In heart, religious, +candid, sincere, courageous, at once frank and reticent,--a thoroughly +large and profound nature, whom it was worth going to Labrador to meet. + +Finally, your humble servant, "the Elder," who trusts that the reader +remembers meeting him before, and has somewhat, at least, of his own +pleasure in renewing the acquaintance. + + * * * * * + +The morning of June twelfth, our second Sunday on board, was one to +remain memorable among mornings for beauty,--for these were halcyon +days, and Nature could not change for a moment from her mood. It was +nowise odd or strange, no Nubian of Thibetan beauty, no three-faced +Hindoo divinity, but a regular Grecian-featured Apollo, amber in +forehead, fitly arrayed, coming to a world worthy of him. Cape-Breton +Isle was a strip of denser sky on the southeast horizon; on the west, +far away, rose Entry Island, one of the Magdalen group, deliciously +ruddy and Mediterranean-looking, seen through the lovely, ethereal, +purple haze; while others of the group appeared farther away, one of +them, long and low, an island of absolute gold, polished gold, splendid +as gold under sunshine can be. The light wind bore us on so serenely as +to give the sense of calm more than calm itself; while the music of our +motion through the water, that incomparable barytone, rendered this calm +into sound. + +It was the very Sabbath and Sunday of Nature,--her Sabbath of rest, and +her Sunday of joy. I was surprised to find myself not surprised by this +wonderful morning. It seemed not new nor foreign, but suggested some +divine old-time familiarity and fellowship. It looked me in the eyes out +of its immortal hilarity and peace, took me by the hand, and said, +"Forever!" And in that "Forever" spoke to me an infinite remembrance and +an infinite hope. + +At eleven A. M. we drew near to Gannet Rocks. These are three in number, +all high, one quite small and conical, a second somewhat larger, the +third, which is the home of gannets, several acres in extent. They were +all ruddy, being of red sandstone; and the smallest, in that warm light, +was actual carmine. The largest rises with precipitous sides, which in +parts beetle far over the sea, to a height of four hundred feet, having +above a surface nearly level, but sloping gently to the south. By zigzag +scrambling one may at a particular point climb to this surface; but it +is a hard climb, and a landing can be effected only in extreme calm. + +At the distance of two miles or more, on our approach, the surface was +visible, owing to its slight southward slope. It had precisely the +appearance of being deeply covered with snow, save in one part, about a +fourth of its area, where it was bright green. We knew that this snow +was no other than the female gannets, crowded together in the act of +sitting on their eggs; but by no inspection with powerful glasses could +we discern a single point where the rock appeared between them. They +were literally _packed_ together, every inch of room being used. Six or +eight acres of them! + +But where are the males? There is no apparent room for them on the rock. +Just as this question occurred to me, some one cried out, "Look in the +air! look in the air above the rock!" I lifted my glass, and there they +were, a veritable _cloud_. They reminded me, saving the color, of a +cloud of midges which astonished me one summer evening when I was a +boy,--so thick that you could not see through them. Whether these ever +alight I cannot say. One thing is certain: they cannot all, nor any +considerable portion of them, alight on this rock together,--unless, +indeed, one should roost on another's back. + +But the gannet is not particular about alighting. It is just as cheap +flying, he thinks. His true home, like that of the frigate-bird and one +or two others, is the air. This is indicated in his structure. The skin +is not, as in most animals, strictly connected with the flesh, but is +attached by separate elastic fibres; and, like the frigate-bird, it can +force in under the skin, and into various cellular passages in the body, +air which is rarefied by its animal heat, and contributes greatly to its +buoyancy. + +The gannet is a handsome bird, larger by measurement, though not +heavier, than the largest gulls,--snow-white, save the outer third of +the wing, which is jet-black,--his wings long and sharp,--his motion in +the air not rapid, but singularly home-like and easy. He is unable to +rise from level ground, but must launch himself from a height, probably +owing to his shortness and inelasticity of leg and length of wing; nor, +indeed, can he rise from the water, unless somewhat assisted by its +motion. And this suggests a beautiful provision of Nature: the wings of +all true swimmers and divers are short and-round, to facilitate their +ascent from the water. + +If surprised on land, the gannet neither attempts to fly nor offers +resistance, conscious of helplessness; but when attacked in the water, +where he is more at home, he will fight fiercely. Nuttall, with grange +contradiction, says, that, though web-footed, they do not swim,--yet +elsewhere speaks of looking down from a cliff and seeing them "swimming +and chasing their prey." I cannot testify. + +After lingering an hour or two, "breaking the Sabbath," the schooner +proceeded,--the wind freshening during the afternoon, and the Gulf +growing choppy, as if it could not quite suffer us to pass without +exhibiting somewhat of that peevish quality for which it has an evil +renown. It was but a passing wrinkle of ill-humor, however,--a feeble +hint of what it could do, if it chose. + +And when we recrossed it, two and a half months later, it chose! + + * * * * * + +_June 14._ "Land ho! Labrador!" + +"Where? Where is it?" cry a chorus of voices. + +"There, a little on the larboard bow." + +A long, silent, rather disconcerted gaze. + +"I don't see it," says one. + +"Nor I." + +"There,--there,"--pointing,--"close down to the sea." + +"You don't mean that cloud?" + +"I mean that land." + +"Humph!" + +There is something occult about this art of seeing land. The landsman's +eyesight is good; he prides himself a little upon it. He looks; and for +him the land isn't there. The seaman's eyesight is no better; he looks, +and for him the land is so plainly in view that he cannot understand +your failure to see it. He is secretly pleased, though,--and may pretend +impatience in order to conceal his pleasure. I have sailed in all, +perhaps, a distance equal to that around the earth, a good proportion of +it along-shore; and I see as far as most men. But once on this very +voyage, during a storm, I had occasion to be convinced that nautical +optics will assert their advantage. Land was pointed out; it had been +some time seen, and we were avoiding it, the weather being thick and our +position uncertain. I did my best to descry it, ready to quarrel with my +eyes for not doing so, and a little annoyed to find myself but a +landsman after all. But see it I couldn't. I did indeed, after a while, +make out to fancy that I perceived an infinitesimal densening of the +mist there; but the illusion was one difficult to sustain. + +At four o'clock in the afternoon we cast anchor in Sleupe Harbor, named +for one Admiral Sleupe, of whom I know just this, that a harbor in +Labrador, Lat. 51 deg., is named for him. This region, however, is named +generally from Little Mecatina Island, which lies about six miles to the +southwest, considerable in size, and a most wild-looking land, tossed, +tumbled, twisted, and contorted in every conceivable and inconceivable +way. The harbor, too, a snug little hole between islands, was worthy of +Labrador. Its shores were all of gray, unbroken rock, not rising in +cliffs, but sloping to the sea, and dipping under it in regular decline, +like a shore of sand; while not a tree, not a shrub, not a grass-blade, +was to be seen. I never beheld a scene so bleak, bare, and hard. Nor did +I ever see a shore that seemed so completely "master of the situation." +The mightiest cliff confesses the power which it resists. Grand, +enduring, awful, it may be; but many a scar on its face and many a +fragment at its feet tells of what it endures. But this scarless gray +rock, thrusting its hand in a matter-of-course way under the sea, and +seeming to hold it as in a cup, suggested a quality so comfortably +immitigable that one's eyes grew cold in looking at it. + +Suddenly, "I see an inhabitant!" cries one. + +Yes, there he was, moving over the rock. Can you imagine how far away +and foreign he looked? The gray granite beneath him, the gray cloud +above him, seemed nearer akin. Instinctively, one thought of hastening +to a book of natural history for some description of the creature. Then +came the counter-thought, "This is a man!" And the attempt to realize +that fact put him yet farther, put him infinitely away. It was like +rebounding from a wall. No form is so foreign as the human, if a bar be +placed to the sympathy of him who regards it; and for the time this waif +of humanity walked in the circle of an unconquerable strangeness. + +He came on board,--another with him; for their hut was near by. +Canadian French they proved to be; could tatter English a little; and +with the passage of speech the flow of sympathy began, and we felt them +to be human. Through the Word the worlds were made! + +A wilderness of desert islands lies at this point along the coast, +extending out, I judged, not less than fifteen miles. Excepting Little +Mecatina, which is a number of miles in length, and must be some fifteen +hundred feet high, they are not very considerable either in area or +elevation,--from five to five hundred acres in extent, and from thirty +to two hundred feet in height. They are swardless and treeless, though +in two places I found a few blades of coarse, tawny-green grass; and +patches of sombre shrubbery, two and a half feet high, were not wanting. +Little lichen grows on the rock, though in the depressions and on many +of the slopes grows, or at least exists, a boggy greenish-gray moss, +over which it breaks your knees--if, indeed, your spine do not choose to +monopolize that enjoyment--to travel long. The rock is pale granite, +disposed in layers, which vary from two to ten or twelve feet in +thickness. These incline at an angle of from ten to twenty degrees, +giving to the islands, as a predominant characteristic, a regular slope +on one side and a cliff-like aspect on the other; though not a few are +bent up in the middle, perhaps exhibiting there some sharp ridge or +vertical wall, while from this they decline to either side. + +As beheld on the day of our arrival, this scenery was of an incomparable +desolation. Above was the coldest gray sky I remember to have seen; the +sea lay all in pallid, deathly gray beneath; islands in all shades of +grimmer and grimmest gray checkered it; vast drifts of gray old snow +filled the deeper hollows; and a heartless atmosphere pushed in the +sense of this grayness to the very marrow. It was as if all the ruddy +and verdurous juices had died in the veins of the world, and from core +to surface only gray remained. To credit fully the impression of the +scene, one would say that Existence was dead, and that we stood looking +on its corpse, which even in death could never decay. Eternal +Desolation,--Labrador! + +But extremes meet. + + + + +THE PROCESS OF SCULPTURE. + + +I have heard so much, lately, about artists who do not do their own +work, that I feel disposed to raise the veil upon the mysteries of the +studio, and enable those who are interested in the subject to form a +just conception of the amount of assistance to which a sculptor is +fairly entitled, as well as to correct the false, but very general +impression, that the artist, beginning with the crude block, and guided +by his imagination only, hews out his statue with his own hands. + +So far from this being the case, the first labor of the sculptor is upon +a small clay model; in which he carefully studies the composition of his +statue, the proportions, and the general arrangement of the drapery, +without regard to very careful finish of parts. This being accomplished, +and the small model cast in plaster, he employs some one to enlarge his +work to any size which he may require; and this is done by scale, and +with almost as much precision as the full-size and perfectly finished +model is afterwards copied in marble. + +The first step in this process is to form a skeleton of iron, the size +and strength of the iron rods corresponding to the size of the figure to +be modelled; and here, not only strong hands and arms are requisite, +but the blacksmith with his forge, many of the irons requiring to be +heated and bent upon the anvil to the desired angle. This solid +framework being prepared, and the various irons of which it is composed +firmly wired and welded together, the next thing is to hang thereon a +series of crosses, often several hundred in number, formed by two bits +of wood, two or three inches in length, fastened together by wire, one +end of which is attached to the framework. All this is necessary for the +support of the clay, which would otherwise fall by its own weight. (I +speak here of Roman clay,--the clay obtained in many parts of England +and America being more properly potter's clay, and consequently more +tenacious.) The clay is then pressed firmly around and upon the irons +and crosses with strong hands and a wooden mallet, until, from a clumsy +and shapeless mass, it acquires some resemblance to the human form. When +the clay is properly prepared, and the work advanced as far as the +artist desires, his own work is resumed, and he then laboriously studies +every part, corrects his ideal by comparison with living models, copies +his drapery from actual drapery arranged upon the lay-figure, and gives +to his statue the last refinement of beauty. + +It will thus be seen that there is an intermediate stage, even in the +clay, when the work passes completely out of the sculptor's hands and is +carried forward by his assistant,--the work on which the latter is +employed, however, obviously requiring not the least exercise of +creative power, which is essentially the attribute of the artist. To +perform the part assigned him, it is not necessary that the assistant, +should be a man of imagination or refined taste,--it is sufficient that +he have simply the skill, with the aid of accurate measurements, to +construct the framework of iron and to copy the small model before him. +But in _originating_ that small model, when the artist had nothing to +work from but the image existing in his own brain, imagination, refined +feeling, and a sense of grace were essential, and were called into +constant exercise. So, again, when the clay model returns into the +sculptor's hands, and the work approaches completion, often after the +labor of many months, it is he alone who infuses into the clay that +refinement and individuality of beauty which constitute his "style," and +which are the test of the greater or less degree of refinement of his +mind, as the force and originality of the conception are the test of his +intellectual power. + +The clay model having at last been rendered as perfect as possible, the +sculptor's work upon the statue is virtually ended; for it is then cast +in plaster and given into the hands of the marble-workers, by whom, +almost entirely, it is completed, the sculptor merely directing and +correcting the work as it proceeds. This disclosure, I am aware, will +shock the many, who often ingeniously discover traces of the sculptor's +hand where they do not exist. It is true, that, in some cases, the +finishing touches are introduced by the artist himself; but I suspect +that few who have accomplished and competent workmen give much of their +time to the mallet or the chisel, preferring to occupy themselves with +some new creation, or considering that these implements may be more +advantageously wielded by those who devote themselves exclusively to +their use. It is also true, that, although the process of transferring +the statue from plaster to marble is reduced to a science so perfect +that to err is almost impossible, yet much depends upon the workmen to +whom this operation is intrusted. Still, their position in the studio is +a subordinate one. They translate the original thought of the sculptor, +written in clay, into the language of marble. The translator may do his +work well or ill,--he may appreciate and preserve the delicacy of +sentiment and grace which were stamped upon the clay, or he may render +the artist's meaning coarsely and unintelligibly. Then it is that the +sculptor himself must reproduce his ideal in the marble, and breathe +into it that vitality which, many contend, only the artist can inspire. +But, whether skilful or not, the relation of these workmen to the artist +is precisely the same as that of the mere linguist to the author who, in +another tongue, has given to the world some striking fancy or original +thought. + +But the question when the clay _is_ "properly prepared" forms the +debatable ground, and has already furnished a convenient basis for the +charge that it is never "properly prepared" for women-artists until it +is ready for the caster. I affirm, from personal knowledge, that this +charge is utterly without foundation,--and as it would be affectation in +me to ignore what has been so freely circulating upon this subject in +print, I take this opportunity of stating that I have never yet allowed +a statue to leave my studio, upon the clay model of which I had not +worked during a period of from four to eight months,--and further, that +I should choose to refer all those desirous of ascertaining the truth to +Mr. Nucci, who "prepares" my clay for me, rather than to my +brother-sculptor, in the _Via Margutta_, who originated the report that +I was an impostor. So far, however, as my designs are concerned, I +believe even he has not, as yet, found occasion to accuse me of drawing +upon other brains than my own. + +We women-artists have no objection to its being known that we employ +assistants; we merely object to its being supposed that it is a system +peculiar to _ourselves_. When Thorwaldsen was called upon to execute his +twelve statues of the Apostles, he designed and furnished the small +models, and gave them into the hands of his pupils and assistants, by +whom, almost exclusively, they were copied in their present colossal +dimensions. The great master rarely put his own hand to the clay; yet we +never hear them spoken of except as "Thorwaldsen's statues." When +Vogelberg accepted the commission to model his colossal equestrian +statue of Gustavus Adolphus, physical infirmity prevented the artist +from even mounting the scaffolding; but he made the small model, and +directed the several workmen employed upon the full-size statue in clay, +and we never heard it intimated that Vogelberg was not the sculptor of +that great work. Even Crawford, than whom none ever possessed a more +rapid or facile hand, could never have accomplished half the immense +amount of work which pressed upon him in his later years, had he not had +more than one pair of hands to aid him in giving outward form to the +images in his fertile brain. Nay, not to refer solely to artists who are +no longer among us, I could name many studios, both in Rome and England, +belonging to our brothers in Art, in which the assistant-modeller forms +as necessary a part of studio-"property" as the living model or the +marble-workers,--and many more, on a smaller scale, in which he lends a +helping hand whenever required. If there are a few instances in which +the sculptor himself conducts his clay model through every stage, it is +usually because pecuniary considerations prevent his employing a +professional modeller. + +I do not wish it to be supposed that Thorwaldsen's general practice was +such as I have described in the particular case referred to: probably no +artist ever studied or worked more carefully upon the clay model than +he. What I have stated was only with the view of showing to what extent +he felt himself justified in employing assistance. I am quite persuaded, +however, that, had Thorwaldsen and Vogelberg been women, and employed +one-half the amount of assistance they did in the cases mentioned, we +should long since have heard the great merit of their works attributed +to the skill of their workmen. + +Nor should we forget--to draw for examples upon a kindred art--how +largely the painters of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries relied +upon the mechanical skill of their pupils to assist them in producing +the great works which bear their names. All the painters of note of that +time, like many of the present day, had their pupils, to whom was +intrusted much of the laborious portion of their work, the master +furnishing the design and superintending its execution. Raphael, for +instance, could never have left one half the treasures of Art which +adorn the Vatican and enrich other galleries, had he depended solely +upon the rapidity of his own hand; and of the many frescos which exist +in the Farnese Palace, and are called "Raphael's frescos," there are but +two in which are to be traced the master's hand,--the Galatea, and one +of the compartments in the series representing the story of Cupid and +Psyche. + +It will thus be seen how large a portion of the manual labor which is +supposed to devolve entirely upon the artist is, and has always been, +really performed by other hands than his own. I do not state this fact +in a whisper, as if it were a great disclosure which involved the honor +of the artist; it is no secret, and there is no reason why it should be +so. The disclosure, it is true, will be received by all who regard +sculpture as simply a mechanical art with a feeling of disappointment. +They will brand the artist who cannot lay claim to the entire +manipulation of his statue, whether in clay or marble, as an +impostor,--nor will they resign the idea that the truly conscientious +sculptor will carve every ornament upon his sandals and polish every +button upon his drapery. But those who look upon sculpture as an +intellectual art, requiring the exercise of taste, imagination, and +delicate feeling, will never identify the artist who conceives, +composes, and completes the design with the workman who simply relieves +him from great physical labor, however delicate some portion of that +labor may be. It should be a recognized fact, that the sculptor is as +fairly entitled to avail himself of mechanical aid in the execution of +his work as the architect to call into requisition the services of the +stone-mason in the erection of his edifice, or the poet to employ the +printer to give his thoughts to the world. Probably the sturdy mason +never thinks much about proportion, nor the type-setter much about +harmony; but the master-minds which inspire the strong arm and cunning +finger with motion think about and study both. It is high time that some +distinction should be made between the labor of the hand and the labor +of the brain. It is high time, in short, that the public should +understand in what the sculptor's work properly consists, and thus +render less pernicious the representations of those who, either from +thoughtlessness or malice, dwelling upon the fact that assistance has +been employed in certain cases, without defining the limits of that +assistance, imply the guilt of imposture in the artists, and deprive +them, and more particularly women-artists, of the credit to which, by +talent or conscientious labor, they are justly entitled. + + HARRIET HOSMER. + + + + +BRYANT'S SEVENTIETH BIRTHDAY. + + + O even-handed Nature! we confess + This life that men so honor, love, and bless + Has filled thine olden measure. Not the less + + We count the precious seasons that remain; + Strike not the level of the golden grain, + But heap it high with years, that earth may gain + + What heaven can lose,--for heaven is rich in song: + Do not all poets, dying, still prolong + Their broken chants amid the seraph throng, + + Where, blind no more, Ionia's bard is seen, + And England's heavenly minstrel sits between + The Mantuan and the wan-cheeked Florentine? + + This was the first sweet singer in the cage + Of our close-woven life. A new-born age + Claims in his vesper song its heritage: + + Spare us, oh, spare us long our heart's desire! + Moloch, who calls our children through the fire, + Leaves us the gentle master of the lyre. + + We count not on the dial of the sun + The hours, the minutes, that his sands have run; + Rather, as on those flowers that one by one + + From earliest dawn their ordered bloom display + Till evening's planet with her guiding ray + Leads in the blind old mother of the day, + + We reckon by his songs, each song a flower, + The long, long daylight, numbering hour by hour, + Each breathing sweetness like a bridal bower. + + His morning glory shall we e'er forget? + His noontide's full-blown lily coronet? + His evening primrose has not opened yet; + + Nay, even if creeping Time should hide the skies + In midnight from his century-laden eyes, + Darkened like his who sang of Paradise, + + Would not some hidden song-bud open bright + As the resplendent cactus of the night + That floods the gloom with fragrance and with light? + + How can we praise the verse whose music flows + With solemn cadence and majestic close, + Pure as the dew that filters through the rose? + + How shall we thank him that in evil days + He faltered never,--nor for blame, nor praise, + Nor hire, nor party, shamed his earlier lays? + + But as his boyhood was of manliest hue, + So to his youth his manly years were true, + All dyed in royal purple through and through! + + He for whose touch the lyre of Heaven is strung + Needs not the flattering toil of mortal tongue: + Let not the singer grieve to die unsung! + + Marbles forget their message to mankind: + In his own verse the poet still we find, + In his own page his memory lives enshrined, + + As in their amber sweets the smothered bees,-- + As the fair cedar, fallen before the breeze, + Lies self-embalmed amidst the mouldering trees. + + Poets, like youngest children, never grow + Out of their mother's fondness. Nature so + Holds their soft hands, and will not let them go, + + Till at the last they track with even feet + Her rhythmic footsteps, and their pulses beat + Twinned with her pulses, and their lips repeat + + The secrets she has told them, as their own: + Thus is the inmost soul of Nature known, + And the rapt minstrel shares her awful throne! + + O lover of her mountains and her woods, + Her bridal chamber's leafy solitudes, + Where Love himself with tremulous step intrudes, + + Her snows fall harmless on thy sacred fire: + Far be the day that claims thy sounding lyre + To join the music of the angel choir! + + Yet, since life's amplest measure must be filled, + Since throbbing hearts must be forever stilled, + And all must fade that evening sunsets gild, + + Grant, Father, ere he close the mortal eyes + That see a Nation's reeking sacrifice, + Its smoke may vanish from these blackened skies! + + Then, when his summons comes, since come it must, + And, looking heavenward with unfaltering trust, + He wraps his drapery round him for the dust, + + His last fond glance will show him o'er his head + The Northern fires beyond the zenith spread + In lambent glory, blue and white and red,-- + + The Southern cross without its bleeding load, + The milky way of peace all freshly strowed, + And every white-throned star fixed in its lost abode! + +NOVEMBER 3, 1864. + + + + +LEAVES FROM AN OFFICER'S JOURNAL. + + +II. + + CAMP SAXTON, near Beaufort, S.C. + _December 11, 1862._ + +Haroun Alrashid, wandering in disguise through his imperial streets, +scarcely happened upon a greater variety of groups than I, in my evening +strolls among our own camp-fires. + +Beside some of these fires, the men are cleaning their guns or +rehearsing their drill,--beside others, smoking in silence their very +scanty supply of the beloved tobacco,--beside others, telling stories +and shouting with laughter over the broadest mimicry, in which they +excel, and in which the officers come in for a full share. The +everlasting "shout" is always within hearing, with its mixture of piety +and polka, and its castanet-like clapping of the hands. Then there are +quieter prayer-meetings, with pious invocations, and slow psalms, +"deaconed out" from memory by the leader, two lines at a time, in a sort +of wailing chant. Elsewhere, there are _conversazioni_ around fires, +with a woman for queen of the circle,--her Nubian face, gay head-dress, +gilt necklace, and white teeth, all resplendent in the glowing light. +Sometimes the woman is spelling slow monosyllables out of a primer, a +feat which always commands all ears,--they rightly recognizing a mighty +spell, equal to the overthrowing of monarchs, in the magic assonance of +_cat_, _hat_, _pat_, _bat_, and the rest of it. Elsewhere, it is some +solitary old cook, some aged Uncle Tiff, with enormous spectacles, who +is perusing a hymn-book by the light of a pine splinter, in his deserted +cooking-booth of palmetto-leaves. By another fire there is an +actual dance, red-legged soldiers doing right-and-left, and +"now-lead-de-lady-ober," to the music of a violin which is rather +artistically played, and which may have guided the steps, in other days, +of Barnwells and Hugers. And yonder is a stump-orator perched on his +barrel, pouring out his exhortations to fidelity in war and in religion. +To-night for the first time I have heard an harangue in a different +strain, quite saucy, skeptical, and defiant, appealing to them in a sort +of French materialistic style, and claiming some personal experience of +warfare. "You don't know notin' about it, boys. You tink you's brave +enough; how you tink, if you stan' clar in de open field,--here you, an' +dar de Secesh? You's got to hab de right ting inside o' you. You must +hab it 'served [preserved] in you, like dese yer sour plums dey 'serve +in de barr'l; you's got to harden it down inside o' you, or it's +notin'." Then he hit hard at the religionists:--"When a man's got de +sperit ob de Lord in him, it weakens him all out, can't hoe de corn." He +had a great deal of broad sense in his speech; but presently some others +began praying vociferously close by, as if to drown this free-thinker, +when at last he exclaimed, "I mean to fight de war through, an' die a +good sojer wid de last kick,--dat's _my_ prayer!" and suddenly jumped +off the barrel. I was quite interested at discovering this reverse side +of the temperament, the devotional side preponderates so enormously, and +the greatest scamps kneel and groan in their prayer-meetings with such +entire zest. It shows that there is some individuality developed among +them, and that they will not become too exclusively pietistic. + +Their love of the spelling-book is perfectly inexhaustible,--they +stumbling on by themselves, or the blind leading the blind, with the +same pathetic patience which they carry into everything. The chaplain is +getting up a school-house, where he will soon teach them as regularly as +he can. But the alphabet must always be a very incidental business in a +camp. + + * * * * * + + _December 14._ + +Passages from prayers in the camp:-- + +"Let me so lib dat when I die I shall _hab manners_, dat I shall know +what to say when I see my Heabenly Lord." + +"Let me lib wid de musket in one hand, an' de Bible in de oder,--dat if +I die at de muzzle ob de musket, die in de water, die on de land, I may +know I hab de bressed Jesus in my hand, an' hab no fear." + +"I hab lef' my wife in de land o' bondage; my little ones dey say eb'ry +night, Whar is my fader? But when I die, when de bressed mornin' rises, +when I shall stan' in de glory, wid one foot on de water an' one foot on +de land, den, O Lord, I shall see my wife an' my little chil'en once +more." + +These sentences I noted down, as best I could, beside the glimmering +camp-fire last night. The same person was the hero of a singular little +_contre-temps_ at a funeral in the afternoon. It was our first funeral. +The man had died in hospital, and we had chosen a picturesque +burial-place above the river, near the old church, and beside a little +nameless cemetery, used by generations of slaves. It was a regular +military funeral, the coffin being draped with the American flag, the +escort marching behind, and three volleys fired over the grave. During +the services there was singing, the chaplain deaconing out the hymn in +their favorite way. This ended, he announced his text,--"This poor man +cried, and the Lord heard him, and delivered him out of all his +trouble." Instantly, to my great amazement, the cracked voice of the +chorister was uplifted, intoning the text, as if it were the first verse +of another hymn. So calmly was it done, so imperturbable were all the +black countenances, that I half began to conjecture that the chaplain +himself intended it for a hymn, though I could imagine no prospective +rhyme for _trouble_, unless it were approximated by _debbil_,--which is, +indeed, a favorite reference, both with the men and with his Reverence. +But the chaplain, peacefully awaiting, gently repeated his text after +the chant, and to my great relief the old chorister waived all further +recitative and let the funeral discourse proceed. + +Their memories are a vast bewildered chaos of Jewish history and +biography; and most of the great events of the past, down to the period +of the American Revolution, they instinctively attribute to Moses. There +is a fine bold confidence in all their citations, however, and the +record never loses piquancy in their hands, though strict accuracy may +suffer. Thus, one of my captains, last Sunday, heard a colored exhorter +at Beaufort proclaim, "Paul may plant, _and may polish wid water_, but +it won't do," in which the sainted Apollos would hardly have recognized +himself. + +Just now one of the soldiers came to me to say that he was about to be +married to a girl in Beaufort, and would I lend him a dollar and +seventy-five cents to buy the wedding outfit? It seemed as if matrimony +on such moderate terms ought to be encouraged, in these days; and so I +responded to the appeal. + + * * * * * + + _December 16._ + +To-day a young recruit appeared here, who had been the slave of Colonel +Sammis, one of the leading Florida refugees. Two white companions came +with him, who also appeared to be retainers of the Colonel, and I asked +them to dine. Being likewise refugees, they had stories to tell, and +were quite agreeable: one was English-born, the other Floridian, a dark, +sallow Southerner, very well-bred. After they had gone, the Colonel +himself appeared. I told him that I had been entertaining his white +friends, and after a while he quietly let out the remark,-- + +"Yes, one of those white friends of whom you speak is a boy raised on +one of my plantations; he has travelled with me to the North and passed +for white, and he always keeps away from the negroes." + +Certainly no such suspicion had ever crossed my mind. + +I have noticed one man in the regiment who would easily pass for +white,--a little sickly drummer, aged fifty at least, with brown eyes +and reddish hair, who is said to be the son of one of our commodores. I +have seen perhaps a dozen persons as fair or fairer, among fugitive +slaves, but they were usually young children. It touched me far more to +see this man, who had spent more than half a lifetime in this low +estate, and for whom it now seemed too late to be anything but a +"nigger." This offensive word, by the way, is almost as common with them +as at the North, and far more common than with well-bred slave-holders. +They have meekly accepted it. "Want to go out to de nigger-houses, Sah," +is the universal impulse of sociability, when they wish to cross the +lines. "He hab twenty house-servants, an' two hundred head o' nigger," +is a still more degrading form of phrase, in which the epithet is +limited to the field-hands, and they estimated like so many cattle. This +want of self-respect of course interferes with the authority of the +non-commissioned officers, which is always difficult to sustain, even in +white regiments. "He needn't try to play de white man ober me," was the +protest of a soldier against his corporal the other day. To counteract +this, I have often to remind them that they do not obey their officers +because they are white, but because they are their officers; and +guard-duty is an admirable school for this, because they readily +understand that the sergeant or corporal of the guard has for the time +more authority than any commissioned officer who is not on duty. It is +necessary also for their superiors to treat the non-commissioned +officers with careful courtesy, and I often caution the line-officers +never to call them "Sam" or "Will," nor omit the proper handle to their +names. The value of the habitual courtesies of the regular army is +exceedingly apparent with these men: an officer of polished manners can +wind them round his finger, while white soldiers seem rather to prefer a +certain roughness. The demeanor of my men to each other is very +courteous, and yet I see none of that sort of upstart conceit which is +sometimes offensive among free negroes at the North, the dandy-barber +strut. This is an agreeable surprise, for I feared that freedom and +regimentals would produce precisely that. + +They seem the world's perpetual children, docile, gay, and lovable, in +the midst of this war for freedom on which they have intelligently +entered. Last night, before "taps," there was the greatest noise in camp +that I had ever heard, and I feared some riot. On going out, I found the +most tumultuous sham-fight proceeding in total darkness, two +companies playing like boys, beating tin cups for drums. When some +of them saw me they seemed a little dismayed, and came and said, +beseechingly,--"Cunnel, Sah, you hab no objection to we playin', +Sah?"--which objection I disclaimed; but soon they all subsided, rather +to my regret, and scattered merrily. Afterward I found that some other +officer had told them that I considered the affair too noisy, so that I +felt a mild self-reproach when one said, "Cunnel, wish you had let we +play a little longer, Sah." Still I was not sorry, on the whole; for +these sham-fights between companies would in some regiments lead to real +ones, and there is a latent jealousy here between the Florida and +South-Carolina men, which sometimes makes me anxious. + +The officers are more kind and patient with the men than I should +expect, since the former are mostly young, and drilling tries the +temper; but they are aided by hearty satisfaction in the results already +attained. I have never yet heard a doubt expressed among the officers as +to the _superiority_ of these men to white troops in aptitude for drill +and discipline, because of their imitativeness and docility, and the +pride they take in the service. One captain said to me to-day, "I have +this afternoon taught my men to load-in-nine-times, and they do it +better than we did it in my former company in three months." I can +personally testify that one of our best lieutenants, an Englishman, +taught a part of his company the essential movements of the "school for +skirmishers" in a single lesson of two hours, so that they did them very +passably, though I feel bound to discourage such haste. However, I +"formed square" on the third battalion-drill. Three-fourths of drill +consist of attention, imitation, and a good ear for time; in the other +fourth, which consists of the application of principles, as, for +instance, performing by the left flank some movement before learned by +the right, they are perhaps slower than better-educated men. Having +belonged to five different drill-clubs before entering the army, I +certainly ought to know something of the resources of human awkwardness, +and I can honestly say that they astonish me by the facility with which +they do things. I expected much harder work in this respect. + +The habit of carrying burdens on the head gives them erectness of +figure, even where physically disabled. I have seen a woman, with a +brimming water-pail balanced on her head,--or perhaps a cup, saucer, and +spoon,--stop suddenly, turn round, stoop to pick up a missile, rise +again, fling it, light a pipe, and go through many evolutions with +either hand or both, without spilling a drop. The pipe, by the way, +gives an odd look to a well-dressed young girl on Sunday, but one often +sees that spectacle. The passion for tobacco among our men continues +quite absorbing, and I have piteous appeals for some arrangement by +which they can buy it on credit, as we have yet no sutler. Their +imploring, "Cunnel, we can't _lib_ widout it, Sah," goes to my heart; +and as they cannot read, I cannot even have the melancholy satisfaction +of supplying them with the excellent anti-tobacco tracts of Mr. Trask. + + * * * * * + + _December 19._ + +Last night the water froze in the adjutant's tent, but not in mine. +To-day has been mild and beautiful. The blacks say they do not feel the +cold so much as the white officers do, and perhaps it is so, though +their health evidently suffers more from dampness. On the other hand, +while drilling on very warm days, they have seemed to suffer more from +heat than their officers. But they dearly love fire, and at night will +always have it, if possible, even on the minutest scale,--a mere handful +of splinters, that seems hardly more efficacious than a friction-match. +Probably this is a natural habit for the short-lived coolness of an +out-door country; and then there is something delightful in this rich +pine, which burns like a tar-barrel. It was perhaps encouraged by the +masters, as the only cheap luxury the slaves had at hand. + +As one grows more acquainted with the men, their individualities emerge; +and I find first their faces, then their characters, to be as distinct +as those of whites. It is very interesting the desire they show to do +their duty and to improve as soldiers; they evidently think about it, +and see the importance of the thing; they say to me that we white men +cannot stay and be their leaders always, and that they must learn to +depend on themselves, or else relapse into their former condition. + +Beside the superb branch of uneatable bitter oranges which decks my +tent-pole, I have to-day hung up a long bough of finger-sponge, which +floated to the riverbank. As winter advances, butterflies gradually +disappear: one species (a _Vanessa_) lingers; three others have vanished +since I came. Mocking-birds are abundant, but rarely sing; once or twice +they have reminded me of the red thrush, but are inferior, as I have +always thought. The colored people all say that it will be much cooler; +but my officers do not think so, perhaps because last winter was so +unusually mild,--with only one frost, they say. + + * * * * * + + _December 20._ + +Philoprogenitiveness is an important organ for an officer of colored +troops; and I happen to be well provided with it. It seems to be the +theory of all military usages, in fact, that soldiers are to be treated +like children; and these singular persons, who never know their own age +till they are past middle life, and then choose a birthday with such +precision,--"Fifty year old, Sah, de fus' last April,"--prolong the +privilege of childhood. + +I am perplexed nightly for counter-signs,--their range of proper names +is so distressingly limited, and they make such amazing work of every +new one. At first, to be sure, they did not quite recognize the need of +any variation: one night some officer asked a sentinel whether he had +the countersign yet, and was indignantly answered,--"Should tink I hab +'em, hab 'em for a fortnight"; which seems a long epoch for that magic +word to hold out. To-night I thought I would have "Fredericksburg," in +honor of Burnside's reported victory, using the rumor quickly, for fear +of a contradiction. Later, in comes a captain, gets the countersign for +his own use, but presently returns, the sentinel having pronounced it +incorrect. On inquiry, it appears that the sergeant of the guard, being +weak in geography, thought best to substitute the more familiar word, +"Crockery-ware"; which was, with perfect gravity, confided to all the +sentinels, and accepted without question. O life! what is the fun of +fiction beside thee? + +I should think they would suffer and complain, these cold nights; but +they say nothing, though there is a good deal of coughing. I should +fancy that the scarlet trousers must do something to keep them warm, and +wonder that they dislike them so much, when they are so much like their +beloved fires. They certainly multiply fire-light, in any case. I often +notice that an infinitesimal flame, with one soldier standing by it, +looks like quite a respectable conflagration, and it seems as if a group +of them must dispel dampness. + + * * * * * + + _December 21._ + +To a regimental commander no book can be so fascinating as the +consolidated Morning Report, which is ready about nine, and tells how +many in each company are sick, absent, on duty, and so on. It is one's +newspaper and daily mail; I never grow tired of it. If a single recruit +has come in, I am always eager to see how he looks on paper. + +To-night the officers are rather depressed by rumors of Burnside's being +defeated, after all. I am fortunately equable and undepressible; and it +is very convenient that the men know too little of the events of the war +to feel excitement or fear. They know General Saxton and me,--"de +General" and "de Cunnel,"--and seem to ask no further questions. We are +the war. It saves a great deal of trouble, while it lasts, this +childlike confidence; nevertheless, it is our business to educate them +to manhood, and I see as yet no obstacle. As for the rumor, the world +will no doubt roll round, whether Burnside is defeated or succeeds. + + * * * * * + + _Christmas Day._ + + "We'll fight for liberty + Till de Lord shall call us home; + We'll soon be free + Till de Lord shall call us home." + +This is the hymn which the slaves at Georgetown, South Carolina, were +whipped for singing when President Lincoln was elected. So said a little +drummer-boy, as he sat at my tent's edge last night and told me his +story; and he showed all his white teeth as he added,--"Dey tink '_de +Lord_' meant for say de Yankees." + +Last night, at dress-parade, the adjutant read General Saxton's +Proclamation for the New-Year's Celebration. I think they understood it, +for there was cheering in all the company-streets afterwards. Christmas +is the great festival of the year for this people; but, with New-Year's +coming after, we could have no adequate programme for to-day, and so +celebrated Christmas Eve with pattern simplicity. We omitted, namely, +the mystic curfew which we call "taps," and let them sit up and burn +their fires and have their little prayer-meetings as late as they +desired; and all night, as I waked at intervals, I could hear them +praying and "shouting" and clattering with hands and heels. It seemed to +make them very happy, and appeared to be at least an innocent Christmas +dissipation, as compared with some of the convivialities of the +"superior race" hereabouts. + + * * * * * + + _December 26._ + +The day passed with no greater excitement for the men than +target-shooting, which they enjoyed. I had the private delight of the +arrival of our much-desired surgeon and his nephew, the captain, with +letters and news from home. They also bring the good tidings that +General Saxton is not to be removed, as had been reported. + +Two different stands of colors have arrived for us, and will be +presented at New-Year's,--one from friends in New York, and the other +from a lady in Connecticut. I see that "Frank Leslie's Illustrated +Weekly" of December twentieth has a highly imaginative picture of the +muster-in of our first company, and also of a skirmish on the late +expedition. + +I must not forget the prayer overheard last night by one of the +captains:--"O Lord! when I tink ob dis Kismas and las' year de Kismas. +Las' Kismas he in de Secesh, and notin' to eat but grits, and no salt in +'em. Dis year in de camp, and too much victual!" This "too much" is a +favorite phrase out of their grateful hearts, and did not in this case +denote an excess of dinner,--as might be supposed,--but of thanksgiving. + + * * * * * + + _December 29._ + +Our new surgeon has begun his work most efficiently: he and the chaplain +have converted an old gin-house into a comfortable hospital, with ten +nice beds and straw pallets. He is now, with a hearty professional +faith, looking round for somebody to put into it. I am afraid the +regiment will accommodate him; for, although he declares that these men +do not sham sickness, as he expected, their catarrh is an unpleasant +reality. They feel the dampness very much, and make such a coughing at +dress-parade that I have urged him to administer a dose of +cough-mixture, all round, just before that pageant. Are the colored race +_tough_? is my present anxiety; and it is odd that physical +insufficiency, the only discouragement not thrown in our way by the +newspapers, is the only discouragement which finds any place in our +minds. They are used to sleeping in-doors in winter, herded before +fires, and so they feel the change. Still, the regiment is as healthy as +the average, and experience will teach us something.[B] + + * * * * * + + _December 30._ + +On the first of January we are to have a slight collation, ten oxen or +so, barbecued,--or not properly barbecued, but roasted whole. Touching +the length of time required to "do" an ox, no two housekeepers appear to +agree. Accounts vary from two hours to twenty-four. We shall happily +have enough to try all gradations of roasting, and suit all tastes, from +Miss A.'s to mine. But fancy me proffering a spare-rib, well done, to +some fair lady! What ever are we to do for spoons and forks and plates? +Each soldier has his own, and is sternly held responsible for it by +"Army Regulations." But how provide for the multitude? Is it customary, +I ask you, to help to tenderloin with one's fingers? Fortunately, the +Major is to see to that department. Great are the advantages of military +discipline: for anything perplexing, detail a subordinate. + + * * * * * + + _New-Year's Eve._ + +My housekeeping at home is not, perhaps, on any very extravagant scale. +Buying beefsteak, I usually go to the extent of two or three pounds. Yet +when, this morning at daybreak, the quartermaster called to inquire how +many cattle I would have killed for roasting, I turned over in bed, and +answered composedly, "Ten,--and keep three to be fatted." + +Fatted, quotha! Not one of the beasts at present appears to possess an +ounce of superfluous flesh. Never were seen such lean kine. As they +swing on vast spits, composed of young trees, the fire-light glimmers +through their ribs, as if they were great lanterns. But no matter, they +are cooking,--nay, they are cooked. + +One at least is taken off to cool, and will be replaced to-morrow to +warm up. It was roasted three hours, and well done, for I tasted it. It +is so long since I tasted fresh beef that forgetfulness is possible; but +I fancied this to be successful. I tried to imagine that I liked the +Homeric repast, and certainly the whole thing has been far more +agreeable than was to be expected. The doubt now is, whether I have made +a sufficient provision for my household. I should have roughly guessed +that ten beeves would feed as many million people, it has such a +stupendous sound; but General Saxton predicts a small social party of +five thousand, and we fear that meat will run short, unless they prefer +bone. One of the cattle is so small, we are hoping it may turn out veal. + +For drink, we aim at the simple luxury of molasses-and-water, a barrel +per company, ten in all. Liberal housekeepers may like to know that for +a barrel of water we allow three gallons of molasses, half a pound of +ginger, and a quart of vinegar,--this last being a new ingredient for my +untutored palate, though all the rest are amazed at my ignorance. Hard +bread, with more molasses, and a dessert of tobacco, complete the +festive repast, destined to cheer, but not inebriate. + +On this last point, of inebriation, this is certainly a wonderful camp. +For us, it is absolutely omitted from the list of vices. I have never +heard of a glass of liquor in the camp, nor of any effort either to +bring it in or to keep it out. A total absence of the circulating-medium +might explain the abstinence,--not that it seems to have that effect +with white soldiers,--but it would not explain the silence. The craving +for tobacco is constant and not to be allayed, like that of a mother for +her children; but I have never heard whiskey even wished for, save on +Christmas Day, and then only by one man, and he spoke with a hopeless +ideal sighing, as one alludes to the Golden Age. I am amazed at this +total omission of the most inconvenient of all camp-appetites. It +certainly is not the result of exhortation, for there has been no +occasion for any, and even the pledge would scarcely seem efficacious +where hardly anybody can write. + +I do not think there is a great visible eagerness for to-morrow's +festival: it is not their way to be very jubilant over anything this +side of the New Jerusalem. They know also that those in this Department +are nominally free already, and that the practical freedom has to be +maintained, in any event, by military success. But they will enjoy it +greatly, and we shall have a multitude of people. + + * * * * * + + _January 1, 1863_ (evening). + +A happy New-Year to civilized, people,--mere white folks. Our festival +has come and gone, with perfect success, and our good General has been +altogether satisfied. Last night the great fires were kept smouldering +in the pits, and the beeves were cooked more or less, chiefly +more,--during which time they had to be carefully watched, and the great +spits turned by main force. Happy were the merry fellows who were +permitted to sit up all night, and watch the glimmering flames that +threw a thousand fantastic shadows among the great gnarled oaks. And +such a chattering as I was sure to hear, whenever I awoke, that night! + +My first greeting to-day was from one of the most stylish sergeants, who +approached me with the following little speech, evidently the result of +some elaboration:-- + +"I tink myself happy, dis New-Year's Day, for salute my own Cunnel. Dis +day las' year I was servant to a Cunnel ob Secesh; but now I hab de +privilege for salute my own Cunnel." + +That officer, with the utmost sincerity, reciprocated the sentiment. + +About ten o'clock the people began to collect by land, and also by +water,--in steamers sent by General Saxton for the purpose; and from +that time all the avenues of approach were thronged. The multitude were +chiefly colored women, with gay handkerchiefs on their heads, and a +sprinkling of men, with that peculiarly respectable look which these +people always have on Sundays and holidays. There were many white +visitors also,--ladies on horseback and in carriages, superintendents +and teachers, officers and cavalry-men. Our companies were marched to +the neighborhood of the platform, and allowed to sit or stand, as at the +Sunday services; the platform was occupied by ladies and dignitaries, +and by the band of the Eighth Maine, which kindly volunteered for the +occasion; the colored people filled up all the vacant openings in the +beautiful grove around, and there was a cordon of mounted visitors +beyond. Above, the great live-oak branches and their trailing moss; +beyond the people, a glimpse of the blue river. + +The services began at half-past eleven o'clock, with prayer by our +chaplain, Mr. Fowler, who is always, on such occasions, simple, +reverential, and impressive. Then the President's Proclamation was read +by Dr. W. H. Brisbane, a thing infinitely appropriate, a +South-Carolinian addressing South-Carolinians; for he was reared among +these very islands, and here long since emancipated his own slaves. Then +the colors were presented to us by the Rev. Mr. French, a chaplain who +brought them from the donors in New York. All this was according to the +programme. Then followed an incident so simple, so touching, so utterly +unexpected and startling, that I can scarcely believe it on recalling, +though it gave the key-note to the whole day. The very moment the +speaker had ceased, and just as I took and waved the flag, which now for +the first time meant anything to these poor people, there suddenly +arose, close beside the platform, a strong male voice, (but rather +cracked and elderly,) into which two women's voices instantly blended, +singing, as if by an impulse that could no more be repressed than the +morning note of the song-sparrow,-- + + "My Country, 'tis of thee, + Sweet land of liberty, + Of thee I sing!" + +People looked at each other, and then at us on the platform, to see +whence came, this interruption, not set down in the bills. Firmly and +irrepressibly the quavering voices sang on, verse after verse; others of +the colored people joined in; some whites on the platform began, but I +motioned them to silence. I never saw anything so electric; it made all +other words cheap; it seemed the choked voice of a race at last +unloosed. Nothing could be more wonderfully unconscious; art could not +have dreamed of a tribute to the day of jubilee that should be so +affecting; history will not believe it; and when I came to speak of it, +after it was ended, tears were everywhere. If you could have heard how +quaint and innocent it was! Old Tiff and his children might have sung +it; and close before me was a little slave-boy, almost white, who seemed +to belong to the party, and even he must join in. Just think of it!--the +first day they had ever had a country, the first flag they had ever seen +which promised anything to their people, and here, while mere spectators +stood in silence, waiting for my stupid words, these simple souls burst +out in their lay, as if they were by their own hearths at home! When +they stopped, there was nothing to do for it but to speak, and I went +on; but the life of the whole day was in those unknown people's song. + +Receiving the flags, I gave them into the hands of two fine-looking men, +jet-black, as color-guard, and they also spoke, and very +effectively,--Sergeant Prince Rivers and Corporal Robert Sutton. The +regiment sang "Marching Along," and then General Saxton spoke, in his +own simple, manly way, and Mrs. Frances D. Gage spoke very sensibly to +the women, and Judge Stickney, from Florida, added something; then some +gentlemen sang an ode, and the regiment the John Brown song, and then +they went to their beef and molasses. Everything was very orderly, and +they seemed to have a very gay time. Most of the visitors had far to go, +and so dispersed before dress-parade, though the band stayed to enliven +it. In the evening we had letters from home, and General Saxton had a +reception at his house, from which I excused myself; and so ended one of +the most enthusiastic and happy gatherings I ever knew. The day was +perfect, and there was nothing but success. + +I forgot to say, that, in the midst, of the services, it was announced +that General Fremont was appointed Commander-in-Chief,--an announcement +which was received with immense cheering, as would have been almost +anything else, I verily believe, at that moment of high-tide. It was +shouted across by the pickets above,--a way in which we often receive +news, but not always trustworthy. + +FOOTNOTES: + +[B] A second winter's experience removed all this solicitude, for they +learned to take care of themselves. During the first February the +sick-list averaged about ninety, during the second about thirty,--this +being the worst month in the year, for blacks. Charity ought, perhaps, +to withhold the information that during the first winter we had three +surgeons, and during the second only one. + + + + +ENGLAND AND AMERICA. + + +I came to America to see and hear, not to lecture. But when I was +invited by the Boston "Fraternity" to lecture in their course, and +permitted to take the relations between England and America as my +subject, I did not feel at liberty to decline the invitation. England is +my country. To America, though an alien by birth, I am, as an English +Liberal, no alien in heart. I deeply share the desire of all my +political friends in England and of the leaders of my party to banish +ill-feeling and promote good-will between the two kindred nations. My +heart would be cold, if that desire were not increased by the welcome +which I have met with here. More than once, when called upon to speak, +(a task little suited to my habits and powers,) I have tried to make it +understood that the feelings of England as a nation towards you in your +great struggle had not been truly represented by a portion of our press. +Some of my present hearers may, perhaps, have seen very imperfect +reports of those speeches. I hope to say what I have to say with a +little more clearness now. + +There was between England and America the memory of ancient quarrels, +which your national pride did not suffer to sleep, and which sometimes +galled a haughty nation little patient of defeat. In more recent times +there had been a number of disputes, the more angry because they were +between brethren. There had been disputes about boundaries, in which +England believed herself to have been overreached by your negotiators, +or, what was still more irritating, to have been overborne because her +main power was not here. There had been disputes about the Right of +Search, in which we had to taste the bitterness, now not unknown to you, +of those whose sincerity in a good cause is doubted, when, in fact, they +are perfectly sincere. You had alarmed and exasperated us by your Ostend +manifesto and your scheme for the annexation of Cuba. In these +discussions some of your statesmen had shown towards us the spirit which +Slavery does not fail to engender in the domestic tyrant; while, +perhaps, some of our statesmen had been too ready to presume bad +intentions and anticipate wrong. In our war with Russia your sympathies +had been, as we supposed, strongly on the Russian side; and we--even +those among us who least approved the war--had been scandalized at +seeing the American Republic in the arms of a despotism which had just +crushed Hungary, and which stood avowed as the arch-enemy of liberty in +Europe. In the course of that war an English envoy committed a fault by +being privy to recruiting in your territories. The fault was +acknowledged; but the matter was pressed by your Government in a temper +which we thought showed a desire to humiliate, and a want of that +readiness to accept satisfaction, when frankly tendered, which renders +the reparation of an unintentional offence easy and painless between men +of honor. These wounds had been inflamed by the unfriendly criticism of +English writers, who visited a new country without the spirit of +philosophic inquiry, and who in collecting materials for the amusement +of their countrymen sometimes showed themselves a little wanting in +regard for the laws of hospitality, as well as in penetration and in +largeness of view. + +Yet beneath this outward estrangement there lay in the heart of England +at least a deeper feeling, an appeal to which was never unwelcome, even +in quarters where the love of American institutions least prevailed. I +will venture to repeat some words from a lecture addressed a short time +before this war to the University of Oxford, which at that time had +among its students an English Prince. "The loss of the American +Colonies," said the lecturer, speaking of your first Revolution, "was +perhaps in itself a gain to both countries. It was a gain, as it +emancipated commerce and gave free course to those reciprocal streams of +wealth which a restrictive policy had forbidden to flow. It was a gain, +as it put an end to an obsolete tutelage, which tended to prevent +America from learning betimes to walk alone, while it gave England the +puerile and somewhat dangerous pleasure of reigning over those whom she +did not and could not govern, but whom she was tempted to harass and +insult. A source of military strength colonies can scarcely be. You +prevent them from forming proper military establishments of their own, +and you drag them, into your quarrels at the price of undertaking their +defence. The inauguration of free trade was in fact the renunciation of +the only solid object for which our ancestors clung to an invidious and +perilous supremacy, and exposed the heart of England by scattering her +fleet and armies over the globe. It was not the loss of the Colonies, +but the quarrel, that was one of the greatest, perhaps the greatest +disaster that ever befell the English race. Who would not give up +Blenheim and Waterloo, if only the two Englands could have parted from +each other in kindness and in peace,--if our statesmen could have had +the wisdom, to say to the Americans generously and at the right season, +'You are Englishmen, like ourselves; be, for your own happiness and for +our honor, like ourselves, a nation'? But English statesmen, with all +their greatness, have seldom known how to anticipate necessity; too +often the sentence of history on their policy has been, that it was +wise, just, and generous, but too late. Too often have they waited for +the teaching of disaster. Time will heal this, like other wounds. In +signing away his own empire, George III. did not sign away the empire of +English liberty, of English law, of English literature, of English +religion, of English blood, or of the English tongue. But though the +wound will heal,--and that it may heal ought to be the earnest desire of +the whole English name,--history can never cancel the fatal page which +robs England of half the glory and half the happiness of being the +mother of a great nation." Such, I say, was the language addressed to +Oxford in the full confidence that it would be well received. + +And now all these clouds seemed to have fairly passed away. Your +reception of the Prince of Wales, the heir and representative of George +III., was a perfect pledge of reconciliation. It showed that beneath a +surface of estrangement there still remained the strong tie of blood. +Englishmen who loved the New England as well as the Old were for the +moment happy in the belief that the two were one again. And, believe me, +joy at this complete renewal of our amity was very deeply and widely +felt in England. It spread far even among the classes which have shown +the greatest want of sympathy for you in the present war. + +England has diplomatic connections--she has sometimes diplomatic +intrigues--with the Great Powers of Europe. For a real alliance she must +look here. Strong as is the element of aristocracy in her Government, +there is that in her, nevertheless, which makes her cordial +understandings with military despotisms little better than smothered +hate. With you she may have a league of the heart. We are united by +blood. We are united by a common allegiance to the cause of freedom. You +may think that English freedom falls far short of yours. You will allow +that it goes beyond any yet attained by the great European nations, and +that to those nations it has been and still is a light of hope. I see it +treated with contempt here. It is not treated with contempt by +Garibaldi. It is not treated with contempt by the exiles from French +despotism, who are proud to learn the English tongue, and who find in +our land, as they think, the great asylum of the free. Let England and +America quarrel. Let your weight be cast into the scale against us, when +we struggle with the great conspiracy of absolutist powers around us, +and the hope of freedom in Europe would be almost quenched. Hampden and +Washington in arms against each other! What could the Powers of Evil +desire more? When Americans talk lightly of a war with England, one +desires to ask them what they believe the effects of such a war would be +on their own country. How many more American wives do they wish to make +widows? How many more American children do they wish to make orphans? Do +they deem it wise to put a still greater strain on the already groaning +timbers of the Constitution? Do they think that the suspension of trade +and emigration, with the price of labor rising and the harvests of +Illinois excluded from their market, would help you to cope with the +financial difficulties which fill with anxiety every reflecting mind? Do +they think that four more years of war-government would render easy the +tremendous work of reconstruction? But the interests of the great +community of nations are above the private interests of America or of +England. If war were to break out between us, what would become of +Italy, abandoned without help to her Austrian enemy and her sinister +protector? What would become of the last hopes of liberty in France? +What would become of the world? + +English liberties, imperfect as they may be,--and as an English Liberal +of course thinks they are,--are the source from which your liberties +have flowed, though the river may be more abundant than the spring. +Being in America, I am in England,--not only because American +hospitality makes me feel that I am still in my own country, but because +our institutions are fundamentally the same. The great foundations of +constitutional government, legislative assemblies, parliamentary +representation, personal liberty, self-taxation, the freedom of the +press, allegiance to the law as a power above individual will,--all +these were established, not without memorable efforts and memorable +sufferings, in the land from which the fathers of your republic came. +You are living under the Great Charter, the Petition of Eight, the +Habeas Corpus Act, the Libel Act. Perhaps you have not even yet taken +from us all that, if a kindly feeling continues between us, you may find +it desirable to take. England by her eight centuries of constitutional +progress has done a great work for you, and the two nations may yet have +a great work to do together for themselves and for the world. A student +of history, knowing how the race has struggled and stumbled onwards +through the ages until now, cannot believe in the finality and +perfection of any set of institutions, not even of yours. This vast +electioneering apparatus, with its strange machinery and discordant +sounds, in the midst of which I find myself,--it may be, and I firmly +believe it is, better for its purpose than anything that has gone before +it; but is it the crowning effort of mankind? If our creed--the Liberal +creed--be true, American institutions are a great step in advance of the +Old World; but they are not a miraculous leap into a political +millennium. They are a momentous portion of that continual onward effort +of humanity which it is the highest duty of history to trace; but they +are not its final consummation. Model Republic! How many of these models +has the course of ages seen broken and flung disdainfully aside! You +have been able to do great things for the world because your forefathers +did great things for you. The generation will come which in its turn +will inherit the fruits of your efforts, add to them a little of its +own, and in the plenitude of its self-esteem repay you with ingratitude. +The time will come when the memory of the Model Republicans of the +United States, as well as that of the narrow Parliamentary Reformers of +England, will appeal to history, not in vain, to rescue it from the +injustice of posterity, and extend to it the charities of the past. + +New-comers among the nations, you desire, like the rest, to have a +history. You seek it in Indian annals, you seek it in Northern sagas. +You fondly surround an old windmill with the pomp of Scandinavian +antiquity, in your anxiety to fill up the void of your unpeopled past. +But you have a real and glorious history, if you will not reject +it,--monuments genuine and majestic, if you will acknowledge them as +your own. Yours are the palaces of the Plantagenets,--the cathedrals +which enshrined our old religion,--the illustrious hall in which the +long line of our great judges reared, by their decisions, the fabric of +our law,--the gray colleges in which our intellect and science found +their earliest home,--the graves where our heroes and sages and poets +sleep. It would as ill become you to cultivate narrow national memories +in regard to the past as it would to cultivate narrow national +prejudices at present. You have come out, as from other relics of +barbarism which still oppress Europe, so from the barbarism of jealous +nationality. You are heirs to all the wealth of the Old World, and must +owe gratitude for a part of your heritage to Germany, France, and Spain, +as well as to England. Still, it is from England that you are sprung; +from her you brought the power of self-government which was the talisman +of colonization and the pledge of your empire here. She it was, that, +having advanced by centuries of effort to the front of the Old World, +became worthy to give birth to the New. From England you are sprung; and +if the choice were given you among all the nations of the world, which +would you rather choose for a mother? + +England bore you, and bore you not without a mother's pangs. For the +real hour of your birth wag the English Revolution of the seventeenth +century, at once the saddest and the noblest period of English +history,--the noblest, whether we look to the greatness of the +principles at stake, or to the grandeur of the actors who fill the +scene. This is not the official version of your origin. The official +version makes you the children of the revolutionary spirit which was +abroad in the eighteenth century and culminated in the French +Revolution. But this robs you of a century and a half of antiquity, and +of more than a century and a half of greatness. Since 1783 you have had +a marvellous growth of population and of wealth,--things not to be +spoken of, as cynics have spoken of them, without thankfulness, since +the added myriads have been happy, and the wealth has flowed not to a +few, but to all. But before 1783 you had founded, under the name of an +English Colony, a community emancipated from feudalism; you had +abolished here and doomed to general abolition hereditary aristocracy, +and that which is the essential basis of hereditary aristocracy, +primogeniture in the inheritance of land. You had established, though +under the semblance of dependence on the English crown, a virtual +sovereignty of the people. You had created the system of common schools, +in which the sovereignty of the people has its only safe foundation. You +had proclaimed, after some misgivings and backslidings, the doctrine of +liberty of conscience, and released the Church from her long bondage to +the State. All this you had achieved while you still were, and gloried +in being, a colony of England. You have done great things, since your +quarrel with George III., for the world as well as for yourselves. But +for the world, perhaps, you had done greater things before. + +In England the Revolution of the seventeenth century failed. It failed, +at least, as an attempt to establish social equality and liberty of +conscience. The feudal past, with a feudal Europe to support it, sat too +heavy on us to be cast off. By a convulsive effort we broke loose, for a +moment, from the hereditary aristocracy and the hierarchy. For a moment +we placed a popular chief in power, though Cromwell was obliged by +circumstances, as well as impelled by his own ambition, to make himself +a king. But when Cromwell died before his hour, all was over for many a +day with the party of religious freedom and of the people. The nation +had gone a little way out of the feudal and hierarchical Egypt; but the +horrors of the unknown Wilderness, and the memory of the flesh-pots, +overpowered the hope of the Promised Land; and the people returned to +the rule of Pharaoh and his priests amidst the bonfires of the +Restoration. Something had been gained. Kings became more careful how +they cut the subject's purse; bishops, how they clipped the subject's +ears. Instead of being carried by Laud to Rome, we remained Protestants +after a sort, though without liberty of conscience. Our Parliament, such +as it was, with a narrow franchise and rotten boroughs, retained its +rights; and in time we secured the independence of the judges and the +integrity of an aristocratic law. But the great attempt had miscarried. +English society had made a supreme effort to escape from feudalism and +the hierarchy into social justice and religious freedom, and that effort +had failed. + +Failed in England, but succeeded here. The yoke which in the +mother-country we had not strength to throw off, in the colony we +escaped; and here, beyond the reach of the Restoration, Milton's vision +proved true, and a free community was founded, though in a humble and +unsuspected form, which depended on the life of no single chief, and +lived on when Cromwell died. Milton, when the night of the Restoration +closed on the brief and stormy day of his party, bated no jot of hope. +He was strong in that strength of conviction which assures spirits like +his of the future, however dark the present may appear. But, could he +have beheld it, the morning, moving westward in the track of the Puritan +emigrants, had passed from his hemisphere only to shine again in this +with no fitful ray, but with a steady brightness which will one day +reillumine the feudal darkness of the Old World. + +The Revolution failed in England. Yet in England the party of Cromwell +and Milton still lives. It still lives; and in this great crisis of your +fortunes, its heart turns to you. On your success ours depends. Now, as +in the seventeenth century, the thread of our fate is twined with the +thread of yours. An English Liberal comes here, not only to watch the +unfolding of your destiny, but to read his own. + +Even in the Revolution of 1776 Liberal England was on your side. Chatham +was your spokesman, as well as Patrick Henry. We, too, reckon Washington +among our heroes. Perhaps there may have been an excuse even for the +King. The relation of dependence which you as well as he professed to +hold sacred, and which he was bound to maintain, had long become +obsolete. It was time to break the cord which held the child to its +mother; and probably there were some on your side, from the first, or +nearly from the first, resolved to break it,--men instinct with the +revolutionary spirit, and bent on a Republic. All parties were in a +false position; and they could find no way out of it better than civil +war. Good-will, not hatred, is the law of the world; and seldom can +history--even the history of the conqueror--look back on the results of +war without regret. England, scarcely guilty of the offence of her +monarch, drank the cup of shame and disaster to the dregs. That war +ruined the French finances, which till then might have been retrieved, +past the hope of redemption, and precipitated the Revolution which +hurled France through anarchy into despotism, and sent Lafayette to a +foreign dungeon, and his master to the block. You came out victorious; +but, from the violence of the rupture, you took a political bias not +perhaps entirely for good; and the necessity of the war blended you, +under equivocal conditions, with other colonies of a wholly different +origin and character, which then "held persons to service," and are now +your half-dethroned tyrant, the Slave Power. This Revolution will lead +to a revision of many things,--perhaps to a partial revision of your +history. Meantime, let me repeat, England counts Washington among her +heroes. + +And now as to the conduct of England towards you in this civil war. It +is of want of sympathy, if of anything, on our part, not of want of +interest, that you have a right to complain. Never, within my memory, +have the hearts of Englishmen been so deeply moved by any foreign +struggle as by this civil war,--not even, if I recollect aright, by the +great European earthquake of 1848. I doubt whether they were more moved +by the Indian mutiny or by our war with Russia. It seemed that history +had brought round again the great crisis of the Thirty Years' War, when +all England throbbed with the mortal struggle waged between the powers +of Liberty and Slavery on their German battle-field; for expectation can +scarcely have been more intense when Gustavus and Tilly were approaching +each other at Leipsic than it was when Meade and Lee were approaching +each other at Gettysburg. Severed from us by the Atlantic, while other +nations are at our door, you are still nearer to us than all the world +beside. + +It is of want of sympathy, not of want of interest, that you have to +complain. And the sympathy which has been withheld is not that of the +whole nation, but that of certain classes, chiefly of the class against +whose political interest you are fighting, and to whom your victory +brings eventual defeat. The real origin of your nation is the key to the +present relations between you and the different parties in England. This +is the old battle waged again on a new field. We will not talk too much +of Puritans and Cavaliers. The soldiers of the Union are not Puritans, +neither are the planters Cavaliers, But the present civil war is a vast +episode in the same irrepressible conflict between Aristocracy and +Democracy; and the heirs of the Cavalier in England sympathize with your +enemies, the heirs of the Puritan with you. + +The feeling of our aristocracy, as of all aristocracies, is against you. +It does not follow, nor do I believe, that as a body they would desire +or urge their Government to do you a wrong, whatever spirit may be shown +by a few of the less honorable or more violent members of their order. +With all their class sentiments, they are Englishmen, trained to walk in +the paths of English policy and justice. But that their feelings should +be against you is not strange. You are fighting, not for the restoration +of the Union, not for the emancipation of the negro, but for Democracy +against Aristocracy; and this fact is thoroughly understood by both +parties throughout the Old World. As the champions of Democracy, you may +claim, and you receive, the sympathy of the Democratic party in England +and in Europe; that of the Aristocratic party you cannot claim. You must +bear it calmly, if the aristocracies mourn over your victories and +triumph over your defeats. Do the friends of Democracy conceal their joy +when a despotism or an oligarchy bites the dust? + +The members of our aristocracy bear you no personal hatred. An American +going among them even now meets with nothing but personal courtesy and +kindness. Under ordinary circumstances they are not indifferent to your +good-will, nor unconscious of the tie of blood. But to ask them entirely +to forget their order would be too much. In the success of a +commonwealth founded on social and political equality all aristocracies +must read their doom. Not by arms, but by example, you are a standing +menace to the existence of political privilege. And the thread of that +existence is frail. Feudal antiquity holds life by a precarious tenure +amidst the revolutionary tendencies of this modern world. It has gone +hard with the aristocracies throughout Europe of late years, though the +French Emperor, as the head of the Reaction, may create a mock nobility +round his upstart throne. The Roman aristocracy was an aristocracy of +arms and law. The feudal aristocracy of the Middle Ages was an +aristocracy of arms and in some measure of law; it served the cause of +political progress in its hour and after its kind; it confronted +tyrannical kings when the people were as yet too weak to confront them; +it conquered at Runnymede, as well as at Hastings. But the aristocracies +of modern Europe are aristocracies neither of arms nor of law. They are +aristocracies of social and political privilege alone. They owe, and are +half conscious that they owe, their present existence only to factitious +weaknesses of human nature, and to the antiquated terrors of communities +long kept in leading-strings and afraid to walk alone. If there were +nothing but reason to dispel them, these fears might long retain their +sway over European society. But the example of a great commonwealth +flourishing here without a privileged class, and of a popular +sovereignty combining order with progress, tends, however remotely, to +break the spell. Therefore, as a class, the English nobility cannot +desire the success of your Republic. Some of the order there are who +have hearts above their coronets, as there are some kings who have +hearts above their crowns, and who in this great crisis of humanity +forget that they are noblemen, and remember that they are men. But the +order, as a whole, has been against you, and has swayed in the same +direction all who were closely connected with it or dependent on it. It +could not fail to be against you, if it was for itself. Be charitable to +the instinct of self-preservation. It is strong, sometimes violent, in +us all. + +In truth, it is rather against the Liberals of England than against you +that the feeling of our aristocracy is directed. Liberal leaders have +made your name odious by pointing to your institutions as the +condemnation of our own. They did this too indiscriminately perhaps, +while in one respect your institutions were far below our own, inasmuch +as you were a slaveholding nation. "Look," they were always saying, "at +the Model Republic,--behold its unbroken prosperity, the harmony of its +people under the system of universal suffrage, the lightness of its +taxation,--behold, above all, its immunity from war!" All this is now +turned upon us as a taunt; but the taunt implies rather a sense of +escape on the part of those who utter it than malignity, and the answer +to it is victory. + +What has been said of our territorial aristocracy may be said of our +commercial aristocracy, which is fast blending with the territorial into +a government of wealth. This again is nothing new. History can point to +more cases than one in which the sympathies of rich men have been +regulated by their riches. The Money Power has been cold to your cause +throughout Europe,--perhaps even here. In all countries great +capitalists are apt to desire that the laborer should be docile and +contented, that popular education should not be carried dangerously +high, that the right relations between capital and labor should be +maintained. The bold doctrines of the slave-owner as to "free labor and +free schools" may not be accepted in their full strength; yet they touch +a secret chord. But we have friends of the better cause among our +English capitalists as well as among our English peers. The names of Mr. +Baring and Mr. Thomas Bayley Potter are not unknown here. The course +taken by such men at this crisis is an earnest of the essential unity of +interest which underlies all class-divisions,--which, in our onward +progress toward the attainment of a real community, will survive all +class-distinctions, and terminate the conflict between capital and +labor, not by making the laborer the slave of the capitalist, nor the +capitalist the slave of the laborer, but by establishing between them +mutual good-will, founded on intelligence and justice. + +And let the upper classes of England have their due. The Lancashire +operatives have been upon the other side; yet not the less have they +received ready and generous help in their distress from all ranks and +orders in the land. + +It would be most unworthy of a student of history to preach vulgar +hatred of an historic aristocracy. The aristocracy of England has been +great in its hour, probably beneficent, perhaps indispensable to the +progress of our nation, and so to the foundation of yours. Do you wish +for your revenge upon it? The road to that revenge is sure. Succeed in +your great experiment. Show by your example, by your moderation and +self-control through this war and after its close, that it is possible +for communities, duly educated, to govern themselves without the control +of an hereditary order. The progress of opinion in England will in time +do the rest. War, forced by you upon the English nation, would only +strengthen the worst part of the English aristocracy in the worst way, +by bringing our people into collision with a Democracy, and by giving +the ascendancy, as all wars not carried on for a distinct moral object +do, to military passions over political aspirations. Our war with the +French Republic threw back our internal reforms, which till then had +been advancing, for a whole generation. Even the pockets of our +land-owners would not suffer, but gain, by the war; for their rents +would be raised by the exclusion of your corn, and the price of labor +would be lowered by the stoppage of emigration. The suffering would +fall, as usual, on the people. + +The gradual effect of your example may enable European society finally +to emerge from feudalism, in a peaceful way, without violent +revolutions. Every one who has studied history must regard violent +revolutions with abhorrence. A European Liberal ought to be less +inclined to them than ever, when he has seen America, and received from +the sight, as I think he may, a complete assurance of the future. + +I have spoken of our commercial aristocracy generally. Liverpool demands +word by itself. It is the stronghold of the Southern party in England: +from it hostile acts have proceeded, while from other quarters there +have proceeded only hostile words. There are in Liverpool men who do +honor to the name of British merchant; but the city as a whole is not +the one among all our commercial cities in which moral chivalry is most +likely to be found. In Manchester, cotton-spinning though it be, there +is much that is great,--a love of Art, displayed in public +exhibitions,--a keen interest in great political and social +questions,--literature,--even religious thought,--something of that high +aspiring spirit which made commerce noble in the old English merchant, +in the Venetian and the Florentine. In Liverpool trade reigns supreme, +and its behests, whatever they may be, are pretty sure to be eagerly +obeyed. And the source of this is to be found, perhaps, partly in the +fact that Liverpool is an old centre of the Slavery interest in England, +one of the cities which have been built with the blood of the slave. As +the great cotton port, it is closely connected with the planters by +trade,--perhaps also by many personal ties and associations. It is not +so much an English city as an offset and outpost of the South, and a +counterpart to the offsets and outposts of the South in some of your +great commercial cities here. No doubt, the shame of Liverpool Alabamas +falls on England. England must own that she has produced merchants who +disgrace their calling, contaminated by intercourse with the +slave-owner, regardless of the honor and interest of their country, +ready to plunge two kindred nations into a desolating war, if they can +only secure the profits of their own trade. England must own that she +has produced such men; but does this disgrace attach to her alone? + +The clergy of the State Church, like the aristocracy, have probably been +as a body against you in this struggle. In their case too, not hatred of +America, but the love of their own institution, is the cause. If you are +a standing menace to aristocracies, you are equally a standing menace to +State Churches. A State Church rests upon the assumption that religion +would fall, if it were not supported by the State. On this ground it is +that the European nations endure the startling anomalies of their State +Churches,--the interference of irreligious politicians in religion, the +worldliness of ambitious ecclesiastics, the denial of liberty of +conscience, the denial of truth. Therefore it is that they will see the +canker of doubt slowly eating into faith beneath the outward uniformity +of a political Church, rather than risk a change, which, as they are +taught to believe, would bring faith to a sudden end. But the success of +the voluntary system here is overthrowing this assumption. Shall I +believe that Christianity deprived of State support must fall, when I +see it without State support not only standing, but advancing with the +settler into the remotest West? Will the laity of Europe long remain +under their illusion in face of this great fact? Already the State +Churches of Europe are placed in imminent peril by the controversies +which, since religious life has reawakened among us, rend them from +within, and by their manifest inability to satisfy the craving of +society for new assurance of its faith. I cannot much blame the +High-Church bishop who goes to Lord Palmerston to ask for intervention +in company with Lord Clanricarde and Mr. Spence. You express surprise +that the son of Wilberforce is not with you; but Wilberforce was not, +like his son, a bishop of the State Church. Never in the whole course of +history has the old order of things yielded without a murmur to the new. +You share the fate of all innovators: your innovations are not received +with favor by the powers which they threaten ultimately to sweep away. + +To come from our aristocracy and landed gentry to our middle class. We +subdivide the middle class into upper and lower. The upper middle class, +comprising the wealthier tradesmen, forms a sort of minor aristocracy in +itself, with a good deal of aristocratic feeling towards those beneath +it. It is not well educated, for it will not go to the common schools, +and it has few good private schools of its own; consequently, it does +not think deeply on great political questions. It is at present very +wealthy; and wealth, as you know, does not always produce high moral +sentiment. It is not above a desire to be on the genteel side. It is not +free from the worship of Aristocracy. That worship is rooted in the +lower part of our common nature. Is fibres extend beyond the soil of +England, beyond the soil of Europe. America has been much belied, if she +is entirely free from this evil, if there are not here also men careful +of class-distinctions, of a place in fashionable society, of factitious +rank which parodies the aristocracy of the Old World. There is in the +Anglo-Saxon character a strange mixture of independence and servility. +In that long course of concessions by which your politicians +strove--happily for the world and for yourselves they strove in vain--to +conciliate the slave owning aristocracy of the South, did not something +of social servility mingle with political fear? + +In the lower middle class religious Non-Conformity prevails; and the +Free Churches of our Non-Conformists are united by a strong bond of +sympathy with the Churches under the voluntary system here. They are +perfectly stanch on the subject of Slavery, and so far as this war has +been a struggle against that institution, it may, I think, be +confidently said that the hearts of this great section of our people +have been upon your side. Our Non-Conformist ministers came forward, as +you are aware, in large numbers, to join with the ministers of +Protestant Churches on the Continent in an Anti-Slavery address to your +Government and people. + +And as to the middle classes generally, upper or lower, I see no reason +to think that they are wanting in good-will to this country, much less +that they desire that any calamity should befall it. The journals which +I take to be the chief organs of the upper middle class, if they have +not been friendly, have been hostile not so much to the American people +as to the war. And in justice to all classes of Englishmen, it must be +remembered that hatred of the war is not hatred of the American people. +No one hated the war at its commencement more heartily than I did. I +hated it more heartily than ever after Bull Run, when, by the accounts +which reached England, the character of this nation seemed to have +completely broken down. I believed as fully as any one, that the task +which you had undertaken was hopeless, and that you were rushing on your +ruin. I dreaded the effect on your Constitution, fearing, as others did, +that civil war would bring you to anarchy, and anarchy to military +despotism. All historical precedents conspired to lead me to this +belief. I did not know--for there was no example to teach me--the power +of a really united people, the adamantine strength of institutions which +were truly free. Watching the course of events with an open mind, and a +deep interest, such as men at a distance can seldom be brought to feel, +in the fortunes of this country, I soon revised my opinion. Yet, many +times I desponded, and wished with all my heart that you would save the +Border States, if you could, and let the rest go. Numbers of +Englishmen,--Englishmen of all classes and parties,--who thought as I +did at the outset, remain rooted in this opinion. They still sincerely +believe that this is a hopeless war, which can lead to nothing but waste +of blood, subversion of your laws and liberties, and the destruction of +your own prosperity and that of the nations whose interests are bound up +with yours. This belief they maintain with as little of ill-feeling +towards you as men can have towards those who obstinately disregard +their advice. And, after all, though you may have found the wisest as +well as the bravest counsellors in your own hearts, he need not be your +enemy who somewhat timidly counsels you against civil war. Civil war is +a terrible thing,--terrible in the passions which it kindles, as well as +in the blood which it sheds,--terrible in its present effects, and +terrible in those which it leaves behind. It can be justified only by +the complete victory of the good cause. And Englishmen, at the +commencement of this civil war, if they were wrong in thinking the +victory of the good cause hopeless, were not wrong in thinking it +remote. They were not wrong in thinking it far more remote than you did. +Years of struggle, of fear, of agony, of desolated homes, have passed +since your statesmen declared that a few months would bring the +Rebellion to an end. In justice to our people, put the question to +yourselves,--if at the outset the veil which hid the future could have +been withdrawn, and the conflict which really awaited you, with all its +vicissitudes, its disasters, its dangers, its sacrifices, could have +been revealed to your view, would you have gone into the war? To us, +looking with anxious, but less impassioned eyes, the veil was half +withdrawn, and we shrank back from the prospect which was revealed. It +was well for the world, perhaps, that you were blind; but it was +pardonable in us to see. + +We now come to the working-men of England, the main body of our people, +whose sympathy you would not the less prize, and whom you would not the +less shrink from assailing without a cause, because at present the +greater part of them are without political power,--at least of a direct +kind. I will not speak of the opinions of our peasantry, for they have +none. Their thoughts are never turned to a political question. They +never read a newspaper. They are absorbed in the struggle for daily +bread, of which they have barely enough for themselves and their +children. Their condition, in spite of all the benevolent effort that is +abroad among us, is the great blot of our social system. Perhaps, if the +relation between the two countries remains kindly, the door of hope may +be opened to them here; and hands now folded helplessly in English +poor-houses may joyfully reap the harvests of Iowa and Wisconsin. +Assuredly, they bear you no ill-will. If they could comprehend the +meaning of this struggle, their hearts as well as their interests would +be upon your side. But it is not in them, it is in the working-men of +our cities, that the intelligence of the class resides. And the sympathy +of the working-men of our cities, from the moment when the great issue +between Free Labor and Slavery was fairly set before them, has been +shown in no doubtful form. They have followed your wavering fortunes +with eyes almost as keen and hearts almost as anxious as your own. They +have thronged the meetings held by the Union and Emancipation Societies +of London and Manchester to protest before the nation in favor of your +cause. Early in the contest they filled to overflowing Exeter Hall, the +largest place of meeting in London. I was present at another immense +meeting of them, held by their Trades Unions in London, where they were +addressed by Mr. Bright; and had you witnessed the intelligence and +enthusiasm with which they followed the exposition of your case by their +great orator, you would have known that you were not without sympathy in +England,--not without sympathy such as those who look rather to the +worth of a friend than to his rank may most dearly prize. Again I was +present at a great meeting called in the Free-Trade Hall at Manchester +to protest against the attacks upon your commerce, and saw the same +enthusiasm displayed by the working-men of the North. But Mr. Ward +Beecher must have brought back with him abundant assurance of the +feelings of our working-men. Our opponents have tried to rival us in +these demonstrations. They have tried with great resources of personal +influence and wealth. But, in spite of their personal influence and the +distress caused by the cotton famine, they have on the whole signally +failed. Their consolation has been to call the friends of the Federal +cause obscurities and nobodies. And true it is that the friends of the +Federal cause are obscurities and nobodies. They are the untitled and +undistinguished mass of the English people. + +The leaders of our working-men, the popular chiefs of the day, the men +who represent the feelings and interests of the masses, and whose names +are received with ringing cheers wherever the masses are assembled, are +Cobden and Bright. And Cobden and Bright have not left you in doubt of +the fact that they and all they represent are on your side. + +I need not say,--for you have shown that you know it well,--that, as +regards the working-men of our cotton-factories, this sympathy was an +offering to your cause as costly as it was sincere. Your civil war +paralyzed their industry, brought ruin into their houses, deprived them +and their families not only of bread, but, so far as their vision +extended, of the hope of bread. Yet they have not wavered in their +allegiance to the Right. Your slave-owning aristocracy had made up their +minds that chivalry was confined to aristocracies, and that over the +vulgar souls of the common people Cotton must be King. The working-man +of Manchester, though he lives not like a Southern gentleman by the +sweat of another's brow, but like a plebeian by the sweat of his own, +has shown that chivalry is not confined to aristocracies, and that even +over vulgar souls Cotton is not always King. I heard one of your +statesmen the other day, after speaking indignantly of those who had +fitted out the Alabama, pray God to bless the working-men of England. +Our nation, like yours, is not a single body animated by the same +political sentiments, but a mixed mass of contending interests and +parties. Beware how you fire into that mass, or your shot may strike a +friend. + +When England in the mass is spoken of as your enemy on this occasion, +the London "Times" is taken for the voice of the country. The "Times" +was in former days a great popular organ. It led vehemently and even +violently the struggle for Parliamentary Reform. In that way it made its +fortune; and having made its fortune, it takes part with the rich. Its +proprietor in those days was a man with many faults, but he was a man of +the people. Aristocratic society disliked and excluded him; he lived at +war with it to the end. Affronted by the Whigs, he became in a certain +sense a Tory; but he united his Toryism with Chartism, and was sent to +Parliament for Nottingham by Tories and Chartists combined. The +opposition of his journal to our New Poor-Law evinced, though in a +perverse way, his feeling for the people. But his heir, the present +proprietor, was born in the purple. He is a wealthy landed gentleman. He +sits in Parliament for a constituency of landlords. He is thought to +have been marked out for a peerage. It is accusing him of no crime to +suppose, that, so far as he controls the "Times," it takes the bias of +his class, and that its voice, if it speaks his sentiments, is not that +of the English people, but of a rich conservative squire. + +The editor is distinct from the proprietor, but his connections are +perhaps still more aristocratic. A good deal has been said among us of +late about his position. Before his time our journalism was not only +anonymous, but impersonal. The journalist wore the mask not only to +those whom he criticized, but to all the world. The present editor of +the "Times" wears the mask to the objects of his criticism, but drops +it, as has been remarked in Parliament, in "the gilded saloons" of rank +and power. Not content to remain in the privacy which protected the +independence of his predecessors, he has come forth in his own person to +receive the homage of the great world. That homage has been paid in no +stinted measure, and, as the British public has been apprised in rather +a startling manner, with a somewhat intoxicating effect. The lords of +the Money Power, the thrones and dominions of Usury, have shown +themselves as assiduous as ministers and peers; and these potentates +happen, like the aristocracy, to be unfriendly to your cause. Caressed +by peers and millionnaires, the editor of the "Times" could hardly fail +to express the feelings of peers and millionnaires towards a Republic in +distress. We may be permitted to think that he has rather overacted his +part. English peers, after all, are English gentlemen; and no English +gentleman would deliberately sanction the torrent of calumny and insult +which the "Times" has poured upon this nation. There are penalties for +common offenders: there are none for those who scatter firebrands among +nations. But the "Times" will not come off unscathed. It must veer with +victory. And its readers will be not only prejudiced, but idiotic, if it +does not in the process leave the last remnant of its authority behind. + +Two things will suffice to mark the real political position of the +"Times." You saw that a personal controversy was going on the other day +between its editor and Mr. Cobden. That controversy arose out of a +speech made by Mr. Bright, obliquely impugning the aristocratic law of +inheritance, which is fast accumulating the land of England in a few +hands, and disinheriting the English people of the English soil. For +this offence Mr. Bright was assailed by the "Times" with calumnies so +outrageous that Mr. Cobden could not help springing forward to vindicate +his friend. The institution which the "Times" so fiercely defended on +this occasion against a look which threatened it with alteration is +vital and sacred in the eyes of the aristocracy, but is not vital or +sacred in the eyes of the whole English nation. Again, the "Times" hates +Garibaldi; and its hatred, generally half smothered, broke out in a loud +cry of exultation when the hero fell, as it hoped forever, at +Aspromonte. But the English people idolize Garibaldi, and receive him +with a burst of enthusiasm unexampled in fervor. The English people love +Garibaldi, and Garibaldi's name is equally dear to all American hearts. +Is not this--let me ask in passing--a proof that there is a bond of +sympathy, after all, between the English people and you, and that, if as +a nation we are divided from you, it is not by a radical estrangement, +but by some cloud of error which will in time pass away? + +The wealth of the "Times," the high position which it has held since +the period when it was the great Liberal journal, the clever writing and +the early intelligence which its money and its secret connections with +public men enable it to command, give it a circulation and an influence +beyond the class whose interests it represents. But it has been thrust +from a large part of its dominion by the cheap London and local press. +It is exceeded in circulation more than twofold by the London +"Telegraph," a journal which, though it has been against the war, has, I +think, by no means shown in its leading articles the same spirit of +hostility to the American people. The London "Star," which is strongly +Federal, is also a journal of wide circulation. The "Daily News" is a +high-priced paper, circulating among the same class as the "Times"; its +circulation is comparatively small, but it is on the increase, and the +journal, I have reason to believe, is prosperous. The Manchester +"Examiner and Times," again,--a great local paper of the North of +England,--nearly equals the London "Times" in circulation, and is +favorable to your cause. I live under the dominion of the London +"Times," and I will not deny that it is a great power of evil. It will +be a great power of evil indeed, if it succeeds in producing a fatal +estrangement between two kindred nations. But no one who knows England, +especially the northern part of England, in which Liberalism prevails, +would imagine the voice of the "Times" to be that of the English people. + +Of the part taken by the writers of England it would be rash to speak in +general terms, Stuart Mill and Cairns have supported your cause as +heartily as Cobden and Bright. I am not aware that any political or +economical writer of equal eminence has taken the other side. The +leading reviews and periodicals have exhibited, as might have been +expected, very various shades of opinion; but, with the exception of the +known organs of violent Toryism, they have certainly not breathed hatred +of this nation. In those which specially represent our rising intellect, +the intellect which will probably govern us ten years hence, I should +say the preponderance of the writing had been on the Federal side. In +the University of Oxford the sympathies of the High-Church clergy and of +the young Tory gentry are with the South; but there is a good deal of +Northern sentiment among the young fellows of our more liberal colleges, +and generally in the more active minds. At the University Debating Club, +when the question between the North and the South was debated, the vote, +though I believe in a thin house, was in favor of the North. Four +Professors are members of the Union and Emancipation Society. And if +intellect generally has been somewhat coldly critical, I am not sure +that it has departed from its true function. I am conscious myself that +I may be somewhat under the dominion of my feelings, that I may be even +something of a fanatic in this matter. There may be evil as well as good +in the cause which, as the good preponderates, claims and receives the +allegiance of my heart. In that case, intellect, in pointing out the +evil, only does its duty. + +One English writer has certainly raised his voice against you with +characteristic vehemence and rudeness. As an historical painter and a +humorist Carlyle has scarcely an equal: a new intellectual region seemed +to open to me when I read his "French Revolution." But his philosophy, +in its essential principle, is false. He teaches that the mass of +mankind are fools,--that the hero alone is wise,--that the hero, +therefore, is the destined master of his fellow-men, and that their only +salvation lies in blind submission to his rule,--and this without +distinction of time or circumstance, in the most advanced as well as in +the most primitive ages of the world. The hero-despot can do no wrong. +He is a king, with scarcely even a God above him; and if the moral law +happens to come into collision with his actions, so much the worse for +the moral law. On this theory, a Commonwealth such as yours ought not +to exist; and you must not be surprised, if, in a fit of spleen, the +great cynic grasps his club and knocks your cause on the head, as he +thinks, with a single blow. Here is the end of an unsound, though +brilliant theory,--a theory which had always latent in it the worship of +force and fraud, and which has now displayed its tendency at once in the +portentous defence of the robber-policy of Frederic the Great and in the +portentous defence of the Slave Power. An opposite theory of human +society is, in fact, finding its confirmation in these events,--that +which tells us that we all have need of each other, and that the goal +towards which society actually moves is not an heroic despotism, but a +real community, in which each member shall contribute his gifts and +faculties to the common store, and the common government shall become +the work of all. For, if the victory in this struggle has been won, it +has been won, not by a man, but by the nation; and that it has been won +not by a man, but by the nation, is your glory and the pledge of your +salvation. We have called for a Cromwell, and he has not come; he has +not come, partly because Cromwells are scarce, partly, perhaps, because +the personal Cromwell belonged to a different age, and the Cromwell of +this age is an intelligent, resolute, and united people. + +I might mention other eccentricities of opinion quite distinct from the +general temper of the English nation, such as that of the +ultra-scientific school, which thinks it unscientific philanthropy to +ascribe the attributes of humanity to the negro,--a school some of the +more rampant absurdities of which had, just before I left England, +called down the rebuke of real science in the person of Mr. Huxley. And +I might note, if the time would allow, many fluctuations and +oscillations which have taken place among our organs of opinion as the +struggle went on. But I must say on the whole, both with reference to +our different classes and with reference to our literature, that, +considering the complexity of the case, the distance from which our +people viewed it, and the changes which it has undergone since the war +broke out, I do not think there is much room for disappointment as to +the sympathies of our people. Parties have been divided on this question +much as they are on great questions among ourselves, and much as they +were in the time of Charles I., when this long strife began. The England +of Charles and Laud has been against you: the England of Hampden, +Milton, and Cromwell has in the main been on your side. + +I say there has not been much ground for disappointment: I do not say +there has been none. England at present is not in her noblest mood. She +is laboring under a reaction which extends over France and great part of +Europe, and which furnishes the key at this moment to the state of +European affairs. This movement, like all great movements, reactionary +or progressive, is complex in its nature. In the political sphere it +presents itself as the lassitude and despondency which, as usual, have +ensued after great political efforts, such as were made by the +Continental nations in the abortive revolutions of 1848, and by England +in a less degree in the struggle for Parliamentary Reform. In the +religious sphere it presents itself in an analogous shape: there, +lassitude and despondency have succeeded to the efforts of the religious +intellect to escape from the decaying creeds of the old State Churches +and push forward to a more enduring faith; and the priest as well as the +despot has for a moment resumed his sway--though not his uncontested +sway--over our weariness and our fears. The moral sentiment, after high +tension, has undergone a corresponding relaxation. All liberal measures +are for the time at a discount. The Bill for the Abolition of +Church-Rates, once carried in the House of Commons by large majorities, +is now lost. The nominal leaders of the Liberal party themselves have +let their principles fall into abeyance, and almost coalesced with their +Tory opponents. The Whig nobles who carried the Reform Bill have owned +once more the bias of their order, and become determined, though covert, +enemies of Reform. The ancient altars are sought again for the sake of +peace by fainting spirits and perplexed minds; and again, as after our +Reformation, as after our great Revolution, we see a number of +conversions to the Church of Rome. On the other hand, strange physical +superstitions, such as mesmerism and spirit-rapping, have crept, like +astrology under the Roman Empire, into the void left by religious faith. +Wealth has been pouring into England, and luxury with wealth. Our public +journals proclaim, as you may perhaps have seen, that the society of our +capital is unusually corrupt. The comic as well as the serious signs of +the reaction appear everywhere. A tone of affected cynicism pervades a +portion of our high intellect; and a pretended passion for +prize-fighting shows that men of culture are weary of civilization, and +wish to go back to barbarism for a while. The present head of the +Government in England is not only the confederate, but the counterpart, +of the head of the French Empire; and the rule of each denotes the +temporary ascendancy of the same class of motives in their respective +nations. An English Liberal is tempted to despond, when he compares the +public life of England in the time of Pym and Hampden with our public +life now. But there is greatness still in the heart of the English +nation. + +And you, too, have you not known in the course of your history a +slack-tide of faith, a less aspiring hour? Have not you, too, known a +temporary ascendancy of material over spiritual interests, a lowering of +the moral tone, a readiness, for the sake of ease and peace and secure +enjoyment, to compromise with evil? Have not you, too, felt the tyranny +of wealth, putting the higher motives for a moment under its feet? What +else has brought these calamities upon you? What else bowed your necks +to the yoke which you are now breaking at so great a cost? Often and +long in the life of every nation, though the tide is still advancing, +the wave recedes. Often and long the fears of man overcome his hopes; +but in the end the hopes of man overcome his fears. Your regeneration, +when it is achieved, will set forward the regeneration of the European +nations. It is the function which all nations, which all men, in their +wavering progress towards perfection, perform in turn for each other. + +This temporary lowering of the moral tone in English society has +extended to the question of Slavery. It has deadened our feelings on +that subject, though I hope without shaking our principles. You ask +whether England can have been sincere in her enmity to Slavery, when she +refuses sympathy to you in your struggle with the Slave Power. +Talleyrand, cynic as he was, knew that she was sincere, though he said +that not a man in France thought so but himself. She redeemed her own +slaves with a great price. She sacrificed her West-Indian interest. She +counts that achievement higher than her victories. She spends annually +much money and many lives and risks much enmity in her crusade against +the slave-trade. When your Southern statesmen have tried to tamper with +her, they have found her true. If they had bid us choose between a +concession to their designs and war, all aristocratic as we are, we +should have chosen war. Every Englishman who takes the Southern side is +compelled by public opinion to preface his advocacy with a disclaimer of +all sympathy with Slavery. The agent of the slave-owners in England, Mr. +Spence, pleads their cause to the English people on the ground of +gradual emancipation. Once the "Times" ventured to speak in defence of +Slavery, and the attempt was never made again. The principle, I say, +holds firm among the mass of the people; but on this, as on other moral +questions, we are not in our noblest mood. + +In justice to my country, however, let me remind you that you did +not--perhaps you could not--set the issue between Freedom and Slavery +plainly before us at the outset; you did not--perhaps you could +not--set it plainly before yourselves. With the progress of the struggle +your convictions have been strengthened, and the fetters of legal +restriction have been smitten off by the hammer of war. But your rulers +began with disclaimers of Anti-Slavery designs. You cannot be surprised, +if our people took your rulers at their word, or if, notwithstanding +your change,--a change which they imagined to be wrought merely by +expediency,--they retained their first impression as to the object of +the war, an impression which the advocates of the South used every art +to perpetuate in their minds. That the opponents of Slavery in England +should desire the restoration of the Union with Slavery, and with +Slavery strengthened, as they expected it would be, by new concessions, +was what you could not reasonably expect. And remember--I say it not +with any desire to trench on American politics or to pass judgment on +American parties--that the restoration of the Union with Slavery is what +a large section of your people, and one of the candidates for your +Presidency, are in fact ready to embrace now. + +Had you been able to say plainly at the outset that you were fighting +against Slavery, the English people would scarcely have given ear to the +cunning fiction of Mr. Spence. It would scarcely have been brought to +believe that this great contest was only about a Tariff. It would have +seen that the Southern planter, if he was a Free-Trader, was a +Free-Trader not from enlightenment, but because from the degradation of +labor in his dominions he had no manufactures to support; and that he +was in fact a protectionist of his only home production which feared +competition,--the home-bred slave. I have heard Mr. Spence's book called +the most successful lie in history. Very successful it certainly was, +and its influence in misleading England ought not to be overlooked. It +was written with great skill, and it came out just at the right time, +before people had formed their opinions, and when they were glad to have +a theory presented to their minds. But its success would have been +short-lived, had it not received what seemed authoritative confirmation +from the language of statesmen here. + +I might mention many other things which have influenced opinion in the +wrong way: the admiration felt by our people, and, to your honor, +equally felt by you, for the valor and self-devotion which have been +shown by the Southerners, and which, when they have submitted to the +law, will entitle them to be the fellow-citizens of freemen; a careless, +but not ungenerous, sympathy for that which, by men ignorant of the +tremendous strength of a Slave Power, was taken to be the weaker side; +the doubt really, and, considering the conflict of opinion here, not +unpardonably, entertained as to the question of State Sovereignty and +the right of Secession. All these motives, though they operate against +your cause, are different from hatred of you. But there are two points +to which in justice to my country I must especially call attention. + +The first is this,--that you have not yourselves been of one mind in +this matter, nor has the voice of your own people been unanimous. No +English speaker or journal has denounced the war or reviled the conduct +of your Government more bitterly than a portion of American politicians +and a section of the American press. The worst things said in England of +your statesmen, of your generals, of your armies, of your contractors, +of your social state and character as a people, have been but the echo +of things which have been said here. If the New-York correspondents of +some English journals have been virulent and calumnious, their virulence +and their calumnies have been drawn, to a great extent, from the +American circles in which they have lived. No slanders poured by English +ignorance or malevolence on American society have been so foul as those +which came from a renegade American writing in one of our Tory journals +under the name of "Manhattan." No lamentations over the subversion of +the Constitution and the destruction of personal liberty have been +louder than those of your own Opposition. The chief enemies of your +honor have been those of your own household. The crime of a great mass +of our people against you has, in fact, consisted in believing +statements about America made by men whom they knew to be Americans, and +did not know to be disloyal to the cause of their country. I have seen +your soldiers described in an extract from one of your own journals as +jail-birds, vagabonds, and foreigners. I have seen your President +accused of wishing to provoke riots in New York that he might have a +pretence for exercising military power. I have seen him accused of +sending to the front, to be thinned, a regiment which was likely to vote +against him. I have seen him accused of decoying his political opponents +into forging soldiers' votes in order to discredit them. What could the +"Times" itself say more? + +The second point is this. Some of your journals did their best to +prevent our people from desiring your success by declaring that your +success would be followed by aggression on us. The drum, like strong +wine, is apt to get into weak heads, especially when they are +unaccustomed to the sound. An Englishman coming among you is soon +assured that you do not wish to attack Canada. Apart from considerations +of morality and honor, he finds every man of sense here aware that +extent of territory is your danger, if you wish to be one nation,--and +further, that freedom of development, and not procrustean +centralization, is the best thing for the New as well as for the Old +World. But the mass of our people have not been among you; nor do they +know that the hot words sedulously repeated to them by our Southern +press are not authentic expressions of your designs. They are doubly +mistaken,--mistaken both in thinking that you wish to seize Canada, and +in thinking that a division of the Union into two hostile nations, which +would compel you to keep a standing army, would render you less +dangerous to your neighbors. But your own demagogues are the authors of +the error; and the Monroe doctrine and the Ostend manifesto are still +ringing in our ears. I am an adherent of the Monroe doctrine, if it +means, as it did on the lips of Canning, that the reactionary influence +of the old European Governments is not to be allowed to mar the hopes of +man in the New World; but if it means violence, every one must be +against it who respects the rights of nations. When you contrast the +feelings of England towards you with those of other nations, Italy for +example, you must remember that Italy has no Canada. I hope Canada will +soon cease to be a cause of mistrust between us. The political dominion +of England over it, since it has had a free constitution of its own, has +dwindled to a mere thread. It is as ripe to be a nation as these +Colonies were on the eve of the American Revolution. As a dependency, it +is of no solid value to England since she has ceased to engross the +Colonial trade. It distracts her forces, and prevents her from acting +with her full weight in the affairs of her own quarter of the world. It +belongs in every sense to America, not to Europe; and its peculiar +institutions--its extended suffrage, its freedom from the hereditary +principle, its voluntary system in religion, its common schools--are +opposed to those of England, and identical with those of the neighboring +States. All this the English nation is beginning to feel; and it has +tried in the case of the Ionian Islands the policy of moderation, and +found that it raises, instead of lowering, our solid reputation and our +real power. The confederation which is now in course of formation +between the North-American Colonies tends manifestly to a further +change; it tends to a further change all the more manifestly because +such a tendency is anxiously disclaimed. Yes, Canada will soon cease to +trouble and divide us. But while it is England's, it is England's; and +to threaten her with an attack on it is to threaten a proud nation with +outrage and an assault upon its honor. + +Finally, if our people have misconstrued your acts, let me conjure you +to make due allowance for our ignorance,--an ignorance which, in many +cases, is as dark as night, but which the progress of events here begins +gloriously to dispel. We are not such a nation of travellers as you are, +and scarcely one Englishman has seen America for a hundred Americans +that have seen England. "Why does not Beauregard fly to the assistance +of Lee?" said a highly educated Englishman to an American in England. +"Because," was the reply, "the distance is as great as it is from Rome +to Paris." If these three thousand miles of ocean that lie between us +could be removed for a few days, and the two great branches of the +Anglo-Saxon race could look each other in the face, and speak their +minds to each other, there would be an end, I believe, of all these +fears. When an Englishman and an American meet, in this country or in +England, they are friends, notwithstanding all that has passed; why not +the two nations? + +I have not presumed, and shall not presume, to touch on any question +that has arisen or may arise between the Executive Government of my +country and the Executive Government of yours. In England, Liberals have +not failed to plead for justice to you, and, as we thought, at the same +time, for the maintenance of English honor. But I will venture to make, +in conclusion, one or two brief remarks as to the general temper in +which these questions should be viewed. + +In the first place, when great and terrible issues hang upon our acts, +perhaps upon our words, let us control our fancies and distinguish +realities from fictions. There hangs over every great struggle, and +especially over every civil war, a hot and hazy atmosphere of excited +feeling which is too apt to distort all objects to the view. In the +French Revolution, men were suspected of being objects of suspicion, and +sent to the guillotine for that offence. The same feverish and delirious +fancies prevailed as to the conduct of other nations. All the most +natural effects of a violent revolution--the depreciation of the +assignats, the disturbance of trade, the consequent scarcity of +food--were ascribed by frantic rhetoricians to the guineas of Pitt, +whose very limited amount of secret-service money was quite inadequate +to the performance of such wonders. When a foreign nation has given +offence, it is turned by popular imagination into a fiend, and its +fiendish influence is traced with appalling clearness in every natural +accident that occurs. I have heard England accused of having built the +Chicago Wigwam, with the building of which she had as much to do as with +the building of the Great Pyramid. I have heard it insinuated that her +policy was governed by her share in the Confederate Cotton-Loan. The +Confederate Cotton-Loan is, I believe, four millions and a half. There +is an English nobleman whose estates are reputed to be worth a larger +sum. "She is very great," says a French writer, "that odious England." +Odious she may be, but she is great,--too great to be bribed to baseness +by a paltry fee. + +In the second place, let us distinguish hostile acts, of which an +account must of course be demanded, from mere words, which great +nations, secure of their greatness, may afford to let pass. Your +President knows the virtue of silence; but silence is so little the +system on either side of the water, that in the general flux of rhetoric +some rash things are sure to be said. One of our statesmen, while +starring it in the Provinces, carelessly throws out the expression that +Jeff Davis has made the South a nation; another says that you are +fighting for Empire, and the South for Independence. Our Prime-Minister +is sometimes offensive in his personal bearing towards you,--as, to our +bitter cost, he has often been towards other nations. On the other hand, +your statesmen have said hard things of England; and one of your +ambassadors to a great Continental state published, not in his private, +but in his official capacity, language which made the Northern party in +England for a moment hang their heads with shame. A virulence, +discreditable to England, has at times broken forth in our House of +Commons,--as a virulence, not creditable to this country, has at times +broken forth in your Congress. But what has the House of Commons done? +Threatening motions were announced in favor of Recognition,--in defence +of the Confederate rams. They were all set aside by the good sense of +the House and of the nation. It ended in a solemn farce,--in the +question being put very formally to the Government whether it intended +to recognize the Confederate States, to which the Government replied +that it did not. + +And when the actions of our Government are in question, fair allowance +must be made for the bad state of International Law. The very term +itself is, in fact, as matters at present stand, a dangerous fiction. +There can be no law, in a real sense, where there is no law-giver, no +tribunal, no power of giving legal effect to a sentence,--but where the +party on whose side the law is held to be must after all be left to do +himself right with the strong hand. And one consequence is that +governments are induced to rest in narrow technicalities, and to be +ruled by formal precedents, when the question ought to be decided on the +broadest grounds of right. The decision of Lord Stowell, for example, +that it is lawful for the captor to burn an enemy's vessel at sea rather +than suffer her to escape, though really applying only to a case of +special necessity, has been supposed to cover a system of burning prizes +at sea, which is opposed to the policy and sentiment of all civilized +nations, and which Lord Stowell never could have had in view. And it +must be owned that this war, unexampled in all respects, has been +fruitful of novel questions respecting belligerent rights, on which a +Government meaning no evil might easily be led astray. Among its results +we may hope that this revolution will give birth to a better system of +International Law. Would there were reason to hope that it might lead to +the erection of some high tribunal of justice among nations to supersede +forever the dreadful and uncertain ordeal of war! Has the Government of +England, in any case where your right was clear, really done you a +wrong? If it has, I trust that the English nation, temperately and +respectfully approached, as a proud nation requires to be, will surely +constrain its Government to make the reparation which becomes its honor. + +But let it not be forgotten, that, in the worst of times, at the moment +of your lowest depression, England has refused to recognize the +Confederate States, or in any way to interfere in their behalf; and that +the steadiness of this refusal has driven the Confederate envoy, Mr. +Mason, to seek what he deems a more hospitable shore. The inducement of +cotton for our idle looms and our famishing people has been a strong one +to our statesmen as well as to our people, and the Tempter has been at +their side. Despotism, like Slavery, is necessarily propagandist. It +cannot bear the contagion, it cannot bear the moral rebuke, of +neighboring freedom. The new French satrapy in Mexico needs some more +congenial and some weaker neighbor than the United Republic, and we have +had more than one intimation that this need is felt. + +And this suggests one closing word as to our blockade-running. Nothing +done on our side, I should think, can have been more galling, as nothing +has been so injurious to your success. For myself, in common with all +who think as I do on these questions, I abhor the blockade-runners; I +heartily wish that the curse of ill-gotten gain may rest on every piece +of gold they make; and never did I feel less proud of my country than +when, on my way hither, I saw those vessels in Halifax sheltered under +English guns. But blockade-running is the law; it is the test, in fact, +of an effective blockade. And Englishmen are the blockade-runners, not +because England as a nation is your enemy, but because her merchants are +more adventurous and her seamen more daring than those of any nation but +your own. You, I suspect, would not be the least active of +blockade-runners, if we were carrying on a blockade. The nearness of our +fortresses at Halifax and Nassau to your shores, which makes them the +haunt of blockade-runners, is not the result of malice, but of +accident,--of most unhappy accident, as I believe. We have not planted +them there for this purpose. They have come down to us among the general +inheritance of an age of conquest, when aggression was thought to be +strength and glory,--when all kings and nations were alike +rapacious,--and when the prize remained with us, not because we were +below our neighbors in morality, but because we were more resolute in +council and mightier in arms. Our conquering hour was yours. You, too, +were then English citizens. You welcomed the arms of Cromwell to +Jamaica. Your hearts thrilled at the tidings of Blenheim and Ramillies, +and exulted in the thunders of Chatham. You shared the laurels and the +conquests of Wolfe. For you and with you we overthrew France and Spain +upon this continent, and made America the land of the Anglo-Saxon +race. Halifax will share the destinies of the North-American +confederation,--destinies, as I said before, not alien to yours. Nassau +is an appendage to our West-Indian possessions. Those possessions are +and have long been, and been known to every reasoning Englishman to be, +a mere burden to us. But we have been bound in honor and humanity to +protect our emancipated slaves from a danger which lay near. An ocean of +changed thought and feeling has rolled over the memory of this nation +within the last three years. You forget that but yesterday you were the +Great Slave Power. + +You, till yesterday, were the great Slave Power. And England, with all +her faults and shortcomings, was the great enemy of slavery. Therefore +the slave-owners who had gained possession of your Government hated her, +insulted her, tried to embroil you with her. They represented her, and I +trust not without truth, as restlessly conspiring against the existence +of their great institution. They labored, not in vain, to excite your +jealousy of her maritime ambition, when, in enforcing the right of +search and striving to put down the slave-trade, she was really obeying +her conscience and the conscience of mankind. They bore themselves +towards her in these controversies as they bore themselves towards +you,--as their character compels them to bear themselves towards all +whom they have to deal. Living in their own homes above law, the +proclaimed doctrines of lawless aggression which alarmed and offended +not England alone, but every civilized nation. And this, as I trust and +believe, has been the main cause of the estrangement between us, so far +as it has been an estrangement between the nations, not merely between +certain sections and classes. It is a cause which will henceforth +operate no more. A Scandinavian hero, as the Norse legend tells, waged a +terrible combat through a whole night with the dead body of his +brother-in-arms, animated by a Demon; but with the morning the Demon +fled. + +Other thoughts crowd upon my mind,--thoughts of what the two nations +have been to each other in the past, thoughts of what they may yet be to +each other in the future. But these thoughts will rise in other minds as +well as in mine, if they are not stifled by the passion of the hour. If +there is any question to be settled between us, let us settle it without +disparagement to the just claims or the honor of either party, yet, if +possible, as kindred nations. For if we do not, our posterity will curse +us. A century hence, the passions which caused the quarrel will be dead, +the black record of the quarrel will survive and be detested. Do what we +will now, we shall not cancel the tie of blood, nor prevent it from +hereafter asserting its undying power. The Englishmen of this day will +not prevent those who come after them from being proud of England's +grandest achievement, the sum of all her noblest victories,--the +foundation of this the great Commonwealth of the New World. And you will +not prevent the hearts of your children's children from turning to the +birth-place of their nation, the land of their history and of their +early greatness, the land which holds the august monuments of your +ancient race, the works of your illustrious fathers, and their graves. + + GOLDWIN SMITH. + + + + +WE ARE A NATION. + + +The great national triumph we have just achieved renders that foggy and +forlorn Second Tuesday of November the most memorable day of this most +memorable year of the war. Under the heavy curtain of mist that brooded +low over the scene, under the sombre clouds of uncertainty that hung +drizzling and oppressive above the whole land, was enacted a drama whose +grandeur has not been surpassed in history. The deep significance of +that event it is not easy for the mind to fathom. As the accumulating +majorities for the Union came rolling in, like billows succeeding +billows, heaping up the waters of victory, it was not alone the ship of +state that was lifted bodily over the bar, but all her costly freight of +human liberties and human hopes was upborne, and floated some leagues +onward towards the fair haven of the Future. + +The first uprising of the nation, when its existence was assailed, was +truly a sublime spectacle. But the last uprising of the same, to confirm +with cool deliberation the judgment it pronounced in its heat, is a +spectacle of far higher moral sublimity. That sudden wildfire-blaze of +patriotism, if it was simply a blaze, had long since had time to expire. +The Red Sea we had passed through was surely sufficient to quench any +light flame kindled merely in the leaves and brushwood of our national +character. Instead of a brisk and easy conquest of a rash rebellion, +such as seemed at first to be pretty generally anticipated, we had +closed with a powerful antagonist in a struggle which was all the more +terrible because it was unforeseen. The country had soon digested its +hot cakes of enthusiasm, and come to the tougher article, the +ostrich-diet of iron determination. If we were a race of flunkies, ample +opportunities had been afforded to have our flunky-ism whipped out of +us. If Jonathan was but another blustering Sir Andrew Aguecheek, he +would long before have elicited laughter from the world's aristocratic +dress-circle, and split the ears of the groundlings, by turning from the +foe that would fight, and bellowing forth that worthy gentleman's +sentiments:--"An I thought he had been valiant, and so cunning in fence, +I'd have seen him damned ere I'd have challenged him!" But those who +looked hopefully for this conclusion have been disappointed. Even Mr. +Carlyle may now perceive that we have something more than a foul chimney +burning itself out over here:--strange that a seer should thus mistake +the glare of a mountain-torch! We have not made war from a mere +ebullition of spite, or as an experiment, or for any base and temporary +purpose; but this is a war for humanity, and for all time. That we are +in deadly earnest, that the heart of the nation is in it, and that this +is no effervescent and fickle heart, the momentous Tuesday stands before +the world as the final proof. + +True, in that day's winnowing of the national grain, which had been +some four years threshing, plenty of chaff and grit were found. The +opposition to the Administration was made up of three classes. The +smallest, but by far the most active class, consisted of reckless +politicians,--those Northern men with Southern principles (if they have +anything that can properly be called principles) who sympathize with the +Rebels in arms,--who hold the interests of party to be supreme, and +shrink from no acts that bid fair to advance those interests. They are +the grit in the machine. The second class comprised the sheep which +those bad shepherds led,--sheep with a large proportion of swine +intermixed, and many a fanged and dangerous cur, as ignorant as they, +doing the will of his masters,--the brutish class, without enlightenment +or moral perception, goaded by prejudice, and deceived by lies so +shallow and foolish that the wonder was how anybody could be duped by +them. Side by side with these, and often mingling with them, was the +third class, the so-called "Conservatives," whose numbers and +respectability could alone have kept the warlike young Falstaff of the +expedition in countenance, and induced him to march through Coventry (or +rather into it, for he got no farther) with his motley crew of +followers. + +This last-named class, when analyzed, is found to be composed of a great +variety of elements. The downright "Hunker" Conservative, who is very +likely to pass over to and identify himself with the first class, hates +with a natural, ineradicable hate all political and spiritual +advancement. He takes material and selfish, and consequently low and +narrow views of things,--and having secured for himself and his wife, +for his son John and his wife, privilege to eat and sleep and cohabit, +he cannot see the necessity of any further progress. If he is +enterprising, it is to increase his blessings in this world; if devout, +it is to perpetuate them in the next: for sincere religion he has +none,--since religion is but another name for Love, inspiring hope, +charity, and a zeal for the welfare of all mankind.--Others are +conservative from timidity, or because they are wedded to tranquility. +"Oh yes," they say, "no doubt the cause you are fighting for is just; +but then fighting is so dreadful! Let us have peace,--peace at any +cost!" Good-hearted people as far as they go, but lacking in +constitution. To them the fiery torrents of generosity and heroism are +unknown. Numbers of these, it is true, were swept away by the flood of +enthusiasm which prevailed during the first days of the Rebellion; but +when it appeared that the insurgents were not to be overawed and put +down by noise,--that making speeches and hanging out flags would not do +the business,--they became alarmed: the thought of actual bloodshed, and +taxes, and a disturbance of trade developed the Aguecheek. "Good +heavens!" said they, picking up the hats they has tossed with cheers +into the sky, and carefully brushing down the ruffled nap to its former +respectable smoothness, "this will never do! we can't frighten 'em!" So +they concluded to be frightened themselves, and ran back to their +comfortable apron-strings of opinion held by their grandmothers. Strange +as it seems, many of these are persons of piety, taste, and culture. Yet +their culture is retrospective, their taste mere dillettanteism, and +their piety conventional: to whatever is new in theology, or vital in +literature, (at least until the cobwebs of age begin to gather upon it,) +and especially to whatever tends to overthrow or greatly modify the +ancient order of things, they are unalterably opposed. If occasionally +one of them becomes desirous of keeping up with the times, or is forced +along momentarily by the stream of events, some defect of mental or +moral constitution prevents his progress; and you are sure to find him +soon or late returning to the point from which he started, like those +bits of drift-wood which are always bobbing up and down close under the +fall or circling round and round in the eddies. The trouble is, such +sticks float too lightly on the surface of things; if they carried more +heart-ballast, and would sink deeper, the current would bear them +on.--Another variety of the Conservative is the man who is really +progressive and right-minded, but extremely slow. Give him time, and he +is certain to form a just judgment, and range himself on the right side +at last. He goes with the rest only so far as they travel his road, and +his lagging is pretty sure to be atoned for by earnest endeavor in the +end. With these are to be classed numerous other varieties: those who +are "Hunkerish" on account of some strange spiritual obtuseness, or from +misanthropy, or perverseness, or self-conceit, or a cold and sluggish +temperament, or from weak, human sympathies governed by strong political +prejudice,--together with those countless larvae and tadpoles, the +small-fry of sons and nephews, of individuality yet undeveloped, who are +conservative because their fathers and uncles are conservative. + +Such was the Opposition, to which we have devoted so many words, +because, though signally defeated, much of its power and influence +survives. The fact that it proved to be as large as it was is by no +means discouraging: that there should have been so much flabby and +diseased flesh on the body-politic was to have been expected; and that +it would show itself chiefly in the large cities, where foul humors and +leprosy are sure to break out, if anywhere, upon slight irritation, +(contrast the corrupt vote of New York City with Missouri and Maryland +giving their voices for freedom!) was likewise foreseen. That the malady +continues, and by what curative process it is to be subdued and rendered +harmless,--this is what concerns us now. + +We have at last demonstrated, to the satisfaction of our arrogant +Southern friends, let us trust, that the despised Yankee, the +dollar-worshipper, is as prompt to fight for a principle as they for +power and a mistaken right of property,--ready to give blood and +treasure without stint, all for an idea; and that, having reluctantly +set his foot in gore, to draw back is not possible to him, for his heart +is indomitable, and his soul relentless,--in his soul sits Nemesis +herself. We have taught the slaveholding insolence the final lesson, +that there is absolutely nothing to hope from the pusillanimity it +counted upon. To the world abroad, also, that Tuesday's portentous +snow-storm of ballots, covering every vestige of treason here, to the +trail of the Copperhead, and whitening the face of the whole land with a +purer faith, will be more convincing than our victories in the field. +The bubble of Republicanism, which was to display such alacrity at +bursting, is not the childish thing it was deemed, but granitic, with a +fiery, throbbing core; its outward form no mere flashy film, blown out +of chimeras and dreams, but a creation from the solid strata of human +experience, upheaved here by the birth-throes of a new era:-- + + "With inward fires and pain, + It rose a bubble from the plain," + +secure and enduring as Monadnock or Mount Washington. + +We have proved that we are a nation equal to the task of self-discipline +and self-control,--a new thing on this planet. Hitherto, on the stage of +history, kings and princes have been the star-actors: in them all the +interest of the scene has centred: they and a few grand favorites were +everything, and all the rest supernumeraries, "a level immensity of +foolish small people," of no utility except to support them in their +pompous parts. But we have found that "Hamlet" does very well with +Hamlet left out. In place of the prince we will have a principle. +Persons are of no account: the President is of no account simply as a +man. Here, at last, Humanity has flowered; here has blossomed a new race +of men, capable of postponing persons to uses, and private preferences +to the public good, of subjecting its wildest passions to a sense of +justice,--qualities so rare, that, when they are most strikingly +manifested in us, foreign observers stand astonished and incredulous. +Accustomed to seeing other races carried away by their own frenzy the +moment they break free from despotic restraint and attempt to act for +themselves, they cannot believe that Americans actually have that +uncommon virtue, self-control. The predictions of the London "Times" +with regard to us have always proved such ludicrous failures, because +they have been based upon this false estimate of our temper. Taking for +granted that we are a mob, and that a mob is an idiot, whose speech and +actions are void of reason, "full of sound and fury, signifying +nothing," the Thunderer continues to prophesy evil of us; and when, +where madness was most confidently looked for, we exhibit the coolest +sense, it can think of nothing better to do than to denounce us for our +inconsistencies! Yet the self-control we claim for ourselves comes from +no lack of caloric: caloric we possess in abundance, though of a stiller +sort than that with which the world has been hitherto acquainted. Our +friend from the backwoods thought there was no fire in the coal-furnace, +because he could not hear it roar and crackle, and was afterwards amazed +at its steady intensity of heat. Our misguided Southern brethren had the +same opinion of Northern character, and burned their hands most +deplorably when they laid hold of it. + +They have discovered their mistake. Our Transatlantic neighbors have +also, by this time, discovered theirs. Moreover, we (and this is the +main thing) have caught a glimpse of ourselves in the glass of the last +election. Henceforth let us have faith in our destiny. Let us once more +open our maps, and, by the light of that day's revelation, look at the +grand outlines and limitless possibilities of our country. Look at the +old States and the new, and at the future States! Behold the vast plains +of Texas and the Indian Territory,--the rivers of Arizona, Dakotah, and +Utah,--Montana, Idaho, Colorado, and New Mexico, with their magnificent +mountain-chains,--Nevada, and the Pacific States,--Washington, Oregon, +and California, each alone capable of becoming another New England! What +a home is this for the nation that is to be! Let us consider well our +advantages, be true to the inspiration that is in us, put aside at once +and forever the thought of failure, and advance with firm and confident +steps to the accomplishment of the grandest mission ever yet intrusted +to any people. + +True, great humiliations may be still in store for us; for what do we +not deserve? When we consider the inhumanity, the cowardice, the stolid +selfishness, of which this people has been guilty, especially on the +subject of negro slavery, we can find no refuge from despair but in the +comforting assurance that God is a God of mercy, as well as of justice. + +Let us hasten to atone for our sins, and forward the work of national +purification, by doing our duty--our whole duty--now. One thing is +certain: we cannot look for help to other nations, nor to the amiable +disposition of a foe whose pith and pluck are consanguineous with our +own, nor to the agency of individuals. It was written in the beginning +that the people which aspired to make its own laws should also work out +its own salvation. For this reason great leaders have not been given us, +and we shall not need them. It is for a nation unstable in its purposes, +and incapable of self-moderation, that the steady hand of a strong ruler +is necessary. The first Napoleon was no more a natural product of the +first French Revolution than the present Emperor is of the last. They +might each have sat for the picture of the tyrant springing to the neck +of an unbridled Democracy, drawn by Plato in the eighth book of the +"Republic": just as his description of the excesses which necessitate +despotic rule might pass for a description of the frenzy of +'Ninety-Three:--"When a State thirsts after liberty, _and happens to +have bad cup-bearers appointed it, and gets immoderately drunk with an +unmixed draught, thereof_, it punishes even the governors." No such +inebriety has resulted from the moderate draughts of that nectar in +which this new Western race has indulged; and only the southern and +more passionate portion of it is in any danger of converting its acute +"State-Rights" distemper into chronic despotism. The nation in its +childhood needed a paternal Washington; but now it has arrived at +manhood, and it requires, not a great leader, but a magistrate willing +himself to be led. Such a man is Mr. Lincoln: an able, faithful, +hard-working citizen, overseeing the affairs of all the citizens, +accepting the guidance of Providence, and conscientiously yielding +himself to be the medium of a people's will, the agent of its destinies. +That is all we have any right to expect of him; and if we expect more, +we shall be disappointed. He cannot stretch forth his hand and save us, +although we have now twice elected him to his high place. Upon +ourselves, and upon ourselves alone, under God, success and victory +still depend. + +What outward duties are to be fulfilled it is needless to recapitulate +here,--for have they not been taught in every loyal pulpit and in every +loyal print, in sermon, story, and song, until there is not a school-boy +but knows the lesson? Treason must be defeated in the field, its armies +annihilated, its power destroyed forever. In order to accomplish this, +our own armies must be kept constantly recruited with numbers and with +confidence. As for American slavery, it perishes from the face of the +earth utterly. We have had enough of the serpent which the young +Republic warmed in its too kind bosom. Now it dies; there is no help for +it: if you object to the heel upon its head, and place your own head +there to sheild it, God pity you, my friend, for you will have need of +more than human pity! This war is to be brought to a triumphant close, +and the cause of the war extirpated, whether you like it or not. You can +accept destruction and ignominy with it, or you may live to rejoice over +the most glorious victory and reform of the age: take your choice: but +understand, once for all, that complaint is puerile, and expostulation +but an idle wind in the face of inexorable Fate. Shall we remember our +martyred heroes, our noble, our beloved, who have gone down in this +conflict, and sit gloomily content while the devouring monster survives? +Is it nothing that they have fallen, and yet such a wrong that the +fetters of the bondman should fall? Is the claim of property in man so +sacred, and the blood of our brothers so cheap? Have done with this +heartless cant,--this prating about the constitutional rights of +traitors! When the Moslem chief was marching to the chastisement of a +revolted tribe, the insurgents, seeing disaster inevitable in a fair +field, resorted to the device of elevating the Koran upon the shafts of +their spears, and bearing it before them into battle. The stratagem +succeeded. The fanatical Arabs were filled with horror on finding that +they had lifted their swords against the Book of the Holy Prophet, and +fled in confusion,--defeated, not by the foe, but by their own blind +reverence for the letter and outward symbol of the Law. Thus the first +attempt at secession from the Moslem Empire became successful; and the +decadence of that empire was the fatal fruit of that day's folly. In +like manner we have had the letter of the Constitution thrust between us +and victory. The leaders of the Opposition carried it before them, with +ostentation and loud pharisaical rant, in the late political battle. +But, much as it has embarrassed and retarded our cause, terrifying and +bewildering weak minds, the device has not availed in the past, and it +shall avail still less in the future. The spirit of the Constitution we +shall remember and obey; but the sword of justice, edged with common +sense, must cut its way through everything else, to the very heart of +the Rebellion. + +Only from ourselves have we anything to fear. Self-distrust is more to +be dreaded than foreign interference or Rebel despotism. The deportment +of Great Britain has become more and more respectful towards us as we +have shown ourselves worthy of respect; and even France has of late +grown discreetly reticent on the subject of intervention. But it is said +the Rebels will arm their slaves. Very well; if they think to save their +boat by taking the bottom out, in order to make paddles of it, they are +welcome to try the experiment. Are three or four hundred thousand negro +soldiers going to accept from their masters the boon of freedom for +themselves only, and not demand it for their race? Or think you their +gratitude towards those masters is so extraordinary, that they will take +arms against their brothers already in the field, and not be liable to +commit the slight error of passing over and fighting by their side? In +either case, Mr. Davis's proposition, if carried out, is practical +abolitionism; and we have yet to learn how a tottering edifice can be +rendered any more stable by the removal of its acknowledged +"cornerstone." The plan is violently opposed by the slave-owning +classes: for, whatever may be proclaimed to the contrary, they have +risked this war, and devoted themselves to it, believing it to be a war +for the aggrandizement of their peculiar institution; and if that +succumbs, where is the gain? Already their new Government has become to +them an object of dread and detestation, and they are beginning to look +back with regretful hearts to the beneficent Union which they were in +such rash haste to destroy. Only the leaders of the Rebellion can hope +to gain anything by so perilous an expedient; for Slavery has become +with them a secondary consideration,--no doubt Mr. Davis is sincere in +asserting this,--and they are now ready to sacrifice it to their private +ambition. They are in the position of men who, driven to extremity, will +give up everything else in order to preserve their power, and their +necks with it. But let us indulge in no useless apprehensions on this +point. Such a proposition, seriously entertained by the Richmond +Government, is of itself the strongest evidence we could have of the +exhaustion of their resources. Every other means has failed, and this is +their last resort. We are reminded of that vivid description, in one of +Cooper's novels, of an Indian in his canoe drawn into the rapids of +Niagara and swept over the falls,--who, in his wild efforts to save +himself, continued _paddling in the air_ even after he had passed the +verge of the cataract. So the Confederate craft has reached the brink of +destruction, and we may now look to see some frantic paddling in their +air. Or shall we liken it to Milton's bad angel, flying to his new +empire, but dropping into an unexpected "vast vacuity"? + + "Fluttering his pennons vain, plumb down he drops + Ten thousand fathom deep, and to this hour + Down had been falling, had not by ill chance + This strong rebuff of some tumultuous cloud + Instinct with fire and nitre hurried him + As many miles aloft." + +That "ill chance" has been averted by the last election; and no such +"tumultuous cloud" will gather again, to bear up the lost Anarch, if we +courageously act our part. The danger now is from our own weakness, not +from the enemy's strength. + +A great and most important work still remains for us. It is not enough +to perform simply the external and obvious duties of the hour. What we +would insist on here is the internal and moral work to be done. Men have +never yet given full credit to the power of an idea. With faith, ye +shall remove mountains. A pebble of truth, in the hand of the +shepherd-boy of Israel, is mightier to prevail than the spear like a +weaver's beam. How long were the little band of Abolitionists despised! +But they were the cutwater of the national ship. With their +revolutionary idea, so opposed to the universal prejudice, they +succeeded at last in moving the entire country, just as one cog-wheel +set against another overcomes its resistance and puts the whole +machinery in motion. The rills of thought, shooting from the heights of +a few pure and lofty minds, have spread out into this sea of practical +Abolitionism which now covers the whole land,--although the sea may be +inclined to deny its source. May we, then, charge the pioneers of the +Anti-Slavery sentiment with having caused this war? In the same manner +we may regard the coming of Christ as being the cause of all the wars +and persecutions of Christianity. + +If such is the force of earnest conviction, consider what we too may do. +We have gone to the polls and voted for the accomplishment of a certain +object: far more intelligently than at the beginning of the war, (for +few knew then what we were fighting for,) we have met the enemies of our +country, and defeated them at the ballot-box. But there is another and +no less important vote to be cast. The Twentieth Presidential Election +is not the last, even for this year. We are to continue casting our +ballots, every day, and day after day,--nay, year after year, if +necessary,--to the end. We have had political suffrage; but moral +suffrage is now called for. Here woman realizes her rights, so long +talked about, and so little understood; here, too, even the intelligent, +patriotic boy and girl can exert an influence. We know something of what +words can do; but how little we appreciate the power which is behind +words! By the wishes of your heart, by the aspirations of your soul, by +the energies of your mind and will, you form about you an atmosphere as +real as the air you breathe, although, like that, invisible. Not a +prayer is lost; not a throb of patriotish goes for nothing; never a wave +of impulse dies upon the ethereal deep in which we live and move and +have our being. Be filled with the truth as with life itself; let the +divine aura exhale from you wherever you move; and thus you may do more +to overcome the opposition to our cause than when you deposited your +ticket in the box. You may, perhaps, breathe the breath of life into the +nostrils of the coldest clay of conservatism you know: for true it is +that men not only catch manners, as they do diseases, one from another, +but that they catch unconscious inspiration also. Boswell, when absent +from London and his hero, acknowledged himself to be empty, vapid; and +he became somewhat only when "impregnated with the Johnsonian ether." So +the ether of your own earnest, fervent, patriotic character may +impregnate the spiritless and help to sustain the brave. Consider, +moreover, what an element may be thus generated by the combined hopes +and prayers of a whole loyal people! This is the atmosphere which is to +sustain the President and his advisers in their work: this, although we +may not know it, and although they may be unaware, is the vital breath +they need to give them wisdom and power equal to the great crisis; while +even the soldiers, in the far-off fields of conflict, shall feel the +agitations of this subtile fluid, this life-supporting oxygen, buoying +up their hopes, and wafting their banners on to victory. + + + + +REVIEWS AND LITERARY NOTICES. + + + _Dissertations and Discussions: Political, Philosophical, and + Historical._ By JOHN STUART MILL. In Three Volumes. 12mo. + Boston: W. V. Spencer. + +At a time of deep national emotion, like the present, it is impossible +that we Americans should not feel some bias of personal affection in +reading the works of those great living Englishmen who have been true to +us in the darkest hour. Were it only for his faithful friendship to +freedom and to us, Mr. Mill has a right to claim an attentive audience +for every word he has ever written; and this collection of his +miscellaneous writings, covering a period of thirty years, has a special +interest as showing the successive steps by which he has risen to this +high attitude of nobleness. + +But apart from these special ties, Mr. Mill claims attention as the most +advanced of English minds, and the ablest, all things considered, of +contemporary English writers. His detached works have long since found a +very large American audience,--larger, perhaps, than even their +home-circle of readers; and the sort of biographical interest which +attaches to a collection of shorter essays--giving, as it does, a +glimpse at the training of the writer--will more than compensate for the +want of continuity in these volumes, and for the merely local interest +which belongs to many of the subjects treated. Church-rates and the +English currency have not to us even the interest of heraldry, for that +at least can offer pictures of mermaids, and great ingenuity in Latin +puns; but, on the other hand, every discussion of the British +university-system has a positive value, in the exceedingly crude and +undeveloped condition of American collegiate methods. There is the same +disparity of interest in the different critical essays. Bentham has +hardly exerted an appreciable influence on American thought, and the +transitory authority of Coleridge is now merged in more potent agencies; +yet when the essays bearing those great names were first printed in the +periodical then edited by Mill, they made an era in contemporary English +literature, and therefore indirectly modified our own. + +Thus, in one way or another, almost all these essays have a value. The +style is always clear, always strong, sometimes pointed, seldom +brilliant, never graceful; it is the best current sample, indeed, of +that good, manly, rather colorless English which belongs naturally to +Parliamentary Speeches and Quarterly Reviews. Not being an American, the +author may use novel words without the fear of being called provincial; +so that _understandable_, _evidentiary_, _desiderate_, _leisured_, and +_inamoveability_ stalk at large within his pages. As a controversialist, +he is a trifle sharp, but never actually discourteous; and it is +pleasant to see that his chivalry makes him gentlest in dealing with the +humblest, while his lance rings against the formidable shield of a +Cambridge Professor or a Master of Trinity as did that of the disguised +Ivanhoe upon the shield of Bois-Guilbert. + +The historical essays in this collection are exceedingly admirable, +especially the defence of Pericles and the Athenians, in the second +paper on Crete's History. In reading the articles upon ethical and +philosophical questions, one finds more drawbacks. The profoundest +truths can hardly be reached, perhaps, by one who, at the end of his +life, as at the beginning, is a sensationalist in metaphysics and a +utilitarian in ethics. It is only when dealing with these themes that he +seems to show any want of thoroughness: unfairness he never shows. In +the closing tract on "Utilitarianism," which the American publishers +have added to the English collection, one feels especially this +drawback. As the theory of universal selfishness falls so soon as one +considers that a man is capable of resigning everything that looks like +happiness, and of plunging into apparent misery, because he thinks it +right,--so the theory of utilitarianism falls, when one considers that a +man is capable of abstaining from an action that would apparently be +useful to all around him, from a secret conviction that it is wrong in +itself. There are many things which are intrinsically wrong, although, +so far as one can see, they would do good to all around. To assassinate +a bad neighbor,--to rob a miser and distribute his goods,--to marry +Rochester, while his insane wife is living, (for Jane Eyre,)--to put to +death an imbecile and uncomfortable grandmother, (for a +Feegeean,)--these are actions which are indefensible, though the balance +of public advantages might seem greatly in their favor. It is probable +that at this moment a great good would be done to this nation and to the +world by the death of Jefferson Davis; yet the bare suggestion of his +assassination, in the case of Colonel Dahlgren, was received with a +universal shudder, and disavowed as an atrocious slander. But Mr. Mill +can meet such ethical problems only by reverting to that general +principle of Kant, which he elsewhere repudiates: "So act that the rule +on which thou actest would admit of being adopted as a law for all +rational beings." Mr. Mill says of such instances, "The action is of a +class which, if practised generally, would be generally injurious, and +this is the ground of the obligation to abstain from it." But under the +rule of utilitarianism, it is the injuriousness itself which should be +the principle of classification, and to prove an action innoxious is at +once to separate it from that class; so that the objection falls. By his +own principles, a murder which would benefit the community is by that +very attribute differenced from ordinary and injurious murders, nor can +any good argument be found against its commission. The possible bad +precedent is at best a possible misapprehension, to be sufficiently +averted by concealment, where concealment is practicable. + +In dealing with contemporary and practical questions, Mr. Mill shows +always pre-eminent ability, with less of the Insular traits than any +living Englishman. While there is perhaps no single passage in these +volumes so thoroughly grand as his argument for religions freedom in his +essay on Liberty,--an argument which the most heretical theologians of +either Continent could hardly have put so boldly or so well,--yet +through the whole series of essays there runs the same fine strain. He +repeatedly renews his clear and irresistible appeal for the equal +political rights of the sexes: a point on which there is coming to be +but one opinion among the most advanced minds of Europe and America,--a +unanimity which, after the more immediate problem of Slavery is disposed +of, must erelong bring about some practical application of the +principle, in our republican commonwealths. It is interesting to notice +in this connection, that Mr. Mill has included with his own essays the +celebrated article by his wife, on "The Enfranchisement of Women," and +has prefixed to it one of the noblest eulogies ever devoted to any wife +by any husband. + +He deals with strictly American subjects in the best criticism ever +written upon De Tocqueville, where he shows conclusively the error of +that great writer, in attributing to democracy, as such, many social +phenomena which are equally observable under the English monarchy. These +volumes also include--what the English edition of 1859 of course did not +contain--the later essays on "The Contest in America," "The Slave +Power," and "Non-Intervention." In treating of Slavery and of the War, +the author rarely commits an error; in dealing with other American +questions, he is sometimes misled by defective information, and cites +gravely, with the prelude, "It is admitted," or "It is understood," +statements which have their sole origin in the haste of travellers or in +the croaking of disappointed egotists. The government of the majority +does not end in tyranny: cultivated Americans are not cowards: the best +heads are not excluded from public life: free schools do not tend to +stifle free thought, but infinitely to multiply it: individuality of +character is not checked, but healthily trained, by political equality. +Six months in this country would do more to disabuse Mr. Mill, in these +matters, than years of mere reading; and it is a positive injury to his +large ideas that he should not take the opportunity of testing them on +the only soil where they are being put in practice. Whenever he shall +come, his welcome is secure. In the mean time, all that we Americans can +do to testify to his deserts is to reprint his writings beautifully, as +these are printed,--and to read them universally, as these will be read. + + + _Narrative of Privations and Sufferings of United States + Officers and Soldiers while Prisoners of War in the Hands of + the Rebel Authorities._ Being the Report of a Commission of + Inquiry, appointed by the United States Sanitary Commission. + With an Appendix, containing the Testimony. Printed by the U.S. + Sanitary Commission. Philadelphia. + +That uniform thoroughness and accuracy which have marked all that has +been done by the Sanitary Commission, not in the field alone, but in the +committee-room and the printing-office, were never better shown than in +this Report. It attempts something which, unless done thoroughly, was +not worth doing; since, on a subject which appeals so strongly to the +feelings, mere generalities and gossip do more harm than good. It is the +work of a special Commission of Inquiry, composed of three physicians, +(Drs. Mott, Delafield, and Wallace,) two lawyers, (Messrs. Wilkins and +Hare,)and one clergyman (Mr. Walden). This commission has performed a +great amount of labor, and has digested its result into a form so +systematic as to be logically irresistible. The facts on which the +statement rests are a large body of evidence, taken under oath, from +prisoners of both armies, and confirmed by the admissions, carefully +collated, of the Rebel press. The conclusion is, that, in the Southern +prisons, "tens of thousands of helpless men have been, and are now +being, disabled and destroyed by a process as certain as poison, and as +cruel as the torture or burning at the stake, because nearly as +agonizing and more prolonged." + +The next step is to fix the responsibility for all these horrors. All +theories of apology--as that the sufferings were accidental or +exceptional, or that, badly as our soldiers may have fared, the Rebel +soldiers fared little better--are taken up and conclusively refuted, the +last-named with especial thoroughness. The inevitable inference drawn by +the Commission is, that these inhumanities were "designedly inflicted on +the part of the Rebel Government," and were _not_ "due to causes which +such authorities could not control." + +The immediate preparation of this able report is understood to be due to +the Rev. Treadwell Walden, an Episcopal clergyman of Philadelphia, not +unknown to the readers of the "Atlantic." His present work will be the +permanent authority for the facts which it records, and will justify to +future generations the suggestion with which it ends, that these +cruelties are the legitimate working of a form of government which takes +human slavery for its basis. The record of such a government is fitly +written in these pages: it is as appropriate as is, for a king of +Dahomey, his funeral pyramid of skulls. + + + _Freedom of Mind in Willing_; or, Every Being that Wills a + Creative First Cause. By ROWLAND G. HAZARD. New York: D. + Appleton & Co. 12mo. pp. 455. + +The State of Rhode Island is the most metaphysically inclined of all the +sisterhood, not excepting South Carolina. A superficial observer or a +passing traveller might take just the opposite view of her tendencies. +The stranger who should complete a cycle of sumptuous suppers in +Providence, or spend but a day or two in Newport at the height of the +season, might conclude that Matter with its most substantial appliances, +or Fashion with her most fascinating excitements, had combined to +exclude all thoughts of the spiritual from the few square miles over +which this least of the States holds dominion. Should he leave the two +capitals of luxurious wealth and giddy fashion and seek for the haunts +of Philosophy among the quiet nooks which her few valleys and her +splendid sea-coast afford, he might judge that meditation had been +effectually frightened from them all, for nowhere can he escape the whir +of countless spindles and the clash of thousands of looms. + +But inferences like these may not be trusted, as history demonstrates. +The most admirable of modern treatises in the subtile science, that +masterpiece of speculation in matter and style, "The Minute Philosopher" +of Bishop Berkeley, was composed in Rhode Island, and the place is still +indicated where the musing metaphysician is said to have written the +greater portion of the work. That Berkeley's genius did not abandon the +region, when he left it, is manifest from the direction taken by the +late Judge Durfee, whose "Pan-Idea," if it cannot be accepted as in all +respects a satisfactory theory of the relations of the spiritual +universe, may be safely taken as an indication of the lofty and daring +Platonism of the ingenious author. The anonymous author of "Language by +a Heteroscian" is another thinker of somewhat similar tastes. If common +report do not greatly err, it is the same thinker who in the volume +before us solicits the attention of the philosophic world to his views +of the Will. It adds greatly to the interest of the volume itself, in +our view, and we trust will do so in the view of our readers, to know +that he is no studious recluse nor professional philosopher, but active, +shrewd, and keen-sighted, both in his mills, when at home in a fitly +named valley, and upon Change, when in Boston or New York. + +Surely Roger Williams, that boldest of idealists, did not live in vain, +in that he not only set apart the State which he founded as a place of +refuge for all persons given to free and daring speculation, but made it +a kind of Prospero's Isle, that should never cease to be haunted by some +metaphysical spell. + +The appearance of such a work from such a source is of itself most +refreshing, as an indication that a life of earnest devotion to material +pursuits is not inconsistent with an ardent appreciation of the +surpassing importance of speculative inquiries. One such example as this +is enough to refute the oft-repeated assertion that in America all +philosophy must of course give way before the absorbing interest in the +pursuit of wealth. A few years since we chanced to send a copy of an +American edition of Plato's "Phaedo" to a German Professor. "_Eine +wirkliche Erscheinung_," was his reply in acknowledgment, "to see an +edition of a work of Plato from America." What would be his amazement at +receiving a copy of a disquisition on the Will written by an American +mill-owner! + +It is still more refreshing to find the author so sincere and so earnest +an advocate of the elevating tendency of philosophical studies. There is +a charming simplicity in the words with which his Preface is +concluded:--"Whatever opinion may be formed of the success or failure of +any effort to elucidate this subject, I trust it will be admitted that +the arguments I have presented at least _tend_ to show that the +investigation may open more elevated and more elevating views of our +position and our powers, and may reveal new modes of influencing our own +intellectual and moral character, and thus have a more immediate, +direct, and practical bearing on the progress of our race in virtue and +happiness than any inquiry in physical science." Such testimony, coupled +with the impression made by his argument, is most gratifying, not only +in consideration of the source from which it comes, but also as +contrasted with the course of so much of the speculative philosophy of +the day, towards Materialism in Psychology, Necessarianism in Morals, +Naturalism in Philosophy, and Pantheism in Theology. + +The doctrine of the writer, or rather his position with respect to +theories of the Will, is distinctly indicated by the title of his +volume. It is obvious that he must be a decided asserter of Liberty as +opposed to Necessity who dares to throw down the gauntlet in support of +the thesis that "every being who wills is a creative first cause." All +his views of the soul and of its doings are entirely consistent with the +direction which is required by this audacious assertion. That the soul +is an originator in most of its activities is his perpetually asserted +theme. To maintain this he is ready almost to question the reality, as +he more than questions the necessity, of the existence of matter, +verging occasionally, on this point, upon Berkeley's views and style of +thinking. The constructive capacities of the intellect are inferred from +the variety of mathematical creations which it originates, as well as +from the more diverse and interesting structures which the never wearied +and ever aspiring fantasy is always building. Should any one question +the right of these creations to be, or seek to detract from their +importance, our author is ready to defend them to the utmost in contrast +with matter and its claims. Indeed, the author's exposition of his +doctrine of the Will is by itself an inconsiderable source of interest, +when separated from the views of all the functions of the spirit, which +are interwoven with it. In discussing the Will he is necessarily led to +treat of its relations to the other powers and functions of the spirit, +and hence by necessity to give his philosophy of the Soul. This +philosophy, briefly described, is one which regards the soul in its +nature and its acts, in its innermost structure and its outmost +energies, as capable of and destined to action. This in also its dignity +and its glory. The soul or spirit, so far from being the subject of +material forces, or the outgrowth of successive series of material +agencies, or the subtile product or potence of material laws, is herself +the conscious mistress and sovereign of them all, giving to matter and +development and law all their importance, as she condescends to use +these either as the mirror in which her own creations are reflected or +the vehicle by which her acts can be expressed. + +How the author maintains and defends this position the limits of this +brief notice will not allow us to specify. The views expressed which +have the closest pertinency to the will are those which lay especial +stress upon the soul as capable of _wants_, and as thus impelled to +action. Emotion and sensibility neither of them qualifies for action. +_Want_ must supervene, to point to the unattained future, to excite to +change; and to this want knowledge also must be added, in order to +direct the activity. Under the stimulus thus furnished, the future must +be created, as it were, by the will of the soul itself, before it is +made real in fact. + +We are not quite sure that we understand the author's doctrine of Want, +and its relations to the activities of the will, nor that, so far as we +do understand it, we should accept it. But we agree with him entirely, +that it is precisely by means of and in connection with a correct +analysis of these impelling forces that the real nature and import of +the will can be satisfactorily evolved. Mr. Hazard seems to us to make +too little difference between the power of the soul to act and its power +to will or choose. He conceives the will as the capacity which qualifies +for effort of every kind, as the conative power in general, instead of +emphasizing it as the capacity for a special kind of effort, namely, +that of moral selection. + +The second part of the volume is devoted to a criticism of Edwards, the +author on whose "steel cap," as on that of Hobbes of old, every advocate +of liberty is impelled to try the strength and temper of his weapons. +For a critical antagonist, Edwards is admirable, his use of language +being far from precise and consistent, and his definitions and +statements, through his extreme wariness, being vague and vacillating +enough to allow abundant material for comment. Of these advantages Mr. +Hazard knows how to avail himself, and shows not a little acuteness in +exposing the untenable positions and the inconsequent reasoning of the +New-England dialectician. The most ingenious of the chapters upon +Edwards is that in which he refutes the conclusions drawn from the +foreknowledge of God. His position is the following:--If we concede that +the foreknowledge of God were inconsistent with liberty, and involved +the necessity of human volitions, we may suppose the Supreme Being to +forego the exercise of foreknowledge in respect to such events. But it +would not therefore follow that God would be thereby taken by surprise +by any such volitions, or would be incompetent to regulate His own +actions or to control the issues of them in governing the universe. This +he seeks to show, very ingeniously, by asserting that the Supreme Being +must be competent to foresee not the actual volition that will be made, +but every variety that is possible; and as a consummate chess-player +provides by comprehensive forecast against every possible move which his +antagonist can make, and has ready a counter-move, so may we, on the +supposition suggested, conceive the Supreme Being as fully competent, +without the foreknowledge of the actual, by means of His foreknowledge +of the possible, to control and govern the course of the future. This +solution is certainly ingenious, and doubtless original with the author. +It has in all probability occurred to other minds; but, inasmuch as the +advocate for freedom does not usually allow that he is shut up to the +alternative of either denying the divine purpose or abandoning human +freedom, the suggestion of the author has not often, if ever, been +seriously urged before. But we have no space for critical comments. + +The style of the author is good. With some diffuseness, he is usually +clear and animated. The circumstances that he has approached the subject +in his own way, independently of the method of books and the technics of +the schools, has lent great freshness to his thoughts and illustrations. +The occasional observations which he throws in are always ingenious and +sometimes profound. He shows himself at every turn to be an acute +observer, a comprehensive thinker, and deeply imbued with the meditative +spirit. The defects incidental to his peculiar training are more than +compensated by the freshness of his manner and the directness of his +language. More interesting still is the imaginative tendency which gives +to many of his passages the charm of poetic feeling, and elevates them +to the truly Platonic rhythm. There are single sentences, and now and +then entire paragraphs, which are gems in their way, that sparkle none +the less for the plain setting of common sense and unpretending diction +by which they are relieved. + +We ought to add that the attitude of the author in respect to moral and +religious truth is truly, but not obtrusively, reverent. Though he +asserts for man the dignity that pertains to a creator, yet he never +forgets the limits under which and the materials out of which his +creations are wrought. His Theism is outspoken and sincere. + +Whatever judgment may be passed upon this volume in the schools of +philosophy or theology, all truth-loving men will agree that it brings +honor to the literature and thought of the country. No man can read a +few of the many passages of refined thought and sagacious observation +with which the volume abounds, without acknowledging the presence of +philosophic genius. No one can read the passages with which each +principal division of the work concludes, without admiring the fine +strains which indicate the presence of genius inspired by poetic feeling +and elevated by adoring reverence. We are sure that the fit, though +scanty, audience from whom the author craves a kindly judgment will +cheerfully render to him far more than this, even their unfeigned +admiration. + + + _Military Bridges:_ With Suggestions of New Expedients and + Constructions for crossing Streams and Chasms; including, also, + Designs for Trestle and Truss Bridges for Military Railroads. + Adapted especially to the Wants of the Service in the United + States. By HERMANN HAUPT, late Chief of Bureau in Charge of the + Construction and Operation of United States Military Railways, + etc. New York: D. Van Nostrand. 8vo. pp. 310. + +There is in the War Department at Washington a series of splendid +photographs, illustrative of scenes along the line of march of our +armies in Virginia, and depicting minutely the great pioneer labor of +transporting troops and ammunition, giving evidence of the greatest +engineering genius, and the illimitable resource that has been evoked by +this dreadful War of Rebellion. + +The book before us is the result of these operations reduced to form. +The author's name has for the last twenty-five years been associated +with most of the great works of internal improvement in this country, +and is familiar to every Massachusetts man as connected with the great +railroad-enterprise of the State,--the Hoosac Tunnel. + +The professional reputation of the author of "The General Theory of +Bridge-Construction" would of itself be a sufficient guaranty that a new +work from the same source would be entitled to consideration. General +Haupt does not often appear before the public as an author: his works +are few, but of rare merit. The first which appeared, "The General +Theory of Bridge-Construction," was the fruit of many years of +experiment, observation, and calculation, and at once established his +reputation in Europe and America, as unequalled in the specialty of +Bridges. This work was not only the first, but up to the present time is +the only publication in which the action of the parts in a complicated +system is explained, and the direction and intensity of each and every +strain brought within the reach of mathematical formulas, and rendered +accurately determinable. Before the appearance of this book it is +probable that not another engineer in the world could be found able to +calculate the strain upon every sort of bridge-truss, but only on +certain simple forms and combinations. Now, such calculations can be +made by any student in any institution where civil engineering is taught +thoroughly, and where "Haupt on Bridges" is used as a text-book. +Professor Gillespie, writing from Europe, remarked that the greatest +engineer of the age, Robert Stephenson, and his distinguished +associates, had spoken of this book in terms of the highest +commendation. + +After the publication of the controversial papers between Messrs. +Stephenson and Fairbairn in regard to the Britannia Bridge, it became +apparent that neither of these gentlemen, with all their calculations +and expenditures in experiments, had determined the proper distribution +of the strains, and the size and strength required for the side-plates +of tubular bridges, but only for those at the top and bottom. General +Haupt solved the problem mathematically, and sent a communication on the +subject to the American Association for the Advancement of Science, +which has been extensively copied into the scientific journals of +Europe, and has added largely to the reputation of its author. In the +Victoria Bridge at Montreal, the distribution of material in the +vertical plates conforms to the proportions given by General Haupt. + +About the year 1853, General Haupt, then Chief Engineer of the +Pennsylvania Railroad, reviewed the work of Charles Ellett on the Ohio +and Mississippi Rivers, with other plans of improvement that had been +suggested, and, in a pamphlet of about a hundred pages, proposed a +novel, bold, and simple method for the improvement of these rivers, +costing scarcely a tenth as much as the estimated expense of some of the +other methods, and promising greater durability and efficacy. The +Pittsburg Board of Trade recently appointed a scientific commission to +investigate the whole subject; and their report, which is thorough and +exhaustive, gives unanimously the preference to the plan of General +Haupt, as the only practicable mode of improving the Ohio River, so as +to insure a permanent depth of water of not less than six feet. In +passing, we would remark that one of the greatest difficulties the War +Department has had to contend with has been the lack of suitable +navigation on the Ohio River, and it is to be regretted that Government +did not at once seize upon the plans of General Haupt and carry them +into execution. + +In the spring of 1862, General Haupt was solicited to take charge of the +reconstruction of the railroad from Acquia Creek to Fredericksburg. +Without material other than that furnished by forests two miles distant, +and without skilled mechanics, but simply by the aid of common soldiers +who had no previous instruction, he erected, in nine days, a structure +eighty feet high and four hundred feet long, which for more than a year +carried the immense railroad-trains supplying the Army of the Potomac. +It was visited and critically examined by officers in the foreign +service, as a remarkable specimen of bold and successful military +engineering. + +Major-General McDowell, in his defence before the Court of Inquiry, made +the following statement in regard to the Potomac-Creek Bridge, on the +line of the Richmond, Fredericksburg, and Potomac Railroad. + + "The large railroad-bridge over the Rappahannock, some six + hundred feet long by sixty-five feet high, and the larger part + of the one over Potomac Creek, some four hundred feet long by + eighty feet high, were built from the trees cut down by the + troops in the vicinity, and this without those troops losing + their discipline or their instruction as soldiers. The work + they did excited, to a high degree, the wonder and admiration + of several distinguished foreign officers, who had never + imagined such constructions possible by such means, and in such + a way, in the time in which they were done. + + "The Potomac-Run Bridge is a most remarkable structure. When it + is considered, that, in the campaigns of Napoleon, + trestle-bridges of more than one story, even of moderate + height, were regarded as impracticable, and that, too, for + common military roads, it is not difficult to understand why + distinguished Europeans should express surprise at so bold a + specimen of American military engineering. It is a structure + which ignores all the rules and precedents of military science + as laid down in books. It is constructed chiefly of round + sticks cut from the woods, and not even divested of bark; the + legs of the trestles are braced with round poles. It is in four + stories, three of trestles and one of crib-work. The total + height from the deepest part of the stream to the rail is + nearly eighty feet. It carries daily from ten to twenty heavy + railway-trains in both directions, and has withstood several + severe freshets and storms without injury. + + "This bridge was built in May, 1862, in nine working-days, + during which time the greater part of the material was cut and + hauled. It contains more than two million feet of lumber. The + original structure, which it replaced, required as many months + as this did days. It was constructed by the common soldiers of + the Army of the Rappahannock, (command of Major-General + McDowell,) under the supervision of his aide-de-camp, Colonel, + now Brigadier-General, Hermann Haupt, Chief of Railroad + Construction and Transportation." + +A fine lithographic drawing of this bridge, taken from a photograph, +forms the frontispiece to the volume before us. + +Previous to the Battle of Chancellorsville, General Haupt received +instructions to prepare for a rapid advance of the Army of the Potomac +towards Richmond. He provided a sufficient amount of material to rebuild +all the bridges between Fredericksburg and Richmond, and adopted the +bold and novel expedient of portable railroad-bridge trusses. These +trusses were built in advance, in spans of sixty feet; they were to be +carried whole on cars to the end of the track, then dragged like logs, +with the aid of timber-wheels and oxen, to the sites of the bridges, +where they were to be raised bodily on wooden piers, and the rails laid +over them. The reverse at Chancellorsville prevented this plan from +being carried into effect; but four of these spans were used to replace +the trestle-bridge across the Acquia Creek, where they were tested in +actual use, and answered perfectly. + +When informed of the contemplated advance on Richmond, General Haupt +concluded to replace the trestle-bridge across Potomac Creek by the +military truss-bridge, which was of a more permanent character. The +trestle-bridge had performed good service for more than a year, but, as +it obstructed the water-way of the stream too much, and as the +preservation of the communications would become of even greater +importance after the advance than it had previously been, it was thought +best to take it down. General Hooker, having heard of this +determination, sent for General Haupt in much alarm, and inquired if the +report as to the proposed rebuilding of the bridge was true, and +protested against having it disturbed, saying that he needed all the +supplies that could be run forward, and could not allow a suspension of +transportation even for a day. General Haupt replied, that he was +willing to be held responsible for results, but must be permitted to +control his own means; he did not ask for a suspension of +transportation; he would take down the high bridge and build a permanent +bridge on the piers, and would not detain a single train even for an +hour. General Hooker and staff declared that they did not believe such a +feat possible; yet it was actually accomplished without any detention to +the trains whatever, and in a period of time so brief as to be almost +incredible. _In less than two days_ the trusses of the three spans were +placed in position. + +If there is any one faculty which General Haupt appears to possess in a +preeminent degree, it is _resource_. He never finds an engineering +problem so difficult that some satisfactory mode of solution does not +present itself to his mind. He seems to comprehend intuitively the +difficulties of a position, and the means of surmounting them. He never +waits; if he cannot readily obtain the material he desires, he takes +that at hand. His new work on "Military Bridges" exhibits this +power of resource in a remarkable degree; it is full of expedients, +novel, practical, and useful, among which may be mentioned +expedients for crossing streams in front of the enemy by means of +blanket-boats,--ingenious substitutes for pontoon-bridges, floats, and +floating-bridges,--plans for the _complete_ destruction of railroad +bridges and track, and for reconstructing track,--modes of defence for +lines of road, etc.: for the book, be it observed, is not limited in its +contents to the single subject indicated by its title. + +The design of the author, as stated in the Introduction, appears to have +been to give to the army a practically useful book. He has not failed to +draw from other sources where suitable material was furnished, an +indebtedness which he has gracefully acknowledged; but a great part of +the book contains new and original plans and expedients, the fruits of +the experience and observation of the author while in charge of the +construction and transportation for the armies of the Rappahannock, of +Virginia, and of the Potomac, under Generals McDowell, Pope, McClellan, +Burnside, Hooker, and Meade. It is a book no officer can afford to be +without; and to the general reader who wishes to be thoroughly versed in +the operations of the war, it will commend itself as replete with +information on this subject. + + + _Meditations on the Essence of Christianity, and on the + Religious Questions of the Day._ By M. GUIZOT. Translated from + the French under the Superintendence of the Author. London: + JOHN MURRAY. + +Whoever is familiar with religious controversies, past and present, has +not failed to notice of late an improvement in their tone, for which we +cannot be too deeply thankful. This does not arise solely from the +neglect which now prevails of the ancient and highly recommended plan of +imprisoning, torturing, and roasting such obstinate heretics as are too +obtuse or too sharp-sighted to yield to milder methods of treatment. +Such incidents in history as the exposure of Christians to hungry beasts +in the Colosseum, a Smithfield burnt-offering of persistent saints, or a +Spanish auto-da-fe, with attending civic, ecclesiastical, and sometimes +even royal functionaries, and wide-encircling half-rejoicing and +half-compassionate multitudes, were not without their charms and +compensations for victims blessed with a fervid fancy or a deathless +purpose. These cruel scenes associated such with the illustrious dead +who have held life cheaper than truth, and gave them an opportunity of +saying to countless multitudes such as no pulpit-orator could attract +and sway,--"See how Christians die!" The liability to such trials turned +away the fickle from the assembly of the faithful and attracted the +magnanimous. When grim Puritans, in our early history, broke the +stubborn necks of peace-preaching Quakers, the latter often thought it a +special favor from Providence that they were permitted to bear so +striking a testimony against religious fanaticism. They felt, like John +Brown in his Virginian prison, that the best service they could render +to the cause they had loved so well was to love it even unto death. +Indeed, martyrs in mounting the scaffold have ever felt the sentiment,-- + + "Yet that scaffold sways the future, and behind the dim unknown + Standeth God within the shadow, keeping watch above His own." + +Such heroic treatment always relieves any cause from contemptuous +neglect, the one thing which is always harder to bear than the fires of +martyrdom. Every reader of Bunyan knows that he complains far less of +his twelve years' imprisonment than he exults over the success of his +prison born, world-ranging Pilgrim. He would doubtless have preferred +lying in that "den," Bedford jail, other twelve years to being unable to +say,-- + + "My Pilgrim's book has travelled sea and land, + Yet could I never come to understand + That it was slighted or turned out of door + By any kingdom, were they rich or poor." + +The dreariest period in religious discussion commonly occurs when men +have just ceased to inflict legal penalties upon the heterodox, but have +not yet learned those amenities which lend so sweet and gentle a dignity +to debate. In looking over the dusty pamphlets which entomb so many +clerical controversies of our Colonial times, it has often seemed as +though we had lighted on some bar-room wrangle, translated out of its +original billingsgate into scholarly classical quotations and wofully +wrested tests of Holy Writ. This illusion seems all the more probable +when we remember that the potations which inspired the loose jester and +the ministerial pamphleteer of that period but too often flowed from the +same generous tap. This phase of theological dispute is best typified in +that eminent English divine who wrote,--"I say, without the least heat +whatever, that Mr. Wesley lies." The manner in which such reverend +disputants sought to force their conclusions on the reluctant has not +infrequently reminded us of sturdy old Grimshawe, the predecessor of +Bronte at Haworth, of whom Mrs. Gaskell reports, that, finding so many +of his parishioners inclined to loiter away their Sundays at the +ale-house as greatly to thin the attendance upon his ministry, he was +wont to rush in upon them armed with a heavy whip, and scourge them with +many a painful stroke to church, where, doubtless, he scourged them +again with still more painful sermons. + +But, bad as were the controversial habits of the clergy, those of their +skeptical opponents were still worse. That was surely a strange state of +things where such freethinking as the "Age of Reason" could win a wide +circulation and considerable credit. But it was not merely the vulgar +among freethinkers who then substituted sophistry and declamation for +honesty and sense. The philosophers of the Institute caught the manners +of the rabble. What a revolting scene does M. Martin sketch in his +"Essay on the Life and Works of Bernardin de Saint-Pierre"! "The +Institute had proposed this as a prize-question:--'What institutions are +best adapted to establish the morals of a nation?' Bernardin was to +offer the report. The competitors had treated the theme in the spirit of +their judges. Terrified at the perversity of their opinions, the author +of "Studies of Nature" wished to oppose to them more wholesome and +consoling ideas, and he closed his report with one of those morsels of +inspiration into which his soul poured the gentle light of the Gospel. +On the appointed day, in the assembled Institute, Bernardin read his +report. The analysis of the memoirs was heard at first with calmness; +but, at the first words of the exposition of the principles of a +theistical philosopher, a furious outcry arose from every part of the +hall. Some mocked him, asking where he had seen God, and what form He +bore. Others styled him weak, credulous, superstitious; they threatened +to expel him from the assembly of which he had proved himself unworthy; +they even pushed madness so far as to challenge him to single combat, in +order to prove, sword in hand, that there is no God. Cabanis, celebrated +by Carlyle for his dogma, 'Thought is secreted, like bile, somewhere in +the region of the small intestines,' cried out, 'I swear that there is +no God, and I demand that His name shall never be spoken in this place.' +The reporter left the members in grave dispute, not whether there is a +God, but whether the mention of His name should be permitted." + +We have fallen upon better days. The high debate which is now engaging +the attention of Christendom is conducted, for the most part, on both +sides, with distinguished courtesy. Not that the question at issue is, +or is felt to be, any less vital than former ones. The aim of modern +free-inquiry is to remove religious life from the dogmatic basis, upon +which, in Christian lands, it has hitherto stood. Denying the existence, +and sometimes the possibility, of a supernatural revelation, now +admitting, now doubting, and now rejecting the personal immortality of +the soul, our freethinkers profess a high regard for the religious +culture of the race. They would found a new scientific faith, and make +spiritual life an outgrowth of the soul's devout sensibilities. The soul +is to draw its nutriment from Nature, science, and all inspired books; +so that, if preaching is as fashionable in the new dispensation as under +the old, the future saints will be in as bad a plight as, according to +eminent theological authority, were those of a late celebrated divine:-- + + "His hearers can't tell you on Sunday beforehand, + If in that day's discourse they'll be Bibled or Koraned." + +But is such a religion possible? M. Guizot thinks not, and comes forward +in full philosophical dignity to repel recent assaults upon supernatural +religion. The chief gravity of these attacks has doubtless consisted in +exegetical and historic criticism. M. Guizot deems these matters of +minor consequence, and believes that the most important thing is to +settle certain fundamental metaphysical questions, and correct prevalent +erroneous ideas respecting the purpose of revelation. His book consists +of eight Meditations: Upon Natural Problems,--Christian Dogmas,--The +Supernatural,--The Limits of Science,--Revelation,--Inspiration of the +Scriptures,--God according to the Bible,--Jesus according to the Gospel. +These themes are presented so skilfully as to attract the interest of +the careless, while challenging the fixed attention of the trained +thinker. The reader will find himself lured on, by the freshness of the +author's method of handling, into the very heart of these profound and +difficult questions. He will be charmed to find them treated with calm +penetration and outspoken frankness. No late writer has displayed a +better comprehension of all phases of and parties to the controversy. +There is a singular absence of controversial tone, a marvellous lucidity +of statement, and a visible honesty of intention, as refreshing as they +are rare,--while a spirit of warm and tender devotion steals in through +the argumentation, like the odor of unseen flowers through a giant and +tangled wood. Yet there is no want of fidelity to personal convictions, +no effort by cunning shifts to bring about an apparent reconciliation of +opponents which the writer knows will not endure. With a firm hand he +touches the errors of contending schools of interpreters, and demands +their abandonment. To Rationalist and Hyper-Inspirationist in their +strife he says, like another Moses, "Why smitest thou thy fellow?" + +Those who have watched carefully the tendencies of these parties for +many years must sometimes have grown despondent. The progressive school +has claimed with unscientific haste the adoption, as a fundamental +principle of Biblical interpretation, of the negation of the +supernatural. Their argument is simply, that human experience disproves +the supernatural. Man, a recent comer upon the globe, who has never kept +a very accurate record of his experience, who comes forth from mystery +for a few days of troubled life, and then vanishes in darkness,--he in +his short stay upon earth has watched the play of its laws, which were +before him and will remain after him, and has learned without any +revelation that God never has changed, never will, never can change or +suspend them! Who shall assure us that our experience of these laws does +not differ from that of Peter and John, the Apostles? How much better to +say of them with Hume, Whatever the fact, we cannot believe it, or to +query with Montaigne, _Que sais-je_? Far better might we say that human +experience can never overthrow faith in the supernatural, for none can +ever say what has been the experience of the countless dead over whom +oblivion broods. Shall a few _savans_ say, Our experience outweighs the +experience of the Hebrews _plus_ one hundred generations of dead +Gentiles _plus_ one universal instinct of humanity? _Credat M. Littre, +non [Greek: hoi polloi], M. Guizot, vel Agassiz._ But the laws of Nature +are uncha----Ah! that is the very point in dispute. Why can they not +alter? Because they are invari----Tut! Well, then, b-e-c-a-u-s-e----When +you find a good argument, put it into that blank. Till then, adieu. + + "There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, + Than are dreamt of in your philosophy." + +Those who claim a plenary verbal inspiration as essential to a real +revelation are, according to M. Guizot, equally remote from a truly +scientific spirit. Errors in rhetoric and grammar, passages where the +writers speak of astronomical and geological matters in consonance with +the prevailing, but, in many cases, mistaken theories of their times, +being pointed out in the Bible, these cry out, "There can be no real +errors in an inspired book,"--and we are at once amazed and disgusted to +hear men deny the reality of things which they can but perceive, quite +as sturdily as the Port-Royalists refused to allow the presence of +sundry propositions in their books, which, notwithstanding the Pope's +infallible assertion, they had no recollection of thinking or writing, +which they supposed they had always hated and disavowed, and which they +could by no ingenuity of search discover. Sir Thomas Browne might enjoy, +could he revisit the world, the privilege of seeing many who are reduced +to defend their faith with Tertullian's desperate resolution,--"It is +certain, because it is impossible." If ever we escape from such +ineptitude, it will come about by the diffusion of a more philosophic +temper, and the use of a logic that shall refuse to exclude the facts of +human nature from fair treatment, that shall embrace and account for all +the questions involved, and that shall decline to receive as truth +errors of finite science because found in an inspired book. We welcome +this volume as an example of the right spirit and tendency in these +grave discussions, and shall look eagerly for the promised three +succeeding ones. + +This translation, though "executed under the superintendence of the +author," evidently does no justice to the original. We have not seen the +book in French, but we venture to say that M. Guizot never wrote French +which could answer to this version, awkward, careless, and sometimes +obscure. A certain picture of dull and ancient aspect, which had long +passed for an original from the hand of Leonardo da Vinci, and, despite +the raptures of sentimental people who sought to tickle their own vanity +by pretending to perceive in it the marks of its high origin, had +commonly awakened only a sigh of regret over the transitoriness of +pictorial glory, fell at length into the hands of a skilful artist. By +careful examination, this worthy person became satisfied that the +painting was indeed all that had been claimed, but that its primal +splendors had been obscured by the defacing brush of some incompetent +restorer. With loving care he removed the dimming colors, and to an +admiring world was revealed anew the Christ of the Supper. Will not +some American publisher perform a like kindly function for Guizot? + + + _History of the Anti-Slavery Measures of the Thirty-Seventh and + Thirty-Eighth United States Congress_, 1861-64. By HENRY + WILSON. Boston: Walker, Wise, & Co. 12mo. pp. 384. + +Senator Wilson is admirably qualified to record the anti-slavery +legislation in which he has borne so prominent and honorable a part. Few +but those engaged in debates can thoroughly understand their salient +points, and fix upon the precise sentences in which the position, +arguments, and animating spirit of opposite parties are stated and +condensed. The present volume is a labor-saving machine of great power +to all who desire or need a clear view of the course of Congressional +legislation on measures of emancipation, but who prefer to rest in +ignorance rather than wade through the debates as reported in the +"Congressional Globe," striving to catch, amid the waste of words, the +leading ideas or passions on which questions turn. + +The first thing which strikes the reader in Mr. Wilson's well-executed +epitome is the gradual character of this anti-slavery legislation, and +the general subordination of philanthropic to military considerations in +its conduct. The questions were not taken up in the order of their +abstract importance, but as they pressed on the practical judgment for +settlement in exigencies of the Government. When Slavery became an +obstruction to the progress of the national arms, opposition to it was +the dictate of prudence as well as of conscience, and its defenders at +once placed themselves in the position of being more interested in the +preservation of slavery than in the preservation of the nation. The +Republicans, charged heretofore with sacrificing the expedient to the +right, could now retort that their opponents were sacrificing the +expedient to the wrong. + +Senator Wilson's volume gives the history of twenty-three anti-slavery +measures, in the order of their inception and discussion. Among these +are the emancipation of slaves used for insurrectionary purposes,--the +forbidding of persons in the army to return fugitive slaves,--the +abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia,--the President's +proposition to aid States in the abolition of slavery,--the prohibition +of slavery in the Territories,--the confiscation and emancipation bill +of Senator Clark,--the appointment of diplomatic representatives to +Hayti and Liberia,--the bill for the suppression of the African +slave-trade,--the enrolment and pay of colored soldiers,--the +anti-slavery Amendment to the Constitution,--the bill to aid the States +to emancipate their slaves,--and the reconstruction of Rebel States. The +account of the introduction of these and other measures, and the debates +on them, are given by Mr. Wilson with brevity, fairness, and skill. A +great deal of the animation of the discussion, and of the clash and +conflict of individual opinions and passions, is preserved in the +epitome, so that the book has the interest which clings to all accounts +of verbal battles on whose issue great principles are staked. As the +words as well as the arguments of the debates are given, and as the +sentences chosen are those in which the characters of the speakers find +expression, the effect is often dramatic. It cannot fail to be observed, +in reading these reports, that there is a prevailing vulgarity of tone +in the declarations of the champions of Slavery. They boldly avow the +lowest and most selfish views in the coarsest languages and scout and +deride all elevation of feeling and thought in matters affecting the +rights of the poor and oppressed. Their opinions outrage civility as +well as Christianity; and while they make a boast of being gentlemen, +they hardly rise above the prejudices of boors. Principles which have +become truisms, and which it is a disgrace for an educated man not to +admit, they boldly denounce as pestilent paradoxes; and in reading Mr. +Wilson's book an occasional shock of shame must be felt by the most +imperturbable politician, at the spectacle of the legislature of "a +model republic" experiencing a fierce resistance in the attempt to +establish indisputable truths. + +Most of the questions here vehemently discussed should, it might be +supposed, be settled without discussion by the plain average sense and +conscience of any body of men deserving to live in the nineteenth +century; but so completely have the defenders of Slavery substituted +will and passion for reason and morality, and so long have they been +accustomed to have their insolent absurdities rule the politics of the +nation, that the passage of the bills whose varying fortunes Mr. Wilson +records must be considered the greatest triumph of liberty and justice +which our legislative annals afford. And in that triumph the historian +of the Anti-Slavery Measures may justly claim to have had a +distinguished part. Honest, able, industrious, intelligent, +indefatigable, zealous for his cause, yet flexible to events, gifted at +once with practical sagacity and strong convictions, and with his whole +heart and mind absorbed in the business of politics and legislation, he +has proved himself an excellent workman in that difficult task by which +facts are made to take the impress of ideas, and the principles of +equity are embodied in the laws of the land. + + + + +RECENT AMERICAN PUBLICATIONS + +RECEIVED BY THE EDITORS OF THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY. + + +A National Currency. By Sidney George Fisher, Author of "The Trial of +the Constitution," etc. Reprinted from the North American Review for +July, 1864. Philadelphia. J. B. Lippincott & Co. 16mo. paper, pp. 83. 25 +cents. + +Our World: or, First Lessons in Geography, for Children. By Mary L. +Hall. Boston. Crosby & Nichols. 12mo. pp. 177. $1.00. + +The Merchant Mechanic. A Tale of "New England Athens." By Mary A. Howe. +New York. John Bradburn. 12mo. pp. 453. $2.00. + +The American Boy's Book of Sports and Games: A Repository of In- and +Out-Door Amusements for Boys and Youth. Illustrated with over Six +Hundred Engravings, designed by White, Herrick, Wier, and Harvey, and +engraved by N. Orr. New York. Dick & Fitzgerald. 12mo. pp. 600. $3.50. + +Southern Slavery in its Present Aspects: Containing a Reply to a Late +Work of the Bishop of Vermont on Slavery. By Daniel R. Goodwin. +Philadelphia. J. B. Lippincott & Co. 16mo. pp. 343. $1.50. + +Love and Duty. By Mrs. Hubback. Philadelphia. T. B. Peterson & Brothers. +12mo, pp. 446. $2.00. + +Memoirs of Lieutenant-General Scott, LL.D. Written by Himself. In Two +Volumes. New York. Sheldon & Co. 12mo. pp. xxii., 330; iv., 323. $4.00. + +To Be or Not To Be, That is the Question. Boston. Geo. C. Rand and +Avery, Printers. 16mo. pp. 47. 38 cents. + +The Hawaiian Islands: Their Progress and Condition under Missionary +Labors. By Rufus Anderson, D.D. Boston. Gould & Lincoln. 12mo. pp. +xxii., 450. + +Uncle Nat: or, The Good Time which George and Frank had, Trapping, +Fishing, Camping-Out, etc. By Alfred Oldfellow. New York. D. Appleton & +Co. 16mo. pp. 224. $1.25. + +Lyra Anglicana; or, A Hymnal of Sacred Poetry, selected from the Best +English Writers, and arranged after the Order of the Apostles' Creed. By +Rev. George T. Rider, M.A. New York. D. Appleton & Co. 16mo. pp. xiv., +288. $2.00. + +Gunnery Catechism, as applied to the Service of Naval Ordnance. Adapted +to the Latest Official Regulations, and approved by the Bureau of +Ordnance, Navy Department. By J.D. Brandt, formerly of U.S. Navy. New +York. D. Van Nostrand. 18mo. pp. 197. $1.50. + +Ruth: A Song in the Desert. Boston. Gould & Lincoln. 16mo. pp. 64. 60 +cents. + +The Burden of the South, in Verse: or, Poems on Slavery, Grave, +Humorous, Didactic, and Satirical. By Sennoia Rubek. New York. P. +Everardus Warner. 8vo. paper. pp. 96. + +Petersons' New Cook-Book; or, Useful and Practical Receipts for the +Housewife and the Uninitiated. Philadelphia. T. B. Peterson & Brothers, +12mo. pp. 533. $2.00. + +Ancient Law: Its Connection with the Early History of Society, and its +Relation to Modern Ideas. By Henry Sumner Maine. With an Introduction by +Theodore W. Dwight. New York. Charles Scribner. 8vo. pp. lxix., 400. +$3.00. + +The Poems and Ballads of Schiller. Translated by Sir Edward Bulwer +Lytton, Bart. From the Last London Edition. New York. Clark & Maynard. +18mo. pp. 407. + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. +86, December, 1864, by Various + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ATLANTIC MONTHLY, DECEMBER 1864 *** + +***** This file should be named 29516.txt or 29516.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/2/9/5/1/29516/ + +Produced by Joshua Hutchinson, Josephine Paolucci and the +Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net. +(This file was produced from images generously made +available by Cornell University Digital Collections.) + + +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. 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