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diff --git a/39367-h/39367-h.htm b/39367-h/39367-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..466f597 --- /dev/null +++ b/39367-h/39367-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,61184 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN"> +<html> + +<head> +<meta content="text/html;charset=ISO-8859-1" http-equiv="Content-Type"> +<title> +THE CATHOLIC WORLD. Volume I; Numbers 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. +</title> + +<style type="text/css"> + +h1 {font-size: 160%; text-align:center;} + +h2 {font-size: 120%; text-align:center;} + +i { font-weight: bold; } + +pre { font-family: Serif; } + +.cite { margin-left: 5%; } + +.cite2 { margin-left: 10%; } + +.footnote { margin-left: 8%; margin-right: 8%;} + +.center { text-align: center; } + +.image { text-align: center; } + +.right { text-align: right; } + +</style> + +</head> + +<body> + + +<pre> + +Project Gutenberg's The Catholic World; Volume I, Issues 1-6, by E. Rameur + +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 Catholic World; Volume I, Issues 1-6 + A Monthly Eclectic Magazine + +Author: E. Rameur + +Release Date: April 4, 2012 [EBook #39367] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CATHOLIC WORLD, VOLUME I, 1-6 *** + + + + +Produced by Don Kostuch + + + + + +</pre> + + +<p class="cite"> +[Transcriber's notes]<br> + This text is derived from<br> + http://www.archive.org/details/catholicworld01pauluoft +<br><br> + Several scanned pages are obscured by being too closely glued at the + spine. I have interpolated the missing text where it seemed obvious + and left "??" where it was in doubt. +<br><br> + A few cases of inaccurate typesetting such as misplaced words or + lines have been corrected. +<br><br> + Although square brackets [] usually designate footnotes or + transcriber's notes, they do appear in the original text. +<br><br> + To future editors: The poetry has been formatted using + spaces and the "pre" tag. Modify these sections only with + care and reference to the original text. +<br><br> + This text includes Volume I;<br> + Number 1—April 1865<br> + Number 2—May 1865<br> + Number 3—June 1865<br> + Number 4—July 1865<br> + Number 5—August 1865<br> + Number 6—September 1865<br> +[End Transcriber's notes] +</p> +<br> +<i>Fine Binding</i><br> +THE CARSWELL COMPANY LIMITED +<br><br> + + +<h1>THE CATHOLIC WORLD.</h1> + + +<h2><i>A Monthly Eclectic Magazine</i> +<br><br> +of +<br><br> +GENERAL LITERATURE AND SCIENCE. +<br><br> +VOL. I. +<br><br> +APRIL TO SEPTEMBER, 1865.</h2> +<br><br> + +<p class="center"> +NEW YORK: +<br><br> +LAWRENCE KEHOE, PUBLISHER, +<br><br> +7 BEEKMAN STREET. +<br><br> +1865. +</p> +<br> + +<h1>CONTENTS.</h1> +<br> +<pre> + Ancient Saints of God, The, <a href="#19">19</a>. + Ars, A Pilgrimage to, <a href="#24">24</a>. + Alexandria, The Christian Schools of, <a href="#33">33</a>, <a href="#721">721</a>. + Animal Kingdom, Unity of Type in the, <a href="#71">71</a>. + Art, <a href="#136">136</a>, <a href="#286">286</a>, <a href="#420">420</a>. + Art, Christian, <a href="#246">246</a>. + Authors, Royal and Imperial, <a href="#323">323</a>. + All-Hallow Eve, or the Test of Futurity, <a href="#500">500</a>, <a href="#657">657</a>, <a href="#785">785</a>. + Arks, Noah's, <a href="#513">513</a>. + + Babou, Monsieur, <a href="#106">106</a>. + Blind Deaf Mute, History of a, <a href="#826">826</a>. + + Church in the United States, Progress of the, <a href="#1">1</a>. + Constance Sherwood, <a href="#78">78</a>, <a href="#163">163</a>, <a href="#349">349</a>, <a href="#482">482</a>, <a href="#600">600</a>, <a href="#748">748</a>. + Catholicism, The Two Sides of, <a href="#96">96</a>, <a href="#669">669</a>, <a href="#741">741</a>. + Cardinal Wiseman in Rome, <a href="#117">117</a> + Catacombs, Recent Discoveries in the, <a href="#129">129</a>. + Chastellux, The Marquis de, <a href="#181">181</a>. + Church of England, Workings of the Holy Spirit in the, <a href="#289">289</a>. + Cochin China, French, <a href="#369">369</a>. + Consalvi's Memoirs, <a href="#377">377</a>. + Church History, A Lost Chapter Recovered, <a href="#414">414</a>. + Canova, Antonio, <a href="#598">598</a>. + Cathedral Library, The, <a href="#679">679</a>. + Catholic Philosophy in the Thirteenth Century, <a href="#685">685</a>. + + De Guérin, Eugénie and Maurice, <a href="#214">214</a>. + Divina Commedia, Dante's, <a href="#268">268</a>. + Dinner by Mistake, A, <a href="#535">535</a>. + Dramatic Mysteries of the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries, <a href="#577">577</a>. + Dublin May Morning, A, <a href="#825">825</a>. + + Extinct Species, <a href="#526">526</a>. + Experience, Wisdom by, <a href="#851">851</a>. + + Falconry, Modern, <a href="#493">493</a>. + Fifth Century, Civilization in the, <a href="#775">775</a>. + + Guérin, Eugénie and Maurice de, <a href="#214">214</a>. + Glacier, A Night in a, <a href="#345">345</a>. + Grand Chartreuse, A Visit to the, <a href="#830">830</a>. + + Hedwige, Queen of Poland, <a href="#145">145</a>. + Heart and the Brain, <a href="#623">623</a>. + + Irish Poetry, Recent, <a href="#466">466</a>. + + Jem McGowan's Wish, <a href="#56">56</a>. + + Legends and Fables, The Truth of, <a href="#433">433</a>. + London, Catholic Progress in, <a href="#703">703</a>. + London, <a href="#836">836</a>. + Laborers Gone to their Reward, <a href="#855">855</a>. + + Mont Cenis Tunnel, The, <a href="#60">60</a>. + Mongols, Monks among the, <a href="#158">158</a>. + Mourne, The Building of, <a href="#225">225</a>. + Memoirs, Consalvi's, <a href="#377">377</a>. + Maintenon, Madame de, <a href="#799">799</a>. + Miscellany, <a href="#134">134</a>, <a href="#280">280</a>, <a href="#420">420</a>, <a href="#567">567</a>, <a href="#712">712</a>, <a href="#858">858</a>. + + Nick of Time, The, <a href="#124">124</a>. + + Perilous Journey, A, <a href="#198">198</a>. + Poucette, <a href="#260">260</a>. + Prayer, What came of a, <a href="#697">697</a>. + + Russian Religious, A, <a href="#306">306</a>. + + Saints of God, The Ancient, <a href="#19">19</a>. + Science, <a href="#134">134</a>, <a href="#280">280</a>, <a href="#712">712</a>. + Streams, The Modern Genius of, <a href="#233">233</a>. + Stolen Sketch, The, <a href="#314">314</a>. + Swetchine, Madame, and her Salon, <a href="#456">456</a>. + Shakespeare, William, <a href="#548">548</a>. + St. Sophia, The Church and Mosque of, <a href="#641">641</a>. + Species, The Origin and Mutability of, <a href="#845">845</a>. + + Three Wishes, The, <a href="#31">31</a>. + Terrene Phosphorescence, <a href="#770">770</a>. + + Upfield, Many Years Ago at, <a href="#393">393</a>. + + Vanishing Race, A, <a href="#708">708</a>. + + Wiseman, Cardinal in Rome, <a href="#117">117</a>. + Winds, The, <a href="#207">207</a>. + Women, A City of, <a href="#514">514</a>. + Wisdom by Experience, <a href="#851">851</a>. + + Young's Narcissa, <a href="#797">797</a>. + + +POETRY + + A Lie, <a href="#245">245</a>. + Avignon, The Bells of, <a href="#783">783</a>. + + Domine Quo Vadis?<a href="#76">76</a>. + Dream of Gerontius, The, <a href="#517">517</a>, <a href="#630">630</a>. + Dorothea, Saint, <a href="#666">666</a>. + + Ex Humo, <a href="#33">33</a>. + + Gerontius, The Dream of, <a href="#517">517</a>, <a href="#630">630</a>. + + Hans Euler, <a href="#237">237</a>. + + Limerick Bells, Legend of, <a href="#195">195</a>. + + Mary, Queen of Scots, Hymn by, <a href="#337">337</a>. + Martin's Puzzle, <a href="#739">739</a>. + + Saint Dorothea, <a href="#666">666</a>. + Speech, <a href="#829">829</a>. + + Twilight in the North, <a href="#344">344</a>. + + Unspiritual Civilization, <a href="#747">747</a>. + +{iv} + +NEW PUBLICATIONS. + + Archbishop Spalding's Pastoral, <a href="#144">144</a>. + At Anchor, <a href="#287">287</a>. + American Annual Cyclopaedia, US. + A Man without a Country, <a href="#720">720</a>. + + Banim's Boyne Water, <a href="#286">286</a>. + Beatrice, Miss Kavanagh's, <a href="#574">574</a>. + + Cardinal Wiseman's Sermons, <a href="#139">139</a>. + Cummings' Spiritual Progress, <a href="#140">140</a>. + Christian Examiner, Reply to the, <a href="#144">144</a>. + Correlation and Conservation of Forces, The, <a href="#288">288</a>, <a href="#425">425</a>. + Confessors of Connaught, <a href="#574">574</a>. + Curé of Ars, Life of the, <a href="#575">575</a>. + Ceremonial of the Church, <a href="#720">720</a>. + + Darras' History of the Church, <a href="#141">141</a>, <a href="#575">575</a>, <a href="#860">860</a>. + + England, Froude's History of, <a href="#715">715</a>. + + Faith, the Victory, Bishop McGill's, <a href="#428">428</a>. + + Grace Morton, <a href="#574">574</a>. + + Heylen's Progress of the Age, etc., <a href="#142">142</a>. + Household Poems, Longfellow's, <a href="#719">719</a>. + + Irvington Stories, <a href="#143">143</a>. + Irish Street Ballads, <a href="#720">720</a>. + + John Mary Decalogne, Life of, <a href="#576">576</a>. + + Lamotte Fouqué's Undine, etc<a href="#142">142</a>. + La Mère de Dieu, <a href="#432">432</a>. + Life of Cicero, <a href="#573">573</a>. + + Moral Subjects, Card. Wiseman's Sermons on<a href="#287">287</a>. + Mystical Rose, The, <a href="#288">288</a>. + Mater Admirabilis.<a href="#429">429</a>. + Month of Mary, <a href="#720">720</a>. + Martyr's Monument, The, <a href="#860">860</a>. + + New Path, The, <a href="#288">288</a>, <a href="#576">576</a>. + + Our Farm of Four Acres, <a href="#143">143</a>. + + Protestant Reformation, Abp. Spalding's History of the, <a href="#719">719</a>. + + Real and Ideal, <a href="#427">427</a>. + Religious Perfection, Bayma's, <a href="#431">431</a>. + Russo-Greek Church, The, <a href="#576">576</a>. + Retreat, Meditations and Considerations for a, <a href="#720">720</a>. + + Songs for all Seasons, Tennyson's, <a href="#719">719</a>. + Sybil, A Tragedy, <a href="#860">860</a>. + + Translation of the Iliad, Lord Derby's, <a href="#570">570</a>. + Trübner's American and Oriental Literature, <a href="#576">576</a>. + + William Shakespeare, <a href="#860">860</a>. + Whittier's Poems;<a href="#860">860</a>. + + Young Catholic's Library, <a href="#432">432</a>. + Year of Mary, <a href="#719">719</a>. +</pre> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="1">{1}</a> +<br> +<h1>THE CATHOLIC WORLD. +<br><br> +VOL. I., NO. 1.—APRIL, 1865.</h1> +<br><br> + +<h2>From Le Correspondant. +<br><br> +THE PROGRESS OF THE CHURCH IN THE UNITED STATES. +<br><br> +BY E. RAMEUR.</h2> +<br> +<p> +[The following article will no doubt be interesting to our readers, +not only for its intrinsic merit and its store of valuable +information, but also as a record of the impressions made upon an +intelligent foreign Catholic, during a visit to this country. As might +have been expected, the author has not escaped some errors in his +historical and statistical statements—most of which we have noted in +their appropriate places. It will also be observed that while +exaggerating the importance of the early French settlements in the +development of Catholicism in the United States, he has not given the +Irish immigrants as much credit as they deserve. But despite these +faults, which are such as a Frenchman might readily commit, the +article will amply repay reading.—ED. CATHOLIC WORLD.] +</p> +<p> +After the Spaniards had discovered the New World, and while they were +fighting against the Pagan civilization of the southern portions of +the continent, the French made the first [permanent] European +settlement on the shores of America. They founded Port Royal, in +Acaclia, in 1604, and from that time their missionaries began to go +forth among the savages of the North. It was not until 1620 that the +first colony of English Puritans landed in Massachusetts, and it then +seemed not improbable that Catholicism was destined to be the dominant +religion of the New World; but subsequent Anglo-Saxon immigration and +political vicissitudes so changed matters, that by the end of the last +century one might well have believed that Protestantism was finally +and completely established throughout North America. God, however, +prepares his ways according to his own good pleasure; and he knows how +to bring about secret and unforeseen changes, which set at naught all +the calculations of man. The weakness and internal disorders of the +Catholic nations, in the eighteenth century, retarded only for a +moment the progress of the Catholic Church; and Providence, combining +the despised efforts of those who seemed weak with the faults of those +who seemed strong, confounded the superficial judgments of +philosophers, and prepared the way for a speedy religious +transformation of America. +</p> +<p> +This transformation is going on in our own times with a vigor which +seems to increase every year. The <a name="2">{2}</a> causes which have led to it +were, at the outset, so trivial that no writer of the last century +would have dreamed of making account of them. Yet, already at that +time, Canada, where Catholicism is now more firmly established than in +any other part of America, possessed that faithful and energetic +population which has increased so wonderfully during the last half +century; and even in the United States might have been found many an +obscure, but a patient and stout-hearted little congregation—a relic +of the old English Church, which after three centuries of oppression +was to arise and spread itself with a new life. But no one set store +by the poor French colonists; England and Protestantism, together, it +was thought, would soon absorb them; and as for the <i>Papists</i> of the +United States, the wise heads did not even suspect their existence. +The writer who should have spoken of their future would only have been +laughed at. +</p> +<p> +The English Catholics, like the Puritans, early learned to look toward +America as a refuge from persecution, and in 1634, under the direction +of Lord Baltimore, they founded the colony of Maryland. Despite +persecution from Protestants whom they had freely admitted into their +community, they prospered, increased, and became the germ of the +Church of the United States, now so large and flourishing. +</p> +<p> +In the colonial archives of the Ministry of the Navy we have found a +curious manuscript memoir upon Acadia, by Lamothe Cadillac, in which +it is stated that in 1686 there were Catholic inhabitants in New York, +and especially in Maryland, where they had seven or eight priests. +Another paper preserved in the same archives mentions a Catholic +priest residing in New York; and William Penn, who had established +absolute toleration in the colony adjoining that of Maryland, speaks +of an old Catholic priest who exercised the ministry in Pennsylvania. +</p> +<p> +The Catholics at this time are said to have composed a thirtieth part +of the whole population of Maryland. This estimate seems to us too +low. At all events, the increase of our unfortunate brethren in the +faith was retarded by persecution and difficulties of all kinds which +surrounded them. In the Puritan colonies of the North, they were +absolutely proscribed. In the Southern colonies, of Virginia, Georgia, +and Carolina, their condition was but little better; in New York they +enjoyed a precarious toleration in the teeth of penal laws. In +Maryland and Pennsylvania alone they were granted freedom of worship, +and a legal status; though even in those colonies they were exposed to +a thousand wrongs and vexations. Maryland persecuted them from time to +time and banished their priests; and William Penn, in his tolerant +conduct toward them, was bitterly opposed by his own people. +</p> +<p> +Nevertheless, despite difficulties and violence, the Anglo-American +Catholics increased by little and little, wherever they got a +foothold; the descendants of the old settlers multiplied; new ones +came from England and Ireland; and a German immigration set in, +especially in Pennsylvania, where several congregations of German +Catholics were formed at a very early period. In the archives of this +province we have found several valuable indications of the state of +the Church in 1760. There were then two priests, one a Frenchman or an +Englishman, named Robert Harding, the other a German of the name of +Schneider. It seems probable that they were both Jesuits. [Footnote +1] In a letter to Governor Loudon, in 1757, Father Harding estimates +the number of Catholics in Philadelphia and its immediate neighborhood +at two thousand—English, Irish, and German; but in the absence of +Father Schneider he could not be positive as to these figures. A +letter from Gouverneur Morris in 1756 <a name="3">{3}</a> speaks of the Catholics of +Maryland and Pennsylvania as being very numerous and enjoying freedom +of worship, and adds, that in Philadelphia there is a Jesuit who is a +very able and talented man. The Abbé Robin, a chaplain in Rochambeau's +army in 1781, informs us in his narrative that there were several +Catholic churches at Fredericksburg, Va., and even a Catholic +congregation at Charleston, S.C. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 1: In De Courcy and Shea's "Catholic Church in the United + States" pp. 211, 212, an account will be found of both these + missionaries. The first mentioned was an Englishman. Both were— + Jesuits. ED. C. W.] +</p> +<p> +The toleration accorded to the Jesuits in the United States was +precarious, but it amounted in time to a pretty complete freedom; and +as they were not disturbed when the order was suppressed in Europe, +some of their brethren from abroad took refuge with them; so that in +1784, we find, according to Mr. C. Moreau, in his excellent work on +the French emigrant priests in America, [Footnote 2] nineteen priests +in Maryland, and five in Pennsylvania. To these we must add the +priests of Detroit, Mich., Vincennes, Ind., and Kaskaskia and Cahokia, +Ill., all four originally French-Canadian settlements which were ceded +to England along with Canada, and after the American Revolution became +parts of the United States. Counting, moreover, the missionaries +scattered among the Indian tribes, we may safely say that the American +Republic contained at the period of which we are speaking not fewer +than thirty or forty ecclesiastics. The number of the faithful may be +set down as 16,000 in Maryland, 7,000 or 8,000 in Pennsylvania, 3,000 +at Detroit and Vincennes, and about 2,500 in southern Illinois; in all +the other states together they hardly amounted to 1,500. In a total +population therefore of 3,000,000 they numbered about 30,000, and of +these 5,500 were of French origin. Such was the condition of the +Church in the United States when it was regularly established in 1789 +by the erection of an episcopal see at Baltimore, and the appointment, +as bishop, of Mr. Carroll, an American priest, born of one of the +oldest Catholic families of Maryland. The dispersion of the clergy of +France, in 1790, soon afterward supplied America with numerous +evangelical laborers, who gave a new impulse to the development which +was just becoming apparent in the infant Church. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 2: One vol. 12mo. Paris: Douniol.] +</p> +<p> +A few years before the French Revolution, Mr. Emery, superior of Saint +Sulpice, guided by what we must term an extraordinary inspiration, +came to the assistance of the American Church, and with the help of +his brother Sulpitians and at the cost of the society, founded a +theological seminary at Baltimore. His plans were already well matured +when Bishop Carroll, soon after his appointment, entering heartily +into the project, promised him a house and all the assistance he could +give. Four Sulpitians accordingly set out from Paris in 1790, taking +with them five Seminarians. They were supplied with 30,000 francs to +defray the cost of their establishment, and to this modest sum the +crisis which soon overtook the parent establishment allowed them to +add but little; but this mite, bestowed by the Church of France in the +last days of her wealth, was destined to become, like the widow's +mite, the price of innumerable blessings. +</p> +<p> +Between 1791 and 1799 the storm of revolution drove twenty-three +French priests to the United States. As the first apostles, when they +set out from Rome, portioned out Germany and Gaul among themselves, so +they divided this country, and most of them organized new communities +of Christians, or by their zeal awakened communities that slept. Six +of them, Flaget, Cheverus, Dubourg, Maréchal, Dubois, and David, +became bishops. +</p> +<p> +The base of operations from which these peaceful but victorious +invaders went forth was Baltimore, the episcopal see around which were +gathered the old American clergy and the greater part of the Catholic +population. It was here that the Sulpitians <a name="4">{4}</a> had their seminary, +and this establishment became a centre of attraction for a great many +of these exiled priests who belonged to the Society of Saint Sulpice. +Some (as MM. Ciquard, Matignon, and Cheverus) bent their steps from +Baltimore toward the laborious missions among the intolerant and often +fanatical Puritans of the North, where the Catholics—a mere +handful—were found scattered far and wide; isolated in the midst of a +Protestant population; deprived of priests and religious services, and +in danger of totally forgetting the faith in which they had been +baptized. Nothing discouraged these apostolic men. Aided by divine +grace, they awakened the indifferent, converted heretics, gathered +about them the few Catholics who immigrated from Europe, attracted all +men by their affable and conciliating manners, their intelligence and +education, and the disinterestedness of their lives. Soon on this +apparently sterile soil Catholic parishes grew up and flourished in +the midst of people who had never before seen a priest. Thus were +founded the churches of Massachusetts, Maine, and Connecticut—so +quickly that, in 1810 (that is to say, only eighteen years after the +beginning of the missions), it was deemed advisable to erect for them +another bishopric. Congregations had sprung up on every side as if by +enchantment, and the venerable Abbé Cheverus was appointed their first +bishop. +</p> +<p> +Others went westward. The Abbés Flaget, Badin, Barriere, Fournier, and +Salmon carried the faith into Kentucky. There they found a few +Catholic families who had emigrated from Maryland. With them they +organized churches, which increased with prodigious rapidity, and were +the origin of the present dioceses of Louisville, Covington, +Nashville, and Alton. +</p> +<p> +The Abbés Richard, Levadour, Dilhiet, and several others, passed +through the forest and the wilderness, and joined the old French +colonies which still survived around the ruins of the French military +posts in the Northwest and in the valley of the Mississippi. They +found there a few missionaries, whom the Canadian Church still +maintained in those distant countries; but their ranks were thin, and +they were old and feeble. This precious reinforcement enabled them to +give a fresh impetus to the French Catholic congregations over whom +they kept watch in the forest. Detroit, Vincennes, Cahokia, Kaskaskia, +and afterward St. Geneviève and St. Louis in Missouri, ceded to the +United States in 1803, received the visits of these new apostles, and +experienced the benefits of their intelligence and zeal. Nearly all +the places where they fixed themselves have since given their names to +large and flourishing bishoprics. +</p> +<p> +Several of the emigrant priests remained in Maryland and Virginia, and +enabled the Sulpitians to complete the organization of their seminary, +while at the same time they assisted Bishop Carroll in providing more +perfectly and regularly for the wants of those central provinces which +might be called the first home of American Catholicism. The number of +the faithful everywhere increased remarkably. We can hardly estimate +the extraordinary influence which these French missionaries exercised +by their exemplary lives, their learning, their great qualities as +men, and their virtues as saints; and the Anglo-Saxon inhabitants (who +are thoroughly Protestant if you will, but for all that religious at +bottom) were struck by their character all the more forcibly because +it was so totally different from what their prejudices had led them to +expect of the Catholic clergy. +</p> +<p> +There is something patriarchal and Homeric in the lives of these men, +which read like the poetic legends in which nations have commemorated +the history of their first establishment. We have seen the journal of +one of these missionaries—the Abbé Bourg, <a name="5">{5}</a> +who labored further +North, in New Brunswick and Nova Scotia. His life was one long, +perpetual Odyssey. In the spring he used to start from the Bay of +Chaleur, traverse the northern coasts of New Brunswick, pass down the +Bay of Fundy, make the entire circuit of the peninsula of Nova Scotia, +and after a journey of five hundred leagues, performed in nine or ten +months, visit the islands in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, and so come +back to his point of departure. From place to place, the news of his +approach was sent forward by the settlers, so that whenever he stopped +he found the faithful waiting for him, and whole families came fifteen +or twenty leagues to meet him. Hardly had he arrived before he began +the round of priestly labor, of confession and baptism, of burial and +marriage. He was the arbiter of private quarrels, and often of public +disputes. He found time withal to look after the education of the +children—at least to make sure that they were well taught at home. +Thus he would stay fifteen days perhaps in one place, a month in +another, according to the number of the inhabitants. The first +communion of the children crowned his visit. Then the man of God, with +a last blessing on his weeping flock, disappeared for a whole year; +and when the apparition so long desired, but so transitory, had +passed, it left behind a halo of superhuman glory, which seemed to +these pious people the glory rather of a prophet than of an ordinary +man. +</p> +<p> +In such ways the marks of a messenger from God seemed more and more +clearly and unmistakably stamped upon the Catholic missionary, and +Protestants themselves began to yield to the subtle influence of so +much real virtue and self-devotion. Conversions were frequent even +among the descendants of the stern Puritans. Many of the most fervent +Catholic families in the United States date from this period. A rich +Presbyterian minister of Boston (Mr. John Thayer) was converted, and +became a priest and an apostle. So God scattered the seed of grace +behind the footsteps of his poor, persecuted children, who, despite +their apparent misery, bore continually with them the wealth of the +soul, the power of the Word, and the marvellous attraction of their +sacrifices and virtues. +</p> +<p> +Providence, however, had not deployed so strong a force for no purpose +beyond the capture of these converts. A very few missionaries might +have sufficed for that; but it was now time to prepare the land for +the great European immigration which was to cause the astonishing +growth of the United States. Spreading themselves over the vast area +of the Union, the emigrants found everywhere these veteran soldiers +whom the French Revolution had sent forth into the New World as +pioneers, tried both by the pains of persecution and the labors of +apostleship. Before this great human tide the old emigrant priests +were like the primitive rocks which arrest and fix geological +deposits, The Catholic part of the tossing flood invariably settled +around them and their disciples. All over the West the churches +founded by the old French settlers increased, and new ones sprang up +wherever a Catholic priest established himself. From that moment the +grand progressive movement has never ceased. The blood of the martyrs +of France, the spirit of her banished apostles, became fruitful of +blessings, of which the American churches are daily sensible. +</p> +<p> +The first bishop in the United States had been appointed in 1789. Four +years afterward another see was erected at New Orleans, La., which, +ten years later, became a part of the United States; and in 1808, so +rapid had been the Catholic development, that three new bishops were +consecrated—one for Louisville, Ky., another for New York, and the +third for Boston, Mass. Two of these sees were occupied by the French +missionaries who had founded them—Bishop <a name="6">{6}</a> Flaget at Louisville, +and Bishop Cheverus at Boston. That of New York was entrusted to a +venerable priest of English [Irish] origin—the Rev. Luke Concanen. In +the whole United States there were then sixty-eight priests and about +100,000 Catholics. Lei us now glance at the rapid increase of the +American Church up to our own day. +</p> + +<h2>I.</h2> +<p> +From the States of Maryland and Pennsylvania the Church was not long +in spreading into Virginia, New York, Kentucky, and Ohio. The +establishment of sees at Louisville and New York was followed by the +erection of others at Philadelphia in 1809, and Richmond and +Cincinnati in 1821. The two Carolinas, in which the Catholics had +hitherto been an obscure and rigorously proscribed class, received a +bishop at Charleston in 1820. New Orleans, a diocese of French +creation, was divided in 1824 by the erection of the bishopric of +Mobile. The old French colonies in the far West were the nucleus +around which were formed other churches. The dioceses of St. Louis, +Mo. (organized in 1826), Detroit, Mich. (1832), and Vincennes, Ind. +(1834), all took their names from ancient French settlements, and were +peopled almost exclusively by descendants of the French Canadians who +were their first inhabitants. +</p> +<p> +Thus, in the course of twenty-six years, we see eight new sees +erected, making the number of bishops in the United States thirteen. +The number of the clergy amounted in 1830 to 232, and in 1834 probably +exceeded 300. At the date of the next official returns (1840) there +were 482 priests and three more bishoprics—those of Natchez, Miss., +and Nashville, Tenn., both established in 1837, and that of Monterey +in California, a country of Spanish settlement which had recently been +annexed to the United States. [Footnote 3] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 3: Monterey was not a part of the United States until + 1848, nor a bishop's see until 1850. In place of it we should + substitute Dubuque, made a see in 1837.—ED. C. W.] +</p> +<p> +But this increase was not comparable to that which followed between +1840 and 1850. In ten years the number of bishops was doubled by the +erection of fifteen [seventeen] new sees. In 1840 there were sixteen; +in 1850 thirty-one [thirty-three]. The growth during this period was +most perceptible in the North and West. Among the new sees were +Hartford, Conn., Albany and Buffalo, N. Y., Pittsburg, Penn., +Cleveland, O., Chicago, Ill., Milwaukee, Wis., St. Paul, Minn., Oregon +City and Nesqualy, Oregon, and Wheeling in Northern Virginia. The +others were Little Rock, Ark., Savannah, Ga., Galveston, Texas, and +Santa Fé, New Mexico. [Footnote 4] The clergy in 1850 numbered +1,800, having considerably more than doubled [nearly quadrupled] their +number in ten years. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 4: And San Francisco and Monterey—ED C. W.] +</p> +<p> +Thus we see that the Church was pressing hard and fast upon the old +New England Puritans. They soon began to feel uneasy, and to oppose +sometimes a violent resistance to her progress. In some of the States, +especially Connecticut and New Hampshire, there were laws against the +Catholics yet unrepealed; so that the dominant party had more ways of +showing their hatred of the Church than by mere petty vexations. In +Boston things went so far that a nunnery was pillaged and burned by a +mob. It is from this time that we must date the origin of the +Know-Nothing movement, directed ostensibly against foreigners, but +undoubtedly animated in the main by hatred of Catholicism and alarm at +its progress. The fretting and fuming of this political party was the +last effort of Puritan antipathy. The Church prospered in spite of it; +so the Puritans resigned themselves to witness her gradual aggressions +with the best grace they could assume. +</p> +<a name="7">{7}</a> +<p> +Ten new sees were established between 1850 and 1860, and eight of +these were in the North or West—viz., Erie, Newark, Burlington, +Portland, Fort Wayne, Sault St. Marie, Alton, and Brooklyn. Two were +in the South—Covington and Natchitoches. There were thus in the +United States, in 1860, forty-three bishoprics, with 2,235 priests. +Let us now see how many Catholics were embraced in these dioceses, and +what proportion they bore to the total population. +</p> +<p> +The number of the faithful it is not easy to determine accurately; for +a false delicacy prevents the Americans from including the statistics +of religious belief in their census-tables. Estimates are very +variable. A work printed at Philadelphia in 1858 by a Protestant +author sets down the number of Catholics as 3,177,140. Dr. Baird, a +Protestant minister, published at Paris in 1857 an essay on religion +in the United States—an essay, be it remarked, which showed the +Catholics no favor—in which he estimated their number at 3,500,000. +But neither of these estimates rests upon trustworthy data. They were +certainly below the truth when they were made, and are therefore far +from large enough now, for the yearly increase is very great. +</p> +<p> +Our own calculations are drawn partly from our personal observation, +and partly from official documents published by various ecclesiastical +authorities. The best criterion is undoubtedly the rate of increase of +the clergy. +</p> +<p> +It must be evident that in America, more than in any other country, +there is a logical relation between the number of the faithful and the +number of the priests. As the clergy depend entirely upon the +voluntary contributions of their people, there must be a fixed ratio +between the growth of the flocks and the multiplication of pastors. If +the clergy increase too fast, they endanger their means of support. +Now, if priests cannot live in America without a certain number of +parishioners to support them, we may take this number as a basis for +calculating the minimum of the Catholic population; and we may safely +say that the population will be in reality much greater than this +minimum; because, as we can testify from experience, the churches +never lack congregations, and in most places the number of the clergy +is insufficient to supply even the most pressing religious wants of +the people. One never sees a priest in the United States seeking for +employment. On the contrary, the cry of spiritual destitution daily +goes up from parishes and communities which have no pastors. +</p> +<p> +Calculations founded upon the statistics of "church accommodations" +given in the United States census—that is, of the number of persons +the churches are capable of holding—are not applicable to our case; +because the Catholic churches, especially in the large cities, are +thronged two or three times every Sunday by as many distinct +congregations, while the Protestant churches have only one service for +all. The capacity of the churches therefore gives us neither the +actual number of worshippers nor the proportion between our own people +and those of other denominations. We have taken, then, as the basis of +our estimate, the ratio between the number of priests and the number +of the faithful, correcting the result according to the circumstances +of particular places. The first point is to establish this ratio, and +we are led by the concurrent results of careful estimates made in some +of the States, and special or general calculations which we have had +opportunity of making in person, to fix it at the average of one +priest for every 2,000 Catholics. But we have a very trustworthy +method of verifying this estimate, and that is by comparison between +the United States and the contiguous British Provinces, in which the +statistics of religious belief are included in the general census. +Setting aside Lower Canada, where the Catholic population is as +compact as it is in France, we find that in Upper <a name="8">{8}</a> Canada, a +country which resembles the Western United States, the ratio in 1860 +was one priest for every 1,850 Catholics, and in New Brunswick, a +territory very like New England, one for every 2,400. Our average +ratio of one for every 2,000 cannot, therefore, be far from the truth. +We have made due account of all data by which this ratio could be +either raised or lowered in particular times and places. We have +ourselves made investigations in certain districts, and persons well +qualified to speak on the subject have given us information about +others. The result of our corrected calculation gives us 4,400,000 as +the Catholic population of the United States in 1860, the date of the +last general census. We shall give presently the distribution of this +total among the several states; but we wish first to call attention to +another fact of great importance which appears from our figures. In +1808 the Catholics were 100,000 in a total population of 6,500,000, or +1/65th of the whole; in 1830 they were 450,000 in 13,000,000, or +1/29th of the whole; in 1840, 960,000 in 17,070,000, or 1/18th; in +1850, 2,150,000 in 23,191,000, or 1/11th; and finally, in 1860 they +were over 4,400,000 in 31,000,000, or 1/7th of the total population. +It thus appears that for fifty years the Catholics have increased much +faster than the rest of the inhabitants, and especially during the +last two decades. Between 1840 and 1850 their ratio of increase was +125 per cent., while that of the whole population was only 36; and +from 1850 to 1860 their ratio of increase was 109 per cent., while +that of the whole people was 35.59. These figures, to be sure, are not +mathematically certain, for they are deduced partly from estimates; +but we are confident that, considering the imperfect materials at our +disposal, we have come as near the exact truth as possible, both in +the ratio of increase and in the total population. Official returns in +the British Provinces confirm our calculations in a most remarkable +manner; and we believe that, estimating the future growth on the most +moderate scale, the Catholics will number in 1870 one-fifth of the +whole population, and in 1900 not far from one-third. +</p> + +<h2>II.</h2> +<p> +Having traced the progress of the Church step by step in the United +States, it will now be equally interesting and instructive to see how +this progress has been made in different places. The Catholics are by +no means uniformly dispersed over the country, and their increase has +not been equally rapid in all the states. It will be worth our while +to see in which quarters they are settled with the most compactness +and in which they are widely dispersed; and thus we may predict +without great risk which regions are destined to be the Catholic +strongholds in the New World. We have already said that the proportion +of the Catholics to the whole people in 1860 was as one to seven; but +if we divide the country into two parts we shall find that in the +Southern states there are only 1,200,000 Catholics in a population of +12,000,000—that is, they are 1/10th of the whole; while in the North +they number 3,200,000 in 19,000,000, or more than 1/6th. Even these +figures give but a very general idea of the distribution of the +faithful. If we take the whole country, state by state, we shall find +the proportions still more variable. In some places the Catholic +element is already so strong that its ultimate preponderance can +hardly be doubted, while its slow development in other quarters +promises little for the future. The following tables will enable our +readers to comprehend at once the distribution of the Catholics among +the various states: +</p> +<a name="9">{9}</a> +<p> +NORTHERN STATES. +<br><br> +SOUTHERN STATES. +</p> +<p class="image"> +<img alt="" src="images/i009.jpg" border=1><br> +</p> +<br> +<a name="10">{10}</a> +<br> +<p> +These tables show at a glance the disproportion between the Catholics +of the North and those of the South. In only one Northern state (that +of Maine) is the proportion of Catholics as small as 5.45 per cent, of +the whole population; while there are no fewer than five Southern +states in which it is less than three per cent. If we leave out New +Mexico, Texas, Louisiana, Missouri, and Maryland, where the +preponderance of the faithful is due to special causes, we find that +in the other Southern states the average proportion is not above four +per cent. In other words, in these regions the Church has little +better than a nominal existence. This is partly because the stream of +European immigration has always flowed in other directions, and partly +because the negroes generally adhere to the Baptist or Methodist sects +in preference to the Church. +</p> +<p> +But when we examine the tables more in detail, we see that in both +sections the ratio of Catholics varies greatly in different states. It +is easy to account for this difference in the South. Six states only +have any considerable number of Catholic inhabitants. Louisiana and +Missouri owe them to the old French colonies around which the Catholic +settlers clustered. In New Mexico, more than three-fourths of the +people are of Spanish-Mexican origin. Texas derives a great number of +her inhabitants from Mexico, and has received a large Catholic +emigration both from Europe and from the United States. Maryland, the +germ of the American Church, owes her religious prosperity to the +first English Catholic settlers; and the Church in Kentucky is an +offshoot of that in Maryland. Such are the special causes of the great +differences between the churches of the various Southern states. In +the North there is less disparity. European immigration has produced a +much more decided effect in this section than in the preceding. From +this source come most of the faithful of New York, Oregon, California, +Ohio, and New Jersey. In Ohio the Germans have done the principal +part, and they have done much also in Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. The +effect of conversions is more perceptible in Connecticut, Rhode +Island, Massachusetts, and New York than elsewhere. In many of the +states, however, and especially in Pennsylvania, we find numerous +descendants of English Catholic settlers, while the old French +colonies of the West have had their influence upon the population of +Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Illinois, and also of the northern +part of New York, where the French Canadians are daily spreading their +ramifications across the frontier. If we look now at the localities in +which the proportion of Catholics is greatest, we shall notice several +interesting points touching the laws which have determined the +direction of the principal development of the Church, and which will +probably promote it in the future. In the South there are what we may +call three groups of states in which the Catholic element is notably +stronger than in the others. One belongs exclusively to the Southern +section, and consists of Louisiana, Texas, and New Mexico, having an +aggregate Catholic population of 380,000 in 1,363,800, or 28 per +cent. The other groups (Missouri, that is to say, and Maryland and +Kentucky) form parts of much larger groups belonging to the Northern +states. The first of these latter, and that to which Maryland and +Kentucky are attached, consists of Pennsylvania, New York, New Jersey, +and Ohio. Its aggregate population is 11,647,477, of whom the +Catholics are 2,240,000, or nineteen per cent. This group contains the +ancient establishments of Maryland and Pennsylvania—good old Catholic +communities, in which the zeal and piety of the faithful possess that +firm and decided character which comes of long practice and +time-honored traditions. It contains, too, the magnificent seminary of +Baltimore, founded and still directed by the Sulpitians. This is the +largest and most complete <a name="11">{11}</a> establishment of the kind in the United +States, and derives from its connection with the Sulpitian house in +Paris special advantages for superintending the education of young +ecclesiastics, and training accomplished ministers for the sanctuary. +Kentucky, likewise, has some important and noteworthy institutions, +such as the seminary of St. Thomas and the college of St. Mary, both +of which are in high repute at the West, and the magnificent Abbey of +Our Lady of La Trappe at New Haven, with sixty-four religious, +eighteen of whom are choir-monks. The Kentucky Catholics deserve a few +words of special mention. The descendants, for the most part, of the +first settlers of Maryland, who scattered, about a century ago, in +order to people new countries, they partake in an eminent degree of +the peculiar characteristics which have given to Kentuckians a +reputation as the flower of the American people. They are more +decidedly American than the Catholics of any other district, and they +are remarkable for their homogeneousness, their education, and their +attachment to the faith and traditions of the Church. +</p> +<p> +The most important and numerous Catholic population is found in the +state of New York, where the faithful amount to no fewer than 800,000. +They have here religious establishments of every kind. This condition +of things is the result, in great measure, of the well-known ability +of Archbishop Hughes, whose death has left a void which the American +clergy will find it hard to fill. His reputation was not confined to +the Empire City. He was as well known all over the Union as at his own +see, and was everywhere regarded as one of the great men of the +country. Although the progress of the faith in New York has been owing +in a very great degree to immigration, it is in this city and in +Boston that conversions have been most numerous; and in effecting +these, Archbishop Hughes had a most important share. It is not +surprising, then, that his death should have caused a profound +sensation in the city, and that all religious denominations should +have united in testifying respect for his memory. +</p> +<p> +It is difficult to apply a statistical table to the study of the +question of conversions. These are mental operations of infinite +variety, both in their origin and in their ways; for the methods of +Providence are as many and as diverse as the shades of human thought +upon which they act. It may be remarked, however, that the different +Protestant sects furnish very unequal contingents to the little army +of souls daily returning to the true faith; and it is a curious fact +that the two sects which furnish the most are the Episcopalians, who, +in their forms and traditions, approach nearest to the Catholic +Church, and the Unitarians, who go to the very opposite extreme, and +appear to push their philosophical and rationalistic principles almost +beyond the pale of Christianity. These two sects generally comprise +the most enlightened and intellectual people of North America. On the +other hand, the denominations which embrace the more ignorant portions +of the population (such as the Baptists, the Wesleyan Methodists, +etc., etc.) furnish, in proportion to their numbers, but few converts. +The principal Catholic review in the United States (<i>Brownson's +Review</i>, published in New York) is edited by a well-known convert, +whose name it bears, and who was formerly a Unitarian minister. +</p> +<p> +Further North—in New England—there is another Catholic group, of +recent origin, formed of the Puritan states of Connecticut, +Massachusetts, and Rhode Island. The first see here was established by +Bishop Cheverus only sixty years ago. These bishoprics, however, have +already acquired importance; for in the diocese of Hartford the +Catholics are now sixteen per cent, of the whole population, and the +rapidity of their increase and the completeness of their church +organization give us ground for bright hopes of their future progress. +Immigration <a name="12">{12}</a> here does much to promote conversions, and it will +not be extravagant to anticipate that in the course of a few years the +number of the faithful will be doubled. <i>The Pilot</i>, the most +important Catholic journal in the country, is published in Boston. +</p> +<p> +The far West, only a few years ago, was a great wilderness, with only +a few French posts scattered here and there in the Indian forest, like +little islands in the midst of a great ocean. Now it is divided into +several states, and counts millions of inhabitants. In this rapid +transformation, Catholicism has not remained behind. Many dioceses +have been established, and the quickness of their growth has already +placed this group in the second rank so far as regards numerical +importance, while all goes to show that Catholicism is destined here +to preponderate greatly over all other denominations. The states of +Missouri, Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Minnesota contained, in +1860, 4,575,000 souls, of whom 890,000, or 19 per cent., were +Catholics. This is as large a proportion as we find in the central +group. It is, moreover, rapidly rising, and only one thing is +necessary to make these states before long the principal seats of +Catholicism in the Union—that is, an adequate supply of priests. It +is of the utmost importance that the demand for missionaries in these +diocese be supplied at whatever cost. +</p> +<p> +The principal causes of this remarkable increase are, first, the +crowds of immigrants attracted by the great extent of fertile land +thrown open to settlers; and, secondly, the fact that the Catholic +immigrants on their arrival clustered, so to speak, around the old +French settlements, where the missionaries still maintained the +discipline and worship of the Church. At first, therefore, it was easy +to direct this great influx of people, since they naturally tended +toward the pre-existing centres of faith. The consequence was that the +Church lost by apostacies fewer members than one might have supposed, +and fewer than were lost in other places. But now the daily augmenting +crowds of immigrants are dispersing themselves through less solitary +regions. They are coming under more direct and various influences; and +hence the necessity for increasing the number of churches and parish +priests becomes daily more and more urgent. At the same time, the +means at the disposal of the bishops become daily less and less +adequate for supplying this want, especially since the people of the +country, new and unsettled as they are, and absorbed in material +cares, furnish but few candidates for the priesthood. Here we see a +glorious field for the far-reaching benevolence of the Society for the +Propagation of the Faith. Nowhere, we believe, will the sending forth +of pious and devoted priests produce fruits comparable to those of +which the past gives promise to the future in this part of the United +States. We spoke just now of the old French colonies, and our readers +will perhaps be surprised that we should have made so much account of +those poor little villages, which numbered hardly more than from 500 +to 1,500 souls each when the Yankees began to come into the country. +Nevertheless, we have not exaggerated their importance. It is not only +that they served as centres and rallying-points; but so rapid is the +multiplication of families in America that this French population +which, if brought together in one mass in 1800, would have counted at +most 14,000 souls, now numbers, including both the original +settlements and the swarms of emigrants who have gone from them to the +West, not fewer than 80,000. Their descendants are always easily +recognized. Detroit, and its neighborhood in Michigan, Vincennes +(Ind.), Cahokia and Kaskaskia (Ill.), St. Louis, St. Geneviève, +Carondelet, etc. (Mo.), Green Bay and Prairie du Chien (Wis.), St. +Paul (Minn.)—all these old settlements have preserved the deep imprint +of our race. Even in the new colonies which were afterward drawn from +them, the French population have uniformly kept up the practice of +their religion, <a name="13">{13}</a> the use of their mother tongue, and a lively +recollection of their origin. Of this fact we have obtained proof in +several instances from careful personal observation. Small and poor, +therefore, as these settlements were, they had a powerful moral +influence upon the great immigration of the nineteenth century. The +Catholic immigrants felt drawn toward them by the attraction of a +community of thought and customs; and God, whose Providence rules our +lives, directed the movement by his own inscrutable methods. +</p> +<h2>III.</h2> +<p> +While the Catholic element was increasing at the rate of 80, 125, and +109 per cent, every ten years, other religious denominations showed an +increase of only twenty or twenty-five per cent. Some remained +stationary, and a few even lost ground. Whence comes this continued +and increasing disparity in the development of different portions of +the same people? The principal reason assigned for it is the immense +emigration from Ireland to America. As the number of Catholics in the +United States when the emigration began was very small, every swarm of +fresh settlers added much more to their ratio of increase than to that +of other denominations. Ten added to ten gives an increase of 100 per +cent.; but the same number added to 100 gives only ten per cent. At +first sight, this seems a sufficient explanation; but we shall find, +when we come to examine it, that it does not really account for our +increase. If the growth of the American Catholic Church were the +result wholly of immigration, we should find that as the number of +Catholic inhabitants increased, the apparent effect of this +immigration would be diminished. In other words, the <i>ratio</i> of increase +would gradually fall to an equality with that of other denominations. +But, so far from this being the case, the difference between our ratio +of increase and that of the Protestant sects is as great as ever--is +even growing greater. The ratio which was ten per cent. a year between +1830 and 1840, rose to 12.50 per cent, a year between 1840 and 1850, +and was 10.09 per cent, between 1850 and 1860. There are other causes, +therefore, beside European emigration to which we must look for an +explanation of Catholic progress in America. If we study with a little +attention the extent to which immigration has influenced the +development of the whole population of the country, and the exact +proportion of the Catholic part of this immigration, we shall find +confirmation of the conclusions to which we have been led by the +simple testimony of figures. Immigration has never furnished more than +six or seven per cent. of the decennial increase of the population of +the United States, the growth of which has been at the rate of +thirty-five per cent, during the same period. Immigration, therefore, +contributed to it only one-fifth. Again, of these immigrants, +including both Irish and Germans, not more than one-third have been +Catholics. Moreover, we must take account of the considerable number +of members that the Church has lost in the course of their dispersion +all over the country. +</p> +<p> +Clearly, then, the influence of immigration is not enough to account +for the rapid progress of the faith. A careful analysis of the +Catholic population at different tunes, and in different places, +enables us to specify two other causes. +</p> +<p> +1. The Catholics are principally distributed at the North among the +free states, where the population increases much faster than it does +at the South; and the Catholic families, it has been observed, +multiply much faster than the others, in consequence, no doubt, of +their more active and regular habits of life, sustained morality, +respect for the marriage tie, and regard for domestic obligations. +This difference in fecundity is quite perceptible wherever the +Catholic element <a name="14">{14}</a> is strong—as in Canada, and the states of New +York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, Illinois, Wisconsin, etc., and, +among the Southern states, in Louisiana, Maryland, and Missouri. +</p> +<p> +2. Another cause of increase is the conversion of Protestants—a cause +which operates slowly, quietly, and, at first, imperceptibly, but with +that constant and uniform power—reminding us of the great operations +of nature—which is almost always the sign of a Providential agency. +Eloquent theorists and brilliant writers on statistics, preferring +salient facts and striking phenomena—what they call the great +principles of science—too often overlook or despise those obscure +movements which act quietly upon the human conscience. Yet how much +more powerful is this mysterious action—like the continual dropping of +water—than the showy effects which captivate so many thinkers, whose +organs of perception seem dazzled by the glow of their imagination! +Such was the nature of the invisible operation which was inaugurated +by the preaching of the martyrs of the faith whom the French +Revolution cast forth like seed all over the world. The rules of +political economy had nothing to do with it. It acted in the secret +chambers of men's hearts and the retirement of their meditative +moments, and it has gone on without interruption to the present +moment, increasing year by year. The Church seizes upon the +convictions of grown men; reaches the young by her admirable systems +of education; impresses all by her living, persuasive propagandism, +made beautiful by the zeal and devotion and holiness of her +missionaries. Simple and dignified, without the affectation of dignity— +austere, without fanaticism—their presence alone roots up old +prejudices, while their preaching and example fill the soul with new +lights and with anxieties which nothing but their instructions can set +at rest. Thus, wherever they go, the thoughts and comparisons which +they suggest multiply conversions all around them. You have only to +question a few Catholic families in the older states about their early +religious history, and you will see how important an element in the +prosperity of the Church is this force of attraction—so important, +that the following statement may almost be taken as a general law: +Wherever a Catholic priest establishes himself, though there be not a +Catholic family in the place, it is almost certain that by the end of +a time which varies from five to ten years, he will be surrounded by a +Catholic community large enough to form a parish and support a +clergyman. This rule seems to us to have no exception except in some +of the southern states. We have no hesitation in stating it broadly of +even those parts of New England in which the anti-Catholic feeling is +now strongest. +</p> +<p> +We shall presently have occasion to show that the only thing which +prevents the American Church from increasing, perhaps doubling, the +rapidity of its progress, is the scarcity of ecclesiastics and +missionaries, from which all the dioceses are suffering. +</p> +<p> +We have explained the important part which converts have played in +this progress. The inquiry naturally arises: Whence come so many +conversions? What are the causes which generally lead to them? These +are delicate and difficult questions. We have no wish to speak ill of +the Protestant clergy. Most of them are certainly honorable men, +estimable husbands and good fathers; but we cannot help observing that +they lack the sacerdotal character so conspicuous in the Catholic +priest. Their ministry and their teaching cannot fully satisfy the +soul; and whenever a calm and unprejudiced comparison is drawn between +them and the Catholic clergy, it is strange if the former do not +suffer by the contrast, and behold their flocks, little by little, +passing over to the side of the Church. This comparison is one motive +which often leads Protestants, not precisely into <a name="15">{15}</a> the bosom of +the faith, but to the study of Catholic doctrine; and this is a step +by no means easy to persuade them to take; for, of every ten +Protestants who honestly study the faith, seven or eight end by +becoming Catholics. The Americans are a people of a strong religious +bent. Nothing which concerns the great question of religion is +indifferent to them. They study and reflect upon such matters much +more than we skeptical and critical Frenchmen. The conversions +resulting from such frequent consideration of religious matters ought, +therefore, to be far more numerous in America, and even in England, +than in other countries. +</p> +<p> +There are doubtless many other causes which contribute to the same +result. Among them are mixed marriages, which generally turn out to +the advantage of the Church, especially in the case of educated people +in the upper ranks in society. Not only are the children of these +marriages brought up Catholics, but almost always, as experience has +shown us, the Protestant parent becomes a Catholic too. +</p> +<p> +The excellent houses of education directed by religious orders are +another active cause of conversions. If elementary education is almost +universal in the United States, it is nevertheless true that the +higher institutions of learning are exceedingly defective. The +colleges and boarding-schools founded under the direction of the +Catholic clergy, though inferior to those of France in the +thoroughness of the education they impart and the amount of study +required of their pupils, are yet vastly superior to all other +American establishments in their method, their discipline, and the +attainments of their professors. The consequence is that they are +resorted to by numbers of Protestant youth of both sexes. No +compulsion is used to make them Catholics; no undue influence is +exerted; the press, free as it is, rarely finds excuse for complaint +on this score; but facts and doctrines speak for themselves. The good +examples and affectionate solicitude which surround these young +people, and the friendships they contract, leave a deep impression on +their minds, and plant the seed of serious thought, which sooner or +later bears fruit. Various circumstances may lead to the final +development of this seed. Now perhaps a first great sorrow wakens it +into life; now it is quickened by new ideas born of study and +experience; in one case the determining influence may be a marriage; +in another, intercourse with Catholic society; and not a few may be +moved by the falsity of the notions of Catholicism which they find +current among Protestants, and which their own experience enables them +to detect. This motive operates oftener than people suppose, and +generally with those who at school or college seemed most bitterly +hostile to the faith. In tine, those who have been educated at +Catholic institutions are less prejudiced and better prepared for the +action of divine grace, which Providence may send through any one of a +thousand channels. +</p> +<p> +And lastly, Catholicism acts upon the Americans through the medium of +the habits and customs to which it gradually attaches them, the result +of which is that in the growth of the population the Church makes a +constant, an insensible, and what we might call a spontaneous +increase. It is a well-known fact that the Catholic families of North +America, as a general rule, are distinguished by a character of +stability, good order, and moderation which is often wanting in the +Yankee race. Now this turns to the advantage of the Church; for it is +evident that a people which fixes itself permanently where it has once +settled, which concentrates itself, so to speak, has a better chance +of acquiring a predominance in the long run than one of migratory +habits, always in pursuit of some better state which always eludes it. +This truth is nowhere more apparent than in a county of Upper Canada +where we spent nearly three years. The county of Glengarry was settled +<a name="16">{16}</a> in 1815 by Scotchmen, some of whom were Catholics. The colony +increased partly by the natural multiplication of the settlers, partly +by immigration, until about 1840, when immigration almost totally +ceased, all the lands being occupied. The population was then left to +grow by natural increase alone. The Protestants at that time were +considerably in the majority; but by 1850 the proportions began to +change, and out of 17,576 inhabitants 8,870 were Catholics. In 1860 +the majority was completely reversed, and in a population of 21,187 +there were 10,919 Catholics; in other words, the latter, by the +regular operation of natural causes, had gained every year from one to +two per cent, upon the whole. It would not be easy to give a detailed +explanation of this fact; we are only conscious that some mysterious +and irresistible agency is gradually augmenting the proportion of the +Catholic element in American society and weakening the Protestant. +</p> +<p> +American society might be compared to a troubled expanse of water +holding various substances in solution. The solid bottom upon which +the waters rest is formed by the deposit of these substances, and day +after day, during the moments of rest which follow every agitation of +the waves, more and more of the Catholic element is precipitated which +the waters bring with them at each successive influx, but fail to +carry off again. It is by this human alluvium that our religion grows +and extends itself; and if this growth is wonderful, it may be that +the effect of the infusion of so much sound doctrine into American +society will prove equally astonishing and precious. +</p> +<p> +Great stress has often been laid upon the good qualities of the +American people, but comparatively few have spoken of their faults; +not because they had none, but because their faults were lost sight of +in the brilliancy of their material prosperity. But recent events have +led to more reflection upon this point; so it will not astonish our +readers if we point oat one or two, such as the decay of thoughtful, +systematic, methodical intelligence among them, in comparison with +Europeans; their narrowness of mind; their inaptitude for general +ideas; and their sensibly diminishing delicacy of mind. These defects +show an unsuspected but serious and rapid degeneracy of the +Anglo-American race, and the decline has already perhaps gone further +than one would readily believe. If Catholicism, which tends eminently +to develop a spirit of method and order, broadness of view and +delicacy of sentiment, should combat successfully these failings, it +would render a signal service to the United States in return for the +liberty which they have granted it. +</p> +<p> +But Catholics, we should add, are indebted to the United States for +something more than simple liberty. They have there learned to +appreciate their real power. They have learned by experience how +little they have to fear from pure universal liberty, how much +strength and influence they can acquire in such a state of society. +There is this good and this evil in liberty—that it always proves to +the advantage of the strong; so that when there is question of the +relations between man and man, it must be a well-regulated liberty, or +it will result in the oppression of the weak. But the case is +different when it comes to a question of discordant doctrines: man has +everything to gain by the triumph of sound, strong principles and the +destruction of false and specious theories. In such a contest, let but +each side appear in its true colors, and we have nothing to fear for +the cause of truth. The United States will at least have had the merit +of affording an opportunity for a powerful demonstration of the truth; +and great as are the advantages which the Catholic Church can confer +upon the country, she herself will reap still greater advantages by +conferring them; for it will turn to her benefit in her action upon +the world at large. +</p> +<p> +In fact, the experience of the Church <a name="17">{17}</a> in America has doubtless +gone for something in the familiarity which religious minds are +gradually acquiring with the principles of political liberty; and thus +the growth of American Catholicism is allied to the world-wide +reaction which is now taking place after the religious eclipse of the +last century. This transformation of the United States, in truth, is +only one marked incident in the intellectual revolution which is +drawing the whole world toward the Catholic Church—England as well +as America, Germany as well as England, even Bulgaria in the far East. +The foreign press brings us daily the signs of this progress; and +nothing can be easier than to point them out in France under our own +eyes. But unfortunately we have been too much in the habit, for the +last century, of leading a life of continual mortification, too +conscious that we were laughed at by the leaders of public opinion. We +crawled along in fear and trembling, creeping close to the walls, +dreading at every step to give offence, or to cause scandal, or to +lose some of our brethren. Accustomed to see our ranks thinned and +whole files carried off in the flower of their youth, we stood in too +great fear of the deceitful power of doctrines which seemed to promise +everything to man and ask nothing from him in return. And therefore +many of us still find it hard to understand the new state of things in +which we are making progress without external help. This progress, +however, inaugurated by the energy of a few, the perseverance of all, +and the overruling hand of divine Providence, is unquestionably going +on, and may easily be proved. We have only to visit our churches, +attend some of the special retreats for men, or look at the Easter +communions, to see what long steps faith and religious practice have +taken within the last forty years. The change is most perceptible +among the educated classes and in the learned professions. We have +heard old professors express their astonishment in comparing the +schools of the present time with those of their youth. It was then +almost impossible to find a young man at the <i>École Polytechnique</i>, at +St. Cyr, or at the <i>École Centrale</i>, with enough faith and enough +courage openly to profess his religion; now it may be said that a +fifth or perhaps a fourth part of the students openly and +unhesitatingly perform their Easter duty. We ourselves remember that +no longer ago than 1830 it required a degree of courage of which few +were found capable to manifest any religious sentiment in the public +lyceums. Voltairianism—or to speak better, an intolerant +fanaticism—delighted to cover these faithful few with public +ridicule; while now, if we may believe the best authorized accounts, +it is only a small minority who openly profess infidelity. We can +affirm that in the School of Law the change is quite as great, and it +has begun to operate even in that time-honored stronghold of +materialism, the School of Medicine. +</p> +<p> +But what must strike us most forcibly in the examination of these +questions is the fact, already pointed out by the Abbé Meignan, that +the progress of religion has kept even pace with the extension of free +institutions. Wherever the liberal <i>régime</i> has been established, the +reaction in favor of religion has become stronger, no doubt because +liberty places man face to face with the consequences of his own acts +and the necessities of his feeble nature. Man is never so powerfully +impelled to draw near to God as when he becomes conscious of his own +weakness; never so deeply impressed with the emptiness of false +doctrines as when he has experienced their nothingness in the +practical affairs of life. The violence of external disorder soon +leads him to, reflect upon the necessity of solid, methodical, moral +education, such as regulates one's life, and such as the Church alone +can impart. And therefore the great change of sentiment of which we +have spoken is perceptible chiefly among the educated and liberal +classes, while with the ignorant and <a name="18">{18}</a> vulgar infidelity holds its +own and is even gaining. The educated classes, more thoughtful, +knowing the world and having experience of men, see further and +calculate more calmly the tendency of events; with the common people +reason and plain sense are often overpowered by the violence of their +temperament and the impetuosity of their passions. Ignorance and +inordinate desires do the rest, and they imagine that man will know +how to conduct without knowing how to govern himself. +</p> +<p> +Whatever demagogues may say, history proves that the head always rules +the body. The period of discouragement and apprehension is past. We +shall yet, no doubt, have to go through trials, and violent crises, +and perhaps cruel persecutions; but we may hope everything from the +future. And why not? If we study the history of the Jewish people, we +shall see how God chastises his people in order to rouse them from +their moral torpor, and raise them up from apparent ruin by unforeseen +means. Weakness, in his hand, at once becomes strength; he asks of us +nothing but faith and courage. We have traced his Providence in the +methods by which he has stimulated the growth of the American +Church—methods all the more effectual because, unlike our own vain +enterprises, they worked for a long time in silence and obscurity. +These Western bishoprics remained almost unknown up to the day when, +the light bursting forth all at once, the world beheld a Church +already organized, already strong, where it had not suspected even her +existence. +</p> +<p> +There is a magnificent and instructive scene in <i>Athalie</i>, where the +veil of the temple is rent, and discloses to the eyes of the terrified +queen, Joas, whom she had believed dead, standing in his glory +surrounded by an army. Even so, it seems to us, was the American +Church suddenly revealed in all her vigor to the astonished world, +when her bishops came two years ago to take their place in the council +at Rome. And the same progress is making all over the globe. Noiseless +and unobtrusive, it attracts no attention from the world; it is +overlooked by Utopian theorists; it goes on quietly in the domain of +conscience; but the day will come when its light will break forth and +astonish mankind by its brightness. Such are the ways of God! +</p> +<br> +<p> +NOTE.—The greater part of the materials for the preceding article +were written or collected during the course of a journey which we made +in the United States in 1860. Since then the progress of Catholicism +has necessarily been somewhat checked by the events of the lamentable +civil war which is desolating the country; but the check has been far +less serious than might have reasonably been apprehended. Religion has +been kept apart from political dissensions and public disorders; it +has only had to suffer the common evils which war, mortality, and +general impoverishment have inflicted upon the whole people. If all +these things are to have any bad effect upon the progress of the +Church, it will be in future years, not now. In fact, all the +documents which we have been able to collect show that the numbers of +both the faithful and the clergy, instead of falling off, have gone on +increasing. In thirty-eight dioceses there are now 275 more priests +than there were in 1860; from the five other sees, namely, those of +New Orleans, Galveston, Mobile, Natchitoches, and Charleston, we have +no returns. This increase is confined almost entirely to the regions +in which the Church was already strongest; elsewhere matters have +remained about stationary. +</p> +<p> +Of this number of 275 priests added to the Church in the course of +three years, 251 belong to the following fourteen dioceses, namely: +Baltimore, Pittsburg, Cincinnati, Cleveland, Brooklyn, Albany, Alton, +Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul, Detroit, Fort Wayne, Vincennes, and +Hartford. The last-named belongs to the <a name="19">{19}</a> Northeastern or New +England group, all the others to the Central and Western. Thus +fourteen dioceses alone show nine-tenths of the total increase, and +the others divide the remaining tenth among them in very minute +fractions. From some states, it is true, the returns are very meagre, +and from others they are altogether wanting; but the disproportion is +so strong as to leave no doubt that the future conquests of the Church +in the United States will be gained, as we have already said, +principally in the Middle and Western States. +</p> +<p> +E. R. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2><i>From The Month.</i> +<br><br> +THE ANCIENT SAINTS OF GOD. +<br><br> +A FRENCH OFFICER'S STORY. +<br><br> +BY THE LATE CARDINAL WISEMAN. +<br><br><br> +CHAPTER I. +<br><br> +INTRODUCTION.</h2> +<p> +We often practically divide the saints into three classes. The ancient +saints, those of the primitive age of Christianity, we consider as the +patrons of the universal Church, watching over its well-being and +progress, but, excepting Rome, having only a general connection with +the interests of particular countries, still less of individuals. +</p> +<p> +The great saints of the middle age, belonging to different races and +countries, have naturally become their patrons, being more especially +reverenced and invoked in the places of their births, their lives, and +still more their deaths; whence, St. Willibrord, St. Boniface, and St. +Walburga are more honored in Germany, where they died, than in +England, where they were born. +</p> +<p> +The third class includes the more modern saints, who spoke our yet +living languages, printed their books, followed the same sort of life, +wore the same dress as we do, lived in houses yet standing, founded +institutions still flourishing, rode in carriages, and in another +generation would have traveled by railway. Such are St. Charles, St. +Ignatius, St. Philip, St. Teresa, St. Vincent, B. Benedict Joseph, and +many others. Toward these we feel a personal devotion independent of +country; nearness of time compensating for distance of place. There is +indeed one class of saints who belong to every age and every country; +devotion toward whom, far from diminishing, increases the further we +recede from their time and even their land. For we are convinced that +a Chinese convert has a more sensitive and glowing devotion toward our +Blessed Lady, than a Jewish neophyte had in the first century. When I +hear this growth of piety denounced or reproached by Protestants, I +own I exult in it. +</p> +<p> +For the only question, and there is none in a Catholic mind, is +whether such a feeling is good in itself; if so, growth in it, age by +age, is an immense blessing and proof of the divine presence. It is as +if one told me that there is more humility now in the Church than +there was in the first century, more zeal than in the third, more +faith than in the eighth, more charity than in the twelfth. And so, if +there is more devotion now than there was 1,800 years ago toward the +Immaculate Mother of God, toward <a name="20">{20}</a> her saintly spouse, toward St. +John, St. Peter, and the other Apostles, I rejoice; knowing that +devotion toward our divine Lord, his infancy, his passion, his sacred +heart, his adorable eucharist, has not suffered loss or diminution, +but has much increased. It need not be, and it is not, as John the +Baptist said, "He must increase, and I diminish." Both here increase +together; the Lord, and those who best loved him. +</p> +<p> +But this is more than a subject of joy: it is one of admiration and +consolation. For it is the natural course of things that sympathies +and affections should grow less by time. We care and feel much less +about the conquests of William I., or the prowess of the Black Prince, +than we do about the victories of Nelson or Wellington; even Alfred is +a mythical person, and Boadicea fabulous; and so it is with all +nations. A steadily increasing affection and intensifying devotion (as +in this case we call it) for those remote from us, in proportion as we +recede from them, is as marvellous—nay, as miraculous—as would be the +flowing of a stream from its source up a steep hill, deepening and +widening as it rose. And such I consider this growth, through +succeeding ages, of devout feeling toward those who were the root, and +seem to become the crown, or flower, of the Church. It is as if a beam +from the sun, or a ray from a lamp, grew brighter and warmer in +proportion as it darted further from its source. +</p> +<p> +I cannot but see in this supernatural disposition evidence of a power +ruling from a higher sphere than that of <i>ordinary</i> providence, the laws +of which, uniform elsewhere, are modified or even reversed when the +dispensations of the gospel require it; or rather, these have their +own proper and ordinary providence, the laws of which are uniform +within its system. And this is one illustration, that what by every +ordinary and natural course should go on diminishing, goes on +increasing. But I read in this fact an evidence also of the stability +and perpetuity of our faith; for a line that is ever growing thinner +and thinner tends, through its extenuation, to inanition and total +evanescence; whereas one that widens and extends as it advances and +becomes more solid, thereby gives earnest and proof of increasing +duration. +</p> +<p> +When we are attacked about practices, devotions, or corollaries of +faith—"developments," in other words—do we not sometimes labor +needlessly to prove that we go no further than the Fathers did, and +that what we do may be justified from ancient authorities? Should we +not confine ourselves to showing, even with the help of antiquity, +that what is attacked is good, is sound, and is holy; and then thank +God that we have so much more of it than others formerly possessed? If +it was right to say "Ora pro nobis" once in the day, is it not better +to say it seven times a day; and if so, why not seventy times seven? +The rule of forgiveness may well be the rule of seeking intercession +for it. But whither am I leading you, gentle reader? I promised you a +story, and I am giving you a lecture, and I fear a dry one. I must +retrace my steps. I wished, therefore, merely to say that, while the +saints of the Church are very naturally divided by us into three +classes—holy patrons of the Church, of particular portions of it, and +of its individual members—there is one raised above all others, which +passes through all, composed of protectors, patrons, and nomenclators, +of saints themselves. For how many Marys, how many Josephs, Peters, +Johns, and Pauls, are there not in the calendar of the saints, called +by those names without law of country or age! +</p> +<p> +But beyond this general recognition of the claims of our greatest +saints, one cannot but sometimes feel that the classification which I +have described is carried by us too far; that a certain human dross +enters into the composition of our devotion; we perhaps nationalize, +or even individualize, <a name="21">{21}</a> the sympathies of those whose love is +universal, like God's own, in which alone they love. We seem to fancy +that St. Edward and St. Frideswida are still English; and some persons +appear to have as strong an objection to one of their children bearing +any but a Saxon saint's name as they have to Italian architecture. We +may be quite sure that the power and interest in the whole Church have +not been curtailed by the admission of others like themselves, first +Christians on earth, then saints in heaven, into their blessed +society; but that the friends of God belong to us all, and can and +will help us, if we invoke them, with loving impartiality. The little +history which I am going to relate serves to illustrate this view of +saintly intercession; it was told me by the learned and distinguished +prelate whom I shall call Monsig. B. He has, I have heard, since +published the narrative; but I will give it as I heard it from his +lips. +</p> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER II. +<br><br> +THE FRENCH OFFICER'S FIRST APPEARANCE.</h2> +<br> +<p> +On the 30th of last month—I am writing early in August—we all +commemorated the holy martyrs, Sts. Abdon and Sennen. This in itself +is worthy of notice. Why should we in England, why should they in +America, be singing the praises of two Persians who lived more than +fifteen hundred years ago? Plainly because we are Catholics, and as +such in communion with the saints of Persia and the martyrs of Decius. +Yet it may be assumed that the particular devotion to these two +Eastern martyrs is owing to their having suffered in Rome, and so +found a place in the calendar of the catacombs, the basis of later +martyrologies. Probably after having been concealed in the house of +Quirinus the deacon, their bodies were buried in the cemetery or +catacomb of Pontianus, outside the present Porta Portese, on the +northern bank of the Tiber. In that catacomb, remarkable for +containing the primitive baptistery of the Church, there yet remains a +monument of these saints, marking their place of sepulture. [Footnote +5] Painted on the wall is a "floriated" and jewelled cross; not a +conventional one such as mediaeval art introduced, but a plain cross, +on the surface of which the painter imitated natural jewels, and from +the foot of which grow flowers of natural forms and hues; on each side +stands a figure in Persian dress and Phrygian cap, with the names +respectively running down in letters one below the other: +</p> +<p class="center"> +SANCTVS ABDON: SANCTVS SENNEN. +</p> +<p> +The bodies are no longer there. They were no doubt removed, as most +were, in the eighth century, to save them from Saracenic profanation, +and translated to the basilica of St. Mark in Rome. There they repose, +with many other martyrs no longer distinguishable; since the ancient +usage was literally to bury the bodies of martyrs in a spacious crypt +or chamber under the altar, so as to verify the apocalyptic +description, "From under the altar of God all the saints cry aloud." +This practice has been admirably illustrated by the prelate to whom I +have referred, in a work on this very crypt, or, in ecclesiastical +language, <i>Confession</i> of St. Mark's. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 5: See <i>Fabiola</i>, pp. 362, 363.] +</p> +<p> +One 30th of July, soon after the siege of Rome in 1848, the chapter of +St. Mark's were singing the office and mass of these Persian martyrs, +as saints of their church. Most people on week-days content themselves +with hearing early a low mass, so that the longer offices of the +basilica, especially the secondary ones, are not much frequented. On +this occasion, however, a young French officer was noticed by <a name="22">{22}</a> the +canons as assisting alone with great recollection. +</p> +<p> +At the close of the function, my informant went up to the young man, +and entered into conversation with him. +</p> +<p> +"What feast are you celebrating today?" asked the officer. +</p> +<p> +"That of Sts. Abdon and Sennen," answered Monsignor B. +</p> +<p> +"Indeed! how singular!" +</p> +<p> +"Why? Have you any particular devotion to those saints?" +</p> +<p> +"Oh, yes; they are my patron saints. The cathedral of my native town +is dedicated to them, and possesses their bodies." +</p> +<p> +"You must be mistaken there: their holy relics repose beneath our +altar; and we have to-day kept their feast solemnly on that account." +</p> +<p> +On this explanation of the prelate the young officer seemed a little +disconcerted, and remarked that at P— everybody believed that the +saints' relics were in the cathedral. +</p> +<p> +The canon, as he then was, of St. Mark's, though now promoted to the +"patriarchal" basilica of St. John, explained to him how this might +be, inasmuch as any church possessing considerable portions of larger +relics belonging to a saint was entitled to the privilege of one +holding the entire body, and was familiarly spoken of as actually +having it; and this no doubt was the case at P—. +</p> +<p> +"But, beside general grounds for devotion to these patrons of my +native city, I have a more particular and personal one; for to their +interposition I believe I owe my life." +</p> +<p> +The group of listeners who had gathered round the officer was deeply +interested in this statement, and requested him to relate the incident +to which he alluded. He readily complied with their request, and with +the utmost simplicity made the following brief recital. +</p> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER III. +<br><br> +THE OFFICER'S NARRATIVE.</h2> +<br> +<p> +"During the late siege of Rome I happened to be placed in an advanced +post, with a small body of soldiers, among the hillocks between our +headquarters in the villa Pamphily-Doria and the gate of St. +Pancratius. The post was one of some danger, as it was exposed to the +sudden and unsparing sallies made by the revolutionary garrison on +that side. The broken ground helped to conceal us from the marksmen +and the artillery on the walls. However, that day proved to be one of +particular danger. Without warning, a <i>sortie</i> was made in force, either +merely in defiance or to gain possession of some advantageous post; +for you know how the church and convent of St. Pancratius was assailed +by the enemy, and taken and retaken by us several times in one day. +The same happened to the villas near the walls. There was no time +given us for speculation or reflection. We found ourselves at once in +presence of a very superior force, or rather in the middle of it; for +we were completely surrounded. We fought our best; but escape seemed +impossible. My poor little picket was soon cut to pieces, and I found +myself standing alone in the midst of our assailants, defending myself +as well as I could against such fearful odds. At length I felt I was +come to the last extremity, and that in a few moments I should be +lying with my brave companions. Earnestly desiring to have the +suffrages of my holy patrons in that my last hour, I instinctively +exclaimed, 'Sts. Abdon and Sennen, pray for me!' What then happened I +cannot tell. Whether a sudden panic struck my enemies, or something +more important called off their attention, or what else to me +inexplicable—occurred, I cannot say; all that I know is, that somehow +or other I found myself alone, unwounded <a name="23">{23}</a> and unhurt, with my poor +fellows lying about, and no enemy near. +</p> +<p> +"Do you not think that I have a right to attribute this most wonderful +and otherwise unaccountable escape to the intercession and protection +of Sts. Abdon and Sennen?" +</p> +<p> +I need scarcely say that this simple narrative touched and moved +deeply all its hearers. No one was disposed to dissent from the young +Christian officer's conclusion. +</p> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER IV. +<br><br> +THE EXPLANATION.</h2> +<br> +<p> +It was natural that those good ecclesiastics who composed the chapter +of St. Mark's should feel an interest in their youthful acquaintance. +His having accidentally, as it seemed, but really providentially, +strolled into their church at such a time, with so singular a bond of +sympathy with its sacred offices that day, necessarily drew them in +kindness toward him. His ingenuous piety and vivid faith gained their +hearts. +</p> +<p> +In the conversation which followed, it was discovered that all his +tastes and feelings led him to love and visit the religious monuments +of Rome; but that he had no guide or companion to make his wanderings +among them as useful and agreeable as they might be made. It was +good-naturedly and kindly suggested to him to come from time to time +to the church, when some one of the canons would take him with him on +his <i>ventidue ore</i> walk after vespers, and act the <i>cicerone</i> to him, +if they should visit some interesting religious object. This offer he +readily accepted, and the intelligent youth and his reverend guides +enjoyed pleasant afternoons together. At last one pleasanter than all +occurred, when in company with Monsignor B. +</p> +<p> +Their ramble that evening led them out of the Porta Portuensis, among +the hills of Monte Verde, between it and the gate of St. Pancratius— +perhaps for the purpose of visiting that interesting basilica. Be it +as it may, suddenly, while traversing a vineyard, the young man +stopped. +</p> +<p> +"Here," he exclaimed, "on this very spot, I was standing when my +miraculous deliverance took place." +</p> +<p> +"Are you sure?" +</p> +<p> +"Quite. If I lived a hundred years, I could never forget it. It is the +very spot." +</p> +<p> +"Then stand still a moment," rejoined the prelate; "we are very near +the entrance to the cemetery of Pontianus. I wish to measure the +distance." +</p> +<p> +He did so by pacing it. +</p> +<p> +"Now," he said, "come down into the catacomb, and observe the +direction from where you stand to the door." The key was soon +procured. +</p> +<p> +They accordingly went down, proceeded as near as they could judge +toward the point marked over-head, measured the distance paced above, +and found themselves standing before the memorial of Sts. Abdon and +Sennen. +</p> +<p> +"There," said the canon to his young friend; "you did not know that, +when you were invoking your holy patrons, you were standing +immediately over their tomb." +</p> +<p> +The young officer's emotion may be better conceived than described on +discovering this new and unexpected coincidence in the history of his +successful application to the intercession of ancient saints. +</p> +<p class="center"> +SANCTI ABDON ET SENNEN, ORATE PRO NOBIS. +</p> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="24">{24}</a> +<br> +<h2>From The Lamp. +<br><br> +A PILGRIMAGE TO ARS.</h2> +<br> +<p> +I went to Lyons for the express purpose of visiting the tomb of the +Curé of Ars; for I knew the village of Ars was not very far from that +city, though I had but a vague idea as to where it was situated or how +it was to be reached. I trusted, however, to obtaining all needful +information from the people at the hotel where I was to pass the +night; and I was not mistaken in my expectations; but I must confess, +to my sorrow, that I felt for a moment a very English sort of +shamefacedness about making the inquiry. Put to the waiter of an +English hotel, such a question would simply have produced a stare of +astonishment or a smile of pity. A visit to the tomb of the Duke of +Wellington at St. Paul's, or a descent into kingly vaults for the wise +purpose of beholding Prince Albert's coffin, with its wreaths of +flowers laid there by royal and loving hands these things he would +have sympathized with and understood. But a pilgrimage to the last +resting-place of a man who, even admitting he were at that moment a +saint in heaven, had been but a simple parish-priest upon earth, would +have been a proceeding utterly beyond his capacity to comprehend, and +he would undoubtedly have pronounced it either an act of insanity or +one of superstition, or something partaking of the nature of the two. +I forgot, for a moment, that I was in a Catholic country, and inquired +my way to Ars with an uncomfortable expectation of a sneering answer +in return. Once, however, that the question was fairly put, there was +nothing left for me but to be ashamed of my own misgivings. +</p> +<p> +"Madame wished to visit the tomb of the sainted Curé?—<i>mais oui</i>. It +was the easiest thing in the world. Only an hour's railway from Lyons +to Villefranche; and an omnibus at the latter station, which had been +established for the express purpose of accommodating the pilgrims, who +still flocked to Ars from every quarter of the Catholic world." +</p> +<p> +I listened, and my way seemed suddenly to become smooth before me. +Later on in the evening, I found that the housemaid of the hotel had +been there often; and two or three times at least during the lifetime +of the Curé. I asked her for what purpose she had gone there; whether +to be cured of bodily ailments or to consult him on spiritual matters? +"For neither one nor the other," she answered, with great simplicity; +"but she had had a great grief, and her mother had taken her to him to +be comforted." There was something to me singularly lovely in this +answer, and in the insight which it gave me into the nature of that +mission, so human, and yet so divine, which the Curé had accomplished +in his lifetime. God had placed him there, like another John the +Baptist, to announce penance to the world. He preached to thousands—he +converted thousands—he penetrated into the hidden consciences of +thousands, and laid his finger, as if by intuition, upon the hidden +sore that kept the soul from God. Men, great by wealth and station, +came to him and laid their burden of sin and misery at his feet. Men, +greater still by intellect, and prouder and more difficult of +conversion (as sins of the intellect ever make men), left his presence +simple, loving, and believing as little children. For these he had +lightning glances and words of fire; these by turns he reprimanded, +exhorted, and encouraged; but when the weak and sorrowful of God's +flock came to him, he paused in his apostolic task to weep over them +and console them. And so it was with <a name="25">{25}</a> Jesus. The great and wealthy +of the earth came to him for relief, and he never refused their +prayers; but how many instances do we find in the gospel of the gift +of health bestowed, unasked and unexpected, upon some poor wanderer by +the wayside, or the yet greater boon of comfort given to some poor +suffering heart, for no other reason that we know of than that it +suffered and had need of comfort! The cripple by the pool of Bethsaida +received his cure at the very moment when he was heartsick with hope +deferred at finding no man to carry him down to the waters; and the +widow of Nain found her son suddenly restored to life because, as the +gospel expressly tells us, he was "the only son of his mother, and she +was a widow." +</p> +<p> +The heart of the Curé of Ars seems to have been only less tender than +that of his divine Master; and in the midst of the sublime occupation +of converting souls to God, he never disdained the humble task of +healing the stricken spirit, and leading it to peace and joy. +</p> +<p> +"My husband died suddenly," the young woman went on to say, in answer +to my further questions; "and from affluence I found myself at once +reduced to poverty. I was stunned by the blow; but my mother took me +to the cure; and almost before he had said a word, I felt not only +consoled, but satisfied with the lot which God had assigned me." And +so indeed she must have been. When I saw her, she was still poor, and +earning her bread by the worst of all servitude, the daily and nightly +servitude of a crowded inn; but gentle, placid, and smiling, as became +one who had seen and been comforted by a saint. She evidently felt +that she had been permitted to approach very near to God in the person +of God's servant, and every word she uttered was so full of love and +confidence in the sainted curé that it increased (if that were +possible) my desire to kneel at his tomb, since the happiness of +approaching his living person had been denied me. +</p> +<p> +The next morning I set off for Villefranche. It is on the direct line +to Paris, and at about an hour's railroad journey from Lyons. When I +reached it, I found three omnibuses waiting at the station, and I +believe they were all there for the sole purpose of conveying pilgrims +to Ars. One of the conductors tried every mode of persuasion—and there +are not a few in the vocabulary of a Frenchman—to inveigle me into his +omnibus. "I should be at Ars in half an hour, and could return at two, +three, four o'clock—in short, at any hour of the night or day that +might please me best." It was with some difficulty I resisted the +torrent of eloquence he poured out upon me; but, in the first place, I +felt that he was promising what he himself would have called "the +impossible," since a public conveyance must necessarily regulate its +movements by the wishes of the majority of its passengers; and in the +next, I had a very strong desire to be alone in body as well as in +mind during the few hours that I was to spend at Ars. +</p> +<p> +At last I found an omnibus destined solely for visitors to +Villefranche itself, and the conductor promised that he would provide +me a private carriage to Ars if I would consent to drive first to his +hotel. Cabaret he might have called it with perfect truth, for cabaret +it was, and nothing more—a regular French specimen of the article, +with a great public kitchen, where half the workmen of the town +assembled for their meals, and a small cupboard sort of closet opening +into it for the accommodation of more aristocratic guests. Into this, +<i>bon gré, mal gré</i>, they wished to thrust me, but I violently repelled +the threatened honor, and with some difficulty carrying my point, +succeeded in being permitted to remain in the larger and cooler space +of the open kitchen until my promised vehicle should appear. It came +at last, a sort of half-cab, half-gig, without a hood, but with a +curiously contrived harness of loose ropes, and looking altogether +<a name="26">{26}</a> dangerously likely to come to pieces on the road. Luckily, I am +not naturally nervous in such matters, and, consoling myself with the +thought that if we did get into grief the "<i>bon curé</i>" was bound to +come to my assistance, seeing I had incurred it solely for the sake of +visiting his tomb, I was soon settled as comfortably as circumstances +would permit, and we set off at a brisk pace. +</p> +<p> +The country around Villefranche is truly neither pretty nor +picturesque; and though we were not really an hour on the road, the +drive seemed tedious. Our Jehu also, as it turned out, had never been +at Ars before; so that he had not only to stop more than once to +inquire the way, but actually contrived at the very last to miss it. +He soon discovered the mistake, however, and retracing his steps, a +very few minutes brought us to the spot where the saint had lived +forty years, and where he now sleeps in death. His house stands beside +the church, but a little in the rear, so it does not immediately catch +the eye; and the church, where his real life was spent, is separated +from the road by a small enclosure, railed off, and approached by a +few steps. We looked around for some person to conduct us, but there +was no one to be seen; so, after a moment's hesitation, we ascended +the steps and entered the church. If you wish to know what kind of +church it is, I cannot tell you. I do not know, in fact, whether it is +Greek or Gothic, or of no particular architecture at all; I do not +know even if it is in good taste or in bad taste. The soul was so +filled with a sense of the presence of the dead saint that it left no +room for the outer sense to take note of the accidents amid which he +had lived. There are two or three small chapels—a Lady chapel, one +dedicated to the Sacred Heart, and another to St. John the Baptist. +There is also the chapel of St. Philomena, with a large lifelike image +of the "<i>bonne petite sainte</i>" to whom he loved to attribute every +miracle charity compelled him to perform; and there is the +confessional, where for forty years he worked far greater wonders on +the soul than any of the more obvious ones he accomplished on the +body. All, or most of all, this I saw in a vague sort of way, as one +who saw not; but the whole church was filled with such an aroma of +holiness, there was such a sense of the actual presence of the man who +had converted it into a very tabernacle in the wilderness—a true Holy +of Holies, where, in the midst of infidel France, God had descended +and conversed almost visibly with his people—that I had neither the +will nor the power to condescend to particulars, and examine it in +detail. +</p> +<p> +My one thought as I entered the church was, to go and pray upon his +tomb; but in the first moment of doubt and confusion I could not +remember, if indeed I had been told, the exact spot where he was +buried. The chapel of St. Philomena was the first to attract my +notice, and feeling that I could not be far wrong while keeping close +to his dear little patroness, I knelt down there to collect my ideas. +</p> +<p> +The stillness of the church made itself felt. There were indeed many +persons praying in it, but they prayed in that profound silence which +spoke to the heart, and penetrated it in a way no words could have +ever done. +</p> +<p> +I was thirsting, however, to approach the tomb of the saint, and at +last ventured to whisper the question to a person near me. She pointed +to a large black slab nearly in the centre of the church, and told me +that he lay beneath it. Yes, he was there, in the very midst of his +people, not far from the chapel of St. Philomena, and opposite to the +altar whence he had so many thousands of times distributed the bread +of life to the famishing souls who, like the multitude of old, had +come into the desert, and needed to be fed ere they departed to their +homes. Yes, he was there; and with a strange mingling of joy and +sorrow in the thought I went and knelt down beside him. +</p> +<a name="27">{27}</a> +<p> +Had I gone to Ars but a few years before, I might have found him in +his living person; might have thrown myself at his feet, and poured +out my whole soul before him. Now I knelt indeed beside him, but +beside his body only, and the soul that would have addressed itself to +mine was far away in the bosom of its God. Humanly speaking, the +difference seemed against me, and yet, in a more spiritual point of +view, it might perhaps be said to be in my favor. +</p> +<p> +The graces which he obtained for mortals here he obtained by more than +mortal suffering and endurance—by tears, by fastings, and nightly +and daily impetrations;—now, with his head resting, like another St. +John, on the bosom of his divine Lord, surely he has but to wish in +order to draw down whole fountains of love and tenderness on his +weeping flock below. And certainly it would seem so; for however +numerous the miracles accomplished in his lifetime, they have been +multiplied beyond all power of calculation since his death. +</p> +<p> +Later on in the day, when the present curé showed me a room nearly +half full of crutches and other mementos of cures wrought—"These are +only the ones left there during his lifetime," he observed, in a tone +which told at once how much more numerous were those which cure had +made useless to their owners since his death. +</p> +<p> +I had not been many minutes kneeling before his tomb, when the lady +who had pointed it out to me asked if I would like to see the house +which he had inhabited in his lifetime. On my answering gladly in the +affirmative, she made me follow her through a side-door and across a +sort of court to the house inhabited by the present curé. This house +had never been the abode of M. Vianney, but had been allotted to the +priests who assisted him in his missions. The one which he actually +inhabited is now a sort of sanctuary, where every relic and +recollection of him is carefully preserved for the veneration of the +faithful. We were shown into a sort of <i>salle à manger</i>, sufficiently +poor to make us feel we were in the habitation of men brought up in +the school of a saint, and almost immediately afterward the present +curé entered. He had been for many years the zealous assistant of the +late curé; and, in trying to give me an idea of the influx of +strangers into Ars, he told me that, while M. Vianney spent habitually +from fifteen to seventeen hours in the confessional, he and his +brother priest were usually occupied at least twelve hours out of the +twenty-four in a similar manner. Even this was probably barely +sufficient for the wants of the mission, for the number of strangers +who came annually to Ars during the latter years of the curé's life +was reckoned at about 80,000, and few, if any, of these went away +without having made a general confession, either to M. Vianney +himself, or, if that were not possible, to one or other of the +assisting clergy. +</p> +<p> +It was pleasant to talk with one who had been living in constant +communication with a saint; and I felt as if something of the spirit +of M. Vianney himself had taken possession of the good and gentle man +with whom I was conversing. Among other things, he told me that the +devout wish of the saint had of late years been the erection of a new +church to St. Philomena; and he gave me a fac-simile of his +handwriting in which he had promised to pray especially for any one +aiding him in the work. The surest way, therefore, I should imagine, +to interest him in our necessities—now that he is in heaven—would be +to aid in the undertaking which he had in mind and heart while yet +dwelling on earth. Even in his lifetime there had been a lottery got +up for raising funds; and as money is still coming in from all +quarters, his wish will doubtless soon be accomplished. I saw a very +handsome altar which has been already presented, and which has been +put aside in one of the rooms of the curé until the church, for which +it is <a name="28">{28}</a> intended, shall have been completed. M. le curé showed me +one or two small photographs, which had been taken without his +knowledge during the lifetime of the saint; and also a little carved +image, which he said was a wonderful likeness, and far better than any +of the portraits. Afterward he pointed out another photograph, as +large as life, and suspended against the wall, which had been procured +after death. It was calm and holy, as the face of a saint in death +should be, and I liked it still better in its placid peace than the +smile of the living photograph. Even the smile seemed to tell of +tears. You know that he who smiles is still doing battle—cheerfully +and successfully indeed, but still doing battle with the enemies of +his soul; while the grave calmness of the dead face tells you at once +that all is over—the fight is fought, the crown is won; eternity has +set its seal on the good works of time, and all is safe for ever. +</p> +<p> +I could have looked at that photograph a long time, and said my +prayers before it—it seemed to repose in such an atmosphere of +sanctity and peace—but the hours were passing quickly, and there was +still much to see and hear concerning the dead saint. I took leave, +therefore, of the good priest who had been my cicerone so far, and +sought the old housekeeper, who was in readiness to show me the house +where M. Vianney had lived. We crossed a sort of court, which led us +to a door opposite the church. When this was opened, I found myself in +a sort of half-garden, half-yard, in the centre of which the old house +was standing. +</p> +<p> +It is hard to put upon paper the feelings with which a spot the +habitation of a saint just dead is visited. The spirit of love and +charity and peace which animated the living man still seems brooding +over the spot where his life was passed, and you feel intensely that +the true beauty of the Lord's house was here, and that this has been +the place where his glory hath delighted to dwell. The first room I +entered was one in which the crutches left there by invalids had been +deposited. It was a sight to see. The crutches were piled as close as +they could be against the wall, and yet the room was almost half full. +The persons who used those crutches must have been carried hither, +lame and suffering, and helpless as young children; and they walked +away strong men and cured. Truly "the lame walk and the blind see;" +and the Lord hath visited his people in the person of his servant. +</p> +<p> +My next visit was made to the <i>salle à manger</i>, where M. Vianney had +always taken the one scanty meal which was his sole support during his +twenty-four hours of almost unbroken labor. It was poverty in very +deed—poverty plain, unvarnished, and unadorned—such poverty as an +Irish cabin might have rivalled, but could scarcely have surpassed. +The walls were bare and whitewashed; the roof was merely raftered; and +the floor, which had once been paved with large round stones, such as +are used for the pavement of a street, was broken here and there into +deep holes by the removal of the stones. During his forty years' +residence at Ars, M. Vianney had probably never spent a single sou +upon any article which could contribute to his own comfort or +convenience; and this room bore witness to the fact. How, indeed, +should he buy anything for himself, who gave even that which was given +to him away, until his best friends grew well-nigh weary of bestowing +presents, which they felt would pass almost at the same instant out of +his own possession into the hands of any one whom he fancied to be in +greater want of them than he was? I stood in that bare and desolate +apartment, and felt as if earth and heaven in their widest extremes, +their most startling contrasts, were there in type and reality before +me. All that earth has of poor and miserable and unsightly was present +to the eyes of the body; all that heaven has of bright <a name="29">{29}</a> and +beautiful and glorious was just as present, just as visible, to the +vision of the soul. It was the very reverse of the fable of the fairy +treasures, which vanish into dust when tested by reality. All that you +saw was dust and ashes, but dust and ashes which, tried by the +touchstone of eternity, would, you knew, prove brighter than the +brightest gold, fairer than the fairest silver that earth ever yielded +to set in the diadem of her kings! My reflections were cut short by +the entrance of one of the priests, who invited us to come up stairs +and inspect the vestments which had belonged to the late curé, and +which were kept, I think, apart from those in ordinary use in the +church. There was a great quantity of them, and they were all in +curious contrast with everything else we had seen belonging to M. +Vianney. Nothing too good for God; nothing too mean and miserable for +himself—that had been the motto of his life; and the worm-eaten +furniture of the dining-room, the gold and velvet of the embroidered +vestments, alike bore witness to the fidelity with which he had acted +on it. The vestments were more than handsome—some of them were +magnificent. One set I remember in particular which was very +beautiful. It had been given, with canopy for the blessed sacrament +and banners for processions, by the present Marquis D'Ars, the chief +of that beloved family, who, after the death of Mdlle. D'Ars, became +M. Vianney's most efficient aid in all his works of charity. The +priest who showed them to us, and who had also been one of the late +curé's missionaries, told us that M. Vianney was absolutely enchanted +with joy when the vestments arrived, and that he instantly organized +an expedition to Lyons in order to express his gratitude at the altar +of Notre Dame de Fourrière. The whole parish attended on this +occasion. They went down the river in boats provided for the purpose, +and with banners flying and music playing, marched in solemn +procession through the streets of Lyons, and up the steep sides of +Fourrière, until they reached the church of Notre Dame. There the +whole multitude fell on their knees, and M. Vianney himself prayed, no +doubt long and earnestly, before the miraculous image of Our Lady, +seeking through her intercession to obtain some especial favor for the +man who, out of his own abundance, had brought gifts of gold and +silver to the altar of his God. +</p> +<p> +I asked the priest for some information about the granary which was +said to have been miraculously filled with corn. He told me he had +been at Ars at the time, and that there could be no doubt that the +granary had been quite empty the night before. It was, I think, a time +of scarcity, and the grain had been set aside for the use of the poor. +M. Vianney went to bed miserable at the failure of his supplies; but +when he visited the granary again early the next morning, he found it +full. It was at the top of his own house, I believe, and was kept, of +course, carefully locked. Nobody knew how it had been filled, or by +whom. In fact, it seemed absolutely impossible that any one could have +carted the quantity of grain needed for the purpose and carried it up +stairs without being detected in the act. The priest made no comment +on the matter; indeed, he seemed anything but inclined to enlarge upon +it, though he made no secret of his own opinion as to the miraculous +nature of the occurrence. As soon as he had answered my inquiries, he +led us to the room which had been the holy curé's own personal +apartment. It was, as well as I can remember, the one over the +dining-room. No apostle ever lived and died in an abode more entirely +destitute of all human riches. It was kept exactly in the same state +in which it had been during his lifetime—a few poor-looking books +still on the small book-shelf, a wooden table and a chair, and the +little bed in the corner, smoothed and laid down, as if only waiting +his return from the confessional for the <a name="30">{30}</a> few short hours he gave +to slumber—if, indeed, he did give them; for no one ever penetrated +into the mystery of those hours, or knew how much of the time set +apart apparently for his own repose was dedicated to God, or employed +in supplicating God's mercies on his creatures. +</p> +<p> +The history of that room was the history of the saint. A book-shelf +filled with works of piety and devotion; a stove, left doubtless +because it had been originally built into the room, but left without +use or purpose (for who ever heard of his indulging in a fire?); a +table and a chair—that was all; but it was enough, and more than +enough, to fill the mind with thought, and to crowd all the memories +of that holy life into the few short moments that I knelt there. How +often had he come back to that poor apartment, his body exhausted by +fasting, and cramped by long confinement in the confessional, and his +heart steeped (nay, drowned, as he himself most eloquently expressed +it) in bitterness and sorrow by the long histories of sins to which he +had been compelled to listen—sins committed against that God whom he +loved far more tenderly than he loved himself! How often, in the +silence and darkness of the night, has he poured forth his soul, now +in tender commiseration over Jesus crucified by shiners, now over the +sinners by whom Jesus had been crucified! How often has he (perhaps) +called on God to remove him from a world where God was so offended; +and yet, moved by the charity of his tender human heart, has besought, +almost in the same breath, for the conversion of those sinners whose +deeds he was deploring—the cure of their diseases and the removal or +consolation of their sorrows! Like a mother who, finding her children +at discord, now prays to one to pardon, now to another to submit and +be reconciled, so was that loving, pitying heart ever as it were in +contradiction with itself—weeping still with Jesus, and yet still +pleading for his foes. +</p> +<p> +The mere action of such thoughts upon the human frame would make +continued life a marvel; but when to this long history of mental woe +we add the hardships of his material life—the fifteen or seventeen +hours passed in the confessional, in heat and cold, in winter as in +summer; the one scanty meal taken at mid-day; the four hours of sleep, +robbed often and often of half their number for the sake of quiet +prayer—when we think of these things, there is surely more of miracle +in this life of forty years' duration than in the mere fact that it +won miracles at last from heaven, and that God, seeing how faithfully +this his servant did his will here on earth, complied in turn with +his, and granted his desires. +</p> +<p> +No one, I think, can visit that spot, or hear the history of that +life, as it is told by those who knew him as it were but yesterday, +without an increase of love, an accession of faith, a more vivid sense +of the presence of God in the midst of his creatures, and a more real +comprehension of the extent and meaning of those words, "the communion +of saints," which every one repeats in the creed, and yet which few +take sufficiently to their heart of hearts to make it really a portion +of their spiritual being—a means of working out their own salvation +by constant and loving communication with those who have attained to +it already. Thousands will seek the living saint for the eloquence of +his words, the sublimity, of his counsels, the unction of his +consolations; but, once departed out of this life, who visits him in +his tomb? who turns to him for aid? who lift their eyes to heaven, to +ask for his assistance thence, with the same undoubting confidence +with which they would have sought it had he been still in the flesh +beside them? In one sense of the word, many; and yet few indeed +compared to the number of those to whom "the communion of saints" is +an article of faith, or ought at least to be so, in something more +than the mere service of the lip. It was amid some such <a name="31">{31}</a> thoughts +as these that I left the town of Ars, grieved indeed that I had not +seen the holy curé in his lifetime, and yet feeling that, if I had but +faith enough, I was in reality rather a gainer than a loser by his +death. He who would have prayed for me on earth would now pray for me +in heaven. He who would have dived into my conscience and brought its +hidden sins to light, would obtain wisdom and grace for another to put +his finger on the sore spot and give it healing. He who would perhaps +have cured me of my bodily infirmities, could do so (if it were for +the good of my soul) not less efficiently now that he was resting on +the heart of his divine Lord. God had granted his prayers while he was +yet upon earth—a saint indeed, and yet liable at any moment to fall +into sin—would he refuse to hear him now that he had received him +into his kingdom, and so rendered him for ever incapable of offending? +I hoped not, I felt not; and in this certainty I went on my way +rejoicing, feeling that it was well for this sinful world that it had +yet one more advocate at the throne of its future Judge, and well +especially for France that, in this our nineteenth century, she had +given a saint to God who would have been the glory of the first. For +truly the arm of the Lord is not shortened. What he has done before, +he can do again; and, therefore, we need not wonder if the miracles of +the Apostles are still renewed at the tomb of this simple and +unlettered, priest, who taught their doctrines for forty years in the +unknown and far-off village of which Providence had made him pastor. +</p> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>From Once A Week. +<br><br> +THE THREE WISHES.</h2> +<br> +<p> +The Eastern origin of this tale seems evident; had it been originally +composed in a Northern land, it is probable that the king would have +been represented as dethroned by means of bribes obtained from his own +treasury. In an Eastern country the story-teller who invented such a +just termination of his narrative would, most likely, have experienced +the fate intended for his hero, as a warning to others how they +suggested such treasonable ideas. Herr Simrock, however, says it is a +German tale; but it may have had its origin in the East for all that. +Nothing is more difficult, indeed, than to trace a popular tale to its +source. Cinderella, for example, belongs to nearly all nations; even +among the Chinese, a people so different to all European nations, +there is a popular story which reads almost exactly like it. Here is +the tale of the Three Wishes. +</p> +<p> +There was once a wise emperor who made a law that to every stranger +who came to his court a fried fish should be served. The servants were +directed to take notice if, when the stranger had eaten the fish to +the bone on one side, he turned it over and began on the other side. +If he did, he was to be immediately seized, and on the third day +thereafter he was to be put to death. But, by a great stretch of +imperial clemency, the culprit was permitted to utter one wish each +day, which the emperor pledged himself to grant, provided it was not +to spare his life. Many had already perished in consequence of this +edict, when, one day, a count and his young son presented themselves +at court. The fish was served as usual, and when the <a name="32">{32}</a> count had +removed all the fish from one side, he turned it over, and was about +to commence on the other, when he was suddenly seized and thrown into +prison, and was told of his approaching doom. Sorrow-stricken, the +count's young son besought the emperor to allow him to die in the room +of his father; a favor which the monarch was pleased to accord him. +The count was accordingly released from prison, and his son was thrown +into his cell in his stead. As soon as this had been done, the young +man said to his gaolers—"You know I have the right to make three +demands before I die; go and tell the emperor to send me his daughter, +and a priest to marry us." This first demand was not much to the +emperor's taste, nevertheless he felt bound to keep his word, and he +therefore complied with the request, to which the princess had no kind +of objection. This occurred in the times when kings kept their +treasures in a cave, or in a tower set apart for the purpose, like the +Emperor of Morocco in these days; and on the second day of his +imprisonment the young man demanded the king's treasures. If his first +demand was a bold one, the second was not less so; still, an emperor's +word is sacred, and having made the promise, he was forced to keep it; +and the treasures of gold and silver and jewels were placed at the +prisoner's disposal. On getting possession of them, he distributed +them profusely among the courtiers, and soon he had made a host of +friends by his liberality. +</p> +<p> +The emperor began now to feel exceedingly uncomfortable. Unable to +sleep, he rose early on the third morning and went, with fear in his +heart, to the prison to hear what the third wish was to be. +</p> +<p> +"Now," said he to his prisoner, "tell me what your third demand is, +that it may be granted at once, and you may be hung out of hand, for I +am tired of your demands." +</p> +<p> +"Sire," answered his prisoner, "I have but one more favor to request +of your majesty, which, when you have granted, I shall die content. It +is merely that you will cause the eyes of those who saw my father turn +the fish over to be put out." +</p> +<p> +"Very good," replied the emperor, "your demand is but natural, and +springs from a good heart. Let the chamberlain be seized," he +continued, turning to his guards. +</p> +<p> +"I, sire!" cried the chamberlain; "I did not see anything—it was the +steward." +</p> +<p> +"Let the steward be seized, then," said the king. +</p> +<p> +But the steward protested with tears in his eyes that he had not +witnessed anything of what had been reported, and said it was the +butler. The butler declared that he had seen nothing of the matter, +and that it must have been one of the valets. But they protested that +they were utterly ignorant of what had been charged against the count; +in short, it turned out that nobody could be found who had seen the +count commit the offence, upon which the princess said: +</p> +<p> +"I appeal to you, my father, as to another Solomon. If nobody saw the +offence committed, the count cannot be guilty, and my husband is +innocent." +</p> +<p> +The emperor frowned, and forthwith the courtiers began to murmur; then +he smiled, and immediately their visages became radiant. +</p> +<p> +"Let it be so," said his majesty; "let him live, though I have put +many a man to death for a lighter offence than his. But if he is not +hung, he is married. Justice has been done." +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="33">{33}</a> +<br> + +<h2>From The Month. +<br><br> +EX HUMO. +<br><br> +BY BARRY CORNWALL.</h2> +<br> +<pre> + Should you dream ever of the days departed— + Of youth and morning, no more to return— + Forget not me, so fond and passionate-hearted; + Quiet at last, reposing + Under the moss and fern. + + There, where the fretful lake in stormy weather + Comes circling round the reddening churchyard pines, + Rest, and call back the hours we lost together, + Talking of hope, and soaring + Beyond poor earth's confines. + + If, for those heavenly dreams too dimly sighted, + You became false—why, 'tis a story old: + <i>I</i>, overcome by pain, and unrequited, + Faded at last, and slumber + Under the autumn mould. + + Farewell, farewell! No longer plighted lovers, + Doomed for a day to sigh for sweet return: + One lives, indeed; one heart the green earth covers— + Quiet at last, reposing + Under the moss and fern. +</pre> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>From The Dublin Review. +<br><br> +THE CHRISTIAN SCHOOLS OF ALEXANDRIA.</h2> +<br> +<i>S. Clementis Alexandrini Opera Omnia</i>. Lutetiae. 1629. +<br><br> +<i>Geschichte der Christlicher Philosophie, von</i> Dr. Heinrich Ritter. +Hamburg: Perthes. 1841. +<br> +<p> +If any country under the sun bears the spell of fascination in its +very name, that country is Egypt. The land of the Nile and the +pyramids, of the Pharaohs and the Ptolemies—the land where art and +science had mysterious beginnings before the dawn of history, where +powerful dynasties held sway for long generations over the fertile +river-valley, and built for themselves mighty cities—Thebes, the +hundred-gated, Memphis, with its palaces, Heliopolis, with its temples— +and left memorials of themselves that are attracting men at this very +day to Luxor and Carnak, to the avenue of sphynxes and the pyramids— +Egypt, where learning +</p> +<pre> + Uttered its oracles sublime + Before the Olympiads, in the dew + And dusk of early time— +</pre> +<p> +the land where, +</p> +<a name="34">{34}</a> +<pre> + Northward from its Nubian springs, + The Nile, for ever new and old, + Among the living and the dead + Its mighty, mystic stream has rolled— +</pre> +<p> +Egypt seems destined to be associated with all the signal events of +every age of the world. Israel's going into and going out of Egypt is +one of the epic pages of Holy Scripture; Sesostris, King of Egypt, +left his name written over half of Asia; Alexander, the greatest of +the Greeks, laid in Egypt the foundation of a new empire; Cleopatra, +the captive and the captor of Julius Caesar and Mark Antony, killed +herself as the old land passed away for ever from the race of Ptolemy; +Clement and Origen, Porphyry and Plotinus, have left Egypt the classic +land of the Church's battle against the purest form of heathen +philosophy; St. Louis of France has made Egypt the scene of a glorious +drama of heroism and devotion; the pyramids have lent their name to +swell the list of Napoleon's triumphs; and the Nile is linked for ever +with the deathless fame of Nelson. +</p> +<p> +In the last decade of the second century, about the time when the +pagan virtues of Marcus Aurelius had left the Roman empire to the +worse than pagan vices of his son Commodus, Egypt, to the learned and +wealthy, meant Alexandria. What Tyre had been in the time of Solomon, +what Sidon was in the days of which Homer wrote, that was Alexandria +from the reign of Ptolemy Soter to the days of Mahomet. In external +aspect it was in every way worthy to bear the name of him who drew its +plans with his own hands. Its magnificent double harbor, of which the +Great Port had a quay-side six miles in length, was the common +rendezvous for merchant ships from every part of Syria, Greece, Italy, +and Spain; and its communications with the Red Sea and the Nile +brought to the warehouses that overlooked its quay the riches of +Arabia and India, and the corn and flax of the country of which it was +the capital. The modern traveller, who finds Alexandria a prosperous +commercial town, with an appearance half European, half Turkish, +learns with wonder that its 60,000 inhabitants find room on what was +little more than the mole that divided the Great Port from the +Eunostos. But it should be borne in mind that old Alexandria numbered +300,000 free citizens. The mosques, the warehouses, and the private +dwellings of the present town are built of the fragments of the grand +city of Alexander. The great conqueror designed to make Alexandria the +capital of the world. He chose a situation the advantages of which a +glance at the map will show; and if any other proof were needed, it +may be found in the fact that, since 1801, the population of the +modern town has increased at the rate of one thousand a year. He +planned his city on such vast proportions as might be looked for from +the conqueror of Darius. Parallel streets crossed other streets, and +divided the city into square blocks. Right through its whole length, +from East to West—that is, parallel with the sea-front—one magnificent +street, two hundred feet wide and four miles in length, ran from the +Canopic gate to the Necropolis. A similar street, shorter, but of +equal breadth, crossed this at right angles, and came out upon the +great quay directly opposite the mole that joined the city with the +island of Pharos. This was the famous Heptastadion, or Street of the +Seven Stadia, and at its South end was the Sun-gate; at its North, +where it opened on the harbor, the gate of the Moon. To the right, as +you passed through the Moon-gate on to the broad quay, was the +exchange, where merchants from all lands met each other, in sight of +the white Pharos and the crowded shipping of the Great Port. A little +back from the gate, in the Heptastadion, was the Caesareum, or temple +of the deified Caesars, afterward a Christian church. Near it was the +Museum, the university of Alexandria. Long marble colonnades connected +the <a name="35">{35}</a> university with the palace and gardens of the Ptolemies. On +the opposite side of the great street was the Serapeion, the +magnificent temple of Serapis, with its four hundred columns, of which +Pompey's Pillar is, perhaps, all that is left. And then there was the +mausoleum of Alexander, there were the courts of justice, the +theatres, the baths, the temples, the lines of shops and houses—all on +a scale of grandeur and completeness which has never been surpassed by +any city of the world. Such a city necessarily attracted men. +Alexandria was fitly called the "many-peopled," whether the epithet +referred to the actual number of citizens or to the varieties of +tongue, complexion, and costume that thronged its streets. The Greeks, +the Egyptians, and the Jews, each had their separate quarter; but +there were constant streams of foreigners from the remote India, from +the lands beyond the black rocks that bound the Nile-valley, and from +the Ethiopic races to which St. Matthew preached, where the Red Sea +becomes the Indian Ocean. At the time we speak of, these discordant +elements were held in subjection by the Roman conquerors, whose +legionaries trod the streets of the voluptuous city with stern and +resolute step, and were not without occasion, oftentimes, for a +display of all the sternness and resolution which their bearing +augured. +</p> +<p> +Alexandria, however, in addition to the busy life of commerce and +pleasure that went on among Greeks, Egyptians, Jews, and Africans, was +the home of another kind of life, still more interesting to us. +Ptolemy Soter, who carried out Alexander's plans, was a man of no +common foresight and strength of character. He was not content with +building a city. He performed, in addition, two exploits, either of +which, from modern experience, we should be inclined to consider a +title to immortality. He invented a new god, and established a +university. The god was Serapis, whom he imported from Pergamus, and +who soon became popular. The university was the Museum, in which lived +and taught Demetrius of Phalerus, Euclid, Stilpo of Megara, Philetas +of Cos, Apelles the painter, Callimachus, Theocritus, Eratosthenes, +Apollonius Rhodius, and a host of others in philosophy, poetry, +geometry, astronomy, and the arts. Here, under successive Ptolemies, +professors lectured in splendid halls, amid honored affluence. All +that we have of the Greek classics we owe to the learned men of the +Museum. Poetry bloomed sweetly and luxuriantly in the gardens of the +Ptolemies; though, it must be confessed, not vigorously, not as on +Ionic coast-lands, nor as in the earnest life of Athenian freedom—save +when some Theocritus appeared, with his broad Doric, fresh from the +sheep-covered downs of Sicily. The name of Euclid suggests that +geometry was cared for at the Museum; Eratosthenes, with his +voluminous writings, all of which have perished, and his one or two +discoveries, which will never die, may stand for the type of +geography, the science for which he lived; and Hipparchus, astronomer +and inventor of trigonometry, may remind us how they taught at the +Museum that the earth was the centre of the universe, and yet, +notwithstanding, could foretell an eclipse almost as well as the +astronomer royal. In philosophy, the university of Alexandria has +played a peculiar part. As long as the Ptolemies reigned in Egypt, the +Museum could boast of no philosophy save commentaries on Aristotle and +Plato, consisting, in great measure, of subtle obscurities to which +the darkest quiddities of the deepest scholastic would appear to have +been light reading. But when the Roman came in, there sprang up a +school of thought that has done more than any other thing to hand down +the fame of Ptolemy's university to succeeding ages. Alexandria was +the birthplace of Neo-Platonism, and, whatever we may think of the +philosophy itself, we must allow it has bestowed fame on its alma <a name="36">{36}</a> +mater. At the dawn of the Christian era, Philon the Jew was already +ransacking the great library to collect matter that should enable him +to prove a common origin for the books of Plato and of Moses. Two +hundred years afterward—that is, just at the time of which we speak— +Plotinus was listening to Ammonius Saccas in the lecture-hall of the +Museum, and thinking out the system of emanations, abysms, and depths +of which he is the first and most famous expounder. Porphyry, the +biographer and enthusiastic follower of Plotinus, was probably never +at Alexandria in person; but his voluminous writings did much to make +the Neo-Platonist system known to Athens and to the cities of Italy. +In his youth he had listened to the lectures of Origen, and thus was +in possession of the traditions both of the Christian and the heathen +philosophy of Alexandria. But his Christian studies did not prevent +him from being the author of that famous book, "Against the +Christians," which drew upon him the denunciations of thirty-five +Christian apologists, including such champions as St. Jerome and St. +Augustine. The Neo-Platonist school culminated and expired in Proclus, +the young prodigy of Alexandria, the ascetic teacher of Athens, the +"inspired dogmatizer," the "heir of Plato." Proclus died in 485, and +his chair at Athens was filled by his foolish biographer Marinus, +after which Neo-Platonism never lifted up its head. +</p> +<p> +Between the time when Philon astonished the orthodox money-getting +Hebrews of the Jews' quarter by his daring adoption of Plato's Logos, +and the day when poor old Proclus—his once handsome and strong frame +wasted by fasting and Pythagorean austerities—died, a drivelling old +man, in sight of the groves of the Academe and the tomb of Plato, not +far from whom he himself was to lie, many a busy generation had +trodden the halls of the Museum of Alexandria. All that time the +strife of words had never ceased, in the lecture-hall, in the gardens +of the departed Ptolemies, round the banquet-table where the +professors were feasted at the state's expense. All that time the fame +of Alexandria had gathered to her Museum the young generations that +succeeded each other in the patrician homes and wealthy burghs of +Syria, Greece, and Italy. They came in crowds, with their fathers' +money in their purses, to be made learned by those of whose exploits +report had told so much. Some came with an earnest purpose. To the +young medical student, the Alexandrian school of anatomy and the +Alexandrian diploma (in whatever shape it was given)—not to mention +the opportunity of perusing the works of the immortal Hippocrates in +forty substantial rolls of papyrus—were worth all the expense of a +journey from Rome or Edessa. To the lawyer, the splendid collections +of laws, from those of the Pentateuch to those of Zamolxis the +Scythian, were treasures only to be found in the library where the +zeal of Demetrius Phalerius and the munificence of Ptolemy +Philadelphus had placed them. But the vast majority of the youth who +flocked to the Museum came with no other purpose than the very general +one of finishing their education and fitting themselves for the world. +With these, the agreeable arts of poetry and polite literature were in +far greater request than law, medicine, astronomy, or geography. If +they could get a sight of the popular poet of the hour in his morning +meditation under the plane-trees of the gardens, or could crush into a +place in the theatre when he recited his new "Ode to the Empress's +Hair;" or if they attended the lecture of the most fashionable +exponent of the myths of the Iliad, and clapped him whenever he +introduced an allusion to the divine Plato, it was considered a very +fair morning's work, and might be fitly rewarded by a boating party to +Canopus in the afternoon, or a revel far into the night in any of +those thousand palaces of vice <a name="37">{37}</a> with which luxurious Alexandria +was so well provided. And yet there is no doubt that the young men +carried away from their university a certain education and a certain +refinement—an education which, though it taught them to relish the +pleasures of intellect, in no wise disposed them to forego the +enjoyments of sense; and a refinement which, while imparting a +graceful polish to the mind, was quite compatible with the deepest +moral depravity. Pagans as they were, they were the fairest portion of +the whole world, for intellect, for manliness, for generosity, for +wit, for beauty and strength of mind and body—natural gifts that, like +the sun and the rain, are bestowed upon just and unjust. Their own +intercourse with each other taught them far more than the speculations +of any of the myth-hunting professors of the Museum. They crowded in +to hear them, they cheered them, they would dispute and even fight for +a favorite theory that no one understood, with the doubtful exception +of its inventor. But it was not to be supposed that they really cared +for abysms or mystical mathematics, or that they were not a great deal +more zealous for suppers, and drinking bouts, and boating parties. +These latter employments, indeed, may be said to have formed their +real education. Greek intellect, Greek taste, wit, and beauty, in the +sunniest hour of its bloom, mingled with its like in the grandest city +that, perhaps, the earth has ever seen. The very harbors, and temples, +and palaces were an education. The first rounding of the Pharos—when +the six-mile semicircle of granite quay and marble emporia burst on +the view, with the Egyptian sun flashing from white wall and blue sea, +and glancing and sparkling amidst the dense picturesque multitude that +roared and surged on the esplanade—disclosed a sight to make the soul +grow larger. The wonderful city itself was a teaching: the assemblage +of all that was best and rarest in old Egyptian art, and all that was +freshest and most lovely in the art of Greece, left no corner of a +street without its lesson to the eye. Indoors, there was the Museum, +with its miles of corridors and galleries, filled with paintings and +sculptures; outside, the Serapeion, the Caesareum, the exchange, the +palace, the university itself, each a more effective instructor than a +year's course in the schools. And after all this came the library, +with its 700,000 volumes! +</p> +<p> +In the year of our Lord 181, ships filled the Great Port, merchants +congregated in the exchange, sailors and porters thronged the quays; +crowds of rich and poor, high and low, flocked through the streets; +youths poured in to listen to Ammonius Saccas, and poured out again to +riot and sin; philosophers talked, Jews made money, fashionable men +took their pleasure, slaves toiled, citizens bought and sold and made +marriages; all the forms of busy life that had their existence within +the circuit of the many-peopled city were noisily working themselves +out. In the same year, Pantaenus became the head of the catechetical +school of the patriarchal Church of Alexandria. +</p> +<p> +It was the time when those who had lived and walked with the Apostles +had passed away, and when the third generation of the Church's rulers +was already growing old. St. Irenaeus was near his glorious end; St. +Eleutherius, of memory dear to Britain, had just closed his +pontificate by martyrdom, and St. Victor sat in his place. The echoes +of the voice of Peter had hardly died out in Rome and Antioch; the +traditions of Paul's bodily presence were yet living in Asia, in +Greece, and the Islands; and the sweet odor of John's life still hung +about the places where his sojourning had been: many a church of +Greece and Egypt and of the far East had the sepulchre of its founder, +an Apostle or an apostolic man, round which to pray. It was the age of +the persecutions, and the age of the apologies. In every <a name="38">{38}</a> city +that was coming about which from the first had been inevitable. The +Church was laying hold of human learning, and setting it to do her own +work. In fixing upon Alexandria as the spot where, at this period, the +contest between Christian science and Gentile learning, Gentile +ignorance and Gentile brute force, was most interesting and most +developed, we must pass by many other Churches, not in forgetfulness, +though in silence. We must pass by Rome, the capital of the world, not +because there were not learned men there whom Jesus Christ had raised +up to battle with heathen philosophy; for it was but a few years since +Justin Martyr had shed his blood for the faith, and Apollonius from +his place in the senate had spoken his "apology" for his fellow +Christians. But the enemies which the Gospel had to meet at Rome were +not so much the learning and science of the heathen as his evil +passions and vicious life; and the sword of persecution, at Rome +hardly ever sheathed, kept down all attempts at regularity or +organization in public teaching. We must pass by Athens, still the +intellectual capital of the world, not because there were not at +Athens also worthy doctors of the wisdom of the cross—witness, to the +contrary, Athenagoras, the Christian philosopher, who presented his +apology to Marcus Aurelius. But Athens, though at the end of the +second century and long afterward she was the mother of orators, +poets, and philosophers, seems to have been too thoroughly steeped in +the sensuous idolatry of Greece to have harbored a school of +Christianity by the side of the Porch and the Lyceum. If the same was +true of Athens then as a century afterward, her smooth-tongued, +"babbling" sophists, and her pagan charms, must have had to answer for +the soul of many a poor Christian youth that went to seek learning and +found perdition. We pass by Carthage, in spite of Tertullian's great +name; Antioch, notwithstanding Theophilus, whose labors against the +heathen still bore fruit; Sardis, in spite of Melito, then just dead, +but living still in men's mouths by the fame of his learning, +eloquence, and miracles; and Hierapolis, in spite of Apollinaris, who, +like so many others, approached the emperor himself with an apology. +All over the Church there were men raised up by God, and fitted with +learning to confront learning, patience to instruct ignorance, and +unflinching fortitude to endure persecution—men in every way worthy +to be the instruments of that great change which was being wrought out +through the wide world of the Roman empire. +</p> +<p> +But at Alexandria, the school of Christianity existed under +interesting and peculiar conditions. St. Mark had landed on the +granite quay of the Great Port with Peter's commission; he had been +martyred, and his successors had been martyred after him; and for a +long time Christianity here, as everywhere else, had been +contemptuously ignored. It spread, however, as we know. In time, more +than one student, before he attended his lecture in the splendid halls +of the Museum, had given ear to a far different lesson in a different +school. The Christian catechetical school of Alexandria is said to +have been founded by St. Mark himself. If so, it is only what we might +naturally expect; for wherever heathens were being converted, there a +school of teachers had to be provided for their instruction; and we +read of similar institutions at Jerusalem, at Antioch, and at Rome. +But the catechetical school of Alexandria soon assumed an importance +that no other school of those times ever attained. Whether it was that +the influence of the university gave an impetus to regular and +methodical teaching, or that the converts in Alexandria were in great +measure from a cultivated and intellectual class, it appears to have +been found necessary from the earliest times to have an efficient +school, with a man of vigor and intellect at its head, capable of +maintaining his position even when compared <a name="39">{39}</a> with the professors +of the university. The first of the heads or doctors of the school of +whom history has left any account, is Pantaenus. Pantaenus is not so +well known as his place in Church history and his influence on his age +would seem to warrant. He was appointed to his important post at a +time when Christians all over the world must have been rejoicing. The +fourth persecution was just dying out. For twenty years, with the +exception of the short interval immediately after the miracle of the +Thundering Legion, had Marcus Aurelius, imperial philosopher of the +Stoic sort, continued to command or connive at the butchery of his +Christian subjects. What were the motives that led this paragon of +virtuous pagans to lower himself to the commonplace practices of +racking, scourging, and burning, is a question that depends for its +answer upon who the answerer is. Philosophers of a certain class, from +Gibbon to Mr. Mill, are disposed to take a lenient, if not a +laudatory, estimate of his conduct in this matter, and think that the +emperor could not have acted otherwise consistently with his +principles and convictions, as handed down to us in his "Meditations." +Doubtless he had strong convictions on the subject of Christianity, +though it might be questioned whether he came honestly by them. But +his convictions, whatever they were, would probably have ended in the +harmless shape of philosophic contempt, had it not been for the men by +whom he was surrounded. They were Stoics, of course, like their +master, but their stoicism was far from confining itself to +convictions and meditations. They were practical Stoics, of the +severest type which that old-world Puritanism admitted. As good +Stoics, they were of all philosophers the most conceited, and took it +especially ill that any sect should presume to rival them in their +private virtues of obstinacy and endurance. It is extremely probable +that the fourth persecution, both in its commencement and its revival, +was owing to the good offices of Marcus Aurelius's solemn-faced +favorites. But, whatever be the blame that attaches to him, he has +answered for it at the same dread tribunal at which he has answered +for the deification of Faustina and the education of Commodus. +</p> +<p> +However, about the year 180, persecution ceased at Alexandria, and the +Christians held up their heads and revived again, after the bitter +winter through which they had just passed. Their first thoughts and +efforts appear to have been directed to their school. The name of +Pantaenus was already celebrated. He was a convert from paganism, born +probably in Sicily, but certainly brought up in Alexandria. Curiously +enough, he had been a zealous Stoic, and remained so, in the Christian +sense, after his conversion. There is no doubt that he was well known +among the Gentile philosophers of Alexandria. Perhaps he had lectured +in the Museum and dined in the Hall. Probably he had spent many a day +buried in the recesses of the great libraries, and could give a good +account of not a few of their thousands of volumes. He must have known +Justin Martyr—perhaps had something to say to the conversion of that +brilliant genius, not as a teacher, but as a friend and +fellow-student. He may have come across Galen, when that lively +medical man was pursuing his researches on the immortal Hippocrates, +or entertaining a select circle, in the calm of the evening, under one +of the porticos of the Heptastadion. No sooner was he placed at the +head of the Christian school than he inaugurated a great change, or +rather a great development. Formerly the instruction had been intended +solely for converts, that is, catechumens, and the matter of the +teaching had corresponded with this object. Pantaenus changed all +this. The cessation of the persecution had, perhaps, encouraged bolder +measures; men would think there was no prospect of another, as men +generally think when a long and difficult trial is over; so the +Christian schools were to be opened <a name="40">{40}</a> to all the world. If +Aristotle and Plato, Epicurus and Zeno, had their lecturers, should +not Jesus Christ have schools and teachers too? And what matter if the +Christian doctrine were somewhat novel and hard—was not Ammonius the +Porter, at that very time, turning the heads of half the students in +the city, and filling his lecture-room to suffocation, by expounding +transcendental theories about Plato's Logos, and actually teaching the +doctrine of a Trinity? Shame upon the Christian name, then, if they +who bear it do not open their doors, now that danger is past, and +break the true bread to the hungry souls that eagerly snatch at the +stones and dry sticks that others give! So thought Pantaenus. Of his +teachings and writings hardly a trace or a record has reached us. We +know that he wrote valued commentaries on Holy Scripture, but no +fragment of them remains. His teaching, however, as might have been +expected, was chiefly oral. He met the philosophers of Alexandria on +their own ground. He showed that the fame of learning, the earnestness +of character, the vivid personal influence that were so powerful in +the cause of heathen philosophy, could be as serviceable to the +philosophy of Christ. The plan was novel in the Christian world—at +least, in its systematic thoroughness. That Pantaenus had great +influence and many worthy disciples is evident from the fact that St. +Clement of Alexandria, his successor, was formed in his school, and +that St. Alexander of Jerusalem, the celebrated founder of the library +which Eusebius consulted at Jerusalem, writing half a century +afterward to Alexandria, speaks with nothing less than enthusiasm of +the "happy memory" of his old master. If we could pierce the secrets +of those long-past times, what a stirring scene of reverend wisdom and +youthful enthusiasm would the forgotten school of the Sicilian convert +unfold to our sight! Doubtless, from amidst the confused jargon of all +manner of philosophies, the voice of the Christian teacher arose with +a clear and distinct utterance; and the fame of Pantaenus was carried +to far countries by many a noble Roman and many an accomplished Greek, +zealous, like all true academic sons, for the glory of their favorite +master. +</p> +<p> +After ten years of such work as this, Pantaenus vacated his chair, and +went forth as a missionary bishop to convert the Indians. Before +passing on to his successor, a few words on this Indian mission, +apparently so inopportune for such a man at such a time, will be +interesting, and not unconnected with the history of the Christian +schools. +</p> +<p> +In the "many-peopled" city there were men from all lands and of all +shades of complexion. It was nothing strange, then, that an embassy of +swarthy Indians should have one day waited on the patriarch and begged +for an apostle to take home with them to their countrymen. No wonder, +either, that they specified the celebrated master of the catechisms as +their <i>dignissimus</i>. The only wonder is that he was allowed to go. Yet +he went; he set out with them, sailed to Canopus, the Alexandrian +Richmond, where the canal joined the Nile; sailed up the ancient +stream to Koptos, where the overland route began; joined the caravan +that travelled thence, from well to well, to Berenice, Philadelphus's +harbor on the Red Sea; embarked, and, after sailing before the monsoon +for seventy days, arrived at the first Indian port, probably that +which is now Mangalore, in the presidency of Bombay. This, in all +likelihood, was the route and the destination of Pantaenus. Now those +among whom his missionary labors appear to have lain were Brahmins, +and Brahmins of great learning and extraordinary strictness of life. +Moreover, there appears to be no reason to doubt that the Church +founded by St. Thomas still existed, and even flourished, in these +very parts, though its apostolic founder had been martyred a hundred +years before. It was not so unreasonable, then, that <a name="41">{41}</a> a bishop +like Pantaenus should have been selected for such a Church and such a +people. Let the reader turn to the story of Robert de' Nobili, and of +John de Britto, whose field of labor extended to within a hundred +miles of master in human learning when the the very spot where +Pantaenus probably landed. St. Francis Xavier had already found +Christians in that region who bore distinct traces of a former +connection with Alexandria, in the very points in which they deviated +from orthodoxy. De' Nobili's transformation of himself into a Brahmin +of the strictest and most learned caste is well known. He dressed and +lived as a Brahmin, roused the curiosity of his adopted brethren, +opened school, and taught philosophy, inculcating such practical +conclusions as it is unnecessary to specify. De Britto did the very +same things. If any one will compare the Brahmins of De Britto and De' +Nobili with those earlier Brahmins of Pantaenus, as described, for +instance, by Cave from Palladius, he will not fail to be struck with +the similarity of accounts; and if we might be permitted to fill up +the picture upon these conjectural hints, we should say that it seems +to us very likely that Pantaenus, during the years that he was lost to +Alexandria, was expounding and enforcing, in the flowing cotton robes +of a venerable Saniastes, the same deep philosophy to Indian audiences +as he had taught to admiring Greeks in the modest pallium of a Stoic. +Recent missionary experience has uniformly gone to prove that deep +learning and asceticism are, humanly speaking, absolutely necessary in +order to attempt the conversion of Brahmins with any prospect of +success: and the mission of Pantaenus seems at once to furnish an +illustration of this fact, and to afford an interesting glimpse of +"Christian Missions" in the second century. But we must return to +Alexandria. +</p> +<p> +The name that succeeds Pantaenus on the rolls of the School of the +Catechisms is Titus Flavius Clemens, immortalized in history as +Clement of Alexandria. He had sat under Pantaemus, but he was no +ordinary scholar. Like his instructor, he was a convert from paganism. +He was already master in human learning when the grace came. He had +sought far and wide for the truth, and had found it in the Catholic +Church, and into the lap of his new mother he had poured all the +treasures of Egyptian wisdom which he had gathered in his quest. +Athens, Southern Italy, Assyria, and Palestine had each been visited +by the eager searcher; and, last of all, Egypt, and Alexandria, and +Pantaenus had been the term of his travels, and had given to his lofty +soul the "admirable light" of Jesus Christ. When Pantaenus went out as +a missioner to India, Clement, who had already assisted his beloved +master in the work of the schools, succeeded him as their director and +head. It was to be Clement's task to carry on and to develop the work +that Pantaenus had inaugurated—to make Christianity not only +understood by the catechumens and loved by the faithful, but +recognized and respected by the pagan philosophers. Unless we can +clearly see the necessity, or, at least, the reality of the +philosophical side of his character, and the influences that were at +work to make him hold fast to Aristotle and Plato, even after he had +got far beyond them, we shall infallibly set him down, like his modern +biographers, as a half-converted heathen, with the shell of Platonism +still adhering to him. +</p> +<p> +It cannot be doubted that in a society like that of Alexandria in its +palmy days there were many earnest seekers of the truth, even as +Clement himself had sought it. One might even lay it down as a normal +fact, that it was the character of an Alexandrian, as distinguished +from an Athenian, to speculate for the sake of practising, and not to +spend his time in "either telling or hearing some new thing." If an +Alexandrian was a Stoic, never was Stoic more demure or more intent on +warring against his body, after Stoic <a name="42">{42}</a> fashion; if a geometrican, +no disciple of Bacon was ever more assiduous in experimentalizing, +measuring, comparing, and deducing laws; if a Platonist, then +geometry, ethics, poetry, and everything else, were enthusiastically +pressed into the one great occupation of life—the realizing the ideal +and the getting face to face with the unseen. That all this +earnestness did not uniformly result in success was only too true. +Much speculation, great earnestness, and no grand objective truth at +the end of it—this was often the lot of the philosophic inquirer of +Alexandria. The consequence was that not unfrequently, disgusted by +failure, he ended by rushing headlong into the most vicious excesses, +or, becoming a victim to despair, perished by his own hand. So +familiar, indeed, had this resource of disappointment become to the +philosophic mind, that Hegesias, a professor in the Museum, a little +before the Christian era, wrote a book counselling self-murder; and so +many people actually followed his advice as to oblige the reigning +Ptolemy to turn Grand Inquisitor even in free-thinking Egypt, and +forbid the circulation of the book. Yet all this, while it revealed a +depth of moral wretchedness which it is frightful to contemplate, +showed also a certain desperate earnestness; and doubtless there were, +even among those who took refuge in one or other of these dreadful +alternatives, men who, in their beginnings, had genuine aspirations +after truth, mingled with the pride of knowledge and a mere +intellectual curiosity. Doubtless, too, there was many a sincere and +guileless soul among the philosophic herd, to whom, humanly speaking, +nothing more was wanting than the preaching of the faith. Their eyes +were open, as far as they could be without the light of revelation: +let the light shine, and, by the help of divine grace, they would +admit its beams into their souls. +</p> +<p> +There are many such, in every form of error. In Clement's days, +especially, there were many whom Neo-Platonism, the Puseyism of +paganism, cast up from the ocean of unclean error upon the shores of +the Church. Take the case of Justin Martyr: he was a young Oriental of +noble birth and considerable wealth. In the early part of the second +century, we find him trying first one school of philosophers and then +another, and abandoning each in disgust. The Stoics would talk to him +of nothing but virtues and vices, of regulating the diet and curbing +the passions, and keeping the intellect as quiet as possible—a +convenient way, as experience taught them, of avoiding trouble; +whereas Justin wanted to hear something of the Absolute Being, and of +that Being's dealings with his own soul—a kind of inquiry which the +Stoics considered altogether useless and ridiculous, if not +reprehensible. Leaving the Stoics, he devoted himself heart and soul +to a sharp Peripatetic, but quarrelled with him shortly and left him +in disgust; the cause of disagreement being, apparently, a practical +theory entertained by his preceptor on the subject of fees. He next +took to the disciples of Pythagoras. But with these he succeeded no +better than with the others; for the Pythagoreans reminded him that no +one ignorant of mathematics could be admitted into their select +society. Mathematics, in a Pythagorean point of view, included +geometry, astronomy, and music—all those sciences, in fact, in which +there was any scope for those extraordinary freaks of numbers which +delighted the followers of the old vegetarian. Justin, having no +inclination to undergo a novitiate in mathematics, abandoned the +Pythagoreans and went elsewhere. The Platonists were the next who +attracted him. He found no lack of employment for the highest +qualities of his really noble soul in the lofty visions of Plato and +the sublimated theories of his disciples and commentators; though it +appears a little singular that, with his propensities toward the ideal +and abstract, he should have tried so many masters before he <a name="43">{43}</a> sat +down under Plato. However, be that as it may, Plato seems to have +satisfied him for a while, and he began to think he was growing a very +wise man, when these illusions were rudely dispelled. One day he had +walked down to a lonely spot by the sea-shore, meditating, probably, +some deep idea, and perhaps declaiming occasionally some passage of +Plato's Olympian Greek. In his solitary walk he met an old man, and +entered into conversation with him. The event of this conversation was +that Justin went home with a wonderfully reduced estimate of his own +wisdom, and a determination to get to know a few things about which +Plato, on the old man's showing, had been woefully in the dark. Justin +became a convert to Christianity. Now, Justin had been at Alexandria, +and, whether the conversation he relates ever really took place, or is +merely an oratorical fiction, the story is one that represents +substantially what must have happened over and over again to those who +thronged the university of Alexandria, wearing the black cloak of the +philosopher. +</p> +<p> +Justin lived and was martyred some half a century before Clement sat +in the chair of the catechisms. But it is quite plain that, in such a +state of society, there would not be wanting many of his class and +temperament who, in Clement's time, as well as fifty years before, +were in search of the true philosophy. And we must not forget that in +Alexandria there were actually thousands of well-born, intellectual +young men from every part of the Roman empire. To the earnest among +these Clement was, indeed, no ordinary master. In the first place, he +was their equal by birth and education, with all the intellectual +keenness of his native Athens, and all the ripeness and versatility of +one who had "seen many cities of men and their manners." Next, he had +himself been a Gentile, and had gone through all those phases of the +soul that precede and accompany the process of conversion. If any one +knew their difficulties and their sore places, it was he, the +converted philosopher. If any one was capable of satisfying a generous +mind as to which was the true philosophy, it was he who had travelled +the world over in search of it. He could tell the swarthy Syrian that +it was of no use to seek the classic regions of Ionia, for he had +tried them, and the truth was not there; he could assure him it was +waste of time to go to Athens, for the Porch and the Garden were +babbling of vain questions—he had listened in them all. He could calm +the ardor of the young Athenian, his countryman, eager to try the +banks of the Orontes, and to interrogate the sages of Syria; for he +could tell him beforehand what they would say. He could shake his head +when the young Egyptian, fresh from the provincial luxury of Antinoë, +mentioned Magna Graecia as a mysterious land where the secret of +knowledge was perhaps in the hands of the descendants of the Pelasgi. +<i>He</i> had tried Tarentum, he had tried Neapolis; they were worse than +the Serapeion in unnameable licentiousness—less in earnest than the +votaries that crowded the pleasure-barges of the Nile at a festival of +the Moon. He had asked, he had tried, he had tasted. The truth, he +could tell them, was at their doors. It was elsewhere, too. It was in +Neapolis, in Antioch, in Athens, in Rome; but they would not find it +taught in the chairs of the schools, nor discussed by noble +frequenters of the baths and the theatres. He knew it, and he could +tell it to them. And as he added many a tale of his wanderings and +searchings—many an instance of genius falling short, of good-will +laboring in the dark, of earnestness painfully at fault—many of those +who heard him would yield themselves up to the vigorous thinker whose +brow showed both the capacity and the unwearied activity of the soul +within. He was the very man to be made a hero of. Whatever there was +in the circle of Gentile philosophy he knew. St. Jerome calls <a name="44">{44}</a> him +the "most learned of the writers of the Church," and St. Jerome must +have spoken with the sons of those who had heard him lecture—noble +Christian patricians, perchance, whose fathers had often told them +how, in fervent boyhood, they had been spell-bound by his words in the +Christian school of Alexandria, or learned bishops of Palestine, who +had heard of him from Origen at Caesarea or St. Alexander at +Jerusalem. From the same St. Alexander, who had listened to Pantaenus +by his side, we learn that he was as holy as he was learned; and +Theodoret, whose school did not dispose him to admire what came from +the catechetical doctors of Alexandria, is our authority for saying +that his "eloquence was unsurpassed." In the fourth edition of Cave's +"Apostolici," there is a portrait that we would fain vouch to be +genuine. The massive, earnest face, of the Aristotelian type, the +narrow, perpendicular Grecian brow, with its corrugations of thought +and care, the venerable flowing beard, dignifying, but not concealing, +the homely and fatherly mouth, seem to suggest a man who had made all +science his own, yet who now valued a little one of Jesus Christ above +all human wisdom and learning. But we have no record of those features +that were once the cynosure of many eyes in the "many-peopled" city; +we have no memorial of the figure that spoke the truths of the Gospel +in the words of Plato. We know not how he looked, nor how he sat, when +he began with his favorite master, and showed, with inexhaustible +learning, where he had caught sight of the truth, and, again, where +his mighty but finite intellect had failed for want of a more +"admirable light;" nor how he kindled when he had led his hearers +through the vestibule of the old philosophy, and stood ready to lift +the curtain of that which was at once its consummation and its +annihilation. +</p> +<p> +But the philosophers of Alexandria, so-called, were by no means, +without exception, earnest, high-minded, and well-meaning. Leaving out +of the question the mob of students who came ostensibly for wisdom, +but got only a very doubtful substitute, and were quite content with +it, we know that the Museum was the headquarters of an anti-Christian +philosophy which, in Clement's time, was in the very spring of its +vigorous development. Exactly contemporary with him was the celebrated +Ammonius the Porter, the teacher of Plotinus, and therefore the parent +of Neo-Platonism. Ammonius had a very great name and a very numerous +school. That he was a Christian by birth, there is no doubt; and he +was probably a Christian still when he landed at the Great Port and +found employment as a ship-porter. History is divided as to his +behavior after his wonderful elevation from the warehouses to the +halls of the Museum. St. Jerome and Eusebius deny that he apostatized, +while the very questionable authority of the unscrupulous Porphyry is +the only testimony that can be adduced on the other side; but, even if +he continued to be a Christian, his orthodoxy is rather damaged when +we find him praised by such men as Plotinus, Longinus, and Hierocles. +Some would cut the knot by asserting the existence of two Ammoniuses, +one a pagan apostate, the other a Christian bishop—a solution equally +contradicted by the witnesses on both sides. But, whatever Saccas was, +there is no doubt as to what was the effect of his teaching on, at +least, half of his hearers. If we might hazard a conjecture, we should +say that he appears to have been a man of great cleverness, and even +genius, but too much in love with his own brilliancy and his own +speculations not to come across the ecclesiastical authority in a more +or less direct way. He supplied many imposing premises which Origen, +representing the sound half of his audience, used for Christian +purposes, whilst Plotinus employed them for revivifying the dead body +of paganism. The brilliant sack-bearer seems to have been, at the very +least, a liberal <a name="45">{45}</a> Christian, who was too gentlemanly to mention so +very vulgar a thing as the Christian "superstition" in the classic +gardens of the palace, or at the serene banquets of sages in the +Symposium. +</p> +<p> +The question, then, is, How did Christianity, as a philosophy, stand +in relation to the affluent professors of Ptolemy's university? That +they had been forced to see there was such a thing as Christianity, +before the time of which we speak (A.D. 200), it is impossible to +doubt. It must have dawned upon the comprehension of the most +imperturbable grammarian and the most materialist surgeon of the +Museum that a new teaching of some kind was slowly but surely striking +root in the many forms of life that surrounded them. Rumors must long +before have been heard in the common hall that executions had taken +place of several members of a new sect or society, said to be impious +in its tenets and disloyal in its practice. No doubt the assembled +sages had expended at the time much intricate quibble and pun, after +heavy Alexandrian fashion, on the subject of those wretched men; more +especially when it was put beyond doubt that no promises of reward or +threats of punishment had availed to make them compromise their +"opinions" in the slightest tittle. Then the matter would die out, to +be revived several times in the same way; until at last some one would +make inquiries, and would find that the new sect was not only +spreading, but, though composed apparently of the poor and the humble, +was clearly something very different from the fantastic religions or +brutal no-religions of the Alexandrian mob. It would be gradually +found out, moreover, that men of name and of parts were in its ranks; +nay, some day of days, that learned company in the Hall would miss one +of its own number, after the most reverend the curator had asked a +blessing—if ever he did—and it would come out that Professor +So-and-so, learned and austere as he was, had become a Christian! And +some would merely wonder, but, that past, would ask their neighbor, in +the equivalent Attic, if there were to be no more cakes and ale, +because <i>he</i> had proved himself a fool; others would wonder, and feel +disturbed, and think about asking a question or two, though not to the +extent of abandoning their seats at that comfortable board. +</p> +<p> +The majority, doubtless, at Alexandria as elsewhere, set down +Christianity as some new superstition, freshly imported from the home +of all superstitions, the East. There were some who hated it, and +pursued it with a vehemence of malignant lying that can suggest only +one source of inspiration, that is to say, the father of all lies +himself. Of this class were Crescens the Cynic, the prime favorite of +Marcus Aurelius, and Celsus, called the Epicurean, but who, in his +celebrated book, written at this very time, appears as veritable a +Platonist as Plotinus himself. Then, again, there were others who +found no difficulty in recognizing Christianity as a sister +philosophy—who, in fact, rather welcomed it as affording fresh +material for dialectics—good, easy men of routine, blind enough to +the vital questions which the devil's advocates clearly saw to be at +stake. Galen is pre-eminently a writer who has reflected the current +gossip of the day. He was a hard student in his youth, and a learned +and even high-minded man in his maturity, but he frequently shows +himself in his writings as the "fashionable physician," with one or +two of the weaknesses of that well-known character. He spent a long +time at Alexandria, just before Clement became famous, studying under +Heraclian, consulting the immortal Hippocrates, and profiting by the +celebrated dissecting-rooms of the Museum, in which, unless they are +belied, the interests of science were so paramount that they used to +dissect—not live horses; but living slaves. He could not, therefore, +fail to have known how Christianity was regarded at the Museum. +Speaking of Christians, then, in his works, he of course retails a +good deal of <a name="46">{46}</a> nonsense about them, such as we can imagine him to +have exchanged with the rich gluttons and swollen philosophers whom he +had to attend professionally in Roman society; but when he speaks +seriously, and of what he had himself observed, he says, frankly and +honestly, that the Christians deserved very great praise for sobriety +of life, and for their love of virtue, in which they equalled or +surpassed the greatest philosophers of the age. So thought, in all +probability, many of the learned men of Alexandria. +</p> +<p> +The Church, on her side, was not averse to appearing before the +Gentiles in the garb of philosophy, and it was very natural that the +Christian teachers should encourage this idea, with the aim and hope +of gaining admittance for themselves and their good tidings into the +very heart of pagan learning. And was not Christianity a philosophy? +In the truest sense of the word—and, what is more to the purpose, in +the sense of the philosophers of Alexandria—it was a philosophy. The +narrowed meaning that in our days is assigned to philosophy, as +distinguished from religion, had no existence in the days of Clement. +Wisdom was the wisdom by excellence, the highest, <i>the</i> ultimate +wisdom. What the Hebrew preacher meant when he said, "Wisdom is better +than all the most precious things," the same was intended by the +Alexandrian lecturer when he offered to show his hearers where wisdom +was to be found. It meant the fruit of the highest speculation, and at +the same time the necessary ground of all-important practice. In our +days the child learns at the altar-rails that its end is to love God, +and serve him, and be happy with him; and after many years have +passed, the child, now a man, studies and speculates on the reasons +and the bearings of that short, momentous sentence. In the old Greek +world the intellectual search came first, and the practical sentence +was the wished-for result. A system of philosophy was, therefore, in +Clement's time, tantamount to a religion. It was the case especially +with the learned. Serapis and Isis were all very well for the "old +women and the sailors," but the laureate and the astronomer royal of +the Ptolemies, and the professors, many and diverse, of arts and +ethics, in the Museum, scarcely took pains to conceal their utter +contempt for the worship of the vulgar. Their idols were something +more spiritual, their incense was of a more ethereal kind. Could they +not dispute about the Absolute Being? and had they not glimpses of +something indefinitely above and yet indefinably related to their own +souls, in the Logos of the divine Plato? So the Stoic mortified his +flesh for the sake of some ulterior perfectibility of which he could +give no clear account to himself; the Epicurean contrived to take his +fill of pleasure, on the maxim that enjoyment was the end of our +being, "and tomorrow we die;" the Platonist speculated and pursued his +"air-travelling and cloud-questioning," like Socrates in the basket, +in a vain but tempting endeavor to see what God was to man and man to +God; the Peripatetic, the Eclectic, and all the rest, disputed, +scoffed, or dogmatized about many things, certainly, but, mainly and +finally, on those questions that will never lie still:—Who are we? +and, Who placed us here? Philosophy included religion, and therefore +Christianity was a philosophy. +</p> +<p> +When Clement, then, told the philosophers of Alexandria that he could +teach them the true philosophy, he was saying not only what was +perfectly true, but what was perfectly understood by them. The +catechetical school was, and appeared to them, as truly a +philosophical lecture-room as the halls of the Museum. Clement himself +had been an ardent philosopher, and he reverently loved his masters, +Socrates and Plato and Aristotle, whilst he had the feelings of a +brother toward the philosophers of his own day. He became a Christian, +and his dearest object was to win his brethren to a participation in +his own good fortune. <a name="47">{47}</a> He did not burn his philosophical books and +anathematize his masters; like St. Paul, he availed himself of the +good that was in them and commended it, and then proclaimed that he +had the key of the treasure which they had labored to find and had not +found. This explains how it is that, in Clement of Alexandria, the +philosopher's mantle seems almost to hide the simple garb of the +Christian. This also explains why he is called, and indeed calls +himself, an Eclectic in his system; and this marks out the drift and +the aim of the many allusions to philosophy that we find in his extant +works, and in the traditions of his teaching that have come down to +us. If Christianity was truly called a philosophy, what should we +expect in its champion but that he should be a philosopher? Men in +these days read the <i>Stromata</i>, and find that it is, on the outside, +more like Plato than like Jesus Christ; and thus they make small +account of it, because they cannot understand its style, or the reason +for its adoption. The grounds of questions and the forms of thought +have shifted since the days of the catechetical school. But Clement's +fellow-citizens understood him. The thrifty young Byzantine, for +instance, understood him, who had been half-inclined to join the +Stoics, but had come, in his threadbare pallium, to hear the Christian +teacher, and who was told that asceticism was very good and +commendable, but that the end of it all was God and the love of God, +and that this end could only be attained by a Christian. The languid +but intellectual man of fashion understood him, who had grown sick of +the jargon of his Platonist professors about the perfect man and the +archetypal humanity, and who now felt his inmost nature stirred to its +depths by the announcement and description of the Word made flesh. The +learned stranger from Antioch or Athens, seeking for the truth, +understood him, when he said that the Christian dogma alone could +create and perfect the true Gnostic or Knower; he understood perfectly +the importance of the object, provided the assertion were true, as it +might turn out to be. Unless Clement had spoken of asceticism, of the +perfect man, and of the true Gnostic, his teaching would not have come +home to the self-denying student, to the thoughtful sage, to the +brilliant youth, to all that was great and generous and amiable in the +huge heathen society of the crowded city. As it was, he gained a +hearing, and, having done so, he said to the Alexandrians, "Your +masters in philosophy are great and noble: I honor them, I admire and +accept them; but they did not go far enough, as you all acknowledge. +Come to us, then, and we will show what is wanting in them. Listen to +these old Hebrew writers whom I will quote to you. You see that they +treated of all your problems, and had solved the deepest of them, +whilst your forefathers were groping in darkness. All their light, and +much more, is our inheritance. The truth, which you seek, we possess. +'What you worship, without knowing it, that I preach to you.' God's +Word has been made flesh—has lived on this earth, the model man, the +absolute man. Come to us, and we will show you how you may know God +through him, and how through him God communicates himself to you." But +here he stopped. The "discipline of the secret" allowed him to go no +further in public. The listening Christians knew well what he meant; +his pagan hearers only surmised that there was more behind. And was it +not much that Christianity should thus measure strength and challenge +a contest with the old Greek civilization on equal terms, and about +those very matters of intellect and high ethics in which it especially +prided itself? +</p> +<p> +But the contest, never a friendly one, save with the dullest and +easiest of the pagan philosophers, very soon grew to be war to the +knife. We have said that the quiet lovers of literature among the +heathen men of science were perfectly ready to admit the Christian +philosophy to a fair share <a name="48">{48}</a> in the arena of disputation and +discussion, looking upon it as being, at worst, only a foolish system +of obtrusive novelties, which might safely be left to their own +insignificancy. But, quite unexpectedly and startlingly for easy-going +philosophers, Christianity was found, not merely to claim the +possession of truth, but to claim it wholly and solely. And, what was +still more intolerable, its doctors maintained that its adoption or +rejection was no open speculative question, but a tremendous practical +matter, involving nothing less than all morality here and all +happiness hereafter; and that the unfortunate philosopher, who, in his +lofty serenity, approved it as right, and yet followed the wrong, +would have to undergo certain horrors after death, the bare suggestion +of which seemed an outrage on the dignity of the philosophical +character. This was quite enough for hatred; and the philosophers, as +their eyes began to open, saw that Crescens and Celsus were right, and +accorded their hatred most freely and heartily. +</p> +<p> +But Christianity did not stop here. With the old original schools and +their offshoots it was a recognized principle that philosophy was only +for philosophers; and this was especially true of Clement's most +influential contemporaries, the Neo-Platonists. The vulgar had no part +in it, in fact could not come within the sphere of its influence; how +could they? How could the sailors, who, after a voyage, went to pay +their vows in the temple of Neptune on the quay, or the porters who +dragged the grain sacks and the hemp bundles from the tall warehouses +to the holds of Syrian and Greek merchantmen, or the negro slaves who +fanned the brows of the foreign prince, or the armorers of the Jews' +quarter, or the dark-skinned, bright-eyed Egyptian women of the +Rhacôtis suspected of all evil from thieving to sorcery, or, more than +all, the drunken revellers and poor harlots who made night hideous +when the Egyptian moon looked down on the palaces of the +Brucheion—how could any of these find access to the sublime secrets +of Plato or the profound commentaries of his disciples? Even if they +had come in crowds to the lecture-halls—which no one wanted them to +do, or supposed they would do—they could not have been admitted nor +entertained; for even the honest occupations of life, the daily labors +necessary in a city of 300,000 freemen, were incompatible with +imbibing the divine spirit of philosophy. So the philosophers had +nothing to say to all these. If they had been asked what would become +of such poor workers and sinners, they would probably have avoided an +answer as best they could. There were the temples and Serapis and Isis +and the priests—they might go to them. It was certain that +philosophy was not meant for the vulgar. In fact, philosophy would be +unworthy of a habitation like the Museum—would deserve to have its +pensions stopped, its common hall abolished, and its lecture-rooms +shut up—if ever it should condescend to step into the streets and +speak to the herd. It was, therefore, with a disgust unspeakable, and +a swiftly-ripening hatred, that the philosophers saw Christianity +openly proclaiming and practising the very opposite of all this. True, +it had learned men and respected men in its ranks, but it loudly +declared that its mission was to the lowly, and the mean, and the +degraded, quite as much as to the noble, and the rich, and the +virtuous. It maintained that the true divine philosophy, the source of +joy for the present and hope for the future, was as much in the power +of the despised bondsman, trembling under the lash, as of the +prince-governor, or the Caesar himself, haughtily wielding the +insignia of sovereignty. <i>We</i> know what its pretensions and tenets +were, but it is difficult to realize how they must have clashed with +the notions of intellectual paganism in the city of Plotinus—how the +hands that would have been gladly held out in friendship, had it come +in respectable <a name="49">{49}</a> and conventional guise, were shut and clenched, +when they saw in its train the rough mechanic, the poor maid-servant, +the negro, and the harlot. There could be no compromise between two +systems such as these. For a time it might have seemed as if they +could decide their quarrel in the schools, but the old Serpent and his +chief agents knew better: and so did Clement and the Christian +doctors, at the very time that they were taking advantage of fair +weather to occupy every really strong position which the enemy held. +The struggle soon grew into the deadly hand-to-hand grapple that ended +in leaving the corpse of paganism on the ground, dead but not buried, +to be gradually trodden out of sight by a new order of things. +</p> +<br> +<p> +It must not, however, be supposed that the Christian school of +Alexandria was wholly, or even chiefly, employed in controversy with +the schools of the heathen. The first care of the Church was, as at +all times, the household of the faith: a care, however, in the +fulfilment of which there is less that strikes as novel or interesting +at first sight than in that remarkable aggressive movement of which it +has been our object to give some idea. But even in the Church's +household working there is much that is both instructive and +interesting, as we get a glimpse of it in Clement of Alexandria. The +Church in Alexandria, as elsewhere, was made up of men from every lot +and condition of life. There were officials, civil and military, +merchants, shop-keepers, work-people—plain, hard-striving men, +husbands, and fathers of families. In the wake of the upper thousands +followed a long and wide train—the multitude who compose the middle +classes of a great city; and it was from their ranks that the Church +was mainly recruited. They might not feel much interest in the +university, beyond the fact that its numerous and wealthy students +were a welcome stimulus to trade; but still they had moral and +intellectual natures. They must have craved for some kind of food for +their minds and hearts, and cannot have been satisfied with the dry, +unnourishing scraps that were flung to them by the supercilious +philosophers. They must have felt no small content—those among them +who had the grace to hearken to the teachings of Clement—when he told +them that the philosophy <i>he</i> taught was as much for them as for their +masters and their betters. They listened to him, weighed his words, +and accepted them; and then a great question arose. It was a question +that was being debated and settled at Antioch, at Rome, and at Athens, +no less than at Alexandria; but at Alexandria it was Clement who +answered it. "We believe your good tidings," they said; "but tell us, +must we change our lives wholly and entirely? Is everything that we +have been doing so far, and our fathers have been doing before us, +miserably and radically wrong?" They had bought and sold; they had +married and given in marriage; they had filled their warehouses and +freighted their ships; they had planted and builded, and brought up +their sons and daughters. They had loved money, and the praise of +their fellow-men; they had their fashions and their customs, old and +time-honored, and so interwoven with their very life as to be almost +identified with it. Some of their notions and practices the bare +announcement of the Gospel sufficiently condemned; and these must go +at once. But where was the line to be drawn? Did the Gospel aim at +regenerating the world by forbidding marriage and laying a ban on +human labor; by making life intolerable with asceticism; by emptying +the streets and the market-places, and driving men to Nitria and the +frightful rocks of the Upper Nile? And what made the question doubly +exciting was the two-fold fact, first, that in those very days men and +women were continually fleeing from home and family, and hiding, in +the desert; and secondly, that there were in that very city +congregations of <a name="50">{50}</a> men calling themselves Christians, who +proclaimed that it was wrong to marry, and that flesh-meat and wine +were sinful indulgences. +</p> +<p> +The answer that Clement gave to these questionings is found mainly in +that work of his which is called <i>Paedagogus</i>, or "The Teacher." The +answer needed was a sharp, a short, and a decisive one. It needed to +be like a surgical operation—rapidly performed, completed, with +nothing further to be done but to fasten the bandages, and leave the +patient to the consequences, whatever they might be. Society had to be +<i>reset</i>. We need not repeat for the thousandth time the fact of the +unutterable corruptness and rottenness of the whole pagan world. It +was not that there were wanting certain true ideas of duty toward the +state, the family, the fellow-citizen: the evil lay far deeper. It was +not good sense that was wanting; it was the sense of the supernatural. +"Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die," was the formula that +expressed the code of popular morality; and because men could not "eat +and drink" comfortably and luxuriously without some sort of law, +order, and mutual compact, it followed as a necessary consequence that +there must be law, order, and compact. It was not, therefore, that +Clement had merely to hold up the Gospel and show them its meaning +here and its application there. He had to shift the very groundwork of +morality, to take up the very foundations of the moral acts that go to +make up life as viewed in the light of right and wrong. He had to +substitute heaven for earth, hereafter for here, God for self. And he +did so—in a fashion not unknown in the Catholic Church since, as +indeed it had been not unknown to St. Paul long before. He simply held +up to them the crucifix. Let any one turn to the commencement of the +<i>Paedagogus</i>, and he will find a description of what a teacher ought +to be. At the beginning of the second chapter he will read these +words: "My children, our teacher is like the Father, whose Son he is; +in whom there is no sin, great or small, nor any temptation to sin; +God in the figure of a man, stainless, obedient to his Father's will; +the Word, true God, who is in the Father, who is at the Father's right +hand, true God in the form of a man; to whom we must strive with all +our might <i>to make ourselves like</i>." It sounds like the commencement +of a children's retreat in one of our modern cities to hear Clement +proclaim so anxiously that the teacher and model of men is no other +than Jesus, and that we must all become children, and go and listen to +him and study him; yet it is a sentence that must have spoken to the +very inmost hearts of all who had a thought or care for their souls in +Alexandria; and one can perceive, in the terms used in the original +Greek, a conscious adaptation of epithets to meet more than one +Platonic difficulty. It was the reconciliation of the true with the +beautiful. The Alexandrians, Greek and Egyptian, with their Greek +longings for the beautiful, and their Egyptian tendings to the +sensible, were not put off by Clement with a cold abstraction. A +mathematical deity, formed out of lines, relations, and analogies, +such as Neo-Platonism offered, was well enough for the lecture-room, +but had small hold upon the heart. Christianity restored the thrilling +sense of a personal God, which Neo-Platonism destroyed, but for which +men still sighed, though they knew not what they were sighing for; and +Christianity, by Clement's mouth, taught that the living and lovely +life of Jesus was to be the end and the measure of the life of all. +They were to follow him: "My angel shall walk before you," is +Clement's own quotation. And having thus laid down the regenerating +principle—God through Jesus Christ—he descends safely and fearlessly +into details. Minutely and carefully he handles the problems of life, +and sets them straight by the light of the life of Jesus. +</p> +<p> +These details and these directions, <a name="51">{51}</a> as left to us by Clement in +the <i>Paedagogus</i>, are only what we might anticipate from a Christian +teacher to his flock; and yet they are very interesting, and disclose +many facts that are full of suggestion to one who reads by the light +of the Catholic faith. Who would not like to hear what Clement said to +the Church of Alexandria about dress, beauty, feasting, drinking, +furniture, conversation, money, theatres, sleep, labor, and +housekeeping? We know well that there must have been ample scope for +discourse on all these topics. The rich Alexandrians, like the rich +Romans, and the rich Corinthians, and the rich everywhere, were +fearfully addicted to luxury, and their poorer neighbors followed +their example as well as they could. But there were circumstances +peculiar to Alexandria that enabled it to outdo the rest of the world +in this matter; putting Rome, of course, out of the question. It was +the market for India; and seeing that almost everything in the way of +apparel came from India, Alexandria had the pick of the best that the +world could afford, and seems not to have been behindhand in taking +advantage of its privilege. Nobody enjoyed more than the Alexandrian— +whether he were a descendant of the Macedonian who came in with the +Conqueror, or a <i>parvenu</i> of yesterday grown great by his wheat-ships +or his silk-bales—to sweep the Heptastadion, or promenade the Great +Quay, or lounge in the gardens of the Museum, in what ancient tailors +and milliners would call a synthesis of garments, as ample, and stiff, +and brilliant as Indian looms could make them. Then, again, Alexandria +was a university town. Two hundred years of effeminate Ptolemies and +four hundred of wealthy students had been more than enough to create a +tradition of high, luxurious living. The conjunction of all that was +to be got for money, with any amount of money to get it with, had made +Alexandria a model city for carrying out the only maxim which the +greater number even of the philosophers themselves really understood +and practically followed: "Let us eat and drink!" Again, a navigable +river, a rainless sky, and a climate perhaps the finest in the world, +offered both inducements and facilities for parties of pleasure and +conviviality in general. It is true the river was only a canal: one +thing was wanting to the perfection of Alexandria as a site for an +empire city, viz., the Nile; but that the canal was a moderate success +in the eyes of the Alexandrians may be inferred from the fact that +Canopus, where it finished its short course of thirteen or fourteen +miles, and joined the Nile, was a perfect city of river-side hotels, +to which the boats brought every day crowds of pleasure-seekers. Very +gay were the silken and gilded boats, with their pleasant canopies and +soothing music; and very gay and brilliant, but not very reputable, +were the groups that filled them, with their crowns of flowers, their +Grecian attitudinizing, and their ingenious arrangements of +fan-working slaves. This was the population which it was Clement's +work to convert to purity and moderation. +</p> +<p> +It is very common with Clement's modern critics, when making what our +French allies would call "an appreciation" him, to set him down as a +solemn trifler. They complain that they cannot get any "system of +theology" out of his writings; indeed, they doubt whether he so much +as had one. They find him use the term "faith" first in one sense and +then in another, and they are especially offended by his minute +instructions on certain matters pertaining to meat, drink, and dress. +To any one who considers what Clement intended to do in his writings, +and especially in the <i>Paedagogus</i>, there is no difficulty in seeing an +answer to a difficulty like this. He did not <i>mean</i> to construct a +"system of theology," and therefore it is no wonder if his critics +cannot find one. He did not even mean to state the broad, general +principles of the Gospel: his hearers knew these well enough. What he +did mean to do was, <a name="52">{52}</a> to apply these general rules and principles +to a variety of cases occurring in everyday life. And yet, as a matter +of fact, it is to be observed that he always does lay down broad +principles before entering into details. In the matter of eating, for +instance, regarding which he is very severe in his denunciations, and +not without reason, he takes care to state distinctly the great +Catholic canon of mortification: "Though all things were made for man, +yet it is not good to use all, nor at all times." Again, in the midst +of his contemptuous enumeration of ancient wines, he does not forget +to say, "You are not robbed of your drink: it is given to you, and +awaits your hand;" that which is blamed is excess. He sums up what he +has been saying against the voluptuous entertainments then so +universal by the following sentence—a novelty, surely, to both +extremes of pagan society in Alexandria—"In one word, whatever is +natural to man must not be taken from him; but, instead thereof, must +be regulated according to fitting measure and time." +</p> +<p> +In deciding whether Clement was a "solemn trifler," or not, there is +another consideration which must not be omitted, and that is his sense +of the humorous. It may sound incongruous when speaking of a Father of +the Church, and much more of a reputed mystical Father like Clement, +but we think no one can deny that he often supplements a serious +argument by a little stroke of pleasantry. As many of his sentences +stand, a look or a smile would lighten them up and make them sparkle +into humor. Paper and ink cannot carry the tone of the voice or the +glance of the eye, and Clement's voice has been silent and his eye +dimmed for many a century; but may we not imagine that at times +something of archness in the teacher's manner would impart to his +weighty words a touch of quaintness, and the habitually thoughtful eye +twinkle with a gleam of pleasantry? He would be no true follower of +Plato if it were not so. Who shall say he was not smiling when he gave +out that formal list of wines, of eatables, and of scents most +affected by the fashionables of those days? He concludes an invective +against scandalous feats by condemning the universal crown of roses as +a "nuisance:" it was damp, it was cold; it hindered one from using +either his eyes or his ears properly. He advises his audience to avoid +much curious carving and ornamenting of bed-posts; for creeping +things, he says, have a habit of making themselves at home in the +mouldings. He asks if one's hands cannot be as well washed in a clay +basin as in a silver one. He wonders how one can dare to put a plain +little loaf on a grand "wing-footed" table. He cannot see why a lamp +of earthenware will not give as good a light as one of silver. He +alludes with disgust to "hissing frying-pans," to "spoon and pestle," +and even to the "packed stomachs" of their proprietors; to Sicilian +lampreys, and Attican eels; shell-fish from Capo di Faro, and Ascrean +beet from the foot of Helicon; mullet from the Gulf of Thermae, and +pheasants from the Crimea. We hear him contemptuously repeat the +phrases of connoisseurs about their wines, the startling variety of +which we know from other sources besides his writings: he speaks of +the "scented Thasian," the aromatic "Lesbian," the "sweet wine of +Crete," the "pleasant Syracusan." The articles of plate which he +enumerates to condemn would be more than sufficient to furnish out a +modern wedding breakfast. To scents he gives no quarter. We have heard +a distinguished professor of chemistry assert, in a lecture, that +wherever there is scent on the surface there is sure to be dirt +beneath; and, from the well-known fact that in Capua there was one +whole street occupied by perfumers, he could draw no other inference +than that Capua must have been "a very dirty city." It would appear +that Clement of Alexandria was much of this opinion. He gives a +picture of a pompous <a name="53">{53}</a> personage in a procession, "going along +marvellously scented, for the purpose of producing a sensation, and +yet underneath as foul as he could be." He enumerates the absurd +varieties of ointments in fashion, and orders them to be thrown away. +He is indignant at the saffron-colored scented robe that the gentlemen +wore. He will have no flowing or trailing vestments; no "Attic +buskins," no "Persian sandals." He complains that the ladies go and +spend the whole day at the perfumer's, the goldsmith's, and the +milliner's, just as if he were speaking of "shopping" in the +nineteenth century, instead of A.D. 200. He blames the men for +frequenting the barbers' shops, the taverns, and the dicing-houses. It +is amusing in these days to read of his denunciations of shaving. He +has no patience with "hair-haters:" a man without the hair that God +gave him is a "base sight." "God attached such importance to hair," he +says, "that he makes a man come to hair and sense at the same time." +But, in reality, this vehement attack on the "smooth men," as he calls +them, points to one of the most flagrant of heathen immoralities, and +reveals in the context a state of things to which we may not do more +than allude. He condemns luxury in furniture, from "beds with silver +feet, made of ivory and adorned with gold and tortoise-shell," down to +"little table-daggers," that ancient ladies and gentlemen used +indifferently to their food and to their slaves. All this is not very +deep, but it is just what Clement wanted to say, and a great deal more +useful in its place and connection than a "system of theology." We may +add that it is a great deal more interesting to us, who know pretty +well what Clement's "system of theology" was, but not so well what +were the faults and failings of his Christian men and women in those +far-off Alexandrian times. +</p> +<p> +There is another epithet bestowed upon Clement, more widely and with +better authority than that of "trifler." He is called a mystic. He +deals in allegorical interpretations of Holy Scripture, in fanciful +analogies, and whimsical reasonings; he was carried away by the spirit +of Neo-Platonism, and substituted a number of idle myths for the stern +realities of the Gospel. It is not our business at present to show, by +references, that this accusation is untrue; but we may admit at once +that it is not unfounded, and we maintain that it points to an +excellence, rather than a defect, in his teaching. From the remarks +made just now, the reader will be prepared to expect that a teacher in +Alexandria in Clement's days <i>must</i> have been a mystic. It was simply +the fashion; and a fashion, in thought and speech, exacts a certain +amount of compliance from those who think or speak for the good of its +followers. Neo-Platonism was not extant in his time as a definite +system, but ever since the days of Philon its spirit had been the +spirit of the Museum. Nature, in its beauty and variety, was an +allegory of the soul so said the philosophers, and the crowd caught it +up with eagerness. The natural philosopher could not lecture on +Aristotle <i>De Animalibus</i> without deducing morals in the style of +AEsop. The moralist, in his turn, could hardly keep up his class-list +without embodying his Beautiful and his Good in the aesthetical garb +of a myth—the more like Plato, the better. The mathematician +discoursed of numbers, of lines, and of angles, but the interesting +part of his lecture was when he drew the analogy from lines and +numbers to the soul and to God. Alexandria liked allegory, and +believed, or thought she believed, that the Seen was always a type of +the Unseen. Such a belief was not unnatural, and by no means +hopelessly erroneous; nay, was it not highly useful to a Christian +teacher, with the Bible in his hand, in which he would really have to +show them so many things, <i>per allegoriam dicta?</i> Clement took up the +accustomed tone. Had he done otherwise, he would have been strange and +old-fashioned, whereas he <a name="54">{54}</a> wanted to get the ear of his +countrymen, and therefore thought it no harm to fall in with their +humor for the mythical; just as good Father Faber preached and wrote +like a modern Englishman, and not like an antique Douai +controversialist, or a well-meaning translator of "Sermons from the +French." But, say the objectors, Clement's interpretation of Scripture +is so very forced and unnatural. The whole subject of allegorical +interpretation of Sacred Scripture is too wide to be entered upon +here; but that the Bible, especially the Old Testament, <i>has</i> an +allegorical sense, no one denies, and the decision of what is the true +allegorical sense depends more upon the authority of the teacher than +upon the interpretation itself. In the time of Clement, when the +Gnostics were attributing the Old Testament to the Evil Principle, +there was a special necessity for a warm and loving acknowledgment +that it was the voice and the teaching of God to man; and it is no +wonder, therefore, that he allows himself, with the brilliant fancy of +an Athenian, even if sometimes with the fantasticalness of an +Alexandrian, to extract meanings out of the sacred text which our +sober eyes could never have discovered. As it is, we owe to his +mysticism no small portion of the eloquence and beauty of his +writings; we may instance that charming passage in the <i>Paedagogus</i> +where he alludes to the incident related in the twenty-sixth chapter +of Genesis—"Abimelech, King of the Palestines, looking out through a +window, saw Isaac playing with Rebecca his wife." Isaac represents, +the little one of Christ, and is interpreted to be joy; Rebecca is +patience; the royal Abimelech signifies heavenly wisdom. The child of +Jesus Christ, joyful with a joy that none but that blessed teacher can +give, lovingly sports with his "helpmate," patience, and the wisdom +that is from above looks on and wonderingly admires. The beauty of +conception and perfection of form that is inseparable from true Greek +art, whether in a statue or a medal, an epic or an epigram, is by no +means wanting to the first of the Greek Fathers. A reader who should +take up the <i>Paedagogus</i> for no other than literary reasons would not +be disappointed; he would receive, from his reading, a very high idea +of the wisdom, the eloquence, and, above all, the saintly unction of +the great Catholic doctor and philosopher who first made human science +the handmaid of Christian theology. +</p> +<p> +The witnessing to the truth before heathen philosophers and the +teaching the children of the faith might have fully employed both the +zeal and the eloquence of Clement. But there was another and a sadder +use for words, in the task of resisting the heresies that seemed to +grow like foul excrescences from the very growth of the Church +herself. Alexandria, the city of Neo-Platonism, was also with nearly +as good a title the city of Gnosticism. To examine the history of +Gnosticism is not a tempting undertaking. On the one side, it is like +walking into a fog, as dense and unpleasant as ever marked a London +November; on the other, it is to disturb a moral cess-pool, +proverbially better left alone. Of the five groups of the Gnostic +family, which seem to agree in little beside worshipping the devil, +holding to "emanations," and owing their origin to Simon Magus, the +particular group that made Alexandria its headquarters acknowledged as +its leading names Basilides, Valentine, and Mark, each of whom outdid +the other in the absurdity of his ravings about eons, generations, and +the like, and in the abominableness of his practical licentiousness. +Valentine and Mark were contemporaries of Clement, if not personally +(Valentine is said to have died A.D. 150) at least in their immediate +influence. No one can tell satisfactorily what made these precious +followers of Simon Magus spend their days in patching up second-hand +systems out of the rags of cast-off Oriental mysticism. No doubt their +jargon appeared somewhat less <a name="55">{55}</a> unnatural in their own days than it +does in ours. They lived nearer the times when the wrecks of primeval +revelation and history had been wrought into a thousand fantastic +shapes on the banks of the Indus, the Euphrates, and the Nile, and +when, in the absence of the true light, men occupied themselves with +the theatrical illuminations of Bel, Isis, and Vishnu. But these +Gnostics, in the clear dawn of the Gospel, still stuck to the fulsome +properties of the devil's play-house. Unsavory and dishonest, they +deserve neither respect for sincerity nor allowance for originality; +they were mere spinners of "endless genealogies," and, with such a +fig-leaf apron, they tried to conceal for a while the rankness of the +flesh that finally made the very pagans join in hounding them from the +earth. The infamous Mark was holding his conventicles in Alexandria +about the very time that Pantaenus and Clement were teaching. To read +of his high-flown theories about eons and emanations, his sham magic, +his familiarity with demons, his impositions on the weaker sex, and +the frightful licentiousness that was the sure end of it all, is like +reading the history of the doings of the Egyptian priests in the +Serapeion rather than of those who called themselves Christians. And +yet these very men, these deluded Marcosians, gave out to learned and +unlearned Alexandria that they alone were the true followers of +Christ. We may conceive the heart-breaking work it would be for +Clement to repel the taunts that their doings brought upon his name +and profession, and to refute and keep down false brethren, whose +arguments and strength consisted in an appeal to curiosity and brute +passion. And yet how nobly he does it, in that picture of the true +Gnostic, or Knower, to which he so often returns in all his extant +works! +</p> +<p> +But philosophers, faithful, and heretics do not exhaust the story of +Clement's doings. It lends a solemn light to the memorable history we +are noting, to bear in mind that the Church's intellectual war with +Neo-Platonist and Gnostic was ever and again interrupted by the yells +of the blood-thirsty populace, the dragging of confessors to prison, +and all the hideous apparatus of persecution. Which of us would have +had heart to argue with men who might next day deliver us to the +hangman? Who would have found leisure to write books on abstract +philosophy with such stern concrete realities as the scourge and the +knife waiting for him in the street? Clement's master began to teach +just as one persecution was ceasing; Clement himself had to flee from +his schools before the "burden and heat" of another; these were not +times, one would suppose, for science and orderly teaching. Yet our +own English Catholic annals can, in a manner, furnish parallel cases +in more than one solid book of controversy and deep ascetical tract, +thought out and composed when the pursuivants were almost at the +doors. So true it is that when the Church's work demands scientific +and written teaching, science appears and books are written, though +the Gentiles are raging and the peoples imagining their vain things. +</p> +<p> +Here, for the present, we draw to a close these desultory notes on the +Christian Schools of Alexandria. They will have served their purpose +if they have but supplied an outline of that busy intellectual life +which is associated with the names of Pantaenus and Clement. There is +another name that ought to follow these two—the name of Origen, +suggesting another chapter on Church history that should yield to none +in interest and usefulness. The mere fact that in old Alexandria, in +the face of hostile science, clogged and put to shame by pestilent +heresies, ruthlessly chased out of sight ever and again by brute force— +in spite of all this, Catholic science won respect from its enemies +without for a moment neglecting the interests of its own children, is +a teaching that will never be out of date, and least of all at a time +like ours, and in a country where learning <a name="56">{56}</a> sneers at revelation, +where a thousand jarring sects invoke the sacred name of Christ, and +where public opinion—the brute force of the modern world, as the +rack and the fagot were of the ancient—never howls so loudly as when +it catches sight of the one true Church of the living and eternal God. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>From The Lamp. +<br><br> +JEM M'GOWAN'S WISH.</h2> +<br> +<p> +"I wish I were a lord," said Pat M'Gowan, a lazy young fellow, as he +stretched over his grandmother's turf-fire a pair of brawny fists that +were as red as the blaze that warmed them. +</p> +<p> +"<i>You</i> wish to be a lord!" answered Granny M'Gowan; "oh, then, a +mighty quare lord you would make; but, as long as you live, Pat, never +wish again; for who knows but you might wish in the unlucky minute, +and that it would be granted to you?" +</p> +<p> +"Faix, then, granny, I just wish I could have my wish this minute." +</p> +<p> +"You're a fool, Pat, and have no more sense in your head than a +cracked egg has a chance of a chicken inside of it. Maybe you'd never +cease repenting of your wish if you got it." +</p> +<p> +"Maybe so, granny, but for all that I'd like to be a lord. Tell me, +granny, when does the unlucky minute come that a body may get their +wish?" +</p> +<p> +"Why, you see, Pat, there is one particular little bit of a minute of +time in every twenty-four hours that, if a mortal creature has the +unlucky chance to wish on that instant, his wish, whether for good or +for bad, for life or death, fortune or misfortune, sickness or health, +for himself or for others, the wish is granted to him; but seldom does +it turn out for good to the wisher, because it shows he is not +satisfied with his lot, and it is contrary to what God in his goodness +has laid down for us all to do and suffer for his sake. But, Pat, you +blackguard, I see you are laughing at your old granny because you +think I am going to preach a sermon to you; but you're mistaken. I'll +tell you what happened to an uncle of my own, Jem M'Gowan, who got his +wish when he asked for it." +</p> +<p> +"Got his wish—oh, the lucky old fellow!" cried Pat. "Do, granny, tell +me all about him. Got his wish! oh, how I wish I was a lord!" +</p> +<p> +"Listen to me, Pat, and don't be getting on with any of your foolish +nonsense. My uncle, Jem M'Gowan, was then something like yourself, Pat— +a strapping, able chap, but one that, like you too, would sooner be +scorching his shins over the fire than cutting the turf to make it, +and rather watching the potatoes boiling than digging them out of the +ridge. Instead of working for a new coat, he would be wishing some one +gave it to him. When he got up in the morning, he wished for his +breakfast; and when he had swallowed it, he wished for his dinner; and +when he had bolted down his dinner, he began to wish for his supper; +and when he ate his supper, he wished to be in bed; and when he was in +bed, he wished to be asleep—in fact, he did nothing from morning to +night but wish, and even in his dreams I am quite sure he wished to be +awake. Unlucky for Jem, his cabin was convenient to the great big +house of Squire Kavanagh; and when Jem went out in the morning, +shivering with cold, and wishing for a glass of whisky to put <i>spirits</i> +in him, and he saw the bedroom windows of Squire Kavanagh closed, and +knew that the squire was lying warm and snug inside, he always wished +to be Squire Kavanagh. Then, when he saw the <a name="57">{57}</a> squire driving the +horse and the hounds before him, and he all the while working in the +field, he wished it still more; and when he saw him dancing with the +beautiful young ladies and illigant young gentlemen in the moonlight +of a summer's evening, in front of his fine hall-door and under the +shade of the old oak-trees, he wished it more than ever. The squire +was always coming before him; and so happy a man did he seem that Jem +was always saying to himself, 'I wish I was Squire Kavanagh,' from, +cockcrow to sunset, until he at last hit upon the unfortunate minute +in the twenty-four hours when his wish was to be granted. He was just +after eating his dinner of fine, mealy potatoes, fresh-churned +buttermilk, and plenty of salt and salt-butter to relish them, when he +stretched out his two legs, threw up his arms, and yawned out, 'Oh, +dear, I wish I was Squire Kavanagh!' +</p> +<p> +"The words were scarce uttered when he found himself, still yawning, +in the grand parlor of Kavanagh House, sitting opposite to a table +laid out with china, and a table-cloth, silver forks, and no end of +silver spoons, and a roaring hot beefsteak before him. Jem rubbed his +eyes and then his hands with joy, and thought to himself, 'By dad, my +wish is granted, and I'll lay in plenty of beefsteak first of all.' He +began cutting away; but, before he had finished, he was interrupted by +some people coming in. It was Sir Harry M'Manus, Squire Brien, and two +or three other grand gentlemen; and says they to him, 'Kavanagh, don't +you know this is the day you're to decide your bet for five hundred +pounds, that you will leap your horse over the widest part of the pond +outside?' +</p> +<p> +"'Is it me? says Jem. 'Why, I never leaped a horse in my life!' +</p> +<p> +"'Bother!' says one; 'you're joking. You told us yourself that you did +it twenty times, and there's the English colonel that made the bet +with you, and he'll be saying, if you don't do it, that the Irish are +all braggers; so, my dear fellow, it just comes to this—you must +either leap the pond or fight me; for, relying upon your word, I told +the colonel I saw you do it myself.' +</p> +<p> +"'I must fight you or leap the pond, is it?' answered Jem, trembling +from head to foot. +</p> +<p> +"'Certainly, my dear fellow,' replied Sir Harry. 'Either I must shoot +you or see you make the leap; so take your choice.' +</p> +<p> +"'Oh! then, bring out the horse,' whimpered Jem, who was beginning to +wish he wasn't Squire Kavanagh. +</p> +<p> +"In a minute afterward, Jem found himself out in the lawn, opposite a +pond that appeared to him sixty feet wide at the least. 'Why,' said +he, 'you might as well ask me to jump over the ocean, or give a +hop-step-and-a-leap from Howth to Holyhead, as get any horse to cross +that lake of a pond.' +</p> +<p> +"'Come, Kavanagh,' said Sir Henry, 'no nonsense with us. We know you +can do it if you like; and now that you're in for it, you must finish +it.' +</p> +<p> +"'Faix, you'll finish me, I'm afeerd,' said Jem, seeing they were in +earnest with him; 'but what will you do if I'm drowned?' +</p> +<p> +"'Do?' says Sir Henry.' Oh, make yourself aisy on that account. You +shall have the grandest wake that ever was seen in the country. We'll +bury you dacently, and we'll all say that the bouldest horseman now in +Ireland is the late Squire Kavanagh. If that doesn't satisfy you, +there's no pleasing you; so bring out the horse immediately.' +</p> +<p> +"'Oh! murder, murder!" says Jem to himself; 'isn't this a purty thing, +that I must be drowned to make a great character for a little spalpeen +like Squire Kavanagh? Oh, then, it's I that wish I was Jem M'Gowan +again! Going to be drowned like a rat, or smothered like a blind +kitten! and all for a vagabond I don't care a straw about. I, that +never was on a horse's back before, to think of leaping over an ocean! +Bad cess to you, Squire Kavanagh, for your boastin' and your +wagerin'!' +</p> +<a name="58">{58}</a> +<p> +"Well, a fine, dashing, jumping, rearing, great big gray horse was led +up by two grooms to Jem's side. 'Oh, the darling!' said Sir Harry; +'there he goes! there's the boy that will win our bets for us! Clap +him at once upon the horse's back,' says he to the grooms. The sight +left Jem's eyes the very instant he saw the terrible gray horse, well +known as one of the most vicious bastes in the entire country. If he +could, he'd have run away, but fright kept him standing stock-still; +and, before he knew where he was, he was hoisted into the saddle. +'Now, boys,' roared Sir Harry, 'give the horse plenty whip, and my +life for it he is over the pond.' +</p> +<p> +"Jem heard two desperate slashes made on the flanks of the horse. The +creature rose on his four legs off the ground, and came down with a +soss that sent Jem up straight from the saddle like a ball, and down +again with a crack fit to knock him into a hundred thousand pieces, +not one of them bigger than the buttons of his waistcoat. 'Murder!' he +shrieked; 'I wish I was Jem M'Gowan back again!' But there was no use +in saying this, for he had already got his wish. The horse galloped +away like lightning. He felt rising one instant up as high as the +clouds, and the next he came with a plop into the water, like a stone +that you would make take a 'dead man's dive.' He remembered no more +till he saw his two kind friends, Sir Harry M'Manus and Squire Brien, +holding him by the two legs in the air, and the water pouring from his +mouth, nose, and every stitch of his clothes, as heavy and as constant +as if it was flowing through a sieve, or as if he was turned into a +watering-pot. +</p> +<p> +"'I'm a dead man,' says he, looking up in the face of his grand +friends as well as he could, and kicking at the same time to get loose +from them. 'I'm a dead man; and, what's worse, I'm a murdered man by +the two of you.' +</p> +<p> +"'Bedad, you're anything but that,' said Sir Harry. 'You're now the +greatest man in the county, for, though you fell into the pond, the +horse leapt it; and I have won my bet, for which I am extremely +obliged to you.' +</p> +<p> +"After shaking the water out of him, they laid him down on the grass, +got a bottle of whisky, and gave him as much as he chose of it. Jem's +spirits began to rise a little, and he laughed heartily when they told +him he had won 500 from the English colonel. Jem got on his legs, and +was beginning to walk about, when who should he see coming into the +demesne but two gentlemen—one dressed like an officer, with under +his arm a square mahogany box, the other with a great big horsewhip. +Jem rubbed his hands with delight, for he made sure that the gentleman +who carried the box was going to make Squire Kavanagh—that is, +himself—some mighty fine present. +</p> +<p> +"'Kavanagh,' said Sir Harry, 'you will want some one to stand by you +as a friend in this business; would you wish me to be your friend?' +</p> +<p> +"'In troth, I would,' says Jem. 'I would like you to act as a friend +to me upon all occasions.' +</p> +<p> +"'Oh, that's elegant!' said Sir Harry. 'We'll now have rare sport.' +</p> +<p> +"'I'm mighty glad to hear it,' Jem replied, 'for I want a little sport +after all the troubles I had.' +</p> +<p> +"'Oh, you're a brave fellow,' said Sir Harry. +</p> +<p> +"'To be sure I am,' answered Jem. 'Didn't I leap the gray horse over +the big pond?' +</p> +<p> +"The gentleman with the box and whip here came up to Jem and his +friends; and the whip-gentleman took off his hat, and says he, 'Might +I be after asking you, is there any one of the present company Squire +Kavanagh?' +</p> +<p> +"Jem did not like the looks of the gentleman, and Sir Harry M'Manus +stepped before him, and said—'Yes; he is here to the fore. What is +your business with him? I am acting as his <i>friend</i>, and I have a right +to ask the question.' +</p> +<p> +"'Then, I'll tell ye what it is,' said <a name="59">{59}</a> the gentleman. 'He +insulted my sister at the Naas races yesterday.' +</p> +<p> +"'Faix,' says Jem, 'that's a lie! Sure, I wasn't near Naas races.' +</p> +<p> +"The word was hardly out of his mouth when he got a crack of a +horsewhip across the face, that cut, he thought, his head in two. He +caught hold of the gentleman, and tried to take the whip out of his +hand; but, instead of the strength of Jem M'Gowan, he had only the +weakness of Squire Kavanagh, and he was in an instant collared; and, +in spite of all his kicking and roaring, lathered with the big whip +from the top of his head to the sole of his foot. The gentleman got at +last a little tired of beating him, and, flinging him away from him, +said 'You and I are now quits about the lie, but you must give me +satisfaction for insulting my sister.' +</p> +<p> +"'Satisfaction!' roared out Jem, as lie twisted and turned about with +the pain of the beating. 'Bedad, I'll never be satisfied till every +bone in your ugly body is broken.' +</p> +<p> +"'Very well,' said the gentleman. 'My friend, Captain M'Ginnis, is +come prepared for this.' +</p> +<p> +"Upon that, Jem saw the square box opened that he thought was filled +with a beautiful present for him; and he saw four ugly-looking pistols +lying beside each other, and in one corner about two dozen of shining +bran-new bullets. Jem's knees knocked together with fright when he saw +Captain M'Ginnis and Sir Harry priming and loading the pistols. +</p> +<p> +"'Oh! murder, murder! this is worse than the gray horse,' he said. +'Now I am quite sure of being killed entirely.' So he caught hold of +Sir Harry by the coat, and stuttered out, *Oh, then, what in the world +are ye going to do with me?' +</p> +<p> +"'Do?' replied his friend; 'why, you're going to stand a shot, to be +sure.' +</p> +<p> +"'The devil a shot I'll stand,' said Jem. 'I'll run away this minute.' +</p> +<p> +"'Then, by my honor and veracity, if you do,' replied Sir Harry, 'I'll +stop you with a bullet. My honor is concerned in this business. You +asked me to be your friend, and I'll see you go through it +respectably. You must either stand your ground like a gentleman, or be +shot like a dog.' +</p> +<p> +"Jem heartily wished he was no longer Squire Kavanagh; and as they +dragged him up in front of the gentleman, and placed them about eight +yards asunder, he thought of the quiet, easy life he led before he +became a grand gentleman. He never while a laboring boy was ducked in +a pond, or shot like a wild duck. But now he heard something said +about 'making ready;' he saw the gentleman raise his pistol on a level +with his head; he tried to lift his arm, but it stuck as fast by his +side as if it was glued there. He saw the wide mouth of the wicked +gentleman's pistol opened at his very eye, and looking as if it were +pasted up to his face. He could even see the leaden bullet that was +soon to go skelpin' through his brains! He saw the gentleman's finger +on the trigger! His head turned round and round, and in an agony he +cried out—'Oh, I wish I was Jem M'Gowan back again!' +</p> +<br> +<p> +"'Jem, you'll lose half your day's work,' said Ned Maguire, who was +laboring in the same field with him. 'There you've been sleeping ever +since your dinner, while Squire Kavanagh, that you are always talking +about, was shot a few minutes ago in a duel that he fought with some +strange gentleman in his own demesne.' +</p> +<p> +"'Oh," said Jem, as soon as he found that he really wasn't shot, 'I +wouldn't for the wealth of the world be a gentleman. Better to labor +all day than spend half an hour in the grandest of company. Faix, I've +had enough and to spare of grand company and being a gentleman since I +have gone to sleep here in the potato-field; and Squire Kavanagh, if +he only knew it, had much more reason, poor man, to wish he was Jem +M'Gowan than I had to wish I was Squire Kavanagh.' +</p> +<a name="60">{60}</a> +<p> +"And ever after that, Pat," concluded the old lady, "Jem M'Gowan went +about his work like a man, instead of wasting his time in nonsensical +wishings." +</p> +<p> +"Thankee, granny," yawned Pat M'Gowan, as he shuffled off to bed. +"After that long story, I don't think I'll ever wish to be a lord +again." +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>From Chambers's Journal. +<br><br> +THE MONT CENIS TUNNEL.</h2> +<br> +<p> +The tunnel through the Alps at present being pierced to connect the +railway system of France and Italy, has acquired the title of the +"Mont Cenis Tunnel;" but its real position and direction have very +little in common with that well-known Alpine pass. On examining a +chart of the district which has been selected for this important +undertaking, we shall observe that the main chain of the Cottian Alps +extends in a direction very nearly East and West, and that this +portion of it is bounded on either side by two roughly parallel +valleys. On the North we have the valley of the Arc, and on the South +the valley of the Dora Ripari, or, more strictly speaking, the valley +of Rochemolles, a branch of the Dora. The Arc, flowing from East to +West, descends from Lanslebourg to Modane, and from thence, after +joining the Isere, empties itself into the Rhone above Valence. The +torrent Rochemolles, on the other hand, flowing from West to East, +unites itself with the Dora Ripari at Oulx, descends through a narrow +and winding valley to Susa, and thence along the plain to Turin. The +postal road, leaving St. Michel, mounts the valley of the Arc as far +as Lanslebourg, then turns suddenly to the South, passes the heights +of the Mont Cenis, and reaches Susa by a very steep descent. On +mounting the valley of the Arc, and stopping about eighteen miles West +of Mont Cenis, and a mile and a half below the Alpine village of +Modane, we arrive at a place called Fourneaux. Here, at about three +hundred feet above the level of the main road, is the Northern +entrance of the tunnel; the Southern entrance is at the picturesque +village of Bardonnêche, situated at about twenty miles West of Susa, +in the valley of Rochemolles. +</p> +<p> +The considerations which decided the Italian engineers upon selecting +this position for the contemplated tunnel, were principally the +following: first, it was the shortest route that could be found; +secondly, the difference of level between the two extremities was not +too great; and, thirdly, the construction of the connecting lines of +railway—on the North, from St. Michel to Fourneaux, and on the South, +from Susa to Bardonnêche were, as mountain railways go, practicable, +if not easy. The idea of a tunnel through the Alps had long occupied +the minds of engineers and of statesmen both in France and Italy; but +it is to the latter country that we must give the credit of having +worked the idea into a practical shape, and of having inaugurated one +of the most stupendous works ever undertaken by any people. To pierce +a tunnel seven and a half English miles long, by ordinary means, +through a hard rock, in a position where vertical shafts were +impossible, would be an exceedingly difficult, if not, <i>in a practical +point of view, an impossible</i> undertaking, not only on account of the +difficulties of ventilation, but also on account of the immense <i>time</i> +and consequent expense which it would entail. It was evident, <a name="61">{61}</a> +then, that if the project of a tunnel through the Alps was ever to be +realized, some extraordinary and completely new system of mining must +be adopted, by means of which not only a rapid and perfect system of +ventilation could be insured, enabling the miners to resume, without +danger, their labors immediately after an explosion, but which would +treble, or at least double, the amount of work usually performed in +any given time by the system hitherto adopted in tunnelling through +hard rock. To three Piedmontese engineers, Messrs. Grandis, Grattoni, +and Sommeiller, is due the merit of having solved this most difficult +problem; for whether the opening of the Alpine tunnel take place in +ten or twenty years, its ultimate success is now completely assured. +</p> +<p> +A short review of the history of this undertaking, and a summary of +the progress made, together with a description of the works as they +are conducted at the present time, derived from personal observation, +cannot fail to be interesting to English readers. +</p> +<p> +Early in 1857, at St. Pier d'Arena, near Genoa, a series of +experiments was undertaken before a select government commission, to +examine into the practicability of a project for a mechanical +perforating-engine, proposed by Messrs. Grandis, Grattoni, and +Sommeiller, for the more rapid tunnelling through hard rock, and with +a view to its employment in driving the proposed shaft through the +Alps. This machine was to be worked by means of air, highly compressed +by hydraulic or other economical means; which compressed air, after +performing its work in the perforating or boring machines, would be an +available and powerful source of ventilation in the tunnel. These +experiments placed so completely beyond any doubt the practicability +of the proposed system, that, so soon as August of the same year, the +law permitting the construction of the tunnel was promulgated. +</p> +<p> +At this time, absolutely nothing had been prepared, with the exception +of a very general project presented by the proposers, and the model of +the machinery with which the experiments had been made before the +government commission; we cannot, therefore, be much surprised on +finding that some considerable time elapsed before the new machinery +came into successful operation, the more particularly when we consider +the entire novelty of the system, and the unusual difficulties +naturally attending the first starting of such large works, in +districts so wild and uncongenial as those of Fourneaux and +Bardonnêche. Fourneaux was but a collection of mountain-huts, +containing about four hundred inhabitants, entirely deprived of every +means of supporting the wants of any increase of population, and where +outside-work could not be carried on for more than six months in the +year, owing to its ungenial climate. Nor was the case very different +at Bardonnêche, a small Alpine village, situated at more than thirteen +hundred metres (4,225 feet) above the level of the sea, and populated +by about one thousand inhabitants, who lived upon the produce of their +small patches of earth, and the rearing of sheep and goats, and with +their only road of communication with the outer world in a most +wretched and deplorable condition. Under these circumstances, we can +imagine that the task of bringing together large numbers of workmen, +and their competent directing staff, must have been by no means easy; +and that the first work of the direction, although of a nature really +most arduous and tedious (requiring, above all, time and patience), +was also of a nature that could scarcely render its effects very +apparent to the world at large for some considerable time. Again, it +was necessary in this time to make the detailed studies not only of +the tunnel itself, but of the compressing and perforating machinery on +the large scale proposed to be used. This machinery had to be made and +transported through a country abounding in difficulties. Then, as +might be <a name="62">{62}</a> expected, actual trials showed serious defects in the +new machines for the compression of air; and, in perfecting the +mechanical perforators, unexpected difficulties were encountered, +which often threatened to prove insurmountable. The total inexperience +and unskilfulness of the workmen, and the necessity of giving to them +the most tedious instruction; accidents of most disheartening and +discouraging kinds—all tended to delay the successful application of +the new system. +</p> +<p> +The first important work to be undertaken was the tracing or setting +out of the centre line of the proposed tunnel. It was necessary first +to fix on the summit of the mountain a number of points, in a direct +line, which should pass through the two points chosen, or rather +necessitated by the conditions of the locality, for the two ends of +the tunnel in the respective valleys of the Arc and of Rochemolles; +secondly, to determine the exact distance between these two ends; and +thirdly, to know the precise difference of level between the same +points. These operations commenced toward the end of August, 1857. +Starting from the Northern entrance at Fourneaux, a line was set out +roughly in the direction of Bardonnêche, which line was found to cut +the valley of Rochemolles at a point considerably above the proposed +Southern entrance of the tunnel. On measuring this distance, however, +a second and corrected line could be traced, which was found to be +very nearly correct. Correcting this second line in the same manner, +always departing from the North end, a third line was found to pass +exactly through the two proposed and given points. The highest point +of this line was found to be very nearly at an equal distance from +each end of the tunnel, and at but a short distance below the true +summit of the mountain-point, called the "Grand Vallon." The line thus +approximately determined, it was necessary to fix definitely and +exactly three principal stations or observatories—one on the highest +or culminating point of the mountain, perpendicularly over the axis of +the tunnel; and the other two in a line with each entrance, in such a +manner that, from the centre observatory, both the others could be +observed. At the Southern end, owing to the convenient conformation of +the mountain, the observatory could be established at a point not very +far from the mouth of the tunnel; but toward the North, several +projecting points or counterforts on the mountain necessitated the +carrying of the Northern observatory to a very considerable distance +beyond the entrance of the gallery—not, however, so far as not to be +discerned clearly and distinctly, and without oscillation, by the very +powerful and excellent instrument employed. These three points +permanently established, remain as a check for those intervening, and +serve as the base of the operations for the periodical testing of the +accuracy of the line of excavation. +</p> +<p> +The first rough tracing out of the line was completed before the +winter of the year 1857, and it was considered sufficiently correct to +permit the commencement of the tunnel at each end by the ordinary +means—manual labor. In the autumn of 1858, the corrected line was +traced, and the observatories definitely fixed, and all other +necessary geodetic operations completed. Contemporaneously was +undertaken a careful levelling between the two ends, taken along the +narrow path of the Colle di Frejus, and bench-marks were established +at intervals along the whole line. All the data necessary for an exact +profile of the work were now obtained. The exact length of the future +tunnel was found to be twelve thousand two hundred and twenty metres, +or about seven and a half English miles; and the difference of level +between the two mouths was ascertained to be two hundred and forty +metres, or seven hundred and eighty feet, the Southern or Bardonnêche +end being the highest. Under these circumstances, it would have been +easy to have established a <a name="63">{63}</a> single gradient from Bardonnêche down +to Fourneaux of about two centimètres per mètre—that is, of about one +in fifty. But a little reflection will show, that in working both ends +of the gallery at once, in order to effect the proper drainage of the +tunnel, it would be necessary to establish two gradients, each +inclining toward the respective mouths, and meeting in some point in +the middle. This, in fact, has been done, and the two hundred and +forty metres' difference of level has been distributed in the +following manner: From Bardonnêche, the gradient mounts at the rate of +0.50 per one thousand mètres—that is, one in two thousand as far as +the middle of the gallery; here it descends toward Fourneaux with a +gradient of 22.20 mètres per one thousand, or about one in forty-five. +The highest point of the Grand Vallon perpendicularly over the axis of +the tunnel is 1615.8 mètres, or 5251.31 feet. +</p> +<p> +The difficulties encountered in the carrying out of these various +geodetic operations can scarcely be exaggerated. It is true that +nothing is more easy than to picket out a straight line on the ground, +or to measure an angle correctly with a theodolite; but if we consider +the aspect of the locality in which these operations had to be +conducted, repeated over and over again, and tested in every available +manner with the most minute accuracy, we shall be quite ready to +accord our share of praise and admiration to the perseverance which +successfully carried out the undertaking. In these regions, the sun, +fogs, snow, and terrific winds succeed each other with truly +marvellous rapidity, the distant points become obscured by clouds, +perhaps at the very moment when an important sight is to be taken, +causing most vexatious delays, and often necessitating a +recommencement of the whole operation. These delays may in some cases +extend for days, and even weeks. To these inconveniences add the +necessity of mounting and descending daily with delicate instruments +from three thousand to four thousand feet over rocks and rugged +mountain-paths, the time occupied in sending from one point to +another, and the difficulty of planting pickets on elevated positions +often almost inaccessible. All these inconveniences considered, and we +must admit the unusual difficulties of a series of operations which, +under other circumstances, would have offered nothing peculiarly +remarkable. +</p> +<p> +As has already been pointed out, the excavation of the gallery at both +ends had already been in operation, by ordinary means, since the +latter part of the year 1857; this work continued without interruption +until the machinery was ready; and the progress made in that time +affords a valuable standard by which to measure the effect of the new +machinery. In the interval between the end of 1857 and that to which +we have now arrived, namely, the end of 1858, many important works had +been pushed forward. At Bardonnêche, the communications had been +opened, and bridges and roads constructed for facilitating the +transport of the heavy machinery. Houses for the accommodation of the +workmen had been rapidly springing up, together with the vast edifices +for the various magazines and offices. The canal, more than a mile and +a half in length, for conveying water to the air-compressing machines, +was constructed, and the little Alpine village had become the centre +of life and activity. At Fourneaux, works of a similar character had +been put in motion; only here the transport of the water for the +compressors was more costly and difficult, the water being at a low +level. At first, a current derived from the Arc was used to raise +water to the required height, but afterward it was found necessary to +establish powerful forcing-pumps, new in their details, which are +worked by huge water-wheels driven by the Arc itself. Early in the +month of June, 1859, the first erection of the compressing machinery +was commenced at Bardonnêche. The badness of the season, however, and +<a name="64">{64}</a> the Italian campaign of this year, delayed the rapid progress, +and even caused a temporary suspension of this work. The results +obtained by the experiments which had previously been made on a small +scale at St. Pier d'Arena, failed completely in supplying the data +necessary to insure a practical success to the first applications of +the new system; numberless modifications, both in the +compressing-engines and in the perforating-machines, were found +necessary; and several months were consumed in experimenting with, +modifying, and improving the huge machinery; so that it was not before +the 10th of November, 1860, that five compressors were successfully +and satisfactorily at work. On the 12th, however, two of the large +conducting-pipes burst, and caused a considerable amount of damage, +without causing, however, any loss of life. This accident revealed one +or two very serious defects in the manner of working the valves of the +engine; and in order to provide against the possibility of future +accidents of the same nature, further most extensive modifications +were undertaken. +</p> +<p> +By the beginning of January, 1861, the five compressors were again at +work; and on the 12th of this month the boring-engine was introduced +for the first time into the tunnel. Very little useful result was, +however, obtained for a long and anxious period, beyond continually +exposing defects and imperfections in the perforators. The pipes +conducting the compressed air from the compressing-machines to the +gallery gave at first continued trouble and annoyance; soon, however, +a very perfect system of joints was established, and this source of +difficulty was completely removed. After much labor and patience, and +little by little, the perforating-machines became improved and +perfected, as is always the case in any perfectly new mechanical +contrivance having any great assemblage of parts. Actual practice +forced into daylight those numberless little defects which theory only +too easily overlooks; but there was no lack of perseverance and +ingenuity on the part of the directing engineers; one by one the +obstacles were met, encountered, and eventually overcome, and the +machines at last arrived at the state of precision and perfection at +which they may be seen to-day. About the month of May, 1861, the work +was suspended for about a month, in consequence of a derangement in +the canal supplying water to the compressors; and it was considered +necessary to construct a large reservoir on the flank of the mountain, +to act as a deposit for the impurities contained in the water, and +which often caused serious inconvenience in the compressors. In the +whole of the first year 1861, the number of working days was two +hundred and nine, and the advance made was but one hundred and seventy +metres (five hundred and fifty feet), or about eighteen inches per day +of twenty-four hours, an amount less than might have been done by +manual labor in the same time. In the year 1862, however, in the three +hundred and twenty-five days of actual work, the advance made was +raised to three hundred and eighty metres (one thousand two hundred +and thirty-five feet), giving a mean advance of 1.17 metres, or about +three feet nine inches per day. In the year 1863, the length done +(always referring to the South or Bardonnêche side) was raised to +above four hundred metres; and no doubt this year a still greater +progress will have been made. +</p> +<p> +At the Fourneaux or Northern end of the tunnel—owing to increased +difficulties peculiar to the locality—the perforation of the gallery +was much delayed. A totally different system of mechanism for the +compression of air was necessitated; and it was not before the 25th of +January, 1863, that the boring-machine was in <i>successful</i> operation on +this side, or two years later than at Bardonnêche. The experience, +however, gained at this latter place, and the transfer of a few +skilful workmen, soon raised the advance <a name="65">{65}</a> made per day to an +amount equivalent to that effected at the Southern entrance. Thus, on +the South side (omitting the first year, 1861) since the beginning of +1862, and on the North side since the beginning of 1863, the new +system of mechanical tunnelling may be said to have been in regular +and <i>successful</i> operation. +</p> +<p> +In the beginning of September of this year were completed in all three +thousand five hundred and seventy metres of gallery. From this we +deduct sixteen hundred metres done by manual labor, leaving, for the +work done by the machines, a length of nineteen hundred and seventy +metres. From this we can make a further deduction of the one hundred +and seventy metres executed in the first year of experiment and trial +at Bardonnêche, so that we have eighteen hundred metres in length +excavated by the machines in a time dating from the beginning of 1862 +at the South end, and from the beginning of 1863 at the North end of +the tunnel. Thus, up to the month of September, 1864, we have in all +four years and six months; and eighteen hundred metres divided by 4.5 +gives us four hundred metres as the rate of progress per year at each +side, or in total, eight hundred metres per year. Basing our +calculation, then, on this rate, we find that the eight thousand six +hundred and fifty metres yet to be excavated will require about ten +and a half more years; so that we may look forward to the opening of +the Mont Cenis tunnel at about the year 1875. The directing engineers, +who have given good proof of competency and skill, are, however, of +opinion that this period may be considerably reduced, unless some +totally unlooked-for obstacles are met with in the interior of the +mountain. As has been indicated above, sixteen hundred metres in +length of the tunnel was completed by manual labor before the +introduction of the mechanical boring-engines, in a period of five +years at the North and three years at the South side, equal to four +years at each end; and eight hundred metres in four years gives us two +hundred metres per year, or just one-half excavated by the machine in +the same period. +</p> +<p> +In using the machines, up to the present time, a perfect ventilation +of the tunnel has been secured by the compressed air escaping from the +exhaust of the boring-engines; or by jets of air expressly impinged +into the lower end of the gallery to clear out rapidly the smoke and +vapor formed by the explosion of the mine. It should be remembered, +moreover, that in working a gallery of this kind, where vertical +shafts are impossible, by manual labor, a powerful and costly +air-compressing apparatus would have been necessary for the +ventilation of the tunnel alone, so that the economy of the system, as +applied at the Mont Cenis over the general system of tunnelling in +hard rock, is evident. I propose, in the second portion of this +article, to give a short description of the machinery employed and the +system of working adopted, both at the South and North ends of the +Mont Cenis gallery. +</p> +<br> +<h2>II.</h2> +<p> +Travellers who are given to pedestrian exercises may easily visit the +works being carried on for the perforation of the tunnel through the +Alps, both at Bardonnêche and at Modane, passing from one mouth of the +tunnel to the other by the Colle di Frejus; and in fine weather, the +tourist would not repent the eight hours spent in walking from +Bardonnêche to Susa—a distance of about twenty-five miles. The road +descends the valley of the Dora Ripari, and abounds in beautiful +scenery. The railway to be constructed along this narrow defile will +be found to tax the skill of the engineer as much as any road yet +attempted. Its total length, from the terminus at Susa to the mouth of +the Mont Cenis tunnel, will be forty kilometres, <a name="66">{66}</a> or about +twenty-four miles; and the difference of level between these two +points is about two thousand five hundred feet, the line having a +maximum gradient of one in forty, and a minimum of one in eighty-four. +There will be three tunnels of importance, having a total length of +about ten thousand feet; three others of lesser dimensions, having a +total length of five thousand five hundred feet; and twelve other +small tunnels, of lengths varying from two hundred and twenty to eight +hundred and fifty feet, their total length being five thousand four +hundred feet. Thus, the total length of tunnel on these twenty-four +miles of railway will be nearly twenty-one thousand feet, or about +four miles—just one-sixth of the whole line. There will also be +several examples of bridges and retaining walls of unusual dimensions. +</p> +<p> +The works being carried on at Bardonnêche are on a larger scale than +at Modane; so we will, with our readers' permission, suppose ourselves +arrived in company at the former place, and the first point which we +will visit together will be the large house containing the +air-compressing machinery. Before entering, however, we will throw a +glance at the exterior of the building. We find before us, as it were, +<i>two</i> houses, in a direct line one with the other—one situated at the +foot of a steep ascent; and the other at about seventy or eighty feet +above it, on the side of the mountain. These two houses are, however, +but <i>one</i>, being joined by ten rows of inclined arch-work. Along the +summit of each row of arches is a large iron pipe, more than a foot in +diameter. These ten pipes, inclined at an angle of about forty-five +degrees, come out of the side of the upper house, and enter the side +of the lower house, and serve to conduct the water from the large +reservoir above to the air-compressing machinery, which is arranged in +the house below, exerting in this machinery the pressure of a column +of water eighty-four feet six inches in height. On entering the +compression-room, we have before us ten compressing-machines, +precisely the same in all their parts—five on the right hand, and five +on the left, forming, as it were, two groups of five each. In the +centre of these two groups are two machines, in every respect like a +couple of small steam-engines, only they are worked by compressed air +instead of steam, and which we will call <i>aereomotori</i>. Each of these +aereomotori imparts a rotary motion to a horizontal axis extending +along the whole length of the room, and on which are a series of cams, +which regulate the movements of the valves of the great compressors. +This axis we will call the "main shaft." One group of five compressors +is totally independent of the other, and has its aereomotore with its +main shaft; but still, with one single aereomotore, by means of a +simple connecting apparatus, it is possible to work one or the other +group separately, or both together; also, any number of the ten +compressors can be disconnected for repairs without affecting the +action of the rest, or may be injured without conveying any injury to +the others. In front of each of the ten compressors are placed +cylindrical recipients, in every respect like large steam-boilers, +except that they have no fire-grate or flues, each having a capacity +of seventeen cubic metres, or five hundred and eighty-three cubic +feet. These recipients are put into communication one with the other +by means of a tube similar to a steam-pipe connecting a series of +steam-boilers; and each connection is furnished with a stop-valve, so +that any one recipient can be isolated from the rest. +</p> +<p> +Let us now examine the end and action of this machinery. As the +aereomotori which work the valves of the machines for forcing air into +the recipients are themselves worked by compressed air coming from the +recipients, it is evident that before we can put the +compressing-machines in motion, we must have already some supply of +compressed air in the <a name="67">{67}</a> cylindrical vessels. This supply of air, +compressed to a pressure of six atmospheres, is obtained in the +following manner: Each group of five recipients, filled with air at +the ordinary atmospheric pressure, is put in communication with a +large pipe which enters into a cistern placed in the side of the +mountain at about one hundred and sixty-two feet above the floor of +the compressing-room. The first operation, then, is to open the +equilibrium valves placed at the bottom of the two pipes (one from +each group of recipients); water then rushes into the vessels, +compressing the ordinary air therein contained to about a pressure of +six atmospheres. A communication is now opened between this compressed +air and the cylinders of the aereomotori, which commence their action +precisely as a steam-engine would do on the admission of steam; a +rotary motion is given to the main shaft; and the equilibrium valves, +placed in chambers at the bottom of each of the ten pipes coming from +the cistern of water placed in the house above, are opened. We will +observe the operation in one of the ten lines of action, as it were, +consisting of the pipe conducting the water from the cistern, the +compressing-machine, and the cylindrical recipient. The equilibrium +valve at the bottom of the pipe being opened in the manner above +explained, the water, with its head of eighty-four feet six inches, +rushes past it, along a short length of horizontal pipe (in which is +an exhaust valve, now closed), and begins to mount a vertical column +or tube of cast-iron about ten feet high and two feet in diameter: the +air in this column undergoes compression until it has reached a +pressure sufficient to force open a valve in a pipe issuing from the +summit of the tube, and connecting it with the recipient. This valve +being already weighted with the pressure of the air compressed to six +atmospheres by the means previously explained, a certain quantity of +air is thus forced into the vessel; at this moment, another revolution +of the main shaft causes the equilibrium valve at the bottom of the +conducting-pipe to be shut, and at the same time opens the exhaust +valve at the foot of the vertical column. The head of water being now +cut off, and the exhaust open, the water in the vertical column begins +to sink by its own gravity, leaving a vacuum behind it, if it were not +for a small clack-valve opening inward in the upper part of the +compressing column, which opens by the external pressure of the air, +so that by the time all the water has passed out of the exhaust valve, +the compressor is again full of atmospheric air; the valve in +connection with the recipient being closed by the compressed air +imprisoned in the vessel. The aereomotori continue their motion, +another revolution of the main shaft shuts the exhaust and opens the +equilibrium or admission valve; the column of water is again permitted +to act, and the same action is repeated, more air being forced into +the recipient at each round or <i>pulsation</i> of the machine. Now, +supposing no consumption of the compressed air to take place beyond +that used for driving the aereomotori, it seems evident that the water +in the vessels would be gradually forced out, owing to the growing +pressure of the air inside, above the pressure of the column of water +coming from the higher cistern; but the communication with this higher +cistern is always kept open, the column of water acting, in fact, as a +sort of moderator or governor to the compressing-machine, rising or +falling according to the consumption of the compressed air, and always +insuring that there shall be a pressure of six atmospheres acting +against the valve at the summit of the vertical column. A water-tube +placed on the outside of each group of recipients, with a graduated +scale marked on it, indicates at a glance the consumption of air. If +the perforating-machines in the tunnel cease working, the pressure +augments in the recipients, and the water in them falls until an +equilibrium is established, <a name="68">{68}</a> between the pressure of the column of +water and the force of the compressors, until, in fact, these work +without being able to lift the valve at the summit of the vertical +compressing column. On the other hand, if more air than usual be used +for ventilating the tunnel, or by an accidental leakage in the +conducting-pipes, the water rises rapidly in the recipients, and +consequently in the water-gauge outside, and in thus creating an +equilibrium, indicates the state of things. By this means a continual +compensation of pressure is kept up, which prevents any shock on the +valves, and causes the machine to work with the regularity and +uniformity of a steam-engine provided with a governor. In every turn +of the main shaft, a complete circle of effects take place in the +compressors; and experience has shown that three turns a minute of the +shaft—that is, three <i>pulsations</i> of the compressing-machine per +minute—are sufficient. It will thus be seen that a column of water, +having the great velocity due to a head of eighty-four feet six +inches, acts upon a column of air contained in a vertical tube; the +effect of this velocity being to inject, as it were, a certain +quantity of air into a recipient at each upward stroke of the column, +and at each downward stroke drawing in after it an equivalent quantity +of atmospheric air as a fresh supply. The ten recipients charged with +air compressed to six atmospheres (ninety pounds on the square inch) +in the manner above explained, serve as a reservoir of the force +required for working the boring-engines in the tunnel, and for +ventilating and purifying the gallery. The air is conducted in pipes +about eight inches in diameter, having a thickness of metal of about +three-eighths of an inch. Much doubt had previously been expressed as +to the possibility of conveying compressed air to great distances +without a very great and serious loss of power. The experience gained, +however, at the Mont Cenis has shown that, conveyed to a distance of +thirteen English miles, the loss would be but one-tenth of the +original force; and that the actual measured loss of power in a +distance of six thousand five hundred feet, a little more than a mile +and a quarter, was less than 1-127th of the original pressure in the +recipients. +</p> +<p> +The mouth of the tunnel is but a few hundred yards from the +air-compressing house—we will now proceed thither. For nearly a mile +in length the gallery is completed and lined with masonry. At the +first view, we are struck with the bold outline of its section and its +ample dimensions. Excepting, perhaps, the passage of an occasional +railway-truck, laden with pieces of rock and rubbish, we find nothing +to remind us of the numbers of busy workmen and of the powerful +machines which are laboring in the tunnel. All is perfectly quiet and +solitary. Looking around us as we traverse this first and completed +portion, we observe nothing very different from an ordinary +railway-tunnel, with the exception of the great iron pipe which +conveys the compressed air, and is attached to the side of the wall. +At the end of about a quarter of an hour we begin to hear sounds of +activity, and little lights flickering in the distance indicate that +we are approaching the scene of operations. In a few moments we reach +the second division of the tunnel, or that part which is being +enlarged from the comparatively small section made by the +perforating-machine to its full dimensions, previously to being lined +with masonry. In those portions where the workmen are engaged in the +somewhat dangerous operation of detaching large blocks of stone from +the roof, the tunnel is protected by a ceiling of massive beams, under +which the visitor passes—not, however, without hurrying his pace and +experiencing a feeling of satisfaction when the distance is completed. +Gradually leaving behind us the bee-like crowd of busy miners, with +the eternal ring of their boring-bars against the hard rock, we find +the excavated gallery <a name="69">{69}</a> getting smaller and smaller, and the +difficulties of picking our way increasing at every step; the sounds +behind us get fainter and fainter, and in a short time we are again in +the midst of a profound solitude. +</p> +<p> +The little gallery in which we are now stumbling our way over blocks +of stone and rubbish, only varied by long tracts of thick slush and +pools of water, is the section excavated by the boring-machine—in +dimension about twelve feet broad by eight feet high. The tramway +which has accompanied us all the way is still continued along this +small section. In the middle portion underneath the rails is the +canal, inclined toward the mouth of the tunnel, for carrying off the +water; and in this canal are now collected the pipes for conveying the +compressed air to the machines, and the gas for illuminating the +gallery. At the end of a few minutes, a rattling, jingling sound +indicates that we are near the end of our excursion, and that we are +approaching the perforating-machines. On arriving, we find that nearly +the whole of the little gallery is taken up by the engine, the frame +of which, mounted upon wheels, rests upon the main tramway, so that +the whole can be moved backward or forward as necessary. On examining +the arrangement a little closely, we find that in reality we have +before us nine or ten perforators, completely independent of one +another, all mounted on one frame, and each capable of movement in any +direction. Attached to every one of them are two flexible tubes, one +for conveying the compressed air, and the other the water which is +injected at every blow or stroke of the tool into the hole, for the +purpose of clearing out the debris and for cooling the point of the +"jumper." In front, directed against the rock, are nine or ten tubes +(according to the number of perforators), very similar in appearance +to large gun-barrels, out of which are discharged with great rapidity +an equal number of boring-bars or jumpers. Motion is given to these +jumpers by the direct admission of a blast of compressed air behind +them, the return stroke being effected by a somewhat slighter pressure +of air than was used to drive them forward. We will suppose the +machine brought up for the commencement of an attack. The points most +convenient for the boring of the holes having been selected, the nine +or ten perforators, as the case may be, are carefully adjusted in +front of them. The compressed air is then admitted, and the boring of +the holes commences. On an average, at the end of about three-quarters +of an hour, the nine or ten holes are pierced to a depth of two feet +to two feet six inches. Another ten holes are then commenced, and so +on, until about eighty holes are pierced. The greater number of these +holes are driven toward the centre of the point of attack, and the +rest round the perimeter. The driving of these eighty holes to an +average depth of two feet three inches, is usually completed in about +seven hours, and the second operation is then commenced. +</p> +<p> +The flexible tubes conveying the compressed air and the water are +detached from the machines, and placed in security in the covered +canal. The perforating-machine, mounted on its frame or truck, is +drawn back on the tramway behind two massive folding-doors of wood. +Miners then advance and charge the holes in the centre with powder, +and adjust the matches; fire is given, and the miners retire behind +the folding-doors, which are closed. The explosion opens a breach in +the centre part of the front of attack. Powerful jets of compressed +air are now injected, to clear off the smoke formed by the powder. As +soon as the gallery is clear, the other holes in the perimeter are +charged and fired, and more air is injected. Then comes the third +operation. Gangs of workmen advance and clear away the debris and +blocks of stone detached by the explosion of the mine, in little +wagons running on a pair of rails placed by the side of the main +tramway. This done, the main line is <a name="70">{70}</a> prolonged to the requisite +distance, and the perforating engine is again brought forward for a +fresh attack. Thus, we have three distinct operations—first, the +mechanical perforation of the holes; secondly, the charging and +explosion of the mine; and thirdly, the clearing away of the debris. +By careful registers kept since the commencement of the work, it is +found that the mean duration of each successive operation is as +follows: for the perforation of the holes, seven hours thirty-nine +minutes; for the charging and explosion of the mine, three hours +twenty-nine minutes; for the clearing away of the debris, two hours +thirty-three minutes; or, in all, nearly fourteen hours. Occasionally, +however, the three operations may be completed in ten hours, all +depending upon the hardness of the rock. It has been found practically +more expeditious to make two series of operations in twenty-four +hours. +</p> +<p> +Whatever may be the nature of the rock, if it is very hard, the depth +of the holes is reduced; that is, the perforation is only continued +for a certain given time—about six and a half hours—which, for the +eighty holes with ten perforaters, gives us about three-quarters of an +hour for each hole. The rock is generally of calcareous schist, +crystallized, and exceedingly hard, traversed by thick veins of +quartz, which often break the points of the boring-tools after a few +blows. Each jumper gives about three blows per second, and makes +one-eighteenth of a revolution on its axis at each blow, or one +complete revolution every six seconds. Thus, in the three-quarters of +an hour necessary to drive a single hole to the depth of twenty-seven +inches, we have four hundred and fifty revolutions of the bar, and +eighteen hundred violent blows given by the point against the hard +rock, and that under an impulse of about one hundred and eighty +pounds. These figures will give us some idea of the wear and tear of +the perforating-machines. It is calculated that on an average one +perforating-machine is worn out for every six metres of gallery, so +that more than two thousand will be consumed before the completion of +the tunnel. The total length completed at the Bardonnêche side at the +present time is just two thousand three hundred metres, or nearly a +mile and a half. +</p> +<p> +At the north or Modane end, the mechanical perforators are precisely +the same as at Bardonnêche, as also is the system of working in the +gallery. The machinery for the compression of air, however, is very +different, more simple, and in every way an improvement upon that at +the South end. Not finding any convenient means of obtaining a head of +eighty-four feet of water sufficient in quantity for working a series +of compressors, as at Bardonnêche, there has been established at +Modane a system of direct compression, the necessary force for which +is derived from the current of the Arc. Six large water-wheels moved +by this current give a reciprocating motion to a piston contained in a +large horizontal cylinder of cast iron. This piston, having a column +of water on each side of it, raises and lowers alternately these two +columns, in two vertical tubes about ten feet high, compressing the +air in each tube alternately, and forcing a certain quantity, at each +upward stroke of the water, to enter into a cylindrical recipient. +There is very little loss of water in this machine, which in its +action is very like a large double-barreled common air-pump. It is a +question open to science whether the employment of compressed air for +driving the perforating engines in a work such as is in operation at +the Mont Cenis, could not be advantageously and economically exchanged +for the employment of a direct hydraulic motive force, the ventilation +of the tunnel being provided for by other means. The system, however, +employed at Modane has many advantages, which it is impossible to +overlook, and its complete success has given a marked and decided +impulse to the modern science of tunnelling through hard rock. +</p> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="71">{71}</a> +<br> +<h2>Translated from the Civiltà Cattolica. +<br><br> +ON THE UNITY OF TYPE IN THE ANIMAL KINGDOM. +<br><br> +I.</h2> +<br> +<p> +The generation of a human creature takes place neither by the +development of a being which is found in the germ, sketched as it were +like a miniature, nor by a sudden formation or an instantaneous +transition from potential to actual existence. It is effected by the +true production of a new being, which pre-exists only virtually in the +activity of the germ communicated by the conceiver, and the successive +transformation of the potential subject. +</p> +<p> +This truth, an <i>a priori</i> postulate of philosophy, and demonstrated by +physiology <i>a posteriori</i>, was illustrated by us in a preceding +article. Here we must discard an error which has sprung from this +truth. For there have been materialists who maintained that there was +but one type in the whole animal kingdom, that is, <i>man</i>, as he unites +in himself in the highest possible degree perfection of organism and +delicacy of feelings; and that all the species of inferior animals +were so many stages in the development of that most perfect type. This +opinion is thus expressed by Milne-Edwards in his highly esteemed +lectures on the Physiology and Comparative Anatomy of Man and Animals: +</p> +<p class="cite"> + "Every organized being undergoes in its development deep and various + modifications. The character of the anatomical structure, no less than + its vital faculties, changes as it passes from the state of embryo + to that of a perfect animal in its own species. Now all the animals + which are derived from the same type move during a certain time in + the same embryonic road, and resemble each other in that process of + organization during a certain period of time, the longer as their + zoological relationship is closer; afterward they deviate from the + common road and each acquires the properties belonging to it. Those + that are to have a more perfect structure proceed further than those + whose organization is completed at less cost. It results from this + that the transitory or embryonic state of a superior animal + resembles, in a more or less wonderful manner, the permanent state + of another animal lower in the same zoological series. Some authors + have thought right to conclude from this that the diversity of + species proceeds from a series of stages of this kind taking place + at different degrees of the embryonic development; and these + writers, falling into the exaggerations to which imitators are + especially liable, have held that every superior animal, in order to + reach its definitive form, must pass through the series of the + proper forms of animals which are its inferiors in the zoological + hierarchy; so that man, for instance, before he is born, is at first + a kind of worm, then a mollusk, then a fish, or something like it, + before he can assume the characters belonging to his species. An + eminent professor has recently expressed these views in a concise + form, saying that the embryology of the most perfect being is a + comparative transitory anatomy, and that the anatomic table of the + whole animal kingdom is a fixed and permanent representation of the + movable aspect of human organogeny." +</p> +<p> +Thus, according to this opinion, man is the only type of animal life; +and every inferior species is but an imitation, more or less perfect, +of the same; an inchoation stopped in its course at a greater or +shorter distance from the term to which the work of nature tends in +its organization of the human embryo. In short, an <a name="72">{72}</a> <i>entoma in +difetto</i>, to use the language of Dante. +</p> +<p> +The doctrine is not new in the scientific world. It was proclaimed in +the last century by Robinet, who held that all inferior beings are but +so many proofs or sketches upon which nature practises in order to +learn how to form man. In the beginning of the present century +Lamarck, in Germany, following Kielmayer, reproduced the same theory. +According to him all the species of animals inferior to man are but so +many lower steps at which the human embryo stops in its gradual +development. Man, on the contrary, is the last term reached by nature +after she has travelled all through the zoological scale, to fit +herself for that work. About the same time the celebrated naturalist, +Stephen Geoffroy Saint Hilaire, began to disseminate in France +analogous ideas under the name of <i>stages of development</i> (<i>arrêt de +devéloppement)</i>; and these ideas, exaggerated by some of his +disciples, amounted in their minds to the same doctrine of Lamarck, +just alluded to. Among them Professor Serres holds the first rank, and +it is to him that Milne-Edwards alludes in the passage just cited. He +expresses himself thus: +</p> +<p class="cite"> + "Human organogeny is a comparative transitory anatomy, as + comparative anatomy is the fixed and permanent state of the + organogeny of man; and, on the contrary, if we reverse the + proposition, or method of investigation, and study animal life from + the lowest to the highest, instead of considering it from the + highest to the lowest, we shall see that the organisms of the series + reproduce incessantly those of the embryos, and fix themselves in + that state which for animals becomes the term of their development. + The long series of changes of form presented by the same organism in + comparative anatomy is but the reproduction of the numerous series + of transformations to which this organism is subjected in the embryo + in the course of its development. In the embryo the passage is + rapid, in virtue of the power of the life which animates it; in the + animal the life of the organism is exhausted, and it stops there, + because it is not permitted to follow the course traced for the + human embryo. Distinct stages on the one hand, progressive advance + on the other, here is the secret of development, the fundamental + difference which the human mind can perceive between comparative + anatomy and organogeny. The animal series thus considered in its + organisms is but a long chain of embryos which succeed each other + gradually and at intervals, reaching at last man, who thus finds his + physical development in comparative organogeny." +</p> +<p> +Thus speaks Serres. And in another place: +</p> +<p class="cite"> + "The whole animal kingdom appears only like one animal in the course + of formation in the different organisms. It stops here sooner, there + later, and thus at the time of each interruption determines, by the + state in which it then is, the distinctive and organized characters + of classes, families, genera, and species." +</p> +<br> +<h2>II. +<br><br> +THIS OPINION REFUTED BY PHILOSOPHICAL REASONS.</h2> +<br> +<p> +The futility of the above doctrine is manifest, in the first place, +from the weakness of the foundation on which it rests. That foundation +is no other than a kind of likeness which appears at first sight +between the rudimental forms which, in the first steps of its +development, are assumed by the human embryo, and the forms of some +inferior animals. For the germ, by the very reason that it has not, as +it was once believed, all the organism of the human body in +microscopic proportions, but in order to acquire it must pass from +potential to actual existence—by that very reason, is <a name="73">{73}</a> subjected +to continual metamorphoses, that is, to successive transformations, +which give it different aspects, from that of a little disc to the +perfect human figure. Now, it is clear that, in this gradual +transition from the mere power to the act of perfect organization, a +kind of analogy or likeness to some of the numberless forms of +inferior organizations of the animal kingdom may, and must, be found +in its intermediate and incomplete state. +</p> +<p> +But, evidently, between analogy and identity there is an immense +difference; and the fact of there being an analogy with some of those +forms, gives us no right to infer that there is one with all. Hence +this theory is justly despised by the most celebrated naturalists as +the whim of an extravagant fancy. +</p> +<p> +"According to Lamarck," says Frédault, in speaking of this, theory, +"all the animals are but inferior grades at which the human germ +stopped in its development, and man is but the result of the last +efforts of a nature which has passed successively through the grades +of its novitiate, and has arrived at the last term of its perfection. +Presented in this view, the doctrine of epigenesis raised against +itself the most simple and scientific common sense, as being +manifestly erroneous. Numerous works on the development of the germ +have demonstrated that appearances were taken for realities, and that +imagination had created a real romance. It has been proved that if, at +certain epochs of its development, the human germ has a distant +resemblance either to a worm or a reptile, such resemblance is very +remote, and that on this point we must believe as much as we would +believe of the assertion of a man who, looking at the clouds, should +say that he could discover the palaces and gardens of Armida, with +horsemen and armies, and all that a heated imagination might fancy." +</p> +<p> +However, laying aside all that, the opinion which we are now examining +originates, with those who uphold it, in a total absence of +philosophical conceptions. That strange idea of the unity of type and +of its stages, in order to establish the forms of inferior animals, +would never have risen in the mind of any one who had duly considered +the immutability of essences and the reason of the formation of a +thing. The act of making differs from the thing made only as the means +differs from the end. Both belong to the same order—one implies +movement, the other rest. Their difference lies only in this: that +what in the term is unfolded and complete, in its progress toward the +term is found to be only sketched out, and having a tendency to +formation. Hence it follows that, whatever the point of view from +which we consider the embryo of each animal, it is nothing else but +the total organism of the same in the course of formation; and, +therefore, it differs as substantially from every other organism as +the term itself toward which it proceeds. And what we affirm of the +whole organism must be said of each of its parts, which are +essentially related to the whole and follow the nature of the whole. +The first rudiments, for instance, of the hands of man could not +properly be compared to the wings of a bird. As they are hands after +being made, so they are hands in the process of formation; as their +structure is different, so is their being immutable. +</p> +<p> +Whatever may be the likeness between the first appearances of the +human embryo and the forms of lower animals, they are not the effect +of a stable existence, but of a transitory and shifting existence, +which does not constitute a species, but is merely and essentially a +movement toward the formation of the species. On the contrary, the +forms presented by animals already constituted in their being belong +to a stable and permanent existence, which diversifies one species +from another. The difference, then, between the former and the latter +is interior and substantial, and cannot be changed into exterior and +accidental, as it would be if it consisted in <a name="74">{74}</a> stopping or in +travelling further on. The movement or tendency which takes place in +the germ to become another thing until the said germ assumes a perfect +organization relative to the being it must produce, is not a quality +which can be discarded, since it is intimately combined with the +subject itself in which it is found. The essence itself must be +changed in it in order to obtain stability and consistency. But if the +essence be changed, we are out of the question, since in that case we +should have, not the human embryo arrested at this or that stage on +its road, but a different being substituted for it; of analogous +exterior appearance, perhaps, but substantially different, which would +constitute an annual of inferior degree. +</p> +<p> +In short, each animal is circumscribed in its own species, like every +other being in nature. If to reach to the perfection required by its +independent existence it needs development, every step in that journey +is an inchoation of the next, and cannot exist but as such. To change +its nature and to make it a permanent being, is as impossible as to +change one essence into another. +</p> +<p> +Again: From the opinion we are refuting it would follow that all +animals, man excepted, are so many monsters, since they are nothing +else but deviations, for want of ulterior development, from what +nature really intends to do as a term of its action. Thus anomaly is +converted into law, disorder into order, an accidental case into a +constant fact. +</p> +<p> +Finally, in that hypothesis we should have to affirm not only that the +inferior and more imperfect species appeared on earth before the +nobler and the more akin to the unique and perfect type, but also that +on the appearance of a more perfect species the preceding one had +disappeared; being inferior in the scale of perfection. For what other +reason could be alleged for nature's stopping at a bird when it +intends to make a man, but that the causes are not properly disposed, +or that circumstances are not quite favorable to the production of +that perfect animal? Then when the causes are ready, and the +circumstances propitious, it is necessary that man be fashioned and +that the bird disappear. Now all that is contrary to experience. For +all the species, together with the type, are of the same date, and we +see them born constantly in the same circumstances which are common to +all, either of temperature or atmosphere or latitude, etc. +</p> +<p> +The theory, then, of the unity of type in the animal kingdom and of +stages of development falls to the ground, if we only look at it from +a philosophical point of view. +</p> +<br> + +<h2>III. +<br><br> +IT IS REFUTED BY PHYSIOLOGICAL REASONS.</h2> +<br> +<p> +However, physiological arguments have more force in this matter than +the philosophical; since they are more closely connected with the +subject, and have in their favor the tangible evidence of fact. +</p> +<p> +We shall take our arguments from three celebrated naturalists as the +representatives of an immense number, whom want of space forbids us to +quote. +</p> +<p> +Flourens shows the error of that opinion by referring to the diversity +of the nervous system. The nervous system is the foundation of the +animal organism; it is the general instrument of vital functions, of +sensation, and of motion. If then one archetypal idea presides over +the formation of the different organisms, only one nervous system +ought to appear in each, more or less developed or arrested. But +experience teaches us the contrary. It shows nervous systems differing +in different animals ordained to different functions, each perfect in +its kind. "Is there a unity of type?" asks this celebrated naturalist. +"To say that there is but one type is to say that there is but one +form of <a name="75">{75}</a> nervous system; because the form of the nervous system +determines the type; that is, it determines the general form of the +animal. Now, can we affirm that there is but one form of nervous +system? Can we hold that the nervous system of the zoophyte is the +same as that of the mollusk, and this latter the same as that of the +articulata, or this again the same as that of the vertebrata? And if +we cannot say that there is only one nervous system, can we affirm +that there is only one type?" +</p> +<p> +He speaks likewise of the unity of plan. Every creature is built +differently, and the difference is especially striking between members +of the several grand divisions of the animal kingdom. The plan then of +each is different, and so is the typical idea which prescribes its +formation. No animal can then be considered as the proof or outline of +another. +</p> +<p> +"Is there a unity of plan? The plan is the relative location of the +parts. One can conceive very well the unity of plan without the unity +of number; for it is sufficient that all the parts, whatever their +number may be, keep always relatively to each other the same place. +But can one say that the vertebrate animal, whose nervous system is +placed above the digestive canal, is fashioned after the same plan as +the mollusk, whose digestive canal is placed above the nervous system? +Can one say that the crustacean, whose heart is placed above the +spinal marrow, is fashioned after the same pattern as the vertebrate, +whose spinal marrow is placed above the heart? Is the relative +location of the parts maintained? On the contrary, is it not +overthrown? And if there is a change in the location of parts, how is +there a unity of plan?" +</p> +<p> +Müller draws nearer to the consideration of the development of the +human embryo, and forcibly illustrates the falsehood of the pretended +theory. "It is not long since it was held with great seriousness that +the human foetus, before reaching its perfect state, travels +<i>successively</i> though the different degrees of development which are +permanent during the whole life of animals of inferior classes. That +hypothesis has not the least foundation, as Baer has shown. The human +embryo never resembles a radiate, or an insect, or a mollusk, or a +worm. The plan of formation of those animals is quite different from +that of the vertebrate. Man then might at most resemble these last, +since he himself is a vertebrate, and his organization is fashioned +after the common type of this great division of the animal kingdom. +But he does not even resemble at one time a fish, at another a +reptile, a bird, etc. The analogy is no greater between him and a +reptile or a bird, than it is between all vertebrate animals. During +the first stages of their formation, all the embryos of vertebrate +animals present merely the simplest and most general delineations of +the type of a vertebrate; hence it is that they resemble each other so +much as to render it very difficult to distinguish them. The fish, the +reptile, the bird, the mammal, and man are at first the simplest +expression of a type common to all; but in proportion as they grow, +the general resemblance becomes fainter and fainter, and their +extremities, for instance, after being alike for a certain time, +assume the characters of wings, of hands, of feet, etc." +</p> +<p> +Mr. Milne-Edwards takes the same view of embryonic generation: +</p> +<p class="cite"> + "I agree with Geoffrey Saint Hilaire, that often a great analogy is + observed between the final state of certain parts of the bodies of + some inferior animals, and the embryonic state of the same parts of + other animals belonging to the same type the organism of which is + further developed, and with the same philosopher, I call the cause + of the state of permanent inferiority arrests of development. But I + am far from thinking with some of his disciples that the embryo of + man or of mammals exhibits in its different degrees of formation the + species of the less perfect of animate creation. No! a <a name="76">{76}</a> mollusk + or an anhelid is not the embryo of a mammal, arrested in its organic + development, any more than the mammal is a kind of fish perfected. + Each animal carries within itself, from the very origin, the + beginning of its specific individuality, and the development of its + organism, in conformity to the general outline of the plan of + structure proper to its species, is always a condition of its + existence. There is never a complete likeness between an adult + animal and the embryo of another, between one of its organs and the + transitory state of the same in the course of formation; and the + multiplicity of the products of creation could never be explained by + a similar transmutation of species. We shall see hereafter, that in + every zoological group composed of animals which seem to be derived + from a common fundamental type, the different species do not exhibit + at first any marked difference, but soon begin to be marked by + various particularities of constructure always growing and numerous. + Thus each species acquires a character of its own, which + distinguishes it from all others in the way of development, and each + of its organs becomes different from the analogous part of every + other embryo. But the changes which the organs and the whole being + undergo after they have deviated from the common genesiac form, are + generally speaking the less considerable in proportion as the animal + is destined to receive a less perfect organism, and consequently + they retain a kind of resemblance to those transitory forms." +</p> +<p> +Reason then and experience, theory and fact, philosophy and +physiology, agree in protesting against the arbitrary doctrine of the +unity of type in the animal kingdom; a doctrine which has its origin +in an absence of sound scientific notions and a superficial +observation of the phenomena of nature. Through the former defect men +failed to consider that if the end of each animal species is +different, different also must be its being, and therefore a different +type must preside as a rule and supreme law over the formation of the +being. By the latter, some very slight and partial analogies have been +mistaken for identity and universality, and mere appearances have been +assumed as realities. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>From Blackwood's Magazine. +<br><br> +DOMINE, QUO VADIS? [Footnote 6] +<br><br> +BY P. S. WORSLEY.</h2> +<br> + [Footnote 6: See Mrs. Jameson's "Sacred and Legendary Art," p. 180.] +<br> +<pre> + There stands in the old Appian Way, + Two miles without the Roman wall, + A little ancient church, and grey: + Long may it moulder not nor fall! + There hangs a legend on the name + One reverential thought may claim. + + 'Tis written of that fiery time, + When all the angered evil powers + Leagued against Christ for wrath and crime, + How Peter left the accursed towers, + Passing from out the guilty street, + And shook the red dust from his feet. + +<a name="77">{77}</a> + + Sole pilgrim else in that lone road, + Suddenly he was 'ware of one + Who toiled beneath a weary load, + Bare-headed, in the heating sun, + Pale with long watches, and forespent + With harm and evil accident. + + Under a cross his weak limbs bow, + Scarcely his sinking strength avails. + A crown of thorns is on his brow, + And in his hands the print of nails. + So friendless and alone in shame, + One like the Man of Sorrows came. + + Read in her eyes who gave thee birth + That loving, tender, sad rebuke; + Then learn no mother on this earth, + How dear soever, shaped a look + So sweet, so sad, so pure as now + Came from beneath that holy brow. + + And deeply Peter's heart it pierced; + Once had he seen that look before; + And even now, as at the first, + It touched, it smote him to the core. + Bowing his head, no word save three + He spoke—<i>"Quo vadis, Domine?"</i> + + Then, as he looked up from the ground, + His Saviour made him answer due— + "My son, to Rome I go, thorn-crowned, + There to be crucified anew; + Since he to whom I gave my sheep + Leaves them for other men to keep." + + Then the saint's eyes grew dim with tears. + He knelt, his Master's feet to kiss— + "I vexed my heart with faithless fears; + Pardon thy servant, Lord, for this." + Then rising up—but none was there— + No voice, no sound, in earth or air. + + Straightway his footsteps he retraced, + As one who hath a work to do. + Back through the gates he passed with haste, + Silent, alone and full in view; + And lay forsaken, save of One, + In dungeon deep ere set of sun. + +<a name="78">{78}</a> + + Then he who once, apart from ill, + Nor taught the depth of human tears, + Girded himself and walked at will, + As one rejoicing in the years, + Girded of others, scorned and slain, + Passed heavenward through the gates of pain. + + If any bear a heart within, + Well may these walls be more than stone, + And breathe of peace and pardoned sin + To him who grieveth all alone. + Return, faint heart, and strive thy strife; + Fight, conquer, grasp the crown of life. +</pre> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>From The Month. +<br><br> +CONSTANCE SHERWOOD. +<br><br> +AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY. +<br><br> +BY LADY GEORGIANA FULLERTON. +<br><br><br> + +CHAPTER I.</h2> +<br> +<p> +I had not thought to write the story of my life; but the wishes of +those who have at all times more right to command than occasion to +entreat aught at my hands, have in a manner compelled me thereunto. +The divers trials and the unlooked-for comforts which have come to my +lot during the years that I have been tossed to and fro on this uneasy +sea—the world—have wrought in my soul an exceeding sense of the +goodness of God, and an insight into the meaning of the sentence in +Holy Writ which saith, "His ways are not as our ways, nor his thoughts +like unto our thoughts." And this puts me in mind that there are +sayings which are in every one's mouth, and therefore not to be +lightly gainsayed, which nevertheless do not approve themselves to my +conscience as wholly just and true. Of these is the common adage, +"That misfortunes come not alone." For my own part, I have found that +when a cross has been laid on me, it has mostly been a single one, and +that other sorrows were oftentimes removed, as if to make room for it. +And it has been my wont, when one trial has been passing away, to look +out for the next, even as on a stormy day, when the clouds have rolled +away in one direction and sunshine is breaking overhead, we see others +rising in the distance. There has been no portion of my life free from +some measure of grief or fear sufficient to recall the words that "Man +is born to trouble as the sparks fly upward;" and none so reft of +consolation that, in the midst of suffering, I did not yet cry out, +"The Lord is my shepherd; his rod and his staff comfort me." +</p> +<p> +I was born in the year 1557, in a very fair part of England, at +Sherwood Hall, in the county of Stafford. For its comely aspect, +commodious chambers, sunny gardens, and the sweet walks in its +vicinity, it was as commendable a residence for persons of moderate +fortune and contented minds as can well be thought of. Within and +without this my paternal home nothing was wanting which might please +the eye, or minister to <a name="79">{79}</a> tranquillity of mind and healthful +recreation. I reckon it amongst the many favors I have received from a +gracious Providence, that the earlier years of my life were spent +amidst such fair scenes, and in the society of parents who ever took +occasion from earthly things to lead my thoughts to such as are +imperishable, and so to stir up in me a love of the Creator, who has +stamped his image on this visible world in characters of so great +beauty; whilst in the tenderness of those dear parents unto myself I +saw, as it were, a type and representation of his paternal love and +goodness. +</p> +<p> +My father was of an ancient family, and allied to such as were of +greater note and more wealthy than his own. He had not, as is the +manner with many squires of our days, left off residing on his own +estate in order to seek after the shows and diversions of London; but +had united to a great humility of mind and a singular affection for +learning a contentedness of spirit which inclined him to dwell in the +place assigned to him by Providence. He had married at an early age, +and had ever conformed to the habits of his neighbors in all lawful +and kindly ways, and sought no other labors but such as were +incidental to the care of his estates, and no recreations but those of +study, joined to a moderate pursuit of field-sports and such social +diversions as the neighborhood afforded. His outward appearance was +rather simple than showy, and his manners grave and composed. When I +call to mind the singular modesty of his disposition, and the +retiredness of his manners, I often marvel how the force of +circumstances and the urging of conscience should have forced one so +little by nature inclined to an unsettled mode of life into one which, +albeit peaceful in its aims, proved so full of danger and disquiet. +</p> +<p> +My mother's love I enjoyed but for a brief season. Not that it waxed +cold toward me, as happens with some parents, who look with fondness +on the child and less tenderly on the maiden; but it pleased Almighty +God to take her unto himself when I was but ten years of age. Her face +is as present to me now as any time of my life. No limner's hand ever +drew a more faithful picture than the one I have of her even now +engraved on the tablet of my heart. She had so fair and delicate a +complexion that I can only liken it to the leaf of a white rose with +the lightest tinge of pink in it. Her hair was streaked with gray too +early for her years; but this matched well with the sweet melancholy +of her eyes, which were of a deep violet color. Her eyelids were a +trifle thick, and so were her lips; but there was a pleasantness in +her smile and the dimples about her mouth such as I have not noticed +in any one else. She had a sweet womanly and loving heart, and the +noblest spirit imaginable; a great zeal in the service of God, +tempered with so much sweetness and cordiality that she gave not +easily offence to any one, of howsoever different a way of thinking +from herself; and either won them over to her faith through the +suavity of her temper and the wisdom of her discourse, or else worked +in them a personal liking which made them patient with her, albeit +fierce with others. When I was about seven years of age I noticed that +she waxed thin and pale, and that we seldom went abroad, and walked +only in our own garden and orchard. She seemed glad to sit on a bench +on the sunny side of the house even in summer, and on days when by +reason of the heat I liked to lie down in the shade. My parents +forbade me from going into the village; and, through the perverseness +common to too many young people, on account of that very prohibition I +longed for liberty to do so, and wearied oftentimes of the solitude we +lived in. At a later period I learnt how kind had been their intent in +keeping me during the early years of childhood from a knowledge of the +woeful divisions which the late changes in religion had wrought in our +country; which I might easily have heard from <a name="80">{80}</a> young companions, +and maybe in such sort as to awaken angry feelings, and shed a drop of +bitter in the crystal cup of childhood's pure faith. If we did walk +abroad, it was to visit some sick persons, and carry them food or +clothing or medicines, which my mother prepared with her own hands. +But as she grew weaker, we went less often outside the gates, and the +poor came themselves to fetch away what in her bounty she stored up +for them. I did not notice that our neighbors looked unkindly on us +when we were seen in the village. Children would cry out sometimes, +but half in play, "Down with the Papists!" but I witnessed that their +elders checked them, especially those of the poorer sort; and "God +bless you, Mrs. Sherwood!" and "God save you, madam!" was often in +their mouths, as she whom I loved with so great and reverent an +affection passed alongside of them, or stopped to take breath, leaning +against their cottage-palings. +</p> +<p> +Many childish heartaches I can even now remember when I was not +suffered to join in the merry sports of the 1st of May; for then, as +the poet Chaucer sings, the youths and maidens go +</p> +<p class="cite"> + "To fetch the flowers fresh and branch and bloom,<br> + And these, rejoicing in their great delight,<br> + Eke each at other throw the blossoms bright." +</p> +<p> +I watched the merry wights as they passed our door on their way to the +groves and meadows, singing mirthful carols, and bent on pleasant +pastimes; and tears stood in my eyes as the sound of their voices died +away in the distance. My father found me thus weeping one May-day, and +carried me with him to a sweet spot in a wood, where wild-flowers grew +like living jewels out of the green carpet of moss on which we sat; +and there, as the birds sang from every bough, and the insects hovered +and hummed over every blossom, he entertained me with such quaint and +pleasant tales, and moved me to merry laughter by his witty devices; +so that I set down that day in my book of memory as one of the +joyfullest in all my childhood. At Easter, when the village children +rolled pasch eggs down the smooth sides of the green hills, my mother +would paint me some herself, and adorned them with such bright colors +and rare sentences that I feared to break them with rude handling, and +kept them by me throughout the year, rather as pictures to be gazed on +than toys to be played with in a wanton fashion. +</p> +<p> +On the morning of the Resurrection, when others went to the top of +Cannock Chase to hail the rising sun, as is the custom of those parts, +she would sing so sweetly the psalm which speaketh of the heavens +rejoicing and of the earth being glad, that it grieved me not to stay +at home; albeit I sometimes marvelled that we saw so little company, +and mixed not more freely with our neighbors. +</p> +<p> +When I had reached my ninth birthday, whether it was that I took +better heed of words spoken in my hearing, or else that my parents +thought it was time that I should learn somewhat of the conditions of +the times, and so talked more freely in my presence, it so happened +that I heard of the jeopardy in which many who held the Catholic faith +were, and of the laws which were being made to prohibit in our country +the practice of the ancient religion. When Protestants came to our +house—and it was sometimes hard in those days to tell who were such at +heart, or only in outward semblance out of conformity to the queen's +pleasure—I was strictly charged not to speak in their hearing of aught +that had to do with Catholic faith and worship; and I could see at +such times on my mother's face an uneasy expression, as if she was +ever fearing the next words that any one might utter. +</p> +<p> +In the autumn of that year we had visitors whose company was so great +an honor to my parents, and the occasion of so much delight to myself, +that I can call to mind every little circumstance of their brief +sojourn under our roof, even as if it had taken place but <a name="81">{81}</a> +yesterday. This visit proved the first step toward an intimacy which +greatly affected the tenor of my life, and prepared the way for the +direction it was hereafter to take. +</p> +<p> +These truly honorable and well-beloved guests were my Lady Mounteagle +and her son Mr. James Labourn, who were journeying at that time from +London, where she had been residing at her son-in-law the Duke of +Norfolk's house, to her seat in the country; whither she was carrying +the three children of her daughter, the Duchess of Norfolk, and of +that lady's first husband, the Lord Dacre of the North. The eldest of +these young ladies was of about my own age, and the others younger. +</p> +<p> +The day on which her ladyship was expected, I could not sit with +patience at my tambour-frame, or con my lessons, or play on the +virginals; but watched the hours and the minutes in my great desire to +see these noble wenches. I had not hitherto consorted with young +companions, save with Edmund and John Genings, of whom I shall have +occasion to speak hereafter, who were then my playmates, as at a riper +age friends. I thought, in the quaint way in which children couple one +idea with another in their fantastic imaginations, that my Lady +Mounteagle's three daughters would be like the three angels, in my +mother's missal, who visited Abraham in his tent. +</p> +<p> +I had craved from my mother a holiday, which she granted on the score +that I should help her that forenoon in the making of the pasties and +jellies, which, as far as her strength allowed, she failed not to lend +a hand to; and also she charged me to set the bed-chambers in fair +order, and to gather fresh flowers wherewith to adorn the parlor. +These tasks had in them a pleasantness which whiled away the time, and +I alternated from the parlor to the store-room, and the kitchen to the +orchard, and the poultry-yard to the pleasure-ground, running as +swiftly from one to the other, and as merrily, as if my feet were +keeping time with the glad beatings of my heart. As I passed along the +avenue, which was bordered on each side by tall trees, ever and anon, +as the wind shook their branches, there fell on my head showers of red +and gold-colored leaves, which made me laugh; so easy is it for the +young to find occasion of mirth in the least trifle when their spirits +are lightsome, as mine were that day. I sat down on a stone bench on +which the western sun was shining, to bind together the posies I had +made; the robins twittered around me; and the air felt soft and fresh. +It was the eve of Martinmas-day—Hallowtide Summer, as our country +folk call it. As the sun was sinking behind the hills, the tread of +horses' feet was heard in the distance, and I sprang up on the bench, +shading my eyes with my hand to see the approach of that goodly +travelling-party, which was soon to reach our gates. My parents came +out of the front door, and beckoned me to their side. I held my posies +in my apron, and forgot to set them down; for the first sight of my +Lady Mounteagle, as she rode up the avenue with her son at her side, +and her three grand-daughters with their attendants, and many +richly-attired serving-men beside, filled me with awe. I wondered if +her majesty had looked more grand on the day that she rode into London +to be proclaimed queen. The good lady sat on her palfry in so erect +and stately a manner, as if age had no dominion over her limbs and her +spirits; and there was something so piercing and commanding in her +eye, that it at once compelled reverence and submission. Her son had +somewhat of the same nobility of mien, and was tall and graceful in +his movements; but behind her, on her pillion, sat a small counterpart +of herself, inasmuch as childhood can resemble old age, and youthful +loveliness matronly dignity. This was the eldest of her ladyship's +grand-daughters, my sweet Mistress Ann Dacre. This was my first sight +of her who was hereafter to hold so great a place in my heart and <a name="82">{82}</a> +in my life. As she was lifted from the saddle, and stood in her +riding-habit and plumed hat at our door, making a graceful and modest +obeisance to my parents, one step retired behind her grandam, with a +lovely color tinging her cheeks, and her long lashes veiling her sweet +eyes, I thought I had never seen so fair a creature as this high-born +maiden of my own age; and even now that time, as it has gone by, has +shown me all that a court can display to charm the eyes and enrapture +the fancy, I do not gainsay that same childish thought of mine. Her +sisters, pretty prattlers then, four and six years of age, were led +into the house by their governess. But ere our guests were seated, my +mother bade me kiss my Lady Mounteagle's hand and commend myself to +her goodness, praying her to be a good lady to me, and overlook, out +of her great indulgence, my many defects. At which she patted me on +the cheek, and said, she doubted not but that I was as good a child as +such good parents deserved to have; and indeed, if I was as like my +mother in temper as in face, I must needs be such as her hopes and +wishes would have me. And then she commanded Mistress Ann to salute +me; and I felt my cheeks flush and my heart beat with joy as the sweet +little lady put her arms round my neck, and pressed her lips on my +cheek. +</p> +<p> +Presently we all withdrew to our chambers until such time as supper +was served, at which meal the young ladies were present; and I +marvelled to see how becomingly even the youngest of them, who was but +a chit, knew how to behave herself, never asking for anything, or +forgetting to give thanks in a pretty manner when she was helped. For +the which my mother greatly commended their good manners; and her +ladyship said, "In truth, good Mistress Sherwood, I carry a strict +hand over them, never suffering their faults to go unchastised, nor +permitting such liberties as many do to the ruin of their children." I +was straightway seized with a great confusion and fear that this was +meant as a rebuke to me, who, not being much used to company, and +something overindulged by my father, by whose side I was seated, had +spoken to him more than once that day at table, and had also left on +my plate some victuals not to my liking; which, as I learnt at another +time from Mistress Ann, was an offence for which her grandmother would +have sharply reprehended her. I ventured not again to speak in her +presence, and scarcely to raise my eyes toward her. +</p> +<p> +The young ladies withdrew early to bed that night, and I had but +little speech with them. Before they left the parlor, Mistress Ann +took her sisters by the hand, and all of them, kneeling at their +grandmother's feet, craved her blessing. I could see a tear in her eye +as she blessed them; and when she laid her hand on the head of the +eldest of her grand-daughters, it lingered there as if to call down +upon her a special benison. The next day my Lady Mounteagle gave +permission for Mistress Ann to go with me into the garden, where I +showed her my flowers and the young rabbits that Edmund Genings and +his brother, my only two playmates, were so fond of; and she told me +how well pleased she was to remove from London unto her grandmother's +seat, where she would have a garden and such pleasant pastimes as are +enjoyed in the country. +</p> +<p> +"Prithee, Mistress Ann," I said, with the unmannerly boldness with +which children are wont to question one another, "have you not a +mother, that you live with your grandam?" +</p> +<p> +"I thank God that I have," she answered; "and a good mother she is to +me; but by reason of her having lately married the Duke of Norfolk, my +grandmother has at the present time the charge of us." +</p> +<p> +"And do you greatly love my Lady Mounteagle?" I asked, misdoubting in +my folly that a lady of so grave aspect and stately carriage should be +loved by children. +</p> +<a name="83">{83}</a> +<p> +"As greatly as heart can love," was her pretty answer. +</p> +<p> +"And do you likewise love the Duke of Norfolk, Mistress Ann?" I asked +again. +</p> +<p> +"He is my very good lord and father," she answered; "but my knowledge +of his grace has been so short, I have scarce had time to love him +yet." +</p> +<p> +"But I have loved you in no time," I cried, and threw my arms round +her neck. "Directly I saw you, I loved you, Mistress Ann." +</p> +<p> +"Mayhap, Mistress Constance," she said, "it is easier to love a little +girl than a great duke." +</p> +<p> +"And who do you affection beside her grace your mother, and my lady +your grandam, Mistress Ann?" I said, again returning to the charge; to +which she quickly replied: +</p> +<p> +"My brother Francis, my sweet Lord Dacre." +</p> +<p> +"Is he a child?" I asked. +</p> +<p> +"In truth, Mistress Constance," she answered, "he would not be well +pleased to be called so; and yet methinks he is but a child, being not +older, but rather one year younger than myself, and my dear playmate +and gossip." +</p> +<p> +"I wish I had a brother or a sister to play with me," I said; at which +Mistress Ann kissed me and said she was sorry I should lack so great a +comfort, but that I must consider I had a good father of my own, +whereas her own was dead; and that a father was more than a brother. +</p> +<p> +In this manner we held discourse all the morning, and, like a rude +imp, I questioned the gracious young lady as to her pastimes and her +studies and the tasks she was set to; and from her innocent +conversation I discovered, as children do, without at the time taking +much heed, but yet so as to remember it afterward, what especial care +had been taken by her grandmother—that religious and discreet +lady—to instill into her virtue and piety, and in using her, beside +saying her prayers, to bestow alms with her own hands on prisoners and +poor people; and in particular to apply herself to the cure of +diseases and wounds, wherein she herself had ever excelled. Mistress +Ann, in her childish but withal thoughtful way, chide me that in my +own garden were only seen flowers which pleased the senses by their +bright colors and perfume, and none of the herbs which tend to the +assuagement of pain and healing of wounds; and she made me promise to +grow some against the time of her next visit. As we went through the +kitchen-garden, she plucked some rosemary and lavender and rue, and +many other odoriferous herbs; and sitting down on a bench, she invited +me to her side, and discoursed on their several virtues and properties +with a pretty sort of learning which was marvellous in one of her +years. She showed me which were good for promoting sleep, and which +for cuts and bruises, and of a third she said it eased the heart. +</p> +<p> +"Nay, Mistress Ann," I cried, "but that must be a heartsease;" at +which she smiled, and answered: +</p> +<p> +"My grandam says the best medicines for uneasy hearts are the bitter +herb confession and the sweet flower absolution." +</p> +<p> +"Have you yet made your first communion, Mistress Ann?" I asked in a +low voice, at which question a bright color came into her cheek, and +she replied: +</p> +<p> +"Not yet; but soon I may. I was confirmed not long ago by the good +Bishop of Durham; and at my grandmother's seat I am to be instructed +by a Catholic priest who lives there." +</p> +<p> +"Then you do not go to Protestant service?" I said. +</p> +<p> +"We did," she answered, "for a short time, whilst we stayed at the +Charterhouse; but my grandam has understood that it is not lawful for +Catholics, and she will not be present at it herself, or suffer us any +more to attend it, neither in her own house nor at his grace's." +</p> +<p> +While we were thus talking, the two little ladies, her sisters, came +from the house, having craved leave from the governess to run out into +the <a name="84">{84}</a> garden. Mistress Mary was a pale delicate child, with soft +loving blue eyes; and Mistress Bess, the youngest, a merry imp, whose +rosy cheeks and dimpling smiles were full of glee and merriment. +</p> +<p> +"What ugly sober flowers are these, Nan, that thou art playing with?" +she cried, and snatched at the herbs in her sister's lap. "When I +marry my Lord William Howard, I'll wear a posy of roses and +carnations." +</p> +<p> +"When I am married," said little Mistress Mary, "I will wear nothing +but lilies." +</p> +<p> +"And what shall be thy posy, Nan?" said the little saucy one again, +"when thou dost wed my Lord Surrey?" +</p> +<p> +"Hush, hush, madcaps!" cried Mistress Ann. "If your grandam was to +hear you, I doubt not but the rod would be called for." +</p> +<p> +Mistress Mary looked round affrighted, but little Mistress Bess said +in a funny manner, "Prithee, Nan, do rods then travel?" +</p> +<p> +"Ay; by that same token, Bess, that I heard my lady bid thy nurse take +care to carry one with her." +</p> +<p> +"It was nurse told me I was to marry my Lord William, and Madge my +Lord Thomas, and thee, Nan, my Lord Surrey, and brother pretty Meg +Howard," said the little lady, pouting; "but I won't tell grandam of +it an it would be like to make her angry." +</p> +<p> +"I would be a nun!" Mistress Mary cried. +</p> +<p> +"Hush!" her elder sister said; "that is foolish talking, Madge; my +grandmother told me so when I said the same thing to her a year ago. +Children do not know what Almighty God intends them to do. And now +methinks I see Uncle Labourn making as if he would call us to the +house, and there are the horses coming to the door. We must needs obey +the summons. Prithee, Mistress Constance, do not forget me." +</p> +<p> +Forget her! No. From that day to this years have passed over our heads +and left deep scars on our hearts. Divers periods of our lives have +been signalized by many a strange passage; we have rejoiced, and, +oftener still, wept together; we have met in trembling, and parted in +anguish; but through sorrow and through joy, through evil report and +good report, in riches and in poverty, in youth and in age, I have +blessed the day when first I met thee, sweet Ann Dacre, the fairest, +purest flower which ever grew on a noble stem. +</p> +<br> + +<h2>CHAPTER II.</h2> +<br> +<p> +A year elapsed betwixt the period of the so brief, but to me so +memorable, visit of the welcomest guests our house ever received—to +wit, my Lady Mounteagle and her grand-daughters—and that in which I +met with an accident, which compelled my parents to carry me to +Lichfield for chirurgical advice. Four times in the course of that +year I was honored with letters writ by the hand of Mistress Ann +Dacre; partly, as the gracious young lady said, by reason of her +grandmother's desire that the bud acquaintanceship which had sprouted +in the short-lived season of the aforesaid visit should, by such +intercourse as may be carried on by means of letters, blossom into a +flower of true friendship; and also that that worthy lady and my good +mother willed such a correspondence betwixt us as would serve to the +sharpening of our wits, and the using our pens to be good servants to +our thoughts. In the course of this history I will set down at +intervals some of the letters I received at divers times from this +noble lady; so that those who read these innocent pictures of herself, +portrayed by her own hand, may trace the beginnings of those virtuous +inclinations which at an early age were already working in her soul, +and ever after appeared in her. +</p> +<p> +On the 15th day of January of the next year to that in which my eyes +had feasted on this creature so embellished with rare endowments and +<a name="85">{85}</a> accomplished gracefulness, the first letter I had from her came +to my hand; the first link of a chain which knit together her heart +and mine through long seasons of absence and sore troubles, to the +great comforting, as she was often pleased to say, of herself, who was +so far above me in rank, whom she chose to call her friend, and of the +poor friend and servant whom she thus honored beyond her deserts. In +as pretty a handwriting as can well be thought of, she thus wrote: +</p> +<p class="cite"> + "MY SWEET MISTRESS CONSTANCE,<br> + —Though I enjoyed your company but for the too brief time + during which we rested under your honored parents' roof, I + retain so great a sense of the contentment I received + therefrom, and so lively a remembrance of the converse we + held in the grounds adjacent to Sherwood Hall, that I am + better pleased than I can well express that my grandmother + bids me sit down and write to one whom to see and to + converse with once more would be to me one of the chiefest + pleasures in life. And the more welcome is this command by + reason of the hope it raises in me to receive in return a + letter from my well-beloved Mistress Constance, which will + do my heart more good than anything else that can happen + to me. 'Tis said that marriages are made in heaven. When I + asked my grandam if it were so, she said, 'I am of + opinion, Nan, they are made in many more places than one; + and I would to God none were made but such as are agreed + upon in so good a place.' But methinks some friendships + are likewise made in heaven; and if it be so, I doubt not + but that when we met, and out of that brief meeting there + arose so great and sudden a liking in my heart for you, + Mistress Constance,—which, I thank God, you were not slow + to reciprocate,—that our angels had met where we hope one + day to be, and agreed together touching that matter. +<br><br> + "It suits ill a bad pen like mine to describe the fair seat we + reside in at this present time—the house of Mr. James Labourn, + which he has lent unto my grandmother. 'Tis most commodious and + pleasant, and after long sojourn in London, even in winter, a + terrestrial paradise. But, like the garden of Eden, not without + dangers; for the too much delight I took in out-of-doors pastimes— + and most of all on the lake when it was frozen, and we had merry + sports upon it, to the neglect of my lessons, not heeding the lapse + of time in the pursuit of pleasure—brought me into trouble and sore + disgrace. My grandmother ordered me into confinement for three days + in my own chamber, and I saw her not nor received her blessing all + that time; at the end of which she sharply reproved me for my fault, + and bade me hold in mind that 'twas when loitering in a garden Eve + met the tempter, and threatened further and severe punishment if I + applied not diligently to my studies. When I had knelt down and + begged pardon, promising amendment, she drew me to her and kissed + me, which it was not her wont often to do. 'Nan,' she said, 'I would + have thee use thy natural parts, and improve thyself in virtue and + learning; for such is the extremity of the times, that ere long it + may be that many first shall be last and many last shall be first in + this realm of England. But virtue and learning are properties which + no man can steal from another; and I would fain see thee endowed + with a goodly store of both. That great man and true confessor, Sir + Thomas More, had nothing so much at heart as his daughter's + instruction; and Mistress Margaret Roper, once my sweet friend, + though some years older than my poor self, who still laments her + loss, had such fine things said of her by the greatest men of this + age, as would astonish thee to hear; but they were what she had a + right to and very well deserved. And the strengthening of her mind + through study and religious discipline served <a name="86">{86}</a> her well at the + time of her great trouble; for where other women would have lacked + sense and courage how to act, she kept her wits about her, and + ministered such comfort to her father, remaining near him at the + last, and taking note of his wishes, and finding means to bury him + in a Christian manner, which none other durst attempt, that she had + occasion to thank God who gave her a head as well as a heart. And + who knows, Nan, what may befal thee, and what need thou mayst have + of the like advantages?' +<br><br> + "My grandmother looked so kindly on me then, that, albeit abashed at + the remembrance of my fault, I sought to move her to further + discourse; and knowing what great pleasure she had in speaking of + Sir Thomas More, at whose house in Chelsea she had oftentimes been a + visitor in her youth, I enticed her to it by cunning questions + touching the customs he observed in his family. +<br><br> + "'Ah, Nan!' she said, that house was a school and exercise + of the Christian religion. There was neither man nor woman + in it who was not employed in liberal discipline and + fruitful reading, although the principal study was + religion. There was no quarrelling, not so much as a + peevish word to be heard; nor was any one seen idle; all + were in their several employs: nor was there wanting sober + mirth. And so well-managed a government Sir Thomas did not + maintain by severity and chiding, but by gentleness and + kindness.' +<br><br> + "Methought as she said this, that my dear grandam in that matter of + chiding had not taken a leaf out of Sir Thomas's book; and there was + no doubt a transparency in my face which revealed to her this + thought of mine; for she straightly looked at me and said, 'Nan, a + penny for thy thoughts!' at the which I felt myself blushing, but + knew nothing would serve her but the truth; so I said, in as humble + a manner as I could think of, 'An if you will excuse me, grandam, I + thought if Sir Thomas managed so well without chiding, that you + manage well with it.' At the which she gave me a light nip on the + forehead, and said, 'Go to, child; dost think that any but saints + can rule a household without chiding, or train children without + whipping? Go thy ways, and mend them too, if thou wouldst escape + chastisement; and take with thee, Nan, the words of one whom we + shall never again see the like of in this poor country, which he + used to his wife or any of his children if they were diseased or + troubled, "We must not look at our pleasures to go to heaven in + feather-beds, or to be carried up thither even by the chins."' And + so she dismissed me; and I have here set down my fault, and the + singular goodness showed me by my grandmother when it was pardoned, + not thinking I can write anything better worth notice than the + virtuous talk with which she then favored me. +<br><br> + "There is in this house a chapel very neat and rich, and an ancient + Catholic priest is here, who says mass most days; at the which we, + with my grandmother, assist, and such of her servants as have not + conformed to the times; and this good father instructs us in the + principles of Catholic religion. On the eve of the feast of the + Nativity of Christ, my lady stayed in the chapel from eight at night + till two in the morning; but sent us to bed at nine, after the + litanies were said, until eleven, when there was a sermon, and at + twelve o'clock three masses said, which being ended we broke our + fast with a mince-pie, and went again to bed. And all the + Christmas-time we were allowed two hours after each meal for + recreation, instead of one. At other times, we play not at any game + for money; but then we had a shilling a-piece to make us merry; + which my grandmother says is fitting in this time of mirth and joy + for his birth who is the sole origin and spring of true comfort. And + now, sweet Mistress Constance, I must bid you farewell; for the + greatest of <a name="87">{87}</a> joys has befallen me, and a whole holiday to enjoy + it. My sweet Lord Dacre is come to pay his duty to my lady and tarry + some days here, on his way to Thetford, the Duke of Norfolk's seat, + where his grace and the duchess my good mother have removed. He is a + beauty, Mistress Constance; and nature has so profusely conferred on + him privileges, that when her majesty the queen saw him a short time + back on horseback, in the park at Richmond, she called him to her + carriage-door and honored him with a kiss, and the motto of the + finest boy she ever beheld. But I may not run on in this fashion, + letting my pen outstrip modesty, like a foolish creature, making my + brother a looking-glass and continual object for my eyes; but learn + to love him, as my grandam says, in God, of whom he is only + borrowed, and not so as to set my heart wholly on him. So beseeching + God bless you and yours, good Mistress Constance, I ever remain, + your loving friend and humble servant, +<br><br> + "ANN DACRE." +</p> +<p> +Oh, how soon were my Lady Mounteagle's words exalted in the event! and +what a sad brief note was penned by that affectionate sister not one +month after she writ those lines, so full of hope and pleasure in the +prospect of her brother's sweet company! For the fair boy that was the +continual object of her eyes and the dear comfort of her heart was +accidentally slain by the fall of a vaulting horse upon him at the +duke's house at Thetford. +</p> +<p class="cite"> + "MY GOOD MISTRESS CONSTANCE"<br> + (she wrote, a few days after his lamentable death),—"The lovingest + brother a sister ever had, and the most gracious creature ever born, + is dead; and if it pleased God I wish I were dead too, for my heart + is well-nigh broken. But I hope in God his soul is now in heaven, + for that he was so young and innocent; and when here, a short time + ago, my grandmother procured that he should for the first, and as it + has pleased God also for the only and the last, time, confess and be + absolved by a Catholic priest, in the which the hand of Providence + is visible to our great comfort, and reasonable hope of his + salvation. Commending him and your poor friend, who has great need + of them, to your good prayers, I remain your affectionate and humble + servant, +<br><br> + "ANN DACRE." +</p> +<p> +In that year died also, in childbirth, her grace the Duchess of +Norfolk, Mistress Ann's mother; and she then wrote in a less +passionate, but withal less comfortable, grief than at her brother's +loss, and, as I have heard since, my Lady Mounteagle had her +death-blow at that time, and never lifted up her head again as +heretofore. It was noticed that ever after she spent more time in +prayer and gave greater alms. Her daughter, the duchess, who at the +instance of her husband had conformed to the times, desired to have +been reconciled on her deathbed by a priest, who for that end was +conducted into the garden, yet could not have access unto her by +reason of the duke's vigilance to hinder it, or at least of his +continual presence in her chamber at the time. And soon after, his +grace, whose wards they were, sent for his three step-daughters to the +Charterhouse; the parting with which, and the fears she entertained +that he would have them carried to services and sermons in the public +churches, and hinder them in the exercise of Catholic faith and +worship, drove the sword yet deeper through my Lady Mounteagle's +heart, and brought down her gray hairs with sorrow to the grave, +notwithstanding that the duke greatly esteemed and respected her, and +was a very moral nobleman, of exceeding good temper and moderate +disposition. But of this more anon, as 'tis my own history I am +writing, and it is meet I should relate in the order of time what +events came under my notice whilst in <a name="88">{88}</a> Lichfield, whither my +mother carried me, as has been aforesaid, to be treated by a famous +physician for a severe hurt I had received. It was deemed convenient +that I should tarry some time under his care; and Mr. Genings, a +kinsman of her own, who with his wife and children resided in that +town, one of the chiefest in the county, offered to keep me in their +house as long as was convenient thereunto a kindness which my parents +the more readily accepted at his hands from their having often shown +the like unto his children when the air of the country was desired for +them. +</p> +<p> +Mr. and Mrs. Genings were of the religion by law established. He was +thought to be Catholic at heart; albeit he was often heard to speak +very bitterly against all who obeyed not the queen in conforming to +the new mode of worship, with the exception, indeed, of my mother, for +whom he had always a truly great affection. This gentleman's house was +in the close of the cathedral, and had a garden to it well stored with +fair shrubs and flowers of various sorts. As I lay on a low settle +near the window, being forbid to walk for the space of three weeks, my +eyes were ever straying from my sampler to the shade and sunshine out +of doors. Instead of plying at my needle, I watched the bees at their +sweet labor midst the honeysuckles of the porch, or the swallows +darting in and out of the eaves of the cathedral, or the butterflies +at their idle sports over the beds of mignonette and heliotrope under +the low wall, covered with ivy, betwixt the garden and the close. Mr. +Genings had two sons, the eldest of which was some years older and the +other younger than myself. The first, whose name was Edmund, had been +weakly when a child, and by reason of this a frequent sojourner at +Sherwood Hall, where he was carried for change of air after the many +illnesses incident to early age. My mother, who was some years married +before she had a child of her own, conceived a truly maternal +affection for this young kinsman, and took much pains with him both as +to the care of his body and the training of his mind. He was an apt +pupil, and she had so happy a manner of imparting knowledge, that he +learnt more, as he has since said, in those brief sojourns in her +house than at school from more austere masters. After I came into the +world, he took delight to rock me in my cradle, or play with me as I +sat on my mother's knee; and when I first began to walk, he would lead +me by the hand into the garden, and laugh to see me clutch marigolds +or cry for a sunflower. +</p> +<p> +"I warrant thou hast an eye to gold, Con," he would say; "for 'tis the +yellow flowers that please thee best." +</p> +<p> +There is an old hollow tree on the lawn at Sherwood Hall where I often +hid from him in sport, and he would make pretence to seek me +elsewhere, till a laugh revealed me to him, and a chase ensued down +the approach or round the maze. He never tired of my petulance, or +spoke rude words, as boys are wont to do; and had a more serious and +contemplative spirit than is often seen in young people, and likewise +a singular fancy for gazing at the sky when glowing with sunset hues +or darkened by storms, and most of all when studded at night with +stars. On a calm clear night I have noticed him for a length of time, +forgetting all things else, fix his eyes on the heavens, as if reading +the glory of the Lord therein revealed. +</p> +<p> +My parents did not speak to him of Catholic faith and worship, because +Mr. Genings, before he suffered his sons to stay in their house, had +made them promise that no talk of religion should be ministered to +them in their childhood. It was a sore trial to my mother to refrain, +as the Psalmist saith, from good words, which were ever rising from +her heart to her lips, as pure water from a deep spring. But she +instructed him in many things which belong to gentle learning, and in +French, which she knew well; and <a name="89">{89}</a> taught him music, in which he +made great progress. And this wrought with his father to the +furtherance of these his visits to us. I doubt not but that, when she +told him the names of the heavenly luminaries, she inwardly prayed he +might one day shine as a star in the kingdom of God; or when she +discoursed of flowers and their properties, that he should blossom as +a rose in the wilderness of this faithless world; or whilst guiding +his hands to play on the clavichord, that he might one day join in the +glorious harmony of the celestial choirs. Her face itself was a +preachment, and the tones of her voice, and the tremulous sighs she +breathed when she kissed him or gave him her blessing, had, I ween, a +privilege to reach his heart, the goodness of which was readable in +his countenance. Dear Edmund Genings, thou wert indeed a brother to me +in kind care and companionship whilst I stayed in Lichfield that +never-to-be-forgotten year! How gently didst thou minister to the sick +child, for the first time tasting the cup of suffering; now easing her +head with a soft pillow, now strewing her couch with fresh-gathered +flowers, or feeding her with fruit which had the bloom on it, or +taking her hand and holding it in thine own to cheer her to endurance! +Thou wert so patient and so loving, both with her who was a great +trouble to thee and oftentimes fretful with pain, and likewise with +thine own little brother, an angel in beauty and wit, but withal of so +petulant and froward a disposition that none in the house durst +contradict him, child as he was; for his parents were indeed weak in +their fondness for him. In no place and at no time have I seen a boy +so indulged and so caressed as this John Genings. He had a pretty +wilfulness and such playful ways that his very faults found favor with +those who should have corrected them, and he got praise where others +would have met with chastisement. Edmund's love for this fair urchin +was such as is seldom seen in any save in a parent for a child. It was +laughable to see the lovely imp governing one who should have been his +master, but through much love was his slave, and in a thousand cunning +ways, and by fanciful tricks, constraining him to do his bidding. +Never was a more wayward spirit enclosed in a more winsome form than +in John Genings. Never did childish gracefulness rule more absolutely +over superior age, or love reverse the conditions of ordinary +supremacy, than in the persons of these two brothers. +</p> +<p> +A strange thing occurred at that time, which I witnessed not myself, +and on which I can give no opinion, but as a fact will here set it +down, and let such as read this story deem of it as they please. One +night that, by reason of the unwonted chilliness of the evening, such +as sometimes occurs in our climate even in summer, a fire had been lit +in the parlor, and the family were gathered round it, Edmund came of a +sudden into the room, and every one took notice that his face was very +pale. He seemed in a great fear, and whispered to his mother, who said +aloud—"Thou must have been asleep, and art still dreaming, child." +Upon which he was very urgent for her to go into the garden, and used +many entreaties thereunto. Upon which, at last, she rose and followed +him. In another moment she called for her husband, who went out, and +with him three or four other persons that were in the room, and I +remained alone for the space of ten or fifteen minutes. When they +returned, I heard them speaking with great fear and amazement of what +they had seen; and Edmund Genings has often since described to me what +he first, and afterward all the others, had beheld in the sky. He was +gazing at the heavens, as was his wont, when a strange spectacle +appeared to him in the air. As it were, a number of armed men with +weapons, killing and murdering others that were disarmed, and great +store of blood running everywhere about them. His parents and those +with them witnessed the same thing, and a great <a name="90">{90}</a> fear fell upon +them all. I noticed that all that evening they seemed scared, and +could not speak of this appearance in the sky without shuddering. But +one that was more bold than the rest took heart, and cried, "God send +it does not forbode that the Papists will murder us all in our beds!" +And Mistress Genings, whose mother was a French Huguenot, said, +"Amen!" I marked that her husband and one or two more of the company +groaned, and one made, as if unwittingly, the sign of the cross. There +were some I know in that town, nay and in that house, that were at +heart of the old religion, albeit, by reason of the times, they did +not give over attending Protestants' worship. +</p> +<p> +A few days later I was sitting alone, and had a long fit of musing +over the many new thoughts that were crowding into my mind, as yet too +childish to master them, when Edmund came in, and I saw he had been +weeping. He said nothing at first, and made believe he was reading; +but I could see tears trickling down through his fingers as he covered +his face with his hands. Presently he looked up and cried out, +</p> +<p> +"Cousin Constance, Jack is going away from us." +</p> +<p> +"And if it please God, not for a long time," I answered; for it +grieved me to see him sad. +</p> +<p> +"Nay, but he is going for many years, I fear," Edmund said. "My uncle, +Jean de Luc, has asked for him to be brought up in his house at La +Rochelle. He is his godfather, and has a great store of money, which +he says he will leave to Jack. Alack! cousin Constance, I would that +there was no such thing in the world as money, and no such country as +France. I wish we were all dead." And then he fell to weeping again +very bitterly. +</p> +<p> +I told him in a childish manner what my mother was wont to say to me +when any little trouble fell to my lot—that we should be patient, and +offer up our sufferings to God. +</p> +<p> +"But I can do nothing now for Jack," he cried. "It was my first +thought at waking and my last at night, how to please the dear urchin; +but now 'tis all over." +</p> +<p> +"Oh, but Edmund," I cried, "an if you were to be as good as the +blessed saints in heaven, you could do a great deal for Jack." +</p> +<p> +"How so, cousin Constance?" he asked, not comprehending my meaning; +and thereupon I answered: +</p> +<p> +"When once I said to my sweet mother, 'It grieves me, dear heart, that +I can give thee nothing, who gives me so much,' she bade me take heed +that every prayer we say, every good work we do, howsoever imperfect, +and every pain we suffer, may be offered up for those we love; and so +out of poverty, and weakness, and sorrow, we have wherewith to make +precious and costly and cheerful gifts." +</p> +<p> +I spoke as a child, repeating what I had heard; but he listened not as +a child. A sudden light came into his eyes, and methinks his good +angel showed him in that hour more than my poor lips could utter. +</p> +<p> +"If it be as your sweet mother says," he joyfully cried, "we are rich +indeed; and, even though we be sinners and not saints, we have +somewhat to give, I ween, if it be only our heartaches, cousin +Constance, so they be seasoned with prayers." +</p> +<p> +The thought which in my simplicity I had set before him took root, as +it were, in his mind. His love for a little child had prepared the way +for it; and the great brotherly affection which had so long dwelt in +his heart proved a harbinger of the more perfect gift of charity; so +that a heavenly message was perchance conveyed to him that day by one +who likewise was a child, even as the word of the Lord came to the +prophet through the lips of the infant Samuel. From that time forward +he bore up bravely against his grief; which was the sharper inasmuch +that he who was the cause of it showed none in return, but rather joy +in the expectancy of the change which was to part them. He <a name="91">{91}</a> would +still be a-prattling on it, and telling all who came in his way that +he was going to France to a good uncle; nor ever intended to return, +for his mother was to carry him to La Rochelle, and she should stay +there with him, he said, and not come back to ugly Lichfield. +</p> +<p> +"And art thou not sorry, Jack," I asked him one day, "to leave poor +Edmund, who loves thee so well?" +</p> +<p> +The little madcap was coursing round the room, and cried, as he ran +past me, for he had more wit and spirit than sense or manners: +</p> +<p> +"Edmund must seek after me, and take pains to find me, if so be he +would have me." +</p> +<p> +These words, which the boy said in his play, have often come back to +my mind since the two brothers have attained unto a happy though +dissimilar end. +</p> +<p> +When the time had arrived for Mistress Genings and her youngest son to +go beyond seas, as I was now improved in health and able to walk, my +father fetched me home, and prevailed on Mr. Genings to let Edmund go +back with us, with the intent to divert his mind from his grief at his +brother's departure. +</p> +<p> +I found my parents greatly disturbed at the news they had had touching +the imprisonment of thirteen priests on account of religion, and of +Mr. Orton being likewise arrested, who was a gentleman very dear to +them for his great virtues and the steadfast friendship he had ever +shown to them. +</p> +<p> +My mother questioned Edmund as to the sign he had seen in the heavens +a short time back, of which the report had reached them; and he +confirming the truth thereof, she clasped her hands and cried: +</p> +<p> +"Then I fear me much this forebodes the death of these blessed +confessors, Father Weston and the rest." +</p> +<p> +Upon which Edmund said, in a humble manner: +</p> +<p> +"Good Mistress Sherwood, my dear mother thought it signified that +those of your religion would murder in their beds such as are of the +queen's religion; so maybe in both cases there is naught to +apprehend." +</p> +<p> +"My good child," my mother answered, "in regard of those now in +durance for their faith, the danger is so manifest, that if it please +not the Almighty to work a miracle for their deliverance, I see not +how they may escape." +</p> +<p> +After that we sat awhile in silence; my father reading, my mother and +I working, and Edmund at the window intent as usual upon the stars, +which were shining one by one in the deep azure of the darkening sky. +As one of greater brightness than the rest shone through the branches +of the old tree, where I used to hide some years before, he pointed to +it, and said to me, who was sitting nearest to him at the window: +</p> +<p> +"Cousin Constance, think you the Star of Bethlehem showed fairer in +the skies than yon bright star that has just risen behind your +favorite oak? What and if that star had a message for us!" +</p> +<p> +My father heard him, and smiled. "I was even then," he said, "reading +the words of one who was led to the true religion by the contemplation +of the starry skies. In a Southern clime, where those fair luminaries +shine with more splendor than in our Northern heavens, St. Augustine +wrote thus;" and then he read a few sentences in Latin from the book +in his hand,—"Raising ourselves up, we passed by degrees through all +things bodily, even the very heavens, whence sun and moon and stars +shine upon the earth. Yea, we soared yet higher by inward musing and +discourse and admiring of God's works, and we came to our own minds +and went beyond them, so as to arrive at that region of never-failing +plenty where thou feedest Israel for ever with the food of truth." +These words had a sweet and solemn force in them which struck on the +ear like a strain of unearthly music, such as the wind-harp wakes in +the silence of the <a name="92">{92}</a> night. In a low voice, so low that it was like +the breathing of a sigh, I heard Edmund say, "What is truth?" But when +he had uttered those words, straightway turning toward me as if to +divert his thoughts from that too pithy question, he cried: "Prithee, +cousin Constance, hast thou ended reading, I warrant for the hundredth +time, that letter in thine hand? and hast thou not a mind to impart to +thy poor kinsman the sweet conceits I doubt not are therein +contained?" I could not choose but smile at his speech; for I had +indeed feasted my eyes on the handwriting of my dear friend, now no +longer Mistress Dacre, and learnt off, as it were by heart, its +contents. And albeit I refused at first to comply with his request, +which I had secretly a mind to; no sooner did he give over the urging +of it than I stole to his side, and, though I would by no means let it +out of my hand, and folded down one side of the sheet to hide what was +private in it, I offered to read such parts aloud as treated of +matters which might be spoken of without hindrance. +</p> +<p> +With a smiling countenance, then, he set himself to listen, and I to +be the mouthpiece of the dear writer, whose wit was so far in advance +of her years, as I have since had reason to observe, never having met +at any time with one in whom wisdom put forth such early shoots. +</p> +<p class="cite"> + "DEAR MISTRESS CONSTANCE"<br> + (thus the sweet lady wrote),—"Wherefore this long silence and + neglect of your poor friend? An if it be true, which pains me much + to hear, that the good limb which, together with its fellow, like + two trusty footmen, carried you so well and nimbly along the alleys + of your garden this time last year, has, like an arrant knave, + played fast and loose, and failed in its good service,—wherein, I am + told, you have suffered much inconvenience,—is it just that that + other servant, your hand, should prove rebellious too, refuse to + perform its office, and write no more letters at your bidding? For + I'll warrant 'tis the hand is the culprit, not the will; which + nevertheless should be master, and compel it to obedience. So, an + you love me, chide roundly that contumacious hand, which fails in + its duty, which should not be troublesome, if you but had for me + one-half of the affection I have for you. And indeed, Mistress + Constance, a letter from you would be to me, at this time, the + welcomest thing I can think of; for since we left my grandmother's + seat, and came to the Charterhouse, I have new friends, and many + more and greater than I deserve or ever thought to have; but, by + reason of difference of age or of religion, they are not such as I + can well open my mind to, as I might to you, if it pleased God we + should meet again. The Duke of Norfolk is a very good lord and + father to me; but when there are more ways of thinking than one in a + house, 'tis no easy matter to please all which have a right to be + considered; and, in the matter of religion, 'tis very hard to avoid + giving offence. But no more of this at present; only I would to God + Mr. Fox were beyond seas, and my lady of Westmoreland at her home in + the North; and that we had no worse company in this house than Mr. + Martin, my Lord Surrey's tutor, who is a gentleman of great learning + and knowledge, as every one says, and of extraordinary modesty in + his behavior. My Lord Surrey has a truly great regard for him, and + profits much in his learning by his means. I notice he is Catholic + in his judgment and affections; and my lord says he will not stay + with him, if his grace his father procures ministers to preach to + his household and family, and obliges all therein to frequent + Protestant service. I wish my grandmother was in London; for I am + sometimes sore troubled in my mind touching Catholic religion and + conforming to the times, of which an abundance of talk is ministered + unto us, to my exceeding great discomfort, by my Lady Westmoreland, + his grace's <a name="93">{93}</a> sister, and others also. An if I say aught thereon + to Mistress Fawcett (a grave and ancient gentlewoman, who had the + care of my Lord Surrey during his infancy, and is now set over us + his grace's wards), and of misliking the duke's ministers and that + pestilent Mr. Fox—(I fear me, Mistress Constance, I should not have + writ that unbeseeming word, and I will e'en draw a line across it, + but still as you may read it for indeed 'tis what he is; but 'tis + from himself I learnt it, who in his sermons calls Catholic religion + a pestilent idolatry, and Catholic priests pestilent teachers and + servants of Antichrist, and the holy Pope at Rome the man of sin) + she grows uneasy, and bids me be a good child to her, and not to + bring her into trouble with his grace, who is indeed a very good + lord to us in all matters but that one of compelling us to hear + sermons and the like. My Lord Surrey mislikes all kinds of sermons, + and loves Mr. Martin so well, that he stops his ears when Mr. Fox + preaches on the dark midnight of papacy and the dawn of the gospel's + restored light. And it angers him, as well it should, to hear him + call his majesty King Philip of Spain, who is his own godfather, + from whom he received his name, a wicked popish tyrant and a son of + Antichrist. My Lady Margaret, his sister, who is a year younger than + himself, and has a most admirable beauty and excellent good nature, + is vastly taken with what she hears from me of Catholic religion; + but methinks this is partly by reason of her misliking Mr. Fulk and + Mr. Clarke's long preachments, which we are compelled to hearken to; + and their fashion of spending Sunday, which they do call the + Sabbath-day, wherein we must needs keep silence, and when not in + church sit still at home, which to one of her lively disposition is + heavy penance. Methinks when Sunday comes we be all in disgrace; + 'tis so like a day of correction. My Lord Surrey has more liberty; + for Mr. Martin carries him and his brothers after service into the + pleasant fields about Westminster Abbey and the village of Charing + Cross, and suffers them to play at ball under the trees, so they do + not quarrel amongst themselves. My Lord Henry Howard, his grace's + brother, always maintains and defends the Catholic religion against + his sister of Westmoreland; and he spoke to my uncles Leonard, + Edward, and Francis, and likewise to my aunt Lady Montague, that + they should write unto my grandmother touching his grace bringing us + up as Protestants. But the Duke of Norfolk, Mrs. Fawcett says, is + our guardian, and she apprehends he is resolved that we shall + conform to the times, and that no liberty be allowed us for the + exercise of Catholic religion." +</p> +<p> +At this part of the letter I stopped reading; and Edmund, turning to +my father, who, though he before had perused it, was also listening, +said: "And if this be liberty of conscience, which Protestants speak +of, I see no great liberty and no great conscience in the matter." +</p> +<p> +His cheek flushed as he spoke, and there was a hoarseness in his voice +which betokened the working of strong feelings within him. My father +smiled with a sort of pitiful sadness, and answered: +</p> +<p> +"My good boy, when thou art somewhat further advanced in years, thou +wilt learn that the two words thou art speaking of are such as men +have abused the meaning of more than any others that can be thought +of; and I pray to God they do not continue to do so as long as the +world lasts. It seems to me that they mostly mean by 'liberty' a +freedom to compel others to think and to act as they have themselves a +mind to; and by 'conscience' the promptings of their own judgments +moved by their own passions." +</p> +<p> +"But 'tis hard," Edmund said, "'tis at times very hard, Mr. Sherwood, +to know whereunto conscience points, in the midst of so many inward +clamors as are raised in the soul by conflicting passions of dutiful +affection <a name="94">{94}</a> and filial reverence struggling for the mastery. Ay, +and no visible token of God's will to make that darkness light. Tis +that," he cried, more moved as he went on, "that makes me so often +gaze upward. Would to God I might see a sign in the skies! for there +are no sign-posts on life's path to guide us on our way to the +heavenly Jerusalem, which our ministers speak of." +</p> +<p> +"If thou diligently seekest for sign-posts, my good boy," my father +answered, "fear not but that he who said, 'Seek, and you shall find,' +will furnish thee with them. He has not left himself without +witnesses, or his religion to be groped after in hopeless darkness, so +that men may not discern, even in these troublous times, where the +truth lies, so they be in earnest in their search after it. But I will +not urge thee by the cogency of arguments, or be drawn out of the +reserve I have hitherto observed in these matters, which be +nevertheless the mightiest that can be thought of as regards the +soul's health." +</p> +<p> +And so, breaking off this discourse, he walked out upon the terrace; +and I withdrew to the table, where my mother was sitting, and once +more conned over the last pages of <i>my lady's</i> letter, which, when the +reader hath read, he will perceive the writer's rank and her right to +be thus titled. +</p> +<p class="cite"> + "And now, Mistress Constance, I must needs inform you of a + matter I would not leave you ignorant of, so that you + should learn from strangers what so nearly concerns one + whom you have a friendship to—and that is my betrothal + with my Lord Surrey. The ceremony was public, inasmuch as + was needful for the solemnising of a contract which is + binding for life—'until death us do part,' as the + marriage service hath it. How great a change this has + wrought in my thoughts, none knows but myself; for though + I be but twelve years of age (for his grace would have the + ceremony to take place on my birthday), one year older + than yourself, and so lately a child that not a very long + time ago my grandmother would chastise me with her own + hands for my faults, I now am wedded to my young lord, and + by his grace and all the household titled Countess of + Surrey! And I thank God to be no worse mated; for my lord, + who is a few months younger than me, and a very child for + frolicksome spirits and wild mirth, has, notwithstanding, + so great a pleasantness of manners and so forward a wit, + that one must needs have pleasure in his company; and I + only wish I had more of it. Whilst we were only friends + and playmates, I used to chide and withstand him, as one + older and one more staid and discreet than himself; but, + ah me! since we have been wedded, 'tis grand to hear him + discourse on the duty of wives, and quote the Bible to + show they must obey their husbands. He carries it in a + very lordly fashion; and if I comply not at once with his + commands, he cries out what he has heard at the + play-house: +</p> +<p class="cite2"> + 'Such duty as the subject owes the prince<br> + Even such a woman oweth to her husband;<br> + And when she's froward, peevish sullen, sour,<br> + And not obedient to his honest will,<br> + What is she but a foul contending rebel<br> + And graceless traitor to her loving lord?<br> + I am ashamed that women are so simple<br> + To offer war where they should kneel for peace;<br> + Or seek for rule, supremacy, or sway,<br> + Where they are bound to serve, love, and obey.'<br> +<p> +<p class="cite"> + He has a most excellent memory. If he has but once heard out of any + English or Latin book so much read as is contained in a leaf, he + will forthwith perfectly repeat it. My Lord Henry, his uncle, for a + trial, invented twenty long and difficult words a few days back, + which he had never seen or heard before; yet did he recite them + readily, every one in the same order as they were written, having + only once read them over. But, touching that matter of obedience, + which I care not to gainsay, 'tis not easy at present to obey my + lord my husband, and his grace his father, and Mistress Fawcett, + too, who holds as strict a hand over the Countess of Surrey as over + Mistress Ann Dacre; for the commands of these my rulers do not at + all times accord: but I pray to God I may do my duty, and be a good + wife to my lord; and I <a name="95">{95}</a> wish, as I said before, my grandmother + had been here, and that I had been favored with her good counsel, + and had had the benefit of shrift and spiritual advice ere I entered + on this stage of my life, which is so new to me, who was but a child + a few weeks ago, and am yet treated as such in more respects than + one. +<br><br> + "My lord has told me a secret which Higford, his father's servant, + let out to him; and 'tis something so weighty and of so great + import, that since he left me my thoughts have been truants from my + books, and Monsieur Sebastian, who comes to practice us on the lute, + stopped his ears, and cried out that the Signora Contessa had no + mercy on him, so to murther his compositions. Tis not the part of a + true wife to reveal her husband's secrets, or else I would tell you, + Mistress Constance, this great news, which I can with trouble keep + to myself; and I shall not be easy till I have seen my lord again, + which should be when we walk in the garden this evening; but I pray + to God he may not be off instead to the Mall, to play at kittlepins; + for then I have small chance to get speech with him to-day. Mr. + Martin is my very good friend, and reminds the earl of his duty to + his lady; but if my lord comes at his bidding, when he would be + elsewhere than in my company, 'tis little contentment I have in his + visits. +<br><br> + "'Tis yesterday I writ thus much, and now 'tis the day to send this + letter; and I saw not my lord last night by reason of his + grandfather my Lord Arundel sending to fetch me unto his house in + the Strand. His goodness to me is so great, that nothing more can be + desired; and his daughter my Lady Lumley is the greatest comfort I + have in the world. She showed me a fair picture of my lord's mother, + who died the day he was born, not then full seventeen years of age. + She was of so amiable a disposition, so prudent, virtuous, and + religious, that all who knew her could not but love and esteem her. + And I read a letter which this sweet lady had written in Latin to + her father on his birthday, to his great contentment, who had + procured her to be well instructed in that language, as well as in + her own and in all commendable learning. Then I played at primero + with my Lord Arundel and my Lady Lumley and my uncle Francis. The + knave of hearts was fixed upon for the quinola, and I won the flush. + My uncle Francis cried the winning card should be titled Dudley. + 'Not so,' quoth the earl; 'the knave that would match with the queen + in the suit of hearts should never win the game.' And further talk + ensued; from which I learnt that my Lord Arundel and the Duke of + Norfolk mislike my Lord Leicester, and would not he should marry the + queen; and my uncle laughed, and said, 'My lord, no good Englishman + is there but must be of your lordship's mind, though none have so + good reason as yourself to hinder so base a contract; for if my Lord + of Leicester should climb unto her majesty's throne, beshrew me if + he will not remember the box on the ear your lordship ministered to + him some time since;' at which the earl laughed, too; but my Lady + Lumley cried, 'I would to God my brother of Norfolk were rid of my + Lord Leicester's friendship, which has, I much fear me, more danger + in it than his enmity. God send he does not lead his grace into + troubles greater than can well be thought of!' Alack, Mistress + Constance, what uneasy times are these which we have fallen on! for + methinks 'troubles' is the word in every one's mouth. As I was about + to step into the chair at the hall-door at Arundel House, I heard + one of my lord's guard say to another, 'I trust the white horse will + be in quiet, and so we shall be out of trouble.' I have asked Mr. + Martin what these words should mean; whereupon he told me the white + horse, which indeed I might have known, was the Earl of Arundel's + cognisance; and that the times were very troublesome, and plots were + spoken of in the North anent the Queen of Scots, her majesty the + <a name="96">{96}</a> queen's cousin, who is at Chatesworth; and when he said that, + all of a sudden I grew red, and my cheeks burned like two hot coals; + but he took no heed, and said, 'A true servant might well wish his + master out of trouble, when troubles were so rife.' And now shame + take me for taking up so much of your time, which should be spent in + more profitable ways than the reading of my poor letters; and I must + needs beg you to write soon, and hold me as long as I have held you, + and love me, sweet one, as I love you. My Lady Margaret, who is in a + sense twice my sister, says she is jealous of Mistress Constance + Sherwood, and would steal away my heart from her; but, though she is + a winsome and cunning thief in such matters, I warrant you she shall + fail therein. And so, commending myself to your good prayers, I + remain +<br><br> + "Your true friend and loving servant,<br> + "ANN SURREY." +</p> +<p> +As I finished and was folding up my letter the clock struck nine. It +was waning darker without by reason of a cloud which had obscured the +moon. I heard my father still pacing up and down the gravel-walk, and +ever and anon staying his footsteps awhile, as if watching. After a +short space the moon shone out again, and I saw the shadows of two +persons against the wall of the kitchen garden. Presently the +hall-door was fastened and bolted, as I knew by the rattling of the +chain which hung across it. Then my father looked in at the door and +said, "'Tis time, goodwife, for young folks to be abed." Upon which my +mother rose and made as if she was about to withdraw to her +bed-chamber. Edmund followed us up stairs, and, wishing us both +good-night, went into the closet where he slept. Then my mother, +taking me by the hand, led me into my father's study. +</p> +<p> +[TO BE CONTINUED. <a href="#163">Page 163</a>] +</p> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>Translated from Der Katholik. +<br><br> +THE TWO SIDES OF CATHOLICISM. +<br><br> +I.</h2> +<p> +The Church is, in a twofold respect, universal or catholic. While, on +the one hand, she extends herself over the whole earth, and encircles +the entire human race with the bond of the same faith and an equal +love, on the other she makes known, by this very act, the most special +inward character of her own being. Thus the Church is the Catholic +Church, both in her interior being and in her exterior manifestation. +</p> +<p> +The ground of the well-known saying of St. Ambrose, "Where Peter is, +there is the Church," [Footnote 7] lies in the thought, that the +nature of the Church admits of only one form of historical +manifestation. The idea of the true Church can only be realized where +Peter is, in the communion of the legitimate Pope as the successor of +Peter. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 7: Ubi Petrus ibi ecclesia. In Ps. xl. No. 30. ] +</p> +<p> +This proposition has its proximate justification in that clear +expression of the will of Jesus Christ, the founder of the Church, in +which he designates the Apostle Peter as the rock on which he will +build his Church. Moreover, it is precisely this rock-foundation which +is to make the Church indestructible. [Footnote 8] From this it +follows that, in virtue of the ordinance of Jesus, the office of +Peter, or the primacy given him in the Church, was not to expire with +the death of the apostle. For, if the <a name="97">{97}</a> Church is indestructible +precisely on account of her foundation upon the rock-man Peter, he +must remain for all time the support of the Church, and historical +connection with him is the indispensable condition on which the Church +can be firmly established in any part of the earth. This constant +connection with the Apostle Peter is maintained through the bishop of +Rome for the time being. For these two offices, the episcopate of Rome +and the primacy, were connected with each other in the person of the +Apostle Peter. Consequently the same superior rank in the Church which +Peter possessed is transmitted to the legitimate bishop of Rome at the +same time with the Roman episcopal see. Thus the Prince of the +Apostles remains in very deed the rock-foundation of the Church, +continually, in each one of his successors for the time being. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 8: Matt. xvi. 18.] +</p> +<p> +In the view of Christian antiquity, the unity of the Church was the +particular object for which the papacy was established. [Footnote 9] +This unity, apprehended in its historical development, gives us the +conception of catholicity. [Footnote 10] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 9: St. Cyprian, <i>De Unit Eccl. Primatus Petro dafur, ut + una Christi ecclesia et cathedra una monstretur</i>. The primacy is + given to Peter, that the Church of Christ may be shown to be one, + and the chair one.] +<br><br> + [Footnote 10: Ibid. <i>Ecclesia quoque una est, quae in multitudinem. + latius incremento faeccunditatis extenditur.... ecclesia Domini luce + perfusa per obem totam radios suos porrigit. Unum tamen lumen est, + quod ubique diffunditur, nec unitas corporis separatur.</i> +<br><br> + The Church also is one, which is extended to a very great multitude + by the increase of fruitfulness . . . the Church of the Lord + pervaded with light extends its rays over the whole world. + Nevertheless the light which is everywhere diffused is one, and the + unity of the body is never separated.] +</p> +<br> +<p> +Both these marks of the Church must embody themselves in the form of +an outwardly perceptible historical reality. The Church being indebted +for her unity, and by necessary consequence for her catholicity, +precisely to her historical connection with Peter, catholicity is thus +rooted in the idea of the papacy. But does its ultimate and most +profound principle lie therein? +</p> +<p> +The argument, briefly sketched above, obliges us to rest the +catholicity of the Church on the actual institution of Christ. We can, +however, inquire into the essential reason of this institution. Does +this reason lie simply in a free, voluntary determination of Christ, +or in the interior essence of the Church herself? In the latter case, +the Church would appear as Catholic, because the end of her +establishment could be fulfilled under no other condition. There would +be in her innermost being a secret determination, by force of which +the idea of the Church is completely incapable of realization under +any other form than that of catholicity. A Christian Church without +the papacy were, therefore, entirely inconceivable. If this is +actually the case, there lies hidden under the rind of the Church's +visible form of catholicity, a still deeper catholicity, in which we +are bound to recognize the most profound principle of the outward, +historical side of catholicity. +</p> +<p> +But that inward principle, the marrow of the Church, where are we to +look for it? Our theologians, following St. Augustine, teach that the +Church, like man, consists of soul and body. The theological virtues +form the soul of the Church, and her body is constituted by the +outward profession of the faith, the participation of the sacraments, +and exterior connection with the visible head of the Church. +[Footnote 11] St. Augustine, indeed, also designates the Holy Ghost as +the soul or the inner principle of the Church. This is the same +thought with the one which will be presently evolved, in which the +inner principle of catholicity will be reduced to the conception of +the <i>supernatural</i>. This, however, considered in itself, is withdrawn +from the region of historical manifestation. In order that it may pass +from the region of the invisible into that of apprehensible reality, +it needs a medium that may connect together both orders, the invisible +order of the supernatural and the order of historical manifestation. +It is only in this <a name="98">{98}</a> way that catholicity can acquire for itself a +historical shape, and assume flesh and blood. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 11: Bellarm., <i>De Eccl. milit.</i>, cap. ii.] +</p> +<p> +We might be disposed to regard the sacraments as this medium, because +they are the instruments by which grace is conferred, in a manner +apprehensible through the senses. Nevertheless, we cannot find the +constitutive principle of the Church in the sacraments alone. It is +well known that Protestantism has set forth the legitimate +administration of the sacraments as a mark of the true Church. A +searching glance at the Protestant conception of the Church will +hereafter give us a proof that a bare communication in sacraments, at +least from the Protestant stand-point, cannot possibly verify itself +as making a visible Church. According to the Protestant doctrine of +justification, a sacrament is indebted for its grace-giving efficacy +solely to the faith of the receiver. In this view, therefore, the +connection of the invisible element of the supernatural with the +historically manifested reality, and consequently the making visible +of the true Church, is dependent on conditions where historical +fulfilment is not provable. Who can prove whether the recipient of a +sacrament has faith? It is true that, according to the Catholic view, +an objective efficacy is ascribed to the sacrament, i.e., the +outwardly perceptible completion of the sacramental action of itself +permits the invisible element of the supernatural to penetrate into +the sphere of the visible. +</p> +<p> +Notwithstanding this, the Catholic sacrament is, by itself alone, no +sufficient medium through which the being of the true Church can be +brought into visibility. Did she embody herself historically only in +so far as a sensible matter and an outward action are endued with a +supernatural efficacy, the element of the supernatural would come to a +historical manifestation only as the purely objective. A profound view +of the essence of the Church would not find this satisfactory. The +Church, even on her visible side, is not a purely objective, or merely +outward, institution. The ultimate principle of catholicity—and this +statement will make our conception intelligible—although implanted in +the world as a supernatural leaven from above, has nevertheless its +seat in the deepest interior of the human spirit. Thence it penetrates +upward into the sphere of historical manifestation, and thus proves +itself a church-constitutive principle. Such a connection of the +region of the interior and subjective with that of historical and +visible reality is caused by the objective efficacy of a sacrament, +only in the case where the same is productive of its proper effect. +This, however, according to Catholic doctrine, presupposes an inward +disposition on the part of the recipient, the presence of which cannot +be manifested to outward apprehension. A Church, whose essence +consisted merely in the bond established through the sacraments, could +either not be verified with certitude, or would have an exclusively +exterior character. Accordingly, we have not yet found, in the +Catholic sacramental conception, the middle term we are seeking, by +which the essence of catholicity can be brought into visible +manifestation. Rather, this process has to be already completed and +the conception of the Church to be actualized, before the sacrament +can manifest its efficacy. Through this last, the element of the +supernatural, i.e., the invisible germ of the Church, must be +originally planted or gradually strengthened in individual souls. But +this is effected by the sacrament as the organ and in the name of the +Church, though in particular cases outside of her communion. +</p> +<p> +The continuous existence of Catholicity is essentially the +self-building of the body of Christ. It produces its own increase +through the instrumentality of the sacraments. [Footnote 12] The +union between the supernatural and the historical actuality, or the +bond of <a name="99">{99}</a> catholicity, is not then first established in the +sacraments. These only mediate for individual souls the reception into +the union, or confirm them in their organic relation to it, and are +signs of fellowship. In addition to what has been already said, there +is another reason, and one of wider application, to be considered, as +bearing on this point. The principle of a new life which has to be +infused into individual souls through the sacraments is sanctifying +grace. In this, therefore, by logical consequence, we should be +obliged to recognize the interior constitutive principle of the +Church, if it were true that the connection between the inner being of +the Church and her historical manifestation were brought to pass +through the efficacy of the sacraments. According to this apprehension +of the subject, only the saints would belong to the true Church. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 12: Eph. iv. 16.] +</p> +<p> +One might seek to evade this last conclusion by averring that in the +instance of baptism, the sacrament produces in the soul of the +recipient, beside sanctifying grace, still another effect, +independently of the disposition, namely, the baptismal character. +This character is an indelible mark impressed on the soul. Here, then, +is given us a supernatural principle which penetrates the deepest +interior of the human spirit, and which is, at the same time, capable +of verifying itself as a historical fact; inasmuch as it is infallibly +infused into the soul through an outward, sensible action, and +thereby, through the medium of the latter, becomes visible. Beside +this, one might be still more inclined to regard the baptismal +character as the Church's formative principle, because the same is +stamped upon the soul through a sacrament, whose special end is to +incorporate with the body of Christ its individual members; for which +reason, also, baptism is designated in the language of the Church as +the gate of the spiritual life, <i>vitae spiritualis janua</i>. [Footnote 13] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 13: <i>Decret. pro Armenia</i>.] +</p> +<p> +We must, however, in this immediate connection, put in a reminder, +that it is a disputed point in theology, whether baptism is really, in +all cases, the indispensably necessary condition of becoming a member +of the Church. In the opinion of prominent theologians, a mere +catechumen can, under certain circumstances, be a member of the +Church. [Footnote 14] Be that as it may, no one will certainly +dispute the fact that a catechumen, whose soul is glowing with divine +love, belongs at least to the soul of the Church. In him, therefore, +the inner germ of the Church's life really exists before the reception +of the baptismal character. Beside this, it appears to us that the +sacramental character, precisely in view of its determinate end, is +not so qualified that we can put it forward as the interior principle +of catholicity. The baptismal character is intended for a distinctive +mark; by it the seal of Church membership is stamped on the soul. It +is true that the same action by which the character is impressed on +the soul also makes the baptized person a member of the Church, or, +that in the same act which plants the inner germ of the Church's being +in the heart, the soul receives also the characteristic outward +impress of that being. But in so far as it is the immediate and proper +faculty of the baptismal character to impress the stamp of the Church +in indelible features upon the soul, the very conception of this +character presupposes necessarily the conception of the Church, as +prior to itself; which shows that we cannot find the principle of the +interior being of the Church in the baptismal character. This is +confirmed by the additional consideration that the baptismal character +is not effaced from those souls which have broken off every kind of +connection with the Church, and have absolutely nothing remaining in +them by which they communicate in her being. Finally, the existence of +the Church, at least so far as her inner being or soul is concerned, +<a name="100">{100}</a> does not date its origin from the institution of baptism. We +must, therefore, go one step further, in order to discover the +interior source of catholicity. As has been heretofore pointed out, +this source lies in that region which we are usually wont to designate +as the Supernatural Order. Let us, therefore, make a succinct +exposition of the interior law of development in this order. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 14: Suarez, <i>De Fide. Disp.</i> ix., § i., No. 18.] +</p> +<p> +According to the Catholic doctrine, <i>faith</i> is the beginning of human +salvation, the ground and root of justification, [Footnote 15] <i>i.e.</i>, +of the supernatural life of the soul. St. Paul designates faith "the +substance of things hoped for." [Footnote 16] That is to say, the +beatific vision of God, and with it the point toward which the whole +supernatural order tends and in which it rests, has its foundation +laid in faith, and is already in germ contained in it. Christ, and +with him the fountain of our supernatural life, dwells in us through +faith. [Footnote 17] Is Christ, therefore, called the foundation, +beside which no other can be laid, [Footnote 18 ]then is faith +recognized in the basis of the supernatural order, because by faith we +are immediately brought into union with Christ. Wherefore the apostle +makes our participation in the fruits of the work of redemption +precisely dependent on the condition, "If so ye continue in the faith, +grounded and settled." [Footnote 19] The same portion as foundation, +which faith has in the inner life of grace in the soul, is also +accorded to it in relation to the exterior structure of the Church. +The visibility of the true Church is only the historical embodiment of +the element of the supernatural. The divine building of the Church has +for its foundation the apostles, [Footnote 20] that is, as the sense +of the passage evidently is, through the faith which they preached. +Very remarkable is the form of expression in the well-known saying of +the apostle: "One Lord, one faith, one baptism." [Footnote 21] Here +the unity of faith is given the precedence of the unity produced +through baptism, as being its necessary pre-requisite. The one baptism +is the bond of unity of the Church only in the second line. Through +it, namely, the fruitful germ of the one faith in which exclusively +the unity of the Church has its root, is continually planted in +individual souls, an actual confession of that faith being also +included in the ceremony of baptism itself. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 15: <i>Trid. Sess.</i> vi., cap. 8.] +<br><br> + [Footnote 16: Heb. xi. i.] +<br><br> + [Footnote 17: Eph iii. 17.] +<br><br> + [Footnote 18: I Cor. iii. 11.] +<br><br> + [Footnote 19: Coloss. i. 23.] +<br><br> + [Footnote 20: Eph. ii. 20.] +<br><br> + [Footnote 21: Eph. iv. 5.] +</p> +<p> +The Church herself makes use of language which clearly shows that she +regards faith as the deepest principle of her being. [Footnote 22] +The Catechism of the Council of Trent defines the Church as "the +faithful dispersed throughout the world." [Footnote 23] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 22: <i>Concil. Lateran., iv. cap. Firmiter: Una fidelium + universalis ecclesia</i>. ] +<br><br> + [Footnote 23: <i>Catech. Rom.</i>, pars 1, cap. x. . qu. 2. ] +</p> +<p> +According to St. Thomas, also, the unity, and consequently the +catholicity of the Church, is radically grounded in faith. The angelic +doctor means here living faith, or <i>fides formata</i>. According to this +view, the principle of catholicity pervades the innermost depth of +subjectivity. At the same time it is clear how the same comes to an +historical manifestation. This takes place in the symbol of the +Church. The faith which finds its historical expression in the +ecclesiastical symbol is to be regarded as <i>fides formata</i>, [Footnote +24] for this reason, because it is a confession of faith made in the +name and by the personality of the collective Church, which possesses +its inward principle of unity in the <i>fides formata</i>, or living faith. +Moreover, the symbol of the Church is a constant warning for those of +her members who have not the grace of sanctification to make their +faith living through charity. [Footnote 25] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 24: That is, faith made perfect by charity as it exists in + a person who is in the state of grace, in contradistinction from the + faith of a sinner.—TRANSLATOR ] +<br><br> + [Footnote 25: <i>Secunda Secundae</i>, qu. 1. a. q. ad 3. ] +</p> +<p> +In the foregoing doctrinal exposition St. Thomas has marked out for us +the path to be followed in seeking <a name="101">{101}</a> for the medium of union +between the exterior and ulterior catholicity of the Church. Our +argument must start, therefore, from the position that the unity of +the Church in the first line is a unity in faith. In this notion we +have the speculative middle term between the inner being of the Church +and her historical form of manifestation. From the blending of both +these elements is formed the full, adequate idea of catholicity. This +last exhibits itself as a force acting in two distinct spheres, that +of the inward subjectivity and that of historical objectivity. +Consequently, the exterior and interior catholicity of the Church, or +the two sides of Catholicism, must be reduced to the same principle. A +further evolution of this thought will make it clear, why the being of +the true Church can only find its true actualization in the historical +form of Catholicism. +</p> +<p> +The catholic visible form of the Church, as pointed out above, is +indicated in the papacy. But in what relation does the latter stand to +the interior catholicity of the Church? In order to find the right +answer to this decisive question, we must first more exactly define in +what sense the papacy must be regarded as the bond of the historical +unity of the Church. It must be so regarded, precisely in so far as +the primacy has been instituted for the special end of preserving the +faith incorrupt. According to the teaching of the Fathers of the +Church, Peter is the Church's foundation of rock, in virtue of his +faith. [Footnote 26] By this, of course, is not meant the personal +confession of the Apostle Peter, but the object-matter of the same, +the contents of the faith to be preached by Peter and his successors. +Peter, says Leo the Great, is called by Christ the Rock, on account of +the solidity of the faith which he was to preach, <i>pro soliditate +fidei quam erat praedicaturus</i>. [Footnote 27 ] This is not the place +to develop further in what way the papacy proves itself in act the +cement of the unity of faith. We shall speak of that later. It is +enough for our purpose, in the meanwhile, to take note of the judgment +of the ancient Church. According to the doctrine of the Fathers of the +Church, the fundamental significance which the papacy has for the +Church, rests upon a relation of dependence between her faith and the +faith of Peter, including by consequence that of his successors. In +this sense St. Hilarius distinctly calls the faith of the Apostle +Peter the foundation of the Church. [Footnote 28] The same view is +found in St. Ambrose, [Footnote 29] expressed in nearly the same +words. But if Peter is the Church's foundation of rock precisely +through his faith, that mutual relation between the inner catholicity +of the Church and the papacy is no longer doubtful. For that the +Church, according to her inward essence, verifies herself as the +Catholic Church, she owes precisely to her faith, as likewise, on the +other side, her catholic visible form is conditioned by the outward +profession of the same faith. Consequently, the papacy as guardian of +the unity of faith, stands also in a necessary connection with the +inner being of the Church. Here then we have the uniting member we +have been seeking between inward and outward catholicity, the essence +and the manifestation of the Church. <i>In so far as the historical +connection with Peter must be conceived as a bond of faith, in this +same connection or in the form of Catholicism, the true Church, even +as to her inner being, comes historically into visible manifestation.</i> +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 26: See the relevant passages from the fathers in + Ballerini, <i>De vi ac rations primatus Rom. Pont.</i>, cap. xii., § 1, + No. 1. ] +<br><br> + [Footnote 27: Serm. 62.] +<br><br> + [Footnote 28: <i>De Trin</i>., vi. 37. ] +<br><br> + [Footnote 29: <i>De Incarn</i>., cap. 5. ] +</p> +<p> +Faith, which we affirm to be the essential kernel of Catholicism, has +two sides, one which is interior and subjective, and another which +comes to outward manifestation. With the heart we believe unto +justification, but with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. +[Footnote 30] A revealed truth <a name="102">{102}</a> corresponds to supernatural faith +as its necessary object. Therefore, it may be remarked in passing, the +subjective act of faith is equally infallible with the divine +testimony itself, upon which it is essentially based. [Footnote 31] +This revealed object of faith, without which a supernatural faith is +entirely inconceivable, is mediated or set forth through an organ +directly instituted by God for this purpose. An individual, who thinks +that he has discovered, through private investigation or in any other +way, a particular point of doctrine, which hitherto has not been +universally received as such, to be a revealed truth, can only make it +an object of supernatural faith, when he is able to judge with +certainty that this supposed new doctrine of faith would be approved +by the infallible, divinely appointed organ of revealed truth. +[Footnote 32] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 30: Rom. x. 10.] +<br><br> + [Footnote 31: St. Thomas, <i>Secunda Secunda</i>, q. 1 a. 3.] +<br><br> + [Footnote 32: Suarez, <i>De Fide. Disp.</i> iii., Sect, xiii., No. 9.] +</p> +<p> +This mediating organ is, however, as we shall fully show in the course +of our further exposition, no other than the Apostle Peter, and +through the relation which he bears to him, his legitimate successor +in office. Peter is the support and the strength of his brethren, +inasmuch as <i>his</i> faith, to which the dogmatic utterance of his +successors gives a new expression according to the needs of the +Church, forms a criterion for the faith of the Church. Peter, +preaching of the faith, continually apprehensible through the papal +definitions of faith, gives to the faith of the Church the specific +form under which the same incorporates itself historically in an +ecclesiastical confession. But in the Church-confession of faith, as +we have before shown, its inner being comes into visible +manifestation. As medium of Peter's preaching of the faith, the papacy +is consequently also a Church-constitutive principle, inasmuch as +through the actualization of the supreme power delegated to him by +Christ, the being of the Church is made visible, and obtains an +historical form. This is the sense of the words, "On this Rock I will +build my Church." +</p> +<p> +As we have, in the foregoing remarks, conceived of the papacy as the +angle at which the two sides of Catholicism meet, the uniting bond of +the outward and inward catholicity of the Church, we are further bound +to show why precisely the papacy is the appropriate organ to establish +that union between the essence and the manifestation of Catholicism, +and thereby to mediate the actualization of the true idea of the +Church. For this purpose we must endeavor to penetrate somewhat deeper +into the inner being or soul of the Church. We shall there find a +tendency which makes the Catholic form of manifestation of the Church +a postulate of her being. This tendency lies in the character of the +<i>supernatural</i>. In the conception of the supernatural we shall +endeavor to point out the radical conception of Catholicism. The +papacy, and the Catholic visible form of the Church mediated by it, +is, in our opinion, the necessary consequence of the supernaturality +of her being. +</p> +<p> +Thus far we have sketched in brief outlines the mutual relation of the +two sides of Catholicism. We must reserve for a subsequent article the +detailed theological proof of that which we have for the present +suggested as a new theory. Meanwhile we would like to exhibit, in a +few words, the interest which an investigation of this subject claims +for itself at this particular period of time. +</p> +<br> + +<h2>II.</h2> +<br> +<p> +The distinction between an exterior and interior catholicity of the +Church is but slightly touched upon in our books of dogmatic +instruction. No one need wonder at this circumstance. It is well known +that the controversy with Protestantism gave occasion to the usual +modern method of treating of the marks of the Church. The <a name="103">{103}</a> method +of the great controversialists of the age of the Reformation has, at +least in regard to the present question, remained, to a considerable +extent, the model for the dogmatic writers of the present time. The +theologians of a former time, however, found no necessity for +expressly distinguishing between the catholicity of the being of the +Church and that of her manifestation. It was enough for their purpose +to prove that the Church, in her historical manifestation, is the +Catholic Church. +</p> +<p> +The Protestantism of the epoch of the Reformation claimed for its +congregations the honor of having actualized the true idea of the +Church. The churches of Wittenberg, Zurich, and Geneva each pretended +to be the true copy of the evangelical primitive Church. It was easy +for Catholic polemics to destroy this pretension. It was only +necessary to inspect the particular Protestant churches a little +closely. Such a reconnoissance conducted necessarily to the +indubitable conclusion that none of those communions had the marks of +the true Church upon it, and that these were realized only in the +Church in communion with the Pope. +</p> +<p> +Modern Protestantism is much more modest in its pretensions. The +present champions of the Protestant cause characterize, without +disguise, the attempt of the Reformers to bring the essence of the +true Church historically into manifestation in their communions as a +gross error and a backsliding into Catholicism. They will have it, +that the characteristic principle of Protestantism lies precisely in +the acknowledgment that the true essence of the Church can find its +correlative expression in none of the existing churches. The true +Church, according to this notion, remains an unattainable ideal as +long as the world stands. Not to actualize the idea of the Church, +only to strive after its actualization, is the task of a religious +communion. The Protestantism of the day accordingly recognizes it as +its vocation "to give Christianity precisely the expression and form +which best corresponds to the necessities of the time, the demands of +an advanced science and culture, the grade of intellectual and moral +development of the Christian nations." [Footnote 33] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 33: Schenkel, "Essence of Prot.," p. 4.] +</p> +<p> +Protestant polemic theology makes the following use of this view. Over +against the magnificent historical manifestation of the Catholic +Church, the torn and rent condition of the Protestant religious +community presents a striking contrast. The proximate conclusion that +the true Church can only be found within the circle of Catholicism, +they seek now to anticipate on the Protestant side by the observation +that already from the outset one makes a false start who would wish to +recognize the true Church by her form of historical manifestation. +According to the Protestant view, the mark of catholicity verifies +itself exclusively in the inner being of the Church, and not in her +outward manifestation. For, owing to the constant progress of human +development, and the extremely diversified individuality of single +nations, the historical manifestation of the Church must be multiform +to the same extent as the intellectual and moral wants of the +different peoples are various. Nevertheless, in spite of the manifold +differences which distinguish the particular churches in their +historical manifestation, the members of the same blend themselves +together into a great invisible spiritual kingdom. This is the <i>ideal</i> +Church. +</p> +<p> +This is the response which modern Protestantism makes when Catholic +criticism places before its eyes the melancholy picture of its inward +divisions and the history of its variations. From the historical +manifestation of a church to its inner being they say the conclusion +is invalid. In order, therefore, to make Catholic polemics effective, +the relation between the essence and the manifestation of the Church +must be first of all theologically <a name="104">{104}</a> established. It is only after +this has been done that the comparison between "the Church and the +churches" can be exhibited in its entire argumentative force. +</p> +<p> +The theory of the ideal church is not yet effectively refuted, when we +on the Catholic side content ourselves with proving that the true +Church must become visible. This general proposition does not exclude +the proposition of our opponents. For, according to the Protestant +doctrine, also, the creative power of the spirit of Christianity +exhibits itself in the construction of visible congregations, and the +gradual actualization of the ideal Church is conditioned by a sensibly +apprehensible mediation. The final decision of this question must +therefore be sought in the demonstration of the proposition that the +inmost being of the Church can only realize itself historically in the +one specific form; that a catholicity of the essence of the Church +without a catholicity in her manifestation is entirely inconceivable. +Only by this demonstration will the retreat of Protestant polemics +into the ideal Church be for ever cut off. +</p> +<p> +Some have argued against the Protestant view, that as Christian truth +is one so the visible Church can also be but one. [Footnote 34] The +argument is valid only in the prior supposition that there can be but +a single form of historical manifestation for the inner being of the +Church. This, however, Protestantism denies in the sense, that from +its stand-point every particular church represents the idea of the +Church, [Footnote 35] even though it may be on one side only. +According to the diversified stages of cultivation in the Christian +people, so they say, now one, now another side of Christian truth +attains to its expression in the particular confessions, but in none +the full and entire truth. The contradiction existing between these, +therefore, in nowise falls back upon the Christian verity itself. This +Protestant evasion can also be alone met in the way above designated, +by establishing the relation between the essence and the manifestation +of Catholicism. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 34: Moehler, "Symbolism."] +<br><br> + [Footnote 35: This is also the theory of High-Church + Episcopalianism. Mr. Sewall has defined it more logically than any + other writer of that school. According to him, the unity of the + Church consists in this, that all churches are formed after one + ideal model, or on one principle, and the separate churches of + individual bishops are each a perfect organic whole. That is, + Catholic unity is an <i>abstract</i> unity, concreted in each particular + bishop and diocese. Hence there can be no organized unity of the + universal Church, but only <i>union</i> or friendly communion of + independent churches. This notion was highly approved by Bishop + Whittingham, who expressed it in this way, that the true communion + of churches with each other is in <i>speculo Trinitatis</i>. It is pure + Congregationalism, bating the difference between a diocese governed + by a chief and inferior pastors, and a single congregation under one + pastor or several of the same order. But it is the only logical + conception of a visible church possible, when the papacy, or + principle of universal organic unity, is denied. It is the logical + result of the schismatical position of the Greeks, who have no unity + among themselves except that which is national, but are divided into + several independent bodies. Hence, the so-called "union movement," + as clearly shown by Cardinal Patrizi in the Decree sent to the + English bishops, is one which proceeds from a denial of Catholic + unity, and therefore can never lead to unity, but only aim at union, + or voluntary co-operation of distinct churches with each other. The + High-Church theory differs from that of the German Protestants in + this that the former requires that all churches should be alike, and + each one represent completely the ideal Church; but both are based + on the same principle, that of an abstract, invisible unity and + catholicity, concreted in an individual and not a generic and + universal mode.—TRANSLATOR.] +</p> +<p> +It has been further argued that a Church of the Nations, which the +Christian Church must be, according to its idea, is entirely +inconceivable without the papacy at its summit. [Footnote 36] Here, +also, it is presupposed, as already proved, that the conception of +universality which is essentially connected with the idea of the true +Church must also necessarily impress itself upon her actual +explication of herself in time. But it is precisely against this +notion that modern Protestantism contends. Therefore, if our polemic +arms are to bring down their man, the affair must begin with a sharper +delineation of the mutual relation between the essence and the visible +form of the Church. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 36: Döllinger, "The Church and the Churches."] +</p> +<p> +Beside the polemic advantages to be gained in the course which has +been suggested, there is another in the interest of pacification. +Under the rubbish of the Protestant Church-idea there still lies +buried a remnant of <a name="105">{105}</a> Catholic truth. We ought not to shun the +trouble of bringing this to light. It is the Christian truth contained +in his confession which binds the believing Protestant to it. Catholic +theology has to reclaim this as its own property. It has the mission +intrusted to it to show how the religious satisfaction, which the +deeper Protestant mind thinks it finds in the doctrinal conception of +its confession, is imparted to it in richer abundance and morally +purified through the dogma of the Church. Through this conciliatory +method, an understanding of the Catholic truth can be much more easily +and effectually imparted to the unprejudiced Protestant mind than by a +rough polemical method. This end is most essentially served by the +distinction between the essence and the manifestation of Catholicism. +</p> +<p> +Protestant piety makes a great boast of its deep spirituality. The +modern ideal theory of the Church owes a great share of its popularity +to its aptitude of application in this direction. By means of this +conception, the Protestant Church is expected to exhibit itself in a +new light as the church of the interior and spiritual life. Does one +attain the same depth of view from the Catholic stand-point? All doubt +on this point must disappear on thorough consideration of what we have +above named, the inner side of Catholicism. +</p> +<p> +There is another ground for the favor with which this ideal theory of +the Church is at present received. Protestant theology regards it as a +means of its own resuscitation. The old doctrine of justification by +faith alone has in great part lost the charm it once exercised over +the hearts of the German people. The once mighty battle-cry of inward, +subjective faith is no longer to the taste of our age. Therefore, in +our time, instead of the antiquated idea of immediate union with +Christ, the world-moving power of the mind, the creative power of the +idea, is set up as the distinguishing principle of Protestantism. The +latter is thus made to appear as the most powerful protector of the +liberal aspirations of the age. +</p> +<p> +Catholic controversy must take some cognizance of this, if it would +make its own proper principle prevail. While Protestantism seeks to +gain the favor of the contemporary world by obsequiously yielding to +the caprices of the spirit of the age, the inner principle of +Catholicism raises it above the vacillations which sway particular +periods. Only a Church which, thanks to its native principle, is not +borne along by intellectual and social periodical currents, can +effectually correct their movement. In order, therefore, to measure +accurately the influence which the Church, by virtue of her +institution, is called to exercise upon human society, we must +penetrate into her innermost essence, to the very point where +Catholicism has its deepest principle. First from this point can we +correctly understand in how far the Church is a social power. From +this point of view alone can we comprehend her aptitude to be the +teacher of the nations. And precisely of this social and instructive +vocation have our contemporaries lost the right understanding to a +great extent. It is one of the mightiest tasks of our modern theology +to make the minds of men once more capable of apprehending this truth. +[Footnote 37] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 37: A few sentences rather digressive from the main topic + of the article are hero omitted.—TRANSLATOR.] +</p> +<p> +The high importance of authority in the system of Catholicism is well +known. This fundamental principle runs a danger of being placed in a +false light, when it is depressed to the level of the historical and +exterior side of the Church. Ecclesiastical authority, separated from +the ground which lies back of it and which is above the temporal +order, may appear even to the well-disposed as a mere brake for the +stoppage of all intellectual progress. This suggests a temptation to +desire a compromise between the Church and the spirit of the age. When +one takes a merely exterior and <a name="106">{106}</a> historical view of church +authority, the proper spirit of joyousness which ought to belong to +faith is wanting in the submission which is rendered to its decrees. +It is very easy, then, to fall into a sort of diplomatic way of acting +toward the Church as teacher of doctrine. One seeks to accommodate +one's self to her doctrine through subtile distinctions. On the +contrary, the boldest scientific mind frankly and cheerfully bows +itself under the yoke of the obedience of faith, when it sees that the +Church, in her doctrinal decision, is acting from her own interior +principle. +</p> +<p> +Our doctrinal exposition requires now that we should go into a more +thorough argument respecting the immanent principle of Catholicism, +which we shall first of all undertake to do on Scriptural grounds. +This part of the subject will be treated in an ensuing article. +</p> +<br> +[Continued on <a href="#669">Page 669</a>] +<hr> +<br> +<h2>From The Cornhill Magazine. +<br><br> +MONSIEUR BABOU. +<br><br> +I.</h2> +<br> +<p> +In the immediate vicinity of the capital of the kingdom of Lilliput +there is a charming village called "Les Grenouillettes." This rural +resort of the citizens of Mildendo consists, mainly, of three hotels, +thirty public-houses, and five ponds. The population I should reckon +at about ten millions, inclusive of frogs, who are the principal +inhabitants, and who make a great noise in the world there. +</p> +<p> +Hither flock the jocund burgesses, and dance to the sound of harp and +viol. … +</p> +<p> +It occurs to me that, sprightly as I may think it to call Belgium +Lilliput, the mystification might possibly become tiresome and +inconvenient if persisted in throughout this narrative, beside +becoming absolutely unnecessary. As for the village in question, I +have a reason or two for not calling it by its right name. +</p> +<p> +About half-a-dozen years ago, my brother (Captain John Freshe, R.N.), +his wife, and I had been wearily jogging all a summer's day in search +of country lodgings for a few weeks in the immediate neighborhood of +Brussels. Now nothing can be more difficult to find in that locality, +except under certain conditions. +</p> +<p> +You can live at a village hotel, and pay a maximum price for minimum +comfort. +</p> +<p> +You can, possibly, lodge in a public-house, where it will cost you +dear, however little you pay. +</p> +<p> +Or you can, in some villages, hire empty rooms in an entirely empty +house, and hire furniture from Brussels, and servants, if you have +none, by the month. +</p> +<p> +This last alternative has the advantage of ennobling your position +into a quasi-martyrdom, by, in a measure, compelling you to stay where +you are, whether you like it or not. +</p> +<p> +Toward the end of that longest of the long days, we began to regard +life and circumstance with the apathy of despair, and to cease to hope +for anything further from them except dinner. +</p> +<p> +The capital of the kingdom of Lilliput appeared to be partially +surrounded by a vast and melancholy campagna of turnips. These wilds, +immeasurably spread, seemed lengthening as we went. Village after +<a name="107">{107}</a> village had we reached, and explored in vain. Judging by our +feelings, I should say we had ransacked at least half-a-hundred of +those rural colonies. Almost all these villages possessed at least six +public-houses and two ponds. Some few had no ponds, but all had six +public-houses. Rural, dusty, cracked public-houses; with frowzy +gardens, with rotten, sloppy tables and benches; with beery gorillas +playing at quoits and ninepins. +</p> +<p> +The names of none of these settlements seemed to us pronounceable by +human beings, with the exception of two, which sounded like Diggum and +Hittumontheback. But our city driver appeared to be acquainted with +the Simian tongue, and was directed from village to village by the +good-natured apes whom he interrogated. +</p> +<p> +About sunset we came to a larger and quite civilized place, with a +French name, signifying "The Tadpoles"—the place I have described at +the commencement of this narrative. Our dusty fly and dejected horse +turned into the carriage entrance of the first little hotel we saw. It +stood sideways to a picturesque little lake, with green shores. The +carriage entrance went through the house. Beyond, we had caught sight +of a paved yard or court, and of a vista of green leafiness that +looked cool and inviting. We heard the noisy jangling of a +barrel-organ playing a polka, and we found a performance going on in +the court that absorbed the attention of the whole household. No one +seemed to hear, or at least to heed, the sound of our wheels, but, +when our vehicle fairly stopped in the paved yard, a fishy-eyed waiter +came toward us, jauntily flipping time with his napkin. We begged him +to get us dinner instantly. +</p> +<p> +"Way, Mosou," replied that official, in the sweet Belgian-French +language, and let us out of the fly. We had been so long cramped up in +it that we were glad to walk, and stand, and look about the court +while our food was got ready. +</p> +<p> +The organ-grinder had not ceased grinding out his polka for a moment. +The wiry screams of his infernal machine seemed to charm him as much +as they did the rest of the company assembled. He was the usual +Savoyard, with a face like a burnt crust; all fire-brown eyes, sable +ringlets, and insane grimace. He leaned against a low stone post, and +ground out that horrible bray, like a grinning maniac. We walked to a +short distance, and took in the scene. +</p> +<p> +A little sallow young man, having a bushy mustache, stood near a door +into the house, with a dish in his hand, as if he had been transfixed +in the act of carrying it somewhere. Beside him, on the step of the +door, sat a blonde young woman, with large blue eyes and a little +mouth—as pretty and as <i>fade</i> as a Carlo-Dolcian Madonna. Evidently +these were the landlord and his lady. +</p> +<p> +On a garden-bench, by the low wall that divided the court from the +garden beyond, sat, a little apart, a young person of a decidedly +French aspect, dressed quite plainly, but with Parisian precision, in +black silk. In her hand and on her lap lay some white embroidery. She +was not pretty, but had neat, small features, that wore a pleasant +though rather sad smile, as she suspended her work to watch what was +going on. An old woman in a dark-blue gown and a clean cap, with a +pile of freshly-ironed linen in her arms, stood at the top of some +steps leading into a little building which was probably the laundry. +She was wagging her old head merrily to the dance tune. Other +lookers-on lounged about, but some of them had vanished since our +arrival—for instance, the fishy-eyed waiter and a burly individual in +a white nightcap. +</p> +<p> +The centre of attraction remains to be described. Within a few paces +of the organ-grinder, a little girl and boy danced indefatigably on +the stones, to the unmusical music of his box. The little boy was a +small, fair, sickly child, in a linen blouse, and about four years +old. He jumped, and stamped, and <a name="108">{108}</a> laughed excitedly. The little +girl looked about a year older. She was plump and rosy, dressed in a +full pink frock and black silk apron. She had light brown hair, cut +short and straight, like a boy's. She danced very energetically, but +solemnly, without a smile on her wee round mouth. She poussetted, she +twirled—her pink frock spread itself out like a parasol. Her fat +little bare arms akimbo, she danced in a gravely coquettish, +thoroughly business-like way; now crossing, changing places with her +partner; now setting to him, with little pattering feet; now suddenly +whisking and whirling off. The little boy watched her, and followed +her lead: she was the governing spirit of the dance. Both children +kept admirable time. They were dancing the tarantella, though they had +never heard of it; but of all the poetry of motion, the tarantella is +the most natural measure to fall into. +</p> +<p> +The organ-grinder ground, and grinned, and nodded; the landlord and +his wife exchanged looks of admiration and complacency whenever they +could take their eyes off the little dancing nymph: it was easy to see +they were her proud parents. The quiet young lady on the bench looked +tenderly at the tiny, sickly boy, as he frisked. We felt sure she was +his mother. His eyes were light blue, not hazel; but he had the same +neat little features. +</p> +<p> +All of a sudden, down from an open window looking into the court, +there came an enormous voice— +</p> +<p> +"Ah, ah! Bravo! Ah, ah, Monsieur Babébibo-BOU!" +</p> +<p> +The little boy stopped dancing; so did the little girl, and every one +looked up at the window. The little boy, clapping his hands and +screaming with glee, ran under it. No one could be seen at that +aperture, but we had caught a momentary glimpse of a big blond man in +a blue blouse, who had instantly dropped out of sight, and who was +crouching on the floor, for we saw, though the child below could not, +the top of his straw hat just above the window-edge. The little boy +screamed, "Papa, papa!" The great voice, making itself preternaturally +gruff, roared out— +</p> +<p> +"Qui est là? Est-ce par chance Monsieur Babébibo-BOU?" (The first +syllables very fast, the final one explosive.) +</p> +<p> +"Way, way! C'est Mosou Babi—<i>bou</i>!" cried the child, trying to +imitate the gruff voice, and jumping and laughing ecstatically. +</p> +<p> +Out of the window came flying a huge soft ball of many colors, and +then another roar: "Avec les compliments du Roi de tous les joujoux, à +Monsieur Babébibo-BOU!" +</p> +<p> +More rapture. Then a large white packet, palpably sugar-plums, "Avec +les compliments de la Reine de tous les bonbons, a Mademoiselle Marie, +et à Monsieur Babébibo-BOU!" +</p> +<p> +Rapture inexpressible, except by shrill shrieks and capers. The plump +little girl gravely advances and assists at the examination of the +packet, popping comfits into her tiny mouth with a placid melancholy, +which I have often observed in fat and rosy faces. +</p> +<p> +Meanwhile, the organ-grinder has at last stopped grinding, has lowered +his box, and is eating a plateful of cold meat and bread which the old +woman has brought out to him. The landlord and his wife have +disappeared. The young Frenchwoman on the garden-bench has risen, and +come toward the children; and now, from a doorway leading into the +house, issues the big blond man we caught a momentary glimpse of at +the window. +</p> +<p> +The little boy abandons the sugar-plums to his playfellow, and crying +"Papa! papa!" darts to the new comer, who stoops and gathers him up to +his broad breast, in his large arms and hands, kissing him fondly and +repeatedly. The child responds with like effusion. The father's great +red face, with its peaked yellow beard, contrasts touchingly, somehow, +with the wee pale phiz of his little son. <a name="109">{109}</a> The child's tiny white +pads pat the jolly cheeks and pull the yellow beard. Then the man in +the blouse sets his son carefully on the ground, and kisses the young +Frenchwoman who stands by. +</p> +<p> +The big man has evidently been absent awhile from his family. "How +goes it, my sister?" says he. +</p> +<p> +"Well, my brother," she answers quietly. "Thou hast seen Auguste +dance. Thou hast seen how well, and strong, and happy he is—the good +God be thanked." +</p> +<p> +"And after him, thee, my good sister," says the big man, +affectionately. +</p> +<p> +We had been called in to dinner by this time, but the open window of +our eating-room looked into the court close to where the group stood. +We observed that Mademoiselle Marie had remained sole possessor of the +packet of sweets; and that the little boy, content to have got his +papa, made no effort to assert his rights in them. The big papa +interfered, saying, "Mais, mais, la petite.… Give at least of the +bonbons to thy comrade. It is only fair." +</p> +<p> +"Let her eat them, Jean," put in his sister, with naive feminine +generosity and justice. "They are so unwholesome for Auguste, seest +thou?" +</p> +<p> +The big man laughed, lit his pipe, and the three went away into the +little garden, where they strolled, talking in the summer twilight. +</p> +<p> +We came happily to an anchor here, in this foggy little haven, and +finding we could secure, at tolerably moderate charges, the +accommodation we required, made up our minds to stay at this little +hotel for the few weeks of our absence from Brussels. +</p> +<br> + +<h2>II.</h2> +<br> +<p> +Next morning we were breakfasting in the garden under a trellis of +hop-leaves, when the big man in the blouse came up the gravel-walk, +with his small son on his shoulder. +</p> +<p> +They were making a tremendous noise. The little boy was pulling his +father's great red ear; he affected to bellow with anguish, his +roaring voice topped by the child's shrill, gleeful treble. We saluted +the new comers in a neighborly manner. +</p> +<p> +"A beautiful day, Madame," said the big man, in French, taking off his +hat and bowing politely to John's wife, at the same time surrounding +his son safely with his left arm. +</p> +<p> +"Madame and these Messieurs are English, is it not?" +</p> +<p> +"A pretty place," we went on to say, after owning our nationality, +"and very pleasant in this hot weather after the glare of Brussels." +</p> +<p> +"It is that; and I am here as often as possible," returned our new +acquaintance. "My sister is staying here for the advantage of this +little man. … Monsieur Auguste, at your service. Salute then the +society, Auguste. You must know he has the pretension to be a little +delicate, this young man. An invalid, if you please; consequently his +aunt spoils him! It is a ruse on his part, you perceive. Ah, bah! An +invalid! My word, he fatigues my poor arm. Ah—h! I cannot longer +sustain him. I faint—I drop him down he goes. … la—a—à!" +</p> +<p> +Here, lowering him carefully, as if he were crystal, he pretended to +let his son suddenly tumble on a bit of grass-plot. +</p> +<p> +"At present" (grumbling) "here he is, broken to pieces probably; we +shall have the trouble of mending him. His aunt must bring her needle +and thread." +</p> +<p> +Monsieur Auguste was so enchanted with this performance that he +encored it ecstatically. His father obeyed, and then sent him off +running to call out his aunt to breakfast, which was laid under a +neighboring trellis. +</p> +<p> +"He is strong on his legs, is it not, Madame?" said the father, +looking after him; his jolly face and light blue eyes a little grave, +and wistful. "His spirits are so high, see you? He is <a name="110">{110}</a> too +intelligent, too intellectual—he has a little exhausted his strength; +that says all. He is well enough; he has no malady; and every day he +is getting stouter, plainly to the eye." +</p> +<p> +Here the aunt and nephew joined us. Our new acquaintance introduced +her. +</p> +<p> +"Ma belle-soeur. Ma chère,—Madame and these Messieurs are English. +They are good enough to take an interest in this infant Hercules of +ours." +</p> +<p> +He tossed the child on his shoulder again; established on which throne +his little monarch amused himself by ornamenting the parental +straw-hat with a huge flaring poppy and some green leaves, beneath +which the jovial face bloomed Bacchic. +</p> +<p> +Meanwhile the quiet young French-woman, smiling affectionately at +those playfellows as they went off together, sat down on a chair we +offered her, and frankly entered into conversation. +</p> +<p> +In a few minutes we knew a great deal about this little family. The +man in the blouse was a Belgian painter, Jean Baudin, and "well seen +in the expositions of Paris and Brussels." "His wife was my sister: we +were of Paris. When our little Auguste was born, my poor sister died. +She was always delicate. The little one is very delicate. Ah, so +delicate, also. It is impossible to be over-careful of him. And his +father, who is so strong—so strong! But the little one resembles in +every manner his mother. His poor father adores him, as you see. Poor +Jean! he so tenderly loved his wife, who died in her first youth. … +She had but eighteen years—she had six years less than I. In dying +she begged me to be to her infant a mother, and to her poor Jean a +sister. Jean is a good brother, bon et brave homme. And for the little +one, he is truly a child to be adored—judiciously, it is understood, +madame: I spoil him not, believe me. But he is clever to astonish you, +that child. So spiritual, and then such a tender little good heart—a +disposition so amiable. Hardly he requires correction. … Auguste! +how naughty thou art! Auguste! dost thou hear? Jean! take him then off +the dusty wall, and wipe him a little. Mon ami, thou spoilest the +child; one must be judicious." +</p> +<p> +We presently left the garden, and, in passing, beheld Monsieur Auguste +at breakfast. He was seated between his papa and aunt, and was being +adored by both (judiciously and injudiciously) to the heart's content +of all three. +</p> +<p> +We stayed a month at this little hotel at The Tadpoles. The English +family soon fraternized with that of Jean Baudin, the Flemish painter, +also sojourning there, and the only other resident guests. +</p> +<p> +John's wife and Mademoiselle became good friends and gossips, and sat +at work and chat many a summer hour under the hop trellises. +Mademoiselle Rose Leclerc was the Frenchwoman's name, but her name of +ceremony was simply "Mademoiselle." John and I used to walked about +the country, among the lanes, and woods, and hamlets which diversify +the flats on that side of Brussels, accompanying Jean Baudin and his +paint-box. We sat under a tree, or on a stone fence, smoking pipes of +patience, while Jean made studies for those wonderful, elaborate tiny +pictures, the work of his big hands, by which he and his little son +lived. I remember, in particular, a mossy old cottage, rough and grey; +the front clothed with vines, the quaint long gable running down +behind to within a yard of the ground. Baudin sketched that cottage +very often; and often used its many picturesque features. +</p> +<p> +Sometimes it was the rickety, black-timbered porch, garlanded with +vine; a sonsy, blond-haired young Flemish maiden sat there, and +twirled the bobbins on a lace-cushion, in a warm yellow flicker of +sunshine. Sometimes Jean went right into the porch and into the +cottage itself, and presently brought us out an old blue-gowned, +black-coifed creature, knitting as she kicked the grand-babe's clumsy +cradle <a name="111">{111}</a> with her clumsy sabot;—a ray through the leafy little +window-hole found the crone's white hair, and the infant cheek. Honest +Jean only painted what he saw with his eyes. He could copy such simple +poetry as this, and feel it too, though he could indite no original +poems on his canvas pages. He was a hearty good fellow, and we soon +got to like him, and his kindly, unpretentious, but not unshrewd, talk— +that is, when it could be got off the paternal grooves—which, to say +the truth, was seldomer than we (who were not ourselves at that period +the parents of prodigies) may have secretly desired. +</p> +<p> +In the summer evenings we used to sit in the garden all together, the +ladies graciously permitting us to smoke. We liked to set the children +a-dancing again on the grass-plot before us; and I must here confess +that they saltated to a mandolin touched by this hand. I had studied +the instrument under a ragged maestro of Naples, and flattered myself. +I performed on it with credit to both, and to the general delight. +</p> +<p> +Sometimes Jean Baudin would tie to his cane a little +pocket-handkerchief of Monsieur Auguste, and putting this ensign into +his hand, cause him to go through a certain vocal performance of a +martial and defiant character. The pale little man did it with much +spirit, and a truculent aspect, stamping fiercely at particular +moments of the strain. I can only remember the effective opening of +this entertainment. Thus it began—"<i>Les Belges</i>" (at this point the +small performer threw up the staff and flag of his country, and +shouted <i>ff</i>) "<i>SONT BRAVES!!"</i> Papa and aunt regarded with pride that +ferocious champion of his valiant compatriots, looking round to read +our astonishment and rapture in our faces. +</p> +<p> +We all got on excellently with the hotel folk, ingratiating ourselves +chiefly by paying a respectful court to the solid and rosy little +princess of the house. Jean Baudin painted her, sitting placid, a +little open-mouthed, heavy-lidded, over-fed, with a lapful of +cherries. We all made much of her and submitted to her. John's wife +presented her with a frock of English print, of a charming +apple-green; out of which the fat pink face bloomed like a +carnation-bud out of its calyx. +</p> +<p> +The young landlord would bring us out a dish to our garden +dinner-table, on purpose that he might linger and chat about England. +That country, and some of its model institutions, appeared to excite +in his mind a mixture of awe and curiosity, wonder and horror. For +instance, he had heard—he did not altogether believe it +(deprecatingly)—that not only were the shops of London closed, with +shutters, on the Sunday, but also the theatres; and not only the +theatres, but also the expositions, the gardens and salons of dance, +of music, of play. How! it was actually the truth? +</p> +<p> +"Certainly, what Madame was good enough to affirm one must believe. +But then what do they? No business, no amusement what then do they, +mon Dieu!—" +</p> +<p> +"They go to church, read the Bible, and keep the Sabbath day holy," +asserts Mrs. Freshe, in perfect good faith, and severely and proudly, +as becomes a Protestant Britishwoman. +</p> +<p> +"Tiens, tiens! But it is triste, that—. Is it not that it is triste, +Madame? Tiens, tiens! And this is that which is the Protestantism. +Since Madame herself affirms it, one can doubt no longer." +</p> +<p> +And he goes pondering away, to tell his wife; with no increased +tendency to the reformed faith. +</p> +<p> +Even Joseph, the stolid and fishy-eyed waiter, patronized us, and +gravely did us a hundred obliging services beyond his official duty. +</p> +<p> +On a certain evening, Mademoiselle, John, John's wife, and I, sat as +usual at book or work under the trellises; while the two children, at +healthful play, prattled under the shade of the laurel-bushes hard by. +As usual, the solid little Flemish maiden was <a name="112">{112}</a> tyrannizing calmly +over her playfellow. We constantly heard her small voice, quiet, slow, +and dominating: "<i>Je le veux</i>." "<i>Je ne le veux pas</i>." They had for +playthings a little handbell and a toy-wagon, and were playing at +railways. Auguste was the porter, trundling up, with shrill cries, +heavy luggage-trucks piled with gravel, gooseberry-skins, tin +soldiers, and bits of cork. Marie was a rich and haughty lady about to +proceed by the next convoi, and paying an immense sum, in daisies, for +her ticket, to Auguste, become a clerk. A disputed point in these +transactions appeared to be the possession of the bell; the frequent +ringing of which was indeed a principal feature of the performance. +Auguste contended hotly, but with considerable show of reason, to this +effect:—That the instrument belonged to him, in his official +capacities of porter and clerk, rather than to the rich and haughty +lady, who as a passenger was not, and could not be, entitled to +monopolize the bell of the company. Indeed, he declared himself nearly +certain that, as far as his experience went, passengers never did ring +it at all. But Marie's "Je le veux" settled the dispute, and carried +her in triumph, after the crushing manner of her sex, over all +frivolous masculine logic. +</p> +<p> +Mademoiselle sat placid beside us, doing her interminable and +elaborate satin-stitch. She was working at a broad white slip, +intended, I understood, to form the ornamental base of a petticoat. It +was at least a foot wide, of a florid and labyrinthine pattern, full +of oval and round holes, which appeared to have been cut out of the +stuff in order that Mademoiselle might be at the pains of filling them +up again with thready cobwebs. She would often with demure and +innocent complacency display this fabric, in its progress, to John's +wife (who does not herself, I fancy, excel in satin-stitch), and +relate how short a time (four months, I think) she had taken to bring +it so near completion. Mrs. Freshe regarded this work of art with +feminine eyes of admiration, and slyly remarked that it was really +beautiful enough "même pour un trousseau." At the same time she with +difficulty concealed her disapproval of the waste of precious time +incurred by the authoress of the petticoat-border. Not that +Mademoiselle could be accused of neglecting the severer forms of her +science; such as the construction of frocks and blouses for Monsieur +Auguste—adorned, it must be admitted, with frivolous and intricate +convolutions of braid. And the exquisite neatness of the visible +portions of Monsieur Jean's linen also bore honorable testimony to +Mademoiselle's more solid labors. +</p> +<p> +Into the midst of this peaceful garden-scene entered a new personage. +A man of middle height, with a knapsack at his back, came up the +gravel-walk: a handsome brown-faced fellow of five-and-thirty, with a +big black beard, and a neat holland blouse, and a grey felt hat. +</p> +<p> +Mademoiselle and he caught sight of each other at the same instant. +</p> +<p> +Both gave a cry. Her rather sallow little face flushed like a rose. +She started up; down dropped her petticoat-work; she ran forward, +throwing out her hands; she stopped short—shy, and bright, and +pretty as eighteen! The man made a stride and took her in his arms. +</p> +<p> +"Ma Rose! ma Rose! Enfin!" cried he in a strangled voice. +</p> +<p> +She said nothing, but hung at his neck, her two little hands on his +shoulders, her face on his breast. +</p> +<p> +But that was only for a moment. Then Mademoiselle disengaged herself, +and glanced shamefacedly at us. Then she came quickly up—came to +John's wife, slid an arm round her neck, and said rapidly, +tremulously, with sparkling, tearful eyes: +</p> +<p> +"C'est Jules, Madame. C'est mon fiancé depuis quatre ans. Ah, Madame, +j'ai honte—mais,"—and ran back to him. She was transformed. In place +of that staid, almost old-maidish <a name="113">{113}</a> little person we knew, lo! a +bashful, rosy, smiling girl, tripping, skipping, beside herself with +happy love! And her little collar was all rumpled, and so were her +smooth brown braids. Monsieur Jules took off his felt hat, and bowed +politely when she came to us, guessing that he was being introduced. +His brown face blushed a little, too: it was a happy and honest one, +very pleasant to see. +</p> +<p> +The children had left off playing, and stared wide-eyed at these +extraordinary proceedings. Mademoiselle ran to her little nephew, and +brought him to Jules. +</p> +<p> +"I recognize well the son of our poor Lolotte," said he, softly, +lifting and kissing him. "And that dear Jean, where is he?" +</p> +<p> +Even as he spoke there came a familiar roar from that window +overlooking the court-yard, by which the painter sat at his easel +almost all day. "Ohé! Monsieur Ba-Bou!" The little boy nearly jumped +out of his new friend's arms. +</p> +<p> +"Papa! papa! Laissez-moi, done, Mosou!—Papa!" +</p> +<p> +"Is it that thou art by chance this monsieur whom they call?" laughed +Jules, as he put him down. +</p> +<p> +"Way, way!" cried the little man as he pattered off, with that gleeful +shriek of his. "C'est moi, Mosou Ba-Bou! Ba-Bou!" +</p> +<p> +"Thou knowest that great voice of our Jean," said Mademoiselle; "when +he has finished his day's labor he always calls his child like that. +Having worked all day for the little one, he goes now to make himself +a child to play with him. He calls that to rest himself. And truly the +little one idolizes his father, and for him will leave all other +playfellows—even me. Come, then, Jules, let us seek Jean." +</p> +<p> +And with a smiling salute to us the happy couple went arm-in-arm out +of the garden. +</p> +<br> + +<h2>III.</h2> +<br> +<p> +We did not see much of our friends the next day. After their early +dinner, Jean came up the garden all alone, to smoke a pipe, and +stretch his legs before he returned to his work. We thought his +good-natured face was a little sad, in spite of his cheerful <i>abord</i>, +as he came to our garden parlor and spoke to us. +</p> +<p> +"It is a pleasure to see them, is it not?" said he, looking after the +lovers, just vanishing under the archway of the court-yard, into the +sunny village road. Mademoiselle had left off her sober black silk, +and floated in the airiest of chintz muslins. +</p> +<p> +"My good little Rose merits well her happiness. She sent that brave +Jules marching four years ago, because she had promised my poor wife +not to abandon her helpless infant. Truly she has been the best of +little mothers to my Auguste. Jules went away angry enough; but +without doubt he must have loved her all the better when he came to +reflect. He has been to Italy, to Switzerland, to England—know I +where? He is artist-painter, like me—of France always understood. Me, +I am Flemish, and very content to be the compatriot of Rubens, of +Vandyke. But Jules has very much talent: he paints also the portraits, +and has made successes. He is a brave boy, and deserves his Rose." +</p> +<p> +"Will the marriage take place now, at last?" we ventured to ask. +</p> +<p> +"As I suppose," answered Jean, his face clouding perceptibly. +</p> +<p> +"But you will not separate; you will live together, perhaps," +suggested John's wife. +</p> +<p> +"Ah, Madame, how can that be? Jules is of France and I of Belgium. +When I married I brought my wife to Brussels; naturally he will carry +his to Paris. C'est juste." +</p> +<p> +"Poor little Auguste will miss his aunt," said John's wife, +involuntarily, "and she will hardly bear to leave him, I think." +</p> +<p> +"Ah, Madame," said Jean, with ever so little bitterness in his tone, +"what would you? The little one must come second now; the husband will +<a name="114">{114}</a> be first. Yes, yes, and it is but fair! Auguste is strong now, +and I must find him a good bonne. I complain not. I am not so +ungrateful. My poor Rose must not be always the sacrifice. She has +been an angel to us. See you, she has saved the life of us both. The +little one must have died without her, and apparently I must have died +without the little one. C'est simple, n'est ce pas?" smiling. Then he +gave a sigh, truly as if he could not repress it, and walked away +hastily. "We looked after him, compassion in our hearts. +</p> +<p> +"That sickly little boy will hardly live if his aunt leaves him," said +Mrs. Freshe, "<i>and his father knows it</i>." +</p> +<p> +"But what a cruel sacrifice if she stayed!" said John. +</p> +<p> +"And can her lover be expected to wait till Auguste has grown up into +a strong man?" I put in. +</p> +<p> +The day after was Sunday. Coming from an early walk, I heard a +tremendous clamor, of woe or merriment, proceeding from a small +sitting-room that opened into the entrance passage. The door was wide, +and I looked in. Jean Baudin was jammed up in a corner, behind a +barricade of chairs, and was howling miserably, entreating to be let +out. His big sun-browned face was crowned by a white coif made of +paper, and a white apron was tied round his great waist over his blue +blouse. Auguste and Marie danced about the barricade with shrill +screams, frantic with joy. +</p> +<p> +When Baudin saw me he gave a dismal yell, and piteously begged me to +come to his assistance. "See, then, my dear young gentleman, how these +bandits, these rebels, these demons, maltreat their poor bonne! Help, +help!" and suddenly, with a roar like a small Niagara, he burst out of +his prison and took to his heels, round and round the court and up the +garden, the children screaming after him—the noise really terrific. +Presently it died away, and he came back to the doorstep where I +stood, Auguste on his shoulder and the little maiden demurely trotting +after. "At present, I am the bonne," said he. "Rose and her Jules are +gone to church; so is our hostess. In the meanwhile, I undertake to +look after the children. Have you ever seen a little bonne more +pretty? with my coquette cap and my neat apron—hein?" +</p> +<p> +That evening the lovers went out in a boat on the great pond, or +little lake, at the back of the hotel. They carried Auguste with them. +We all went to the water's edge; the rest remained a while, leaning +over the rails that partly skirted the parapet wall except Jean, who +strolled off with his tiny sketch-book. A very peaceful summer picture +was before us, which I can see now if I shut my eyes—I often see it. +A calm and lovely August evening near sunset; a few golden feathers +afloat in the blue sky. Below, the glassy pond that repeats blue sky, +red-roofed cottages, green banks, and woody slopes—repeats, also, the +solitary boat rowed by Jules, the three light-colored figures it +contains, and a pair of swans that glide stately after. The little boy +is throwing bits of bread or cake to them. +</p> +<p> +As we stood there and admired this pretty little bright panorama, +John's wife observed that the child was flinging himself dangerously +forward, in his usual eager, excited way, at every cast he made. +</p> +<p> +"I wonder," said she, "that his aunt takes no notice. She is so +absorbed in talk with Jules she never turns her head. Look! look! +A—h!" +</p> +<p> +A dreadful shriek went up from lake and shore. The poor little fellow, +had overbalanced himself, and had gone headlong into the lake. Some +one had flashed over the parapet wall at the same moment, and struck +the water with a splash and a thud. Some one was tearing through it +like a steam-engine, toward the boat. It was my brother John. We saw +and heard Jules, frantic, and evidently impotent to save; we saw him +make a vain clutch at something that rose to the surface. At the same +time we <a name="115">{115}</a> perceived that he had scarce power to keep Rose with his +left hand from throwing herself into the water. +</p> +<p> +Hardly three minutes had yet passed, yet half the population seemed +thronging to the lake-side, here, where the village skirted it. +</p> +<p> +And suddenly we beheld a terrible—a piteous sight. A big, bareheaded +man, that burst through the people, pale, furious, awful; his teeth +set, his light blue eyes flaring. He seemed to crash through the +crowd, splintering it right and left, like a bombshell through a wall, +and was going crazy and headlong over the parapet into the water. He +could swim no more than Jules. +</p> +<p> +"Sauvé! sauvé!" cried John's wife, gripping his hand and hanging to it +as he went rushing past. "My husband has found him. See! see there, +Jean Baudin! He holds up the dear child." +</p> +<p> +She could not have kept him back a moment—probably he did not feel her +touch; he was only dragging her with him. But his wild eyes, fixed and +staring forward, had seen for themselves what he never heard her say. +</p> +<p> +Fast, fast as one arm could oar him, my brother was bringing Jean his +little one, held above water by the other hand. Then that poor huge +body swayed and shivered; the trembling hands went out, the face +unlocked a little, there came a hoarse sob, and like a thin, strangled +cry in a dream— +</p> +<p> +"Mon petit! mon petit!" +</p> +<p> +But strong again, and savage with love, how he snatched the pale +little burden from John, and tore up the bank to the hotel. There were +wooden back-gates that opened into the court on the lake-side, but +which were unused and locked. At one mighty kick they yawned open +before Jean, and he rushed on into the house. Here all had been +prudently prepared, and the little dripping body was quickly stripped +and wrapped in hot blankets. The village doctor was already there, and +two or three women. Jean Baudin helped the doctor and the women with a +touching docility. All his noisy roughness was smoothed. He tamed his +big voice to a delicate whisper. He spoke and moved with an affecting +submissive gentleness, watching what there was he could do, and doing +it exactly as he was bid. Now and then he spoke a word or two under +his breath—"One must be patient, I know, Monsieur le Médecin; yes, +yes." And now and then he muttered piteously "Mon petit! mon petit!" +But he was as gentle as a lamb, and touchingly eager to be helpful. +</p> +<p> +In half an hour his pain got the better of him a little. +</p> +<p> +"Mais, mon Dieu, mon Dieu!" he moaned, "how I suffer! Ah, Monsieur, is +it not that he breathes a little, my dear little one? Ah, my God, save +me him! Mon petit! mon petit!" +</p> +<p> +He went into a corner of the room, and stood with his forehead against +the wall, his shoulders heaving with silent sobs. Then he came back +quiet and patient again. +</p> +<p> +"Priez, priez pour moi, Madame," said he, once, to John's wife. +</p> +<p> +"I am praying without ceasing, my poor friend," said she. And once she +hastily laid a handkerchief soaked in essence on his forehead, for she +thought he was surely going to faint, when the hope, long, long +deferred, began to turn his heart sick. +</p> +<p> +All this time John and I lingered in the dusky passage, in which that +door ajar made a cleft of yellow light. Every now and then a dim +figure stole up to us with an eager sad whisper, asking, "How goes it? +how goes it?" and slipped away down-stairs with the comfortless +answer. +</p> +<p> +It was poor Jules, who could do nothing for his Rose but this. She had +thrown herself on the floor in a darkening room, and lay there +moaning. Her dire anguish, sharp as a mother's for the little one, was +cruelly and unduly aggravated by self-reproach, and by the +self-inflicted agony of her exile from that room up-stairs. She dared +not enter Jean's presence. She felt that he must for ever abhor the +sight of her; she was afraid he <a name="116">{116}</a> might curse her! She rejected +all kindness, all sympathy, especially from Jules, whom she quite +fiercely ordered to quit her. But when it got quite dark, the poor +fellow took in a candle, and set it on a table; and he spent the time +in going up and down-stairs to fetch her that whisper of news, which, +perhaps, he sweetened with a little false hope before he offered it to +her. +</p> +<p> +At last we outside heard a movement—a stifled exclamation; and then +one of the women ran out. +</p> +<p> +"The child has opened his eyes!" said she, as she hurried down-stairs +for some article required. +</p> +<p> +Presently we heard a man sobbing softly; and then—yes, a faint tiny +voice. And after that—nothing, for a long while. But at last at last! +a miserable, awful cry, and a heavy, heavy fall. And then came out +John's wife, at sight of whose face we turned sick at heart, and +followed her silently down-stairs. We knew what had happened: the +little one was dead. +</p> +<p> +He had opened his eyes, and had probably known his father; for the +light that his presence always kindled there had come into the little +white face. Jean, too ready to clutch the delusive hope, fell +a-sobbing with rapture, and kissing the little fair head. The child +tried to speak, and did speak, though but once. +</p> +<p> +"He said, 'Ba-Bou' quite distinctly," said John's wife, "and then such +a pretty smile came; and it's—it's there still, on his little dear +<i>dead</i> face, John." +</p> +<p> +Here she broke down, and went into a passion of tears, sobbing for +"poor Jean! poor Jean!" +</p> +<p> +He had fainted for the first time in his strong life, and so that +blessed unconsciousness was deadening the first insupportable agony of +his dreadful wound. They carried him out, and laid him on his bed, and +I believe the doctor bled him. They hoped he would sleep afterward +from sheer exhaustion. +</p> +<p> +Presently poor Jules came to us, crying like a child, and begging us +to go to his Rose to try to rouse her, if only to make her weep. She +had fallen into a dry depth and abyss of despair—an icy crevasse, +where even his love could not reach her. +</p> +<p> +Since she had known the child was dead, she had not stirred, except to +resist, moaning, every attempt to lift her from the floor, where she +had cast herself, and except that she shuddered and repulsed Jules, +especially, whenever he went near her. +</p> +<p> +We went into the room where she lay. My good brother stooped, and +spoke to her in his tender, manly fashion, and lifted her, with a +resolution to which she yielded, and seated her on a sofa beside his +wife, whose kind arms closed round her suffering sister. +</p> +<p> +And suddenly some one had come in whom Rose could not see, for her +eyes were pressed to that womanly bosom. John's wife made a little +warning gesture that kept us others silent. +</p> +<p> +It was poor Jean himself; he came in as if in search of somewhat; he +was deadly pale, and perhaps half unconscious what he did. He was +without shoes, and his clothes and blond hair and beard were tumbled +and disordered—just as when they had laid him on his bed. When he saw +Rose, he came straight up to her, and sat down on her other side. +</p> +<p> +"Ma pauvre Rose," said he piteously— +</p> +<p> +She gave a cry and start of terror, and turned and saw him. The poor +fellow's broken heart was in his face; she could not mistake the +sweet-natured anguish there. Half bewildered by his inconceivable +grief, he had gone to her, instinctively, like a child, for sympathy +and comfort. +</p> +<p> +"Ma pauvre Rose," said he, brokenly; "notre petit—" +</p> +<p> +Passionately she took his great head between her hands, and drew it +down on her bosom, and kissed it passionately weeping at last. +</p> +<p> +And we all came out softly, and left them—left them to that Pity +which sends us the wholesome agony of such tears. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="117">{117}</a> +<br> + +<h2>CARDINAL WISEMAN IN ROME.</h2> +<br> +<p> +"It was in the year 1863," says Monsignore Manning, in his funeral +oration on the great prince of the Church whose loss the whole +Catholic world is now deploring, "that the sovereign pontiff, speaking +of the cardinal, described him as 'the man of divine Providence for +England.'" And truly it seems to us that the direct inspiration of the +Holy Ghost has seldom been so clearly apparent in the choice of a +bishop as it was in the case of him who has filled the cathedral chair +of Westminster for the last fifteen years. When we remember the +peculiar circumstances under which he began his pastorship—the +reaction which was steadily, though as yet almost imperceptibly, going +on in favor of the Church; the doubt and perplexity and wavering with +which a crowd of wandering souls were groping in darkness for the +portals of divine truth; and then the outburst of anger with which the +nation at large read the bulls of the Holy Father, raising up the +English Church from the humiliation in which she had lain for three +hundred years, we shall readily understand that a rare union of +qualities was required in the man who should understand and direct +those honest seekers after truth, and breast successfully that storm +of popular fury. That Nicholas Wiseman, who had left England at the +age of sixteen, and passed twenty years of his youth and early manhood +at Rome—absorbed, just at the time when the character is most liable +to be moulded by external associations, in the theological studies and +ceremonies and sacred traditions of the ecclesiastical capital—that +he, we say, should have displayed such a remarkable fitness for both +these works, is not only an indication of the great qualities of the +man, but an instructive commentary on the school in which he had been +formed. It shows us that a Roman education, while it enlarges the view +and sweeps away local prejudices, yet leaves untouched the salient +points of national character. For his success in dealing with the +Catholic movement which followed the emancipation act of 1829, +Cardinal Wiseman was largely indebted to the quickness and accuracy of +perception in theological matters which he had acquired during his +long residence at the centre of the Christian Church; what helped him +most in his victory over the burst of Protestant fury which followed +the restoration of the English hierarchy, and found official +expression in the ecclesiastical titles bill, was his thorough English +boldness and honesty of speech and manly bearing. He appealed to his +countrymen's traditional love of fair-play; they heard him; and before +long all classes learned to love and respect him. +</p> +<p> +Of the twenty years' schooling by which he prepared himself for his +work in England, the cardinal has left us some admirable sketches, +scattered through his books. Dr. Manning alluded briefly to the +influence of his Roman education. We propose to gather up what the +cardinal himself has said about it; to paint with his own pencil a +picture of his life of preparation; leaving other hands, if they will, +to paint his subsequent life of labor. +</p> +<p> +Nicholas Wiseman was born at Seville, in Spain, on the second of +August, 1802. His father was an English merchant, his mother an Irish +lady. He lost his father in infancy, and at the age of six, in +consequence of those wars of invasion which for a time made Spain no +longer habitable, was taken to Ireland to be educated. After spending +one or two years at a boarding-school near Waterford, his mother went +with him to England, and <a name="118">{118}</a> placed him at St. Cuthbert's college, +Ushaw, near Durham. Dr. Lingard was then vice-president of the +college, "and I have retained upon my memory," wrote the cardinal, +nearly fifty years afterward, "the vivid recollection of specific acts +of thoughtful and delicate kindness, which showed a tender heart, +mindful of its duties amidst the many harassing occupations just +devolved on him through the death of the president and his own +literary engagements; for he was reconducting his first great work +through the press. But though he went from college soon after, and I +later left the country, and saw him not again for fifteen years, yet +there grew up an indirect understanding first, and by degrees a +correspondence and an intimacy which continued to the close of his +life." [Footnote 38] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 38: <i>Recollections of the Last Four Popes</i>. Leo XII. Chap. + vii.] +</p> +<p> +It was in the course of the eight years which he passed at this +reverend seat of learning—lineal descendant of the old English +college of Douay—that he determined to become a priest. Here he first +began to manifest that deep affection for the city of St. Peter which +distinguished him down to the end of his life. "Its history," he says, +"its topography, its antiquities, had formed the bond of a little +college society devoted to this queen of cities, while the dream of +its longings had been the hope of one day seeing what could then only +be known through hearsay tourists and fabulous plans." But the hope +was fulfilled soon and unexpectedly. In 1818, Pope Pius VII. restored +the English college at Rome, "after it had been desolate and +uninhabited during almost the period of a generation." Nicholas +Wiseman was one of a band of young men sent out to colonize it. He +gives a charming description of the arrival of the little party at +their Roman home, and the delight and surprise with which they roamed, +alone and undirected, through the solemn building, with its wide +corridors; its neat and cheerful rooms; its wainscotted refectory, +from whose groined ceiling looked down St. George and the dragon; its +library heaped with tumultuous piles of unorganized volumes; its +garden, glowing with the lemon and orange, and presenting to one's +first approach a perspective in fresco by Pozzi; and, above all, its +chapel, illuminated from floor to roof with saints of England and +celestial glories;—or, better still, adjoining the college, the old +roofless church of the Holy Trinity, where in generations long past +many a pilgrim from the British Isles had knelt to pray when the good +priests of his nation fed and lodged him on his visit to the tomb of +the apostles. Pleasant must have been the meeting, on that December +afternoon in the year 1818, between these six young men and their +appointed rector Dr. Gradwell, who, being absent when they arrived, +came home that evening and found himself at the head of a college, and +his frugal meal appropriated by the hungry students. +</p> +<p> +The happiness of that day casts a glow over the page on which, when he +was an old man, the cardinal recorded the incidents. On Christmas eve +he was presented, with some of his companions, to the venerable Pius +VII. We can imagine the feelings of awe with which he approached this +saintly man, released only a few years before from the French +captivity. "There was the halo of a confessor round the tiara of Pius +that eclipsed all gold and jewels.…… Instead of receiving us, as was +customary, seated, the mild and amiable pontiff rose to welcome us, +and meet us as we approached. He did not allow it to be a mere +presentation, or a visit of ceremony. It was a fatherly reception, and +in the truest sense our inauguration into the duties that awaited us. +.… The friendly and almost national grasp of the hand, after due +homage had been willingly paid, between the head of the Catholic +Church, venerable by his very age, and a youth who had nothing even to +promise; <a name="119">{119}</a> the first exhortation on entering a course of +ecclesiastical study—its very inaugural discourse from him whom he +believed to be the fountain of spiritual wisdom on earth;—these +surely formed a double tie, not to be broken, but rather strengthened, +by every subsequent experience." +</p> +<p> +Doubtless his early dreams of Rome were now surpassed by the reality +of his daily life. It was unalloyed spiritual and intellectual +enjoyment. Study was no task; it was only a sort of pleasure; and the +hours of relaxation became a source of mental schooling, even while he +was pursuing the most delightful recreations. It is not difficult to +imagine how he must have spent his holidays—roaming through the field +of art, or resting at some seat of the Muses, or wandering along the +stream of time, bordered by monuments of past greatness—every +footstep awakening the echoes of classic antiquity, or calling up the +most sacred memories of the early suffering Church. Even the solitude +of buried cemeteries, "where the tombs themselves are buried, where +the sepulchres are themselves things decayed and mouldering in +rottenness," is no solitude to him; for he peoples it with the shadowy +forms of the Scipios and Nasones whose ashes are there deposited. How +often, in after years, did he not recur with fond delight to the +"images of long delicious strolls, in musing loneliness, through the +deserted ways of the ancient city; of climbings among its hills, over +ruins, to reach some vantage-ground for mapping the subjacent +territory, and looking beyond on the glorious chains of greater and +lesser mountains, clad in their imperial hues of gold and purple; and +then perhaps of solemn entrance into the cool solitude of an open +basilica, where the thought now rests, as the body then did, after the +silent evening prayer, and brings forward from many well-remembered +nooks every local inscription, every lovely monument of art, the +characteristic feature of each, or the great names with which it is +associated.…… Thus does Rome sink deep and deeper into the soul, +like the dew, of which every separate drop is soft and weightless, but +which still finds its way to the root of everything beneath the soil, +imparting there to every future plant its own warm tint, its own balmy +fragrance, and its own ever rejuvenescent vigor." +</p> +<p> +Such were his hours of recreation: still more delightful were his +hours of study, especially in "the great public libraries, where +noiseless monks brought him and piled round him the folios which he +required, and he sat as still amidst a hundred readers as if he had +been alone." Every day his love, his enthusiasm, for his work seemed +to increase. So he passed six or seven years, "lingering and lagging +behind others," and revelling in spiritual and intellectual luxury. +"Every school-fellow had passed on, and was hard at his noble work at +home, was gaining a crown in heaven to which many have passed." Our +young student had kissed the feet of the dead Pius VII., as he lay in +state in one of the chapels of St. Peter's; had mourned over the +departure of the great minister Consalvi; had presented himself to Leo +XII., and told him, "I am a foreigner who came here at the call of +Pius VII., six years ago; my first patrons, Pius VII., Cardinals +Litta, De Pietro, Fontana, and now Consalvi, are dead. I therefore +recommend myself to your Holiness's protection, and hope you will be a +father to me at this distance from my country." He had obtained the +Holy Father's promise. Already he was known for a youth of marvellous +talents and learning. He had maintained a public disputation in +theology, and been rewarded for his success by the title of D.D. At +last came the jubilee-year of 1825. "The aim of years, the goal of +long preparation, the longed-for crown of unwavering desires, the only +prize thought worthy of being aspired to, was attained in the bright +jubilee spring of Rome. It marks a blessed epoch in a <a name="120">{120}</a> life to +have had the grace of the priesthood superadded to the exuberant +benedictions of that year." +</p> +<p> +Fortunately for the English college,—and fortunately, perhaps we +should add, for England,—he was not yet to depart for the field of +his great labor. To use his own modest words, he was found to be at +hand in 1826, when some one was wanted for the office of vice-rector +of the English college, and so was named to it; and when, in 1828, the +worthy rector, Dr. Gradwell, was appointed bishop, Dr. Wiseman was, by +almost natural sequence, named to succeed him. +</p> +<p> +Thus he continued to drink in the spirit of catholicity, and devotion, +and steadiness in faith, of which Rome is the fountain on earth. With +reverent affection he traced out the mementos of primitive +Christianity, the tombs of the martyrs and saints, the altars and +hiding-places and sacred inscriptions of the catacombs. These holy +retreats had for him a fascination such as no other spot even in Rome +possessed. Again and again he recurs to them in his writings, +lingering fondly around the hallowed precincts, and inspiring his +readers with the love for them that burned so ardently in his own +breast. One of the last pieces that came from his pen was the little +story of a martyr's tomb, which we have placed in this number of our +magazine. +</p> +<p> +Other studies were not neglected. While his companions were indulging +in the mid-day sleep, which almost everybody takes in Rome, he was at +his books. Often he passed whole nights in study, or walking to and +fro, in meditation, through the corridors of the English college. The +seasons of vacation he would often spend collating ancient manuscripts +in the Vatican library, and one of the fruits of that labor was his +<i>Horae Syriacae</i>, published when he was only twenty-five years old. In +the same year (1827), he was appointed—though without severing his +connection with the English college—professor of oriental languages +in the Roman university. It is no doubt to these two events that he +alludes in the following extract from his "Recollections" of Leo XII., +though he tells the story as if he had been only a witness of the +circumstances: "It so happened," he says, "that a person connected +with the English college was an aspirant to a chair in the Roman +university. He had been encouraged to compete for it, on its +approaching vacancy, by his professors. Having no claims of any sort, +by interest or connection, he stood simply on the provision of the +papal bull, which threw open all professorships to competition. It was +but a secondary and obscure lectureship at best; one concerning which, +it was supposed, few would busy themselves or come forward as +candidates. It was, therefore, announced that this rule would be +overlooked, and a person every way qualified, and of considerable +reputation, would be named. The more youthful aspirant unhesitatingly +solicited an audience, at which I was present. He told the Pope +frankly of his intentions and of his earnest wish to have carried out, +in his favor, the recent enactments of his Holiness. Nothing could be +more affable, more encouraging, than Leo's reply. He expressed his +delight at seeing that his regulation was not a dead letter, and that +it had animated his petitioner to exertion. He assured him that he +should have a fair chance, 'a clear stage and no favor,' desiring him +to leave the matter in his hands. +</p> +<p> +"Time wore on; and as the only alternative given in the bull was +proof, by publication of a work, of proficiency in the art or science +that was to be taught, he quietly got a volume through the +press—probably very heavy; but sprightliness or brilliancy was not a +condition of the bull. When a vacancy arrived, it was made known, +together with the announcement that it had been filled up. All seemed +lost, except the honor of the pontiff, to which alone lay any appeal. +Another audience was asked, and <a name="121">{121}</a> instantly granted, its motive +being, of course, stated. I was again present, and shall not easily +forget it. It was not necessary to re-state the case. 'I remember it +all,' the Pope said most kindly; 'I have been surprised. I have sent +for C——, through whom this has been done; I have ordered the +appointment to be cancelled, and I have reproved him so sharply that I +believe it is the reason why he is laid up to-day with fever. You have +acted fairly and boldly, and you shall not lose the fruits of your +industry. I will keep my word with you and the provisions of my +constitution.' With the utmost graciousness he accepted the +volume—now treasured by its author, into whose hands the copy has +returned—acknowledged the right to preference which it had +established, and assured its author of fair play. +</p> +<p> +"The Pope had, in fact, taken up earnestly the cause of his youthful +appellant; instead of annoyance, he showed earnestness and kindness; +and those who had passed over his pretensions with contempt were +obliged to treat with him and compromise with him on terms that +satisfied all his desires. Another audience for thanksgiving was +kindly accorded, and I witnessed the same gentle and fatherly temper, +quietly cheerful, and the same earnest sympathy with the feelings of +him whose cause had been so graciously carried through. If this young +client gained no new energies, gathered no strength from such repeated +proofs of interest and condescension; if these did not both direct and +impel, steer and fill, the sails of his little bark through many +troubled waters; nay, if they did not tinge and savor his entire +mental life, we may write that man soulless and incapable of any noble +emotions." +</p> +<p> +We must not suppose, however, that all this while he was so lost among +his books as to have forgotten that land for whose conversion he was +destined to labor through the best part of his life. He told a dear +friend how, having to wait one day at the Sapienza for the Hebrew +lecture, he went into the Church of St. Eustachio to pray; and there, +before the altar of the Blessed Sacrament and the altar of the Holy +Virgin Mother, the thought came into his mind that, as his native +country, in the oath which she imposes upon the chief personages of +the state, solemnly abjures these sacred mysteries, it was his duty to +devote himself to the defense and honor of those very doctrines in +England. And no one who has read his sermons and lectures and +pastorals can have failed to notice the burning love for the Eucharist +and the Blessed Virgin which inspired him. +</p> +<p> +The time was not yet for his mission to England; and it is so hard, +when the mind has been long running in one groove, to break out of it +and take a totally different course, that perhaps he might have come +in time to look upon the Roman theological schools as the ultimate +sphere of usefulness for which God had destined him, had he not been +suddenly called forth from his studious retirement by the voice of the +supreme pontiff. It was in 1827 that Leo XII. determined to institute +in the church of Gesù e Maria a course of English sermons, to be +attended by all colleges and religious communities that spoke the +language, and by as many other persons as chose to listen. It was +intended, of course, principally for the benefit of strangers. His +Holiness appointed Dr. Wiseman preacher. "The burden was laid there +and then," says the cardinal, describing the audience at which he +received this commission, "with peremptory kindness, by an authority +that might not be gainsaid. And crushingly it pressed upon the +shoulders. It would be impossible to describe the anxiety, pain, and +trouble which this command cost for many years after. Nor would this +be alluded to were it not to illustrate what has been kept in view +through this volume—how the most insignificant life, temper, and mind +may be moulded by the action of a <a name="122">{122}</a> great and almost unconscious +power. Leo could not see what has been the influence of his +commission, in merely dragging from the commerce with the dead to that +of the living one who would gladly have confined his time to the +former,—from books to men, from reading to speaking. Nothing but this +would have done it. Yet supposing that the providence of one's life +was to be active, and in contact with the world, and one's future +duties were to be in a country and in times where the most bashful may +be driven to plead for his religion or his flock, surely a command +overriding all inclination and forcing the will to undertake the best +and only preparation for those tasks, may well be contemplated as a +sacred impulse and a timely direction to a mind that wanted both. Had +it not come then, it never more could have come; other bents would +have soon become stiffened and unpliant; and no second opportunity +could have been opened after others had satisfied the first demand." +</p> +<p> +From this time it would seem as if England had a stronger hold upon +his heart than ever. The noble purpose—which worldly men have since +laughed at as a wild dream—of devoting himself to the conversion of +England, became the ruling idea of his life. And often alone at night +in the college chapel he would "pour out his heart in prayer and +tears, full of aspirations and of a firm trust; of promptings to go, +but fear to outrun the bidding of our divine Master." He offered +himself to the Pope for this great work; but still the time was not +come; and he was told to wait. +</p> +<p> +But if he was not to go yet himself, he had his part to perform in +making others ready. He well knew that to fit his pupils for their +work, he must teach them something beside theology. Englishmen were a +sort of Brahmins; the missionary who went among them must go as one +versed in all learning, or he would not be listened to. He saw how the +natural sciences were growing to be the favorite pursuit—we may +almost say the hobby—of modern scholars, and in a preface to a thesis +by a student of the English college he insisted on the necessity of +uniting general and scientific knowledge to theological pursuits. As +another instance of the personal influence which several successive +pontiffs exercised over his studies, and the many kind marks of +interest which contributed to attach him so strongly to their persons, +we may repeat an anecdote which he tells in reference to this little +essay. He went to present it to Pius VIII., but the Holy Father had it +already before him, and said, "You have robbed Egypt of its spoil, and +shown that it belongs to the people of God." The same idea which he +briefly exposed in this essay, he developed more fully and with great +wealth of illustration in a course of lectures on the Connection +between Science and Revealed Religion, delivered first to his pupils +and afterward to a distinguished audience at the apartments of +Cardinal Weld. It was partly with a view to the revision and +publication of these lectures that he visited England in 1835. +</p> +<p> +During his stay in London, he preached a series of controversial +discourses in the Sardinian chapel during the Advent of 1835, and +another in St. Mary's, Moorfields, in Lent, 1836. The latter were +published under the title of <i>Lectures on the Principal Doctrines and +Practices of the Catholic Church</i>. They exhibit in a remarkable degree +the qualities, so rare in polemical literature, of kindness, +moderation, and charity for all men. The <i>odium theologicum</i>, indeed, +has less place at Rome than anywhere else in the Christian world. It +was at the very centre and chief school of the science of divinity +that he learned to fight against error without temper, and expose +falsehood without hard language. "I will certainly bear willing +testimony," he says, "to the absence of all harsh words and +uncharitable insinuations against others in public lectures or private +teaching, or even <a name="123">{123}</a> in conversation at Rome. One grows up there in +a kinder spirit, and learns to speak of errors in a gentler tone than +elsewhere, though in the very centre of highest orthodox feeling." Dr. +Wiseman went back to the English college, leaving among his countrymen +at home an enviable reputation for honesty, learning, and good sense. +</p> +<p> +A few years more passed in frequent contact with the Holy Father, and +under the continuous influence of the sacred associations with which +eighteen centuries have peopled the Christian capital, and Nicholas +Wiseman was then ready to go forth to his work. The recollection of +numberless favors and kind words from the supreme pontiff went with +him, and strengthened him, and colored his thoughts. He has told of +the cordial and paternal treatment with which he was honored by +Gregory XVI. in particular. "An embrace would supply the place of +ceremonious forms on entrance. At one time a long, familiar +conversation, seated side by side; at another a visit to the +penetralia of the pontifical apartment (a small suite of entresols, +communicating by an internal staircase) occupied the time. +…… +What it has been my happiness to hear from him in such visits, it +would be betraying a sacred trust to reveal; but many and many words +there spoken rise to the mind in times of trouble, like stars, not +only bright in themselves, but all the brighter in their reflection +from the brightness of their mirror. They have been words of mastery +and spell over after events, promises, and prognostics which have not +failed, assurances and supports that have never come to naught." +[Footnote 39] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 39: He gives an amusing account of a perplexing situation + from which this same Pope once unwittingly delivered him, while he + was engaged in his course of lectures on Science and Revealed + Religion at the apartments of Cardinal Weld. "On one of the days of + delivery," says he, "I had been prevented from writing the lecture + in time, and was laboring to make up for my delay, but in vain. + Quarter after quarter of each hour flew rapidly on, and my advance + bore no proportion to the matter before me. The fatal hour of twelve + was fast approaching, and I knew not what excuse I could make, nor + how to supply, except by a lame recital, the important portion yet + unwritten of my task—for an index to the lectures had been printed + and circulated. Just as the last moment arrived, a carriage from the + palace drove to the door, with a message that I would step into it + at once, as His Holiness wished to speak to me. This was, indeed, a + <i>deus ex machina</i>—the only and least thought of expedient that + could have saved me from my embarrassment. A messenger was + despatched to inform the gathering audience of the unexpected cause + of necessary adjournment of our sitting till the next day. The + object of my summons was one of very trifling importance, and + Gregory little knew what a service he had unintentionally rendered + me."] +</p> +<p> +In 1840 it was determined to increase the number of vicars apostolic +in England from four to eight, and Dr. Wiseman, at the same time, was +appointed coadjutor to Bishop Walsh at Wolverhampton. "It was a +sorrowful evening," he says, "at the beginning of autumn, when, after +a residence in Rome prolonged through twenty-two years, till affection +clung to every old stone there, like the moss that grew into it, this +strong but tender tie was cut, and much of future happiness had to be +invested in the mournful recollections of the past." +</p> +<p> +Here we leave him. It was not until ten years later that he became +cardinal, but though from 1840 to 1850 he filled only a subordinate +position, he was working hard and well during this period, and fast +rising to be the foremost man of all the Catholics of England. And his +work never ceased. He lived to see the hierarchy established, and the +conversion of his countrymen making steady if not rapid progress; but +his energy never flagged when a part of his task was done; he passed +on from one labor to another, until that last day, when "he entered +into the sanctuary of God's presence, from which he never again came +forth." +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="124">{124}</a> +<br> +<h2>From All The Year Bound. +<br><br> +THE NICK OF TIME.</h2> +<br> +<p> +Let us suppose a case that might occur if it has not occurred. +</p> +<p> +John Mullet, immersed (say) in the button trade at Birmingham, has +made money in business. He bequeaths his property by will, and is in +due time gathered to his fathers. His two sons, Jasper and Josiah, +take certain portions; and other portions are to go either to the +family of Jasper or to that of Josiah, according as either one of +those brothers survives the other. Jasper remains in England; but +Josiah goes out to Australia, to establish something that may make his +children great people over there. Both brothers, twelve thousand miles +apart, die on the same day, May 1st, one at noon (Greenwich time), the +other at noon (Sydney time). Jasper's children have been on pleasant +cousinly terms with Josiah's; but they are aware of the fact that it +would be better for them that Josiah should die before their own +father, Jasper. Josiah's children, on the other hand, be they few or +many, although they always liked uncle Jasper, cannot and do not +ignore the fact that their interests would be better served by the +survivorship of Josiah than that of Jasper. The two sets of cousins, +therefore, plunge into a contest, to decide the question of +survivorship between the two sons of old John Mullet. +</p> +<p> +This is one variety of a problem which the courts of law and equity +are often called upon to settle. Occasionally the question refers to +two persons who die at the same time, and in each other's company. For +instance: Toward the close of the last century, George Netherwood, his +children by his first wife, his second wife, and her son, were all +wrecked during a voyage from Jamaica to England. Eight thousand pounds +were left by will, in such a way that the relations of the two wives +were greatly interested in knowing whether the second Mrs. Netherwood +did or did not survive her husband, even by one single minute—a +matter which, of course, could not be absolutely proved. Again, in +1806, Mr. Mason and one son were drowned at sea; his remaining eight +children went to law, some of them against the others; because, if the +father died before the son, £5,000 would be divided equally among the +other eight children; whereas, if the son died before the father, the +brothers only would get it, the sisters being shut out. A few years +afterward Job Taylor and his wife were lost in a ship wrecked at sea; +they had not much to leave behind them; but what little there was was +made less by the struggles of two sets of relatives, each striving to +show that one or other of the two hapless persons <i>might</i> possibly +have survived the other by a few minutes. In 1819 Major Colclough, his +wife, and four children, were drowned during a voyage from Bristol to +Cork; the husband and wife had both made wills; and there arose a +pretty picking for the lawyers in relation to survivorships and next +of kin, and trying to prove whether the husband died first, the wife +first, or both together. Two brothers, James and Charles Corbet, left +Demerara on a certain day in 1828, in a vessel of which one was master +and the other mate; the vessel was seen five days afterward, but from +that time no news of her fate was ever received. Their father died +about a month after the vessel was last seen. The ultimate disposal of +his property depended very much on the question whether he survived +his two sons or they survived him. Many curious arguments were used in +court. Two or three captains stated that from August to January are +hurricane <a name="125">{125}</a> months in the West Indian seas, and that the ship was +very likely to have been wrecked quite early in her voyage. There +were, in addition, certain relations interested in James's dying +before Charles; and they urged that, if the ship was wrecked, Charles +was likely to have outlived by a little space his brother James, +because he was a stronger and more experienced man. Alas for the +"glorious uncertainty!" One big-wig decided that the sons survived the +father, and another that the father survived the sons. About the +beginning of the present reign, three persons, father, mother, and +child, were drowned on a voyage from Dublin to Quebec; the husband had +made a will, leaving all his property to his wife; hence arose a +contest between the next of kin and the wife's relations, each +catching at any small fact that would (theoretically) keep one poor +soul alive a few minutes longer than the other. About ten years ago, a +gentleman embarked with his wife and three children for Australia: the +ship was lost soon after leaving England; the mate, the only person +who was saved among the whole of the crew and passengers, deposed that +he saw the hapless husband and wife locked in each other's arms at the +moment when the waves closed over them. There would seem to be no +question of survivorship here; yet a question really arose; for there +were two wills to be proved, the terms of which would render the +relatives much interested in knowing whether husband or wife did +really survive the other by ever so small a portion of time. +</p> +<p> +These entangled contests may rest in peace, so far as the actual +decisions are concerned. And so may others of a somewhat analogous +nature. Such, for instance, as the case of an old lady and her +housekeeper at Portsmouth. They were both murdered one night. The lady +had willed all her property to the housekeeper, and then, the lawyers +fought over the question as to which of the women died first. Or, the +case of a husband who promised, on his marriage-day, to settle £1,200 +on his wife "in three or four years." They were both drowned about +three years after the marriage; and it was not until after a tough +struggle in chancery that the husband's relatives conquered those of +the wife—albeit, the money had nearly vanished in law expenses by +that time. Or, the case of a man who gave a power of attorney to sell +some property. The property was sold on the 8th of June, but the man +was never seen after the 8th of the preceding March, and was supposed +to have been wrecked at sea; hence arose a question whether the man +was or was not dead on the day when the property was sold—a question +in which the buyer was directly interested. The decisions in these +particular cases we pass over; but it is curious to see how the law +sometimes tries to <i>guess</i> at the nick of time in which either one of +two persons dies. Sometimes the onus of proof rests on one of the two +sets of relations. If they cannot prove a survivorship, the judgment +is that the deaths were simultaneous. Sometimes the law philosophizes +on vitality and decay. The Code Napoleon lays down the principle that +of two persons who perish by the same calamity, if they were both +children, the elder probably survived the younger by a brief space, on +account of having superior vital energy; whereas, if they were elderly +people, the younger probably survived the elder. The code also takes +anatomy and physiology into account, and discourses on the probability +whether a man would or would not float longer alive than a woman, in +the event of shipwreck. The English law is less precise in this +matter. It is more prone to infer simultaneous death, unless proof of +survivorship be actually brought forward. Counsel, of course, do not +fail to make the best of any straw to catch at. According to the +circumstances of the case, they argue that a man, being usually +stronger than a woman, probably survives her a little in a case of +<a name="126">{126}</a> simultaneous drowning; that, irrespective of comparative +strength, her greater terror and timidity would incapacitate her from +making exertions which would be possible to him; that a seafaring man +has a chance of surviving a landsman, on account of his experience in +salt-water matters; that where there is no evidence to the contrary, a +child may be presumed to have outlived his father; that a man in good +health would survive one in ill health; and so forth. +</p> +<p> +The nick of time is not less an important matter in reference to +single deaths, under various circumstances. People are often very much +interested in knowing whether a certain person is dead or not. Unless +under specified circumstances, the law refuses to kill a man—that is, +a man known to have been alive at a certain date is presumed to +continue to live, unless and until proof to the contrary is adduced. +But there are certain cases in which the application of this rule +would involve hardship. Many leases are dependent on lives; and both +lessor and lessee are concerned in knowing whether a particular life +has terminated or not. Therefore, special statutes have been passed, +in relation to a limited number of circumstances, enacting that if a +man were seen alive more than seven years ago, and has not since been +seen or heard of, he may be treated as dead. +</p> +<p> +The nick of time occasionally affects the distribution or amount of +property in relation to particular seasons. Some years ago the +newspapers remarked on the fact that a lord of broad acres, whose +rent-roll reached something like £40,000 a year, died "about midnight" +between the 10th and 11th of October; and the possible consequences of +this were thus set forth: "His rents are payable at 'old time,' that +is, old Lady-day and old Michaelmas-day. Old Michaelmas-day fell this +year on Sunday, the 11th instant. The day begins at midnight. Now, the +rent is due upon the first moment of the day it becomes due; so that +at one second beyond twelve o'clock of the 10th instant, rent payable +at old Michaelmas-day is in law due. If the lord died before twelve, +the rents belong to the parties taking the estates; but if after +twelve, then they belong to and form part of his personal estate. The +difference of one minute might thus involve a question on the title to +about £20,000." We do not know that a legal difficulty did arise; the +facts only indicate the mode in which one might have arisen. Sometimes +that ancient British institution, the house clock, has been at war +with another British institution, the parish church clock. A baby was +born, or an old person died, just before the house clock struck twelve +on a particular night, but after the church clock struck. On which day +did the birth or death take place—yesterday or to-day? And how would +this fact be ascertained, to settle the inheritance of an estate? We +know an instance (not involving, however, the inheritance to property) +of a lady whose relations never have definitely known on which day she +was born; the pocket watch of the accoucheur who attended her mother +pointed to a little before twelve at midnight, whereas the church +clock had just struck twelve. Of course a particular day had to be +named in the register; and as the doctor maintained that his watch was +right, there were the materials for a very pretty quarrel if the +parties concerned had been so disposed. It might be that the nick of +time was midnight exactly, as measured by solar or sun-dial time: that +is, the sun may have been precisely in the nadir at that moment; but +this difficulty would not arise in practice, as the law knows only +mean time, not sun-dial time. If Greenwich time were made legal +everywhere, and if electric clocks everywhere established +communication with the master clock at the observatory, there might be +another test supplied; but under the conditions stated, it would be a +nice matter of <i>Tweedledum</i> and <i>Tweedledee</i> <a name="127">{127}</a> to determine +whether the house clock, the church clock, or a pocket watch, should +be relied upon. All the pocket watches in the town might be brought +into the witness-box, but without avail; for if some accorded with the +house clock, others would surely be found to agree better with the +church clock. +</p> +<p> +This question of clocks, as compared with time measured by the sun, +presents some very curious aspects in relation to longitude. What's +o'clock in London will not tell you what's o'clock in Falmouth, unless +you know the difference of longitude between the two places. The sun +takes about twenty minutes to go from the zenith of the one to the +zenith of the other. Local time, the time at any particular town, is +measured from the moment of noon at that town; and noon itself is when +the sun comes to the meridian of that place. Hence Falmouth noon is +twenty minutes after London noon, Falmouth midnight twenty minutes +after London midnight; and so on. When it is ten minutes after +midnight, on the morning of Sunday, the 1st of January, in London, it +is ten minutes before midnight, on Saturday, the 31st of December, at +Falmouth. It is a Sabbath at the one place, a working-day at the +other. That particular moment of absolute time is in the year 1865 at +the one, and 1864 at the other. Therefore, we see, it might become a +ticklish point in what year a man died, solely on account of this +question of longitude, irrespective of any wrong-going or wrong-doing +of clocks, or of any other doubtful points whatever. Sooner or later +this question will have to be attended to. In all our chief towns, +nearly all our towns indeed, the railway-station clocks mark Greenwich +time, or, as it is called, "railway time;" the church clocks generally +mark local time; and some commercial clocks, to serve all parties, +mark both kinds of time on the same dial-face, by the aid of an +additional index hand. Railway time is gradually beating local time; +and the law will by-and-by have to settle which shall be used as the +standard in determining the moment of important events. Some of the +steamers plying between England and Ireland use Greenwich time in +notifying the departures from the English port, and Dublin time in +notifying those from the Irish port; a method singularly embarrassing +to a traveller who is in the habit of relying on his own watch. Does a +sailor get more prog, more grog, more pay, within a given space of +absolute time when coming from America to England, or when going from +England to America? The difference is far too slight to attract either +his attention or that of his employers; yet it really is the case that +he obtains more good things in the former of these cases than in the +latter. His days are shorter on the homeward than on the outward +voyage; and if he receive so much provisions and pay per day, he +interprets day as it is to him on shipboard. When in harbor, say at +Liverpool, a day is, to him as to every one else who is stationary +like himself, a period of definite length; but when he travels +Eastward or Westward, his days are variable in length. When he travels +West, he and the sun run a race; the sun of course beats; but the +sailor accomplishes a little, and the sun has to fetch up that little +before he can complete what foot-racers call a lap. In other words, +there is a longer absolute time between noon and noon to the sailor +going West, than to the sailor ashore. When he travels East, on the +contrary, he and the sun run toward each other; insomuch that there is +less absolute time in the period between his Monday's noon and +Tuesday's noon than when he was ashore. The ship's noon is usually +dinner-time for the sailors; and the interval between that and the +next noon (measured by the sun, not by the chronometer) varies in +length through the causes just noticed. Once now and then there are +facts recorded in the newspapers which bring this <a name="128">{128}</a> truth into +prominence—a truth demonstrable enough in science, but not very +familiar to the general public. When the <i>Great Eastern</i> made her first +veritable voyage across the Atlantic in June, 1860, she left +Southampton on the 17th, and reached New York on the 28th. As the ship +was going West, more or less, all the while, she was going with or +rather after the sun; the interval was greater between noon and noon +than when the ship was anchored off Southampton; and the so-called +eleven days of the voyage were eleven long days. As it was important, +in reference to a problem in steam navigation, to know how many +revolutions the paddles made in a given time, to test the power of the +mighty ship, it was necessary to bear in mind that the ship's day was +longer than a shore day; and it was found that, taking latitude and +longitude into account, the day on which the greatest run was made was +nearly twenty-four and a half hours long; the ship's day was equal to +half an hour more than a landsman's day. The other days varied from +twenty-four to twenty-four and a half. On the return voyage all this +was reversed; the ship met the sun, the days were less than +twenty-four ordinary hours long, and the calculations had to be +modified in consequence. The sailors, too, got more food in a homeward +week than an outward week, owing to the intervals between the meals +being shorter albeit, their appetites may not have been cognizant of +the difference. +</p> +<p> +And this brings us back to our hypothetical Mullets. Josiah died at +noon (Sydney time), and Jasper died on the same day at noon (Greenwich +time). Which died first? Sydney, although not quite at the other side +of the world, is nearly so; it is ten hours of longitude Eastward of +Greenwich; the sun rises there ten hours earlier than with us. It is +nearly bed-time with Sydney folks when our artisans strike work for +dinner. There would, therefore, be a reasonable ground for saying that +Josiah died first. But had it been New Zealand, a curious question +might arise. Otago, and some other of the settlements in those +islands, are so near the antipodes of Greenwich, that they may either +be called eleven and three-quarter hours <i>East</i>, or twelve and a quarter +hours <i>West</i>, of Greenwich, according as we suppose the navigator to go +round the Cape of Good Hope or round Cape Horn. At six in the morning +in London, it is about six in the evening at New Zealand. But of which +day? When it is Monday morning in London, is it Sunday evening or +Monday evening in New Zealand? This question is not so easy to solve +as might be supposed. When a ship called at Pitcairn Island several +years ago, to visit the singular little community that had descended +from the mutineers of the Bounty, the captain was surprised to find +exactly one day difference between his ship's reckoning and that of +the islanders; what was Monday, the 26th, to the one, was Tuesday, the +27th, to the other. A voyage East had been the origin of one +reckoning, a voyage West that of the other. Not unlikely we should +have to go back to the voyage of the Bounty itself, seventy-seven +years ago, to get to the real origin of the Pitcairners' reckoning. +How it may be with the English settlers in New Zealand, we feel by no +means certain. If the present reckoning began with some voyage made +round Cape Horn, then our Monday morning is New Zealand Sunday +evening; but if with some voyage made round the Cape of Good Hope, +then our Monday morning is New Zealand Monday evening. Probabilities +are perhaps in favor of the latter supposition. We need not ask, +"What's o'clock at New Zealand?" for that can be ascertained to a +minute by counting the difference of longitude; but to ask, "What day +of the week and of the month is it at New Zealand?" is a question that +might, for aught we can see, involve very important legal +consequences. +</p> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="129">{129}</a> +<br> +<h2>From the Dublin Review. +<br><br> +RECENT DISCOVERIES IN THE CATACOMBS.</h2> +<br> +<p> +The chromo-lithographic press, established at Rome by the munificence +of Pius IX., has issued its first publication, four sheets in large +folio, <i>Imagines Selectae Deiparae Virginis in Caemeteriis Suburbanis +Udo depictae</i>, with about twenty pages of text from the pen of the +Cavaliere G. B. de Rossi. The subject and the author are amply +sufficient to recommend them to the Christian archaeologist, and the +work of the artists employed is in every way worthy of both. It is by +no means an uncommon idea, even among Catholics who have visited Rome +and <i>done</i> the catacombs, that our Blessed Lady does not hold any +prominent place in the decorations of those subterranean cemeteries. +Protestant tourists often boldly publish that she is nowhere to be +found there. The present publication will suffice to show, even to +those who never leave their own homes, the falsehood of this statement +and impression. De Rossi has here set before us a selection of four +different representations of Holy Mary, as she appears in that +earliest monument of the Christian Church; and, in illustrating these, +he has taken occasion to mention a score or two of others. Moreover, +he has vindicated for them an antiquity and an importance far beyond +what we were prepared to expect; and those who have ever either made +personal acquaintance with him, or have studied his former writings, +well know how far removed he is from anything like uncritical and +enthusiastic exaggerations. Even such writers as Mr. Burgon ("Letters +from Rome") cannot refrain from bearing testimony to his learning, +moderation, and candor; they praise him, often by way of contrast with +some Jesuit or other clerical exponent of the mysteries of the +catacombs, for all those qualities which are calculated to inspire us +with confidence in his interpretations of any nice points of Christian +archaeology. But we fear his Protestant admirers will be led to lower +their tone of admiration for him, and henceforward to discover some +flaw in his powers of criticism, when they find him, as in these +pages, gravely maintaining, concerning a particular representation of +the Madonna in the catacombs, that it is of Apostolic, or +quasi-Apostolic antiquity. It is a painting on the vaulted roof of an +<i>arcosolium</i> in the cemetery of St. Priscilla, and it is reproduced in +the work before us in its original size. The Blessed Virgin sits, her +head partially covered by a short slight veil, holding the Divine +Infant in her arms; opposite to her stands a man, holding in one hand +a volume, and with the other pointing to a star which appears between +the two figures. This star almost always accompanies our Blessed Lady +in ancient paintings or sculptures, wherever she is represented either +with the Magi offering their gifts, or by the manger's side with the +ox and the ass; but with a single figure, as in the present instance, +it is unusual. Archaeologists will probably differ in their +interpretation of this figure; the most obvious conjecture would, of +course, fix on St. Joseph; there seem to be solid reasons, however, +for preferring (with De Rossi) the prophet Isaias, whose predictions +concerning the Messias abound with imagery borrowed from light, and +who may be identified on an old Christian glass by the superscription +of his name. But this question, interesting as it is, is not so +important as the probable date of the painting itself; and here no +abridgment or analysis of' De Rossi's arguments can do justice to the +moderation, yet irresistible force, with which he accumulates proofs +of <a name="130">{130}</a> the conclusion we have already stated, viz., that the +painting was executed, if not in Apostolic times and as it were under +the very eyes of the Apostles themselves, yet certainly within the +first 150 years of the Christian era. He first bids us carefully to +study the art displayed in the design and execution of the painting; +he compares it with the decorations of the famous Pagan tombs +discovered on the Via Latina in 1858, and which are referred to the +times of the Antoninuses; with the paintings in the pontifical +<i>cubiculum</i> in the cemetery of St. Callixtus, and with others more +recently discovered in the cemetery of Pretextatus, to both of which a +very high antiquity is conceded by all competent judges; and he justly +argues that the more classical style of the painting now under +examination <i>obliges</i> us to assign to it a still earlier date. Next, he +shows that the catacomb in which it appears was one of the oldest,—St. +Priscilla, from whom it receives its name, having been the mother of +Pudens and a contemporary of the Apostles (the impress of a seal, with +the name <i>Pudens Felix</i>, is repeated several times on the mortar round +the edge of a grave in this cemetery); nay, further still, it can be +shown that the tombs of Sts. Pudentiana and Praxedes, and therefore, +probably, of their father St. Pudens himself, were in the immediate +neighborhood of the very chapel in which this Madonna is to be seen; +moreover, the inscriptions which are found there bear manifest tokens +of a higher antiquity than can be claimed by any others from the +catacombs: there is the complete triple nomenclature of pagan times, +e.g., Titus Flavius Felicissimus; the epitaphs are not even in the +usual form, <i>in pace</i>, but simply the Apostolic salutation, <i>Pax +tecum, Pax tibi</i>; and finally, the greater number of them are not cut +on stone or marble slabs, but written with red paint on the tiles +which close the graves—a mode of inscription of which not a single +example, we believe, has hitherto been found in any other part the +catacombs. This is a mere outline of the arguments by which De Rossi +establishes his conclusion respecting the age of this painting, and +they are not even exhibited in their full force in the present +publication at all. For a more copious induction of facts, and a more +complete elucidation both of the history and topography of the +catacombs, we must be content to wait till the author's larger work on +<i>Roma Sotterranea</i> shall appear. +</p> +<p> +The most recent painting of the Madonna which De Rossi has here +published is that with which our readers will be the most familiar. It +is the one to which the late Father Marchi, S.J., never failed to +introduce every visitor to the catacomb of St. Agnes, and has been +reproduced in various works; the Holy Mother with her hands +outstretched in prayer, the Divine Infant on her bosom, and the +Christian monogram on either side of her and turned toward her. This +last particular naturally directs our thoughts to the fourth century +as the date of this work; and the absence of the <i>nimbus</i> and some other +indications lead our author to fix the earlier half of the century in +preference to the later. Between these two limits, then, of the first +or second, and the fourth century, he would place the two others which +are now published; he distinguishes them more doubtfully, as belonging +respectively to the first and second half of the third century. In +one, from the cemetery of Domitilla, the Blessed Virgin sits holding +the Holy Child on her lap, whilst four Magi offer their gifts; the +other, from the catacomb of Sts. Peter and Marcellinus, represents the +same scene, but with two Magi only. In both there is the same +departure from the ancient tradition of the number of the wise men, +and from the same cause, viz., the desire to give a proper balance and +proportion to the two sides of the picture, the Virgin occupying the +middle place. Indeed, in one of them, it is still possible to trace +<a name="131">{131}</a> the original sketch of the artist, designing another arrangement +with the three figures only; but the result did not promise to be +satisfactory, and he did what thousands of his craft have continued to +do ever since, sacrificed historic truth to the exigencies of his art. +</p> +<p> +We trust our readers will be induced to get this valuable work and to +study it for themselves; the text may be procured either in French or +in Italian, so that it is readily accessible to all. At the same time +we would take the opportunity of introducing to them another work by +the same indefatigable author, which is also published both in French +and in Italian. At least, such is the announcement of a prospectus now +lying before us, which states that the French translation is published +by Vives, in Paris. We have ourselves only seen the original Italian. +It is a short monthly periodical, illustrations, <i>Bollettino di +Archeologia Cristiana</i>, and is addressed not merely to <i>savans</i>, +Fellows of Royal Societies, and the like, but rather to all educated +men who care for the history of their religion and are capable of +appreciating its evidences. De Rossi claims for the recent discoveries +in the Roman catacombs the very highest place among the scientific +events of the day which have an important religious bearing, and we +think that the justice of his plea must be admitted. Unfortunately, +however, the vastness of the subject, the multiplied engagements of +the author, and (not least) the political vicissitudes of the times, +have hitherto prevented the publication of these discoveries in a +complete and extended form. We are happy to know that the work is +satisfactorily progressing; but meanwhile he has been persuaded by the +suggestions of many friends, and by the convenience of the thing +itself, to publish this monthly periodical, which will keep us <i>au +courant</i> with the most important additions that are being made from +time to time to our knowledge of those precious memorials of primitive +Christianity, and also supply much interesting information on other +archaeological matters. In these pages the reader is allowed to +accompany, as it were, the author himself in his subterranean +researches, to assist at his discoveries, to trace the happy but +doubtful conjecture of a moment through all its gradual stages, until +it reaches the moral certainty of a conclusion which can no longer be +called in question; <i>e.g.</i>, the author gives us a portion of a lecture +which he delivered on July 3, 1852, to the Roman Pontifical Academy of +Archaeology. In this lecture he maintained, in opposition to the usual +nomenclature of the catacombs, and entirely on the strength of certain +topographical observations, that a particular cemetery, into which a +very partial opening had been made in 1848, was that anciently called +by the name of Pretextatus, and in which were buried St. Januarius, +the eldest of the seven sons of St. Felicitas, Felicissimus and +Agapitus, deacons of St. Sixtus, Pope Urban, Quirinus, and other +famous martyrs. Five years passed away, and this opinion had been +neither confirmed nor refuted; but in 1857, excavations undertaken for +another purpose introduced our author into a crypt of this cemetery, +of unusual size and richness of ornament, where one of the <i>loculi</i> +bore an inscription on the mortar which had secured the grave-stone, +invoking the assistance of "Januarius, Agatopus (for Agapitus), and +Felicissimus, martyrs!" This, of course, was a strong confirmation of +the conjecture which had been published so long before; but this was +all which he could produce in the first number of his <i>Bollettino</i> in +January, 1863. In the second number he could add that, as he was going +to press (February 21), small fragments of an inscription on marble +had been disinterred from the same place, of which only single letters +had yet been found, but which, he did not hesitate to say, had been +written by Pope Damasus and contained his name, as well as the name of +<a name="132">{132}</a> St. Januarius. In March he published the twelve or fourteen +letters which had been discovered, arranging them in the place he +supposed them to have occupied in the inscription, which he +conjecturally restored, and which consisted altogether of more than +forty letters. In April he was able still further to add, that they +had now recovered other portions; amongst the rest, a whole word, or +rather the contraction of a word (<i>episcop.</i> for <i>episcopus</i>), exactly in +accordance with his conjecture, though, at the time he made the +conjecture, only half of one of the letters had yet come to light. +</p> +<p> +We need not pursue the subject further. Enough has been said to +satisfy those of our readers who have any acquaintance with the +catacombs, both as to the kind and the degree of interest and +importance which belong to this publication. Its intelligence, +however, is by no means confined to the catacombs. The basilica of San +Clemente; the recent excavations at San Lorenzo, <i>fuori le mura</i>; the +postscript of St. Pamphilus the Martyr at the end of one of his +manuscript copies of the Bible, reproduced in the Codex Sinaiticus +lately published by Tischendorf; the arch of Constantine; ancient +scribblings on the wall (<i>graffiti</i>) of the palace of the Caesars on +the Palatine, etc., etc., are subjects of able and learned articles in +the several numbers we have received. With reference to the +<i>graffiti</i>, one singular circumstance mentioned by De Rossi is worth +repeating here. Most of our readers are probably acquainted with the +<i>graffiti</i> from this place, published by P. Garrucci, in which one +Alessamenus is ridiculed for worshipping as his God the figure of a +man, but with the head of an ass, nailed to a cross. P. Garrucci had +very reasonably conjectured that this was intended as a blasphemous +caricature of the Christian worship; and recently other <i>graffiti</i> in +the very same place have been discovered with the title <i>Episcopus</i>, +apparently given in ridicule to some Christian youth; for that the +room on whose walls these scribblings appear was used for educational +purposes is abundantly proved by the numerous inscriptions announcing +that such or such a one <i>exit de paedagogio</i>. We seem, therefore, in +deciphering these rude scrawls, to assist, as it were, at one of the +minor scenes of that great struggle between paganism and Christianity, +whereof the sufferings of the early martyrs, the apologies of Justin +Martyr, etc., were only another but more public and historical phase. +History tells us that Caracalla, when a boy, saw one of his companions +beaten because he professed the Christian faith. These <i>graffiti</i> seem +to teach us that there were many others of the same tender age, <i>de +domo Caesaris</i>, who suffered more or less of persecution for the same +cause. Other interesting details of the same struggle have been +brought together by De Rossi, carefully gleaned from the patrician +names which appear on some of the ancient grave-stones, sometimes as +belonging to young virgins or widows who had dedicated themselves to +the service of Christ under the discipline of a religious community. +That such a community was to be found early in the fifth century, in +the immediate neighborhood of <i>S. Lorenzo fuori le mura</i>, or, at +least, that the members of such a community were always buried about +that time in that cemetery, is one of the circumstances which may be +said to be clearly proved by the recent discoveries. The proofs are +too numerous and minute for abridgment, but the student will be +interested in examining them as they appear in the <i>Bollettino</i>. +</p> +<p> +Another feature in this archaeological publication is its convenience +as a supplement to the volume of Christian Inscriptions published by +the same author. That volume, as our readers are already aware, +contains only such inscriptions of the first six centuries as bear a +distinct chronological note by the names of the chief magistrates, or +in some other way. Additional specimens of these are not unfrequently +discovered in the excavations still <a name="133">{133}</a> in progress on various sides +of the city; and these De Rossi is careful to chronicle, and generally +also to illustrate by notes, in the pages of his <i>Bollettino</i>. The +chief value of these additions, perhaps, is to be found in the +corroboration they <i>uniformly</i> give to the conclusions which De Rossi +had already deduced, the canons of chronological distinction and +distribution which he had established, from the larger collection of +inscriptions in the work referred to—whether as to the style of +writing or of diction and sentiments, etc.—canons, the full +importance of which will only be recognized when he shall have +published the second volume of the collection of epitaphs bearing upon +questions of Christian doctrine and practice. +</p> +<p> +In the earlier numbers of the <i>Bollettino</i> for the present year there +is a very interesting account of the recent discoveries in the +Ambrosian basilica of Milan, where there seems no room to doubt but +that they have brought to light the very sarcophagus in which the +relics of the great St. Ambrose, as well as those of the martyrs Sts. +Gervasius and Protasius, have rested for more than ten centuries. The +history of the discovery is too long to be inserted here, and too +interesting to be abridged. One circumstance, however, connected with +it is too important to be omitted. The sarcophagus itself has not yet, +we believe, been opened; but, from the two sepulchres below and on +either side of it, where the bishop and the martyrs were originally +deposited, and where they remained until their translation in the +ninth century, many valuable relics have been gleaned. We will only +mention one of them--viz., portions of an <i>ampulla</i> such as are found +in the catacombs, and concerning which Dr. Biraghi, the librarian of +the Bibliotheca Ambrosiana (to whose zeal we are indebted for the +whole discovery, and for the account of it to his learning), assures +us that it has been subjected to a chemical examination, and is shown +to have contained blood. This, as De Rossi truly remarks, is the most +notable instance which has yet come before us of this <i>ampulla</i> having +been placed in the sepulchre of famous and historical martyrs, and it +is of very special importance as throwing a flood of light on those +words of St. Ambrose about these relics so often quoted in the +controversy on this subject—<i>Sanguine, tumulus madet; apparent +cruoris triumphales notae; inviolatae reliquiae loco suo et ordine +repertae</i>. And it is certainly singular that this discovery should +have been made at a moment when the validity of these <i>ampullae</i>, as +sure signs of martyrdom, has been so much called in question. The +Sacred Congregation of Rites had only recently reaffirmed their former +sentence on this matter; and this fact now comes most opportunely from +Milan to add further weight to their decision, by giving a historical +basis to an opinion which before had been thought by some rather to +rest upon theory and conjecture. It will go far, we should think, +toward <i>rehabilitating</i> in the minds of Christian archaeologists the +pious belief of former ages upon this subject, wherever it may have +been shaken. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="134">{134}</a> +<br> +<h2>MISCELLANY. +<br><br> +SCIENCE.</h2> +<br> +<p> +<i>The Mason-Spider of Corfu</i>.—A correspondent of a London journal gives +an interesting account of certain habits of this insect, which belongs +to the <i>mygalidae</i> family. The mygales are chiefly found in hot +climates, and include the largest specimens of spiders known. They are +called mason-spiders, from the curious manner in which they build +their houses. "The mygale nest," says the correspondent, "varies much +in size, from one inch in length to three or four, and even six or +seven inches. In the West Indies, where the spiders are crab-like, the +insects measure six inches over. One nest, especially mentioned and +minutely described by Mr. Oudouin, was three inches and a quarter long +and eight-tenths of an inch wide. The nest, of cylindrical form, is +made by boring into the earth; making his excavation, the next thing, +having decided upon the dimensions of his habitation, is to furnish +it, and most beautiful are his paper-hangings. The whole of the +interior is lined with the softest possible silk, a tissue which the +'major domo' spins all over the apartment until it is padded to a +sufficient thickness and made soft enough. Silk lining like this gives +the idea of the mygale having a luxurious turn. This done, and the +interior finished, the mygale shows his peculiarity by taking steps to +keep out the +<span style="vertical-align:-25%"> +<img alt="" src="images/i134.jpg"> +</span> +of intruders by making not only a door, and +that self-closing, but a door with swinging hinge, and sometimes one +at each end of his nest, which shows that he has a very good opinion +of his own work within, and knows how to take care of it. Not having +met with any case where any one had seen the positive operation of +making the door of these nests, I thought the details would be +interesting, the more so as they corroborated preconceived ideas of +their construction, and were noticed by a friend quartered at Corfu, +who brought home the nest with him. The following is the description +he gave me: +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + "Lying out in one of the sandy plateaux covered with olive groves + with which Corfu abounds, enjoying his cigar and lounging about in + the sandy soil, he came to a spider's nest. Examining it, he found + the lid or door would not open, and seemed held firmly within by the + proprietor—as if Jack were at home—so he applied forthwith the + leverage of a knife-blade, upon which the inmate retired to his + inner chamber. The aggressor decided not to disturb him any more + that day, but marking the place—most necessary thing to do—thought + he would explore further the next day, if fine. +<br><br> + "Accordingly, the next day my friend called early, intending to take + off the door and to watch the progress of restoration, and how it + would be accomplished. After waiting a long time, out came Monsieur + Mygale, and looking carefully round, and finding all quiet, + commenced operations by running his web backward and forward across + the orifice of his nest, till there was a layer of silken web; upon + this he ejected a gluten, over which he scratched the fine sand in + the immediate neighborhood of his nest; this done, he again set to + work—webbing, then gluten, sand; then again web, gluten, sand, about + six times; this occupied in all about eight hours. But the puzzling + part was that this time he was cementing and building himself out + from his own mansion, when, to the astonishment and delight of his + anxious looker-on, he began the finishing stroke by cutting and + forming the door by fixing his hind legs in the centre of the new + covering, and from these as a centre he began cutting with his jaws + right through the door he had made, striking a clear circle round, + and leaving about one-eighth of the circumference as a hinge. This + done, he lifted the door up and walked in. My friend then tried to + open the door with a knife, but the insect pulled it tight from the + inside. He therefore dug round him and took him off bodily—mygale + and nest complete. The hinge is most carefully and beautifully + formed; and there appears to be an important object in view when the + spider covers over the whole of the orifice, for immediately the + door is raised it springs back as soon as released; and this is + caused by the elasticity of the web on the hinge and the peculiar + formation of the lid or door, which is made thicker on the lower + side, so that its <a name="135">{135}</a> own weight helps it to be self-closing, and + the rabbeting of the door is wonderfully surfaced. Bolts and Chub + locks with a latch-key the mygale family do not possess, but as a + substitute the lower part of the door has clawholding holes, so that + a bird's beak or other lever being used, Mons. Mygale holds on to + the door by these, and with his legs against the sides of his house, + offers immense resistance against all comers." +</p> +<p> +<i>Instinct of Insects</i>.—One of the regular course of free scientific +lectures delivered at the Paris Sorbonne this last winter, under the +auspices of the Minister of Public Instruction, was by the +distinguished naturalist M. Milne-Edwards, on the instinct and +intelligence of animals. Taking for his text the saying of Linnaeus, +<i>Natura maxime miranda in minimis,</i> he spoke principally of the +instinct of insects, and especially of solitary bees. These +hymenoptera, in fact, afford one of the most striking examples known +of that faculty which impels an animal, either for its own +preservation or for the preservation and development of its offspring, +to perform the most complicated and intelligent actions, readily and +skilfully, yet without having learned how to do them. One species, the +carpenter-bee (<i>xylocopa</i>), bores in the trunks of trees galleries +running first horizontally and then vertically to a considerable +depth. She then collects a quantity of wax and honey. The honey she +kneads into a little ball of alimentary matter, in the midst of which +she deposits her first egg. With the wax she constructs a horizontal +partition, formed of concentric annular layers; this encloses the +cell. On this partition she deposits a second egg, enclosed like the +first in the provision destined for the support of the future larva; +and over it builds another partition of wax; and so on, to the top of +the vertical cavity. Then she dies; she never sees her offspring. The +latter, so long as they remain larvae, feed upon the honey which the +maternal foresight provided for them; and so soon as they have passed +through their second metamorphosis and become winged insects, issue +forth from their retreat, to perform in their turn a similar labor. +</p> +<p> +Another species of solitary bee, whose larva is carnivorous, resorts +to a still more wonderful, but, it must be confessed, very cruel, +expedient to supply the worm-like progeny with food. She constructs a +gallery or tunnel in the earth, and crowns it with a chimney curved +somewhat like a crosier, so as to keep out the rain. Then she goes +a-hunting, and brings back to her den a number of caterpillars. If she +kills them at once, they will spoil before her eggs are hatched; if +she lets them alone, they will run away. What shall she do? She +pierces the caterpillars with her venomous little dart, and injects +into them a drop of poison, which Mr. Claude Bernard no doubt will +analyze some day. It does not kill, it only paralyzes them; and there +they lie, torpid and immovable, till the larvae come into the world +and feast off the sweet and succulent flesh at their leisure. +</p> +<p> +Everybody is familiar with the habits and wonderful industry of +hive-bees, wasps, and ants. These insects seem to be governed by +something more than blind instinct: it is hardly too much to say that +they give indubitable signs of intelligence. They know how to modify +their course according to circumstances, to provide against unexpected +wants, to avert dangers, and to notify to each other whatever is of +consequence to be known by their whole community. Huber, the +celebrated bee-keeper of Geneva, relates the following anecdote: One +of his hives having been devastated one night by a large sphinx-moth, +the bees set to work the next morning and plastered up the door, +leaving only a small opening which would just admit them, one at a +time, but which the sphinx, with its big body and long wings, could +not pass. As soon as the season arrived when the moths terminate their +short lives, the bees, no longer fearing an invasion, pulled down +their rampart. The next season, as no sphinx appeared to trouble them, +they left their door wide open. +</p> +<br> +<p> +<i>Ostrich-keeping</i>.—By late news from the Cape of Good Hope we learn +that the farmers of that colony are beginning to find it profitable to +keep flocks of ostriches, for the feathers of those birds are worth +£25 sterling the pound. For thirty-five ostriches, there must be three +hundred acres of grazing-ground. The plucking takes place once in six +months; the yield of feathers from each bird being worth from £10 to +£12, 10s. The original cost of the young ostriches is said to be £5 +each. Some of the <a name="136">{136}</a> farmers who have tried the experiment are of +opinion that ostrich-feathers will pay better than any other produce +of the colony. +</p> +<p> +<i>Extraordinary Inland Navigation</i>.—We hear from South America that a +steamer built in England for the Peruvian government, for the +exploration of rivers, has penetrated the great continent from the +Atlantic side to a distance of ninety-five leagues only from the +Pacific, or nearly all across. The vessel, which draws seven feet +water, steamed seven hundred leagues up the Amazon, two hundred up the +Ucayati, and thence into the Pachitea, which had never before been +navigated except by native canoes. What a magnificent extent of inland +navigation is here opened to commercial enterprise! The mind becomes +somewhat bewildered in imagining the future of those vast +river-valleys when hundreds of steamers shall navigate the streams, +trading among millions of population dwelling on their banks. +</p> +<p> +<i>Is the Sun getting Bigger?</i>—It is known that various speculations +have been put forward as to the cause or source of the sun's heat. +Among those who consider that it consists in the falling of asteroids +or meteorites into the sun, is Mr. J. R. Mayer, of Heilbronn, who +states that the surface of the sun measures 115,000 million square +miles, and that the asteroids falling thereon form a mass every minute +equal in weight to from 94,000 to 188,000 billion kilogrammes. It +might be supposed that this enormous shower would increase the mass +and weight of the sun, and by consequence produce an appreciable +effect on the motion of the planets which compose our system. For +instance, it would shorten our year by a second or something less. But +the calculations of astronomers show that this effect does not take +place; and Mr. Mayer states that to increase the apparent diameter of +the sun a single second by the shower of asteroids would require from +33,000 to 66,000 years. +</p> +<p> +<i>Teaching the Deaf and Dumb to Speak</i>.—Dr. Houdin, director of an +institution for the deaf and dumb at Passy, lately announced to the +French Academy, that after twenty-five years' experience he had proved +the possibility of communicating the faculty of speech, in a certain +degree, to deaf mutes. A commission appointed by the Academy and the +Faculty to investigate the subject, reports that the learned doctor +has really succeeded in several instances in teaching these +unfortunate beings to speak and even comprehend spoken language so +well that it is difficult to believe that they are not guided by the +ear. The patients conversed with the members of the commission, and +answered the different questions put to them. They were found to be +perfectly familiar with the use and mechanism of speech, though +destitute of the sense of hearing, and they comprehended what was said +to them, reading the words upon the lips of the speaker with a +marvellous facility. Thus they become fit to enter into society and +capable of receiving all manner of instruction. +</p> +<p> +But here is another case still more wonderful. What would you do if +you had to instruct and prepare for first communion a child who was at +the same time deaf, dumb, and <i>blind</i>? The case is not an imaginary +one; it has occurred in an asylum for deaf-mutes at Notre Dame de +Larnay, in the diocese of Poitiers. A nun was there charged with the +instruction of a child in this unfortunate state, to whom she could +appeal only by the sense of touch. Yet the child, who astonishes +everybody by her sensibility and intelligence, has come by that means +to a knowledge of the spiritual life, of God and his divine Son, of +religion and its mysteries and precepts—has been prepared, in fine, +for a worthy reception of the Eucharist. +</p> + +<h2>ART.</h2> +<p> +The past winter in New York has scarcely kept pace with its immediate +predecessor in the number and merit of the collections of pictures +opened to public inspection or disposed of at auction. The +unprecedented prices obtained for the really excellent collection of +Mr. Wolfe, in Christmas week of 1863, seemed to have inoculated art +collectors and dealers with what may be called a <i>cacoethes vendendi</i>, +and until far into the succeeding summer the picture auctioneers were +called upon to knock down dozens of galleries of "private gentlemen +about to leave the country," varying in merit from respectable to +positively bad. In these sales the moderns had decidedly the best of +it, the few <a name="137">{137}</a> "old masters" who ventured to appeal to the +sympathies and pockets of our collectors being at last treated with +proper contempt. But the prices realized by the Wolfe gallery, even +when reduced to a specie basis, were too high to become a recognized +standard of value, and gradually the interest in such sales, as well +as the bids, declined, until the sellers became aware (the purchasers +had become aware some time previous) that the market was overstocked +and the demand for pictures had ceased. The contributions of the +foreign artists to the New York Sanitary Fair brought probably less +than a third of the money that would have been obtained for them had +they been sold in January instead of June, and such collections as +have been scraped together for sale during the present season have met +with but moderate pecuniary success. It is gratifying to know, +however, that our resident artists, both native and foreign-born, have +for the most part been busily and profitably employed, and that in +landscape, and in some departments of <i>genre</i>, their works have not +suffered in competition with similar ones by reputable European +painters. Without wishing in any respect to recommend or suggest a +protective system for fostering native art, we cannot but rejoice that +the overthrow of the late exaggerated prices for foreign works will +tend to encourage and develop American artists. +</p> +<p> +The principal art event in anticipation is the opening of next +exhibition of the National Academy of Design in the building now +hastening to completion at the corner of Fourth avenue and +Twenty-third streets. It is to be hoped that the contributions will be +worthy of the place and the occasion. Recent exhibitions have not been +altogether creditable to the Academy. +</p> +<p> +Durand, the late president of the Academy, and one of our oldest and +most careful landscape painters, has a characteristic work on +exhibition at Avery's Art Agency, corner of Fourth street and +Broadway. It is called "A Summer Afternoon," and is pervaded by a +soft, pensive sentiment of rural repose. In the elaboration of the +trees and in the soft, mellow distances the artist shows his early +skill, albeit in some of his later pieces the timid handling +inseparable from age is discernible. +</p> +<p> +A collection of several hundred sketches and studies of no special +merit, by Hicks, has recently been disposed of at auction. The essays +of this gentleman in landscape are not happy, and the specimens in +this collection had better, perhaps, have been excluded. +</p> +<p> +Rossiter's pictures representing Adam and Eve in Paradise, now on +exhibition in New York, have excited more remark than commendation. It +may be said briefly, that they fail to do justice to the subject. +</p> +<p> +Curnmings's "Historic Annals of the Academy of Design" have been +published, and constitute an interesting addition to the somewhat +meagre collection of works illustrating American art history. +</p> +<p> +Mr. Thomas Ball, the well-known sculptor of Boston, is about to depart +for Italy, with the intention of remaining several years in Florence, +and executing there in marble a number of plaster models. Among these +are a life-size statue of Edwin Forrest in the part of "Coriolanus," +and busts of the late Rev. Thomas Starr King and Edward Everett. The +latter is said to be an admirable likeness. +</p> +<p> +M. J. Heade, an American artist, formerly of Boston and Providence, is +publishing in London a work upon the humming-birds of Brazil, +illustrated from designs by himself. +</p> +<p> +The United States Senate was recently the scene of a somewhat animated +debate on art matters, arising out of a proposition to authorize the +artist Powell to "paint a picture for the Capitol at a cost not to +exceed $25,000." The scheme was defeated, chiefly through the +opposition of Senator Sumner, who thought the present an improper time +to devote so large a sum to such a purpose. +</p> +<p> +A very remarkable picture by Gérôme, the most original, and realistic +of living French painters, is now on exhibition at Goupil's, in this +city. It is entitled "The Prayer of the Arab in the Desert," and in a +small space presents a complete epitome of Oriental life. +</p> +<br> +<p> +In London the General Exhibition of water-color drawings, and +collections of works of Holman Hunt, Madox Brown, and the late David +Roberts, have recently been opened. The last named contains 900 +pictures, drawings, and sketches, showing the amazing industry of the +artist, and his skill as a draughtsman. +</p> +<a name="138">{138}</a> +<p> +A monument to Shakespeare, from penny subscriptions, is to be erected +on Primrose Hill, near London. +</p> +<br> +<p> +The sale of the celebrated Pourtalès collection at Paris has been the +all-absorbing art topic abroad. The gallery, at last accounts, was +daily crowded with representatives from all parts of Europe, and the +prices surpassed the estimates of the experts. The value set upon the +whole collection was upward of 3,000,000 francs, but that sum will +probably fall far short of the real total. The bronzes and terra-cotta +occupied four days, and produced over 150,000 francs. The following +are among the most remarkable items: A very small statuette of +Jupiter, found at Besançon in 1820, 8,000 francs; another small +statuette of the same, seated, formerly in the Denon collection, +12,000 francs; the celebrated statuette of Apollo, supposed to date +from the sixth century B.C., from the Neri collection, 5,000 francs; +small statuette of Minerva, arms missing, found at Besançon, 19,200 +francs; armor found at Herculaneum, and presented by the Queen of +Naples to Josephine, purchased by the Emperor for 13,000 francs; a +small Roman bust, supposed by Visconti to be a Balbus, bought for the +Louvre for 4,550 francs; a tripod, found in the ruins of the town of +Metapont, and described by Panofka, purchased for the Berlin gallery, +10,000 francs; fine old Roman seat, in bronze, bought for the Louvre, +5,300 francs; vase from Locres, 7,000 francs; another vase, found in +one of the tombs of the Vulci, 9,000 francs. +</p> +<p> +At the sale of the collection of the Marquis de Lambertye, in Paris, a +charming work by Meissonier, "Reynard in his Study, reading a +Manuscript," was purchased for 12,600 francs; had it not been for the +effect of the Pourtalès sale on the art market, the work would have +fetched considerably more money. It was purchased of the artist +himself, for 16,000 francs, by the late marquis. Another and smaller +picture, not six inches by four, also by Meissonier, was sold on the +same occasion—subject, "Van de Velde in his Atelier"—for 7,020 +francs. In the same collection were four works by Decamps, whose +pictures are in great request. One of these, an Eastern landscape, +sold for 15,500 francs; another, a small work, a peasant girl in the +forest, for 4,240 francs; and two still smaller and less important +works, "Tide Out, with Sunset," and "Gorges d'Ollioule," for 1,500 +francs each. Three small works by Eugene Delacroix, a "Tiger attacking +a Serpent," "Combat between Moors and Arabs," and "The Scotch Ballad," +sold, respectively, for 1,820 francs, 1,300 francs, and 2,300 francs. +A minute picture by Paul Delaroche, "Jesus on the Mount of Olives," +sold for 2,200 francs; Diogenes sitting on the edge of an immense jar, +holding his lantern, by Gèrôme, 1,950 francs; and "Arnauts at Prayer," +by the same, 3,900 francs. "The Beach at Trouville," by the lately +deceased painter, Troyon, 4,000 francs, and "Feeding the Poultry," by +the same, 4,850 francs. +</p> +<p> +At the sale of a collection of the works of M. Cordier, the sculptor, +who has earned considerable popularity by his variegated works, +composed of marbles, onyx and bronze, and variously tinted and +decorated, a marble statue, called "La Belle Gallinara," sold for +4,100 francs; a young Kabyle child carrying a branch loaded with +oranges, in Algerian onyx and bronze, and partly colored, 3,000 +francs; an Arab woman, a statue of the same materials as the +preceding, intended to support a lamp or candelabrum, purchased by the +Due de Morny for 6,825 francs. +</p> +<p> +There is a report that the collections of pictures and curiosities +belonging to the Comte de Chambord will shortly be dispersed by the +hammer in Paris. +</p> +<p> +The scaffolding before the north front of the cathedral of Notre Dame, +in Paris, has been removed, and the façade, with the magnificent +Gothic window, forty feet in diameter, can now be seen to great +perfection, all the rich sculptures having been admirably restored. +</p> +<p> +A Paris letter says: "The celebrated painting of the 'Assassination of +the Bishop of Liege,' by Eugene Delacroix, was recently sold at +auction at 35,000 francs. The 'Death of Ophelia,' in pencil, by the +same painter, was knocked down for 2,020 francs, which was considered +a large sum for a sketch. 'St. Louis at the Bridge of Taillebourg,' in +water-colors, fetched 3,100 francs. Some copper-plates engraved by +Eugene Delacroix himself were likewise sold." +</p> +<br> +<p> +At the sale of the collection of the Chevalier de Knyff, at Brussels, +the Virgin with the host and surrounded by angels, by Ingres, was +withdrawn at 28,500 francs. +</p> +<a name="139">{139}</a> +<p> +Among the works of art destroyed in the recent conflagration of the +ducal palace at Brunswick was the colossal bronze figure of Brunonia, +the patron goddess of the town, standing in a car of victory, drawn by +four horses. It was executed by Professor Howaldt and his sons, after +a design by Rietschel. +</p> +<p> +The colossal bronze statue of Hercules, lately exhumed at Rome, has +been safely deposited in the Vatican. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>BOOK NOTICES.</h2> +<br> +<p> +SERMONS ON OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST, AND ON HIS BLESSED MOTHER. +By his Eminence Cardinal Wiseman. 8vo., pp. 421. New York: D. & J. +Sadlier & Co. +</p> +<p> +Coming to us almost in the same moment in which we hear of Cardinal +Wiseman's death, these sermons will be read with a deep and peculiar +interest, now that the eloquent lips which uttered them are closed for +ever. Most of them were preached in Rome, some so long ago as 1827. +These were addressed to congregations composed partly of +ecclesiastics, partly of Catholic sojourners in the Eternal City, and +partly of Protestants. At least one was delivered in Ireland in 1858. +But although some of the discourses belong to the period of the +author's noviceship in the pulpit, and between some there is an +interval of more than thirty years, we are struck by no incongruity of +either thought or style. The earliest have the finish and elegance of +maturity; the latest all the vigor and enthusiasm of youth. +</p> +<p> +They are not controversial, and hardly any of them can even be called +dogmatic sermons. They are addressed more to the heart than directly +to the understanding, although reasoning and exhortation are often so +skilfully blended that it is hard to say where one begins and the +other ends. They are the outpourings, in fact, of a warm and loving +heart and a full brain. The argument is all the more effective because +the cardinal covers his frame-work of logic with the rich drapery of +his brilliant rhetoric. And yet, with all their gorgeous phraseology, +they are characterized by a simplicity of thought which brings them +down to the level of the commonest intellect. +</p> +<p> +The greater part of them were preached during the seasons of Lent and +Advent, and the subjects will therefore be found especially +appropriate to the present period. Here is a beautiful passage in +reference to our Lord's agony in the garden: +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + "There are plants in the luxurious East, my dearly beloved brethren, + which men gash and cut, that from them may distil the precious + balsams they contain; but that is ever the most sought and valued + which, issuing forth of its own accord, pure and unmixed, trickles + down like tears upon the parent tree. And so it seems to me, we may + without disparagement speak of the precious streams of our dear + Redeemer's blood. When forced from his side, in abundant flow, it + came mixed with another mysterious fluid; when shed by the cruel + inflictions of his enemies, by their nails, their thorns, and + scourges, there is a painful association with the brutal instruments + that drew it, as though in some way their defilement could attaint + it. But here we have the first yield of that saving and life-giving + heart, gushing forth spontaneously, pure and untouched by the + unclean hand of man, dropping as dew upon the ground. It is the + first juice of the precious vine; before the wine-press hath bruised + its grapes, richer and sweeter to the loving and sympathizing soul, + than what is afterward pressed out. It is every drop of it ours; and + alas, how painfully so! For here no lash, no impious palm, no + pricking thorn hath called it forth; but our sins, yes, our sins, + the executioners not of the flesh, but of the heart of Jesus, have + driven it all out, thence to water that garden of sorrows! Oh, is it + not dear to us; is it not gathered up by our affections, with far + more reverence and love than by virgins of old was the blood of + martyrs, to be placed for ever in the very sanctuary, yea, within + the very altar of our hearts?" +</p> +<p> +From the discourse on the "Triumphs of the Cross," we select the +closing paragraph: +</p> +<a name="140">{140}</a> +<p class="footnote"> + "O blessed Jesus, may the image of these sacred wounds, as expressed + by the cross, never depart from my thoughts. As it is a badge and + privilege of the exalted office, to which, most unworthy, I have + been raised, to wear ever upon my breast the figure of that cross, + and in it, as in a holy shrine, a fragment of that blessed tree + whereon thou didst hang on Golgotha, so much more let the lively + image of thee crucified dwell within my bosom, and be the source + from which shall proceed every thought, and word, and action of my + ministry! Let me preach thee, and thee crucified, not the plausible + doctrines of worldly virtue and human philosophy. In prayer and + meditation let me ever have before me thy likeness, as thou + stretchest forth thine arms to invite us to seek mercy and to draw + us into thine embrace. Let my Thabor be on Calvary; there it is best + for me to dwell. There thou hast prepared three tabernacles; one for + such as, like Magdalen, have offended much, but love to weep at thy + blessed feet; one for those who, like John, have wavered in + steadfastness for a moment, but long again to rest their head upon + thy bosom; and one whereinto only she may enter whose love burns + without a reproach, whose heart, always one with thine, finds its + home in the centre of thine, fibre intertwined with fibre, till both + are melted into one in that furnace of sympathetic love. With these + favorites of the cross, let me ever, blessed Saviour, remain in + meditation and prayer, and loving affection for thy holy rood. I + will venerate its very substance, whenever presented to me, with + deep and solemn reverence. I will honor its image, wherever offered + to me, with lowly and respectful homage. But still more I will + hallow and love its spirit and inward form, impressed on the heart, + and shown forth in the holiness of life. And oh! divine Redeemer, + from thy cross, thy true mercy-seat, look down in compassion upon + this thy people. Pour forth thence abundantly the streams of + blessing, which flow from thy sacred wounds. Accomplish within them, + during this week of forgiveness, the work which holy men have so + well begun, [Footnote 40] that all may worthily partake of thy + Paschal feast. Plant thy cross in every heart; may each one embrace + it in life, may it embrace him in death; and may it be a beacon of + salvation to his departing soul, a crown of glory to his immortal + spirit! Amen." +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 40: Alluding to the mission just closed by the Fathers of + the Institute of Charity.] +</p> +<p> +What follows is from the sermon on the "Veneration of the Blessed +Virgin:" +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + "If, then, any one shall accuse me of wasting upon the mother of my + Saviour feelings and affections which he hath jealously reserved for + himself. I will appeal from the charge to his judgment, and lay the + cause before him, at any stage of his blessed life. I will go unto + him at the crib of Bethlehem, and acknowledge that, while, with the + kings of the East, I have presented to him all my gold and + frankincense and myrrh, I have ventured, with the shepherds, to + present an humbler oblation of respect to her who was enduring the + winter's frost in an unsheltered stable, entirely for his sake. Or I + will meet him, as the holy fugitives repose on their desert-path to + Egypt, and confess that, knowing from the example of Agar, how a + mother cast forth from her house into the wilderness, for her + infant's sake, only loves it the more, and needs an angel to comfort + her in her anguish (Gen. xxi. 17), I have not restrained my eyes + from her whose fatigues and pain were a hundred-fold increased by + his, when I have sympathized with him in this his early flight, + endured for my sins. Or I will approach a more awful tribunal, and + step to the foot of his cross, and own to him, that while I have + adored his wounds, and stirred up in my breast my deepest feelings + of grief and commiseration for what I have made him suffer, my + thoughts could not refrain from sometimes glancing toward her whom I + saw resignedly standing at his feet, and sharing his sorrows; and + that, knowing how much Respha endured while sitting opposite to her + children justly crucified by command of God (2 Kings xxi. 10), I had + felt far greater compassion for her, and had not withheld the + emotions, which nature itself dictated, of love, and veneration, and + devout affection toward her. And to the judgment of such a son I + will gladly bow, and his meek mouth shall speak my sentence, and I + will not fear it. For I have already heard it from the cross, + addressed to me, to you, to all, as he said: 'Woman, behold thy + son;' and again: 'Behold thy mother.' (John xix. 26, 27.)" +</p> +<p> +An appendix to the volume contains six beautiful pastorals, on +devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, in connection with education. +</p> +<br> +<p> +SPIRITUAL PROGRESS. By J. W. Cummings, D.D., LL.D., of St. Stephen's +Church, New York City. 12mo., pp. 330. New York: P. O'Shea. +</p> +<p> +We cannot better state the purpose of this excellent little book than +in the words of the author's preface: "<i>Spiritual Progress</i> is a +familiar exposition of Catholic morality, which has for its object to +tell people of common intelligence what they are expected to do in +<a name="141">{141}</a> order to be good Christians, and how they shall do it, and the +results that will follow." It is written not for those strong, heroic +souls, whose faith is firm, whose devotion is ardent, and who crave +strong spiritual food; but for that numerous class of weak Christians, +recent converts, honest inquirers, and fervent but uninstructed +Catholics, who are not yet prepared to accept the more difficult +counsels of perfection; who are ready perhaps to do what God says they +must do; but need a little training before they can be brought to do +any more. To put an ascetic work into the hands of such persons would +often be like giving beef to a young baby: it would hurt, not help +them. Dr. Cummings's book, in fact, is a sort of spiritual primer for +the use of those who are just beginning their spiritual education. It +is simple, straightforward, and practical. There is a charm in the +style—so clear, so terse, often almost epigrammatic, and sometimes +rising to the poetical—which carries the reader along in spite of +himself. The tone is not conversational; yet when you read, it seems +as if you were not so much reading as listening. And that argues great +literary merit. +</p> +<p> +Here is an extract from the chapter on "Faults of Conversation:" +</p> +<p class="cite"> + "Gossip is the bane of conversation, for it is the name + under which injustice makes her entrance into society. + There is an element in the breast of the most civilized + communities, even in times of great refinement, that + explains how man may, under certain circumstances, become + a cannibal. It is exhibited in the turns our humor takes + in conversation. We are not ill-natured, nor disposed to + lay a straw in the way of any one who has not injured us, + and yet, when spurred on by the stimulus of talking and + being talked to, we can bring ourselves to mimic, revile, + and misrepresent others, traduce and destroy their good + name, reveal their secrets, and proclaim their faults; and + all this merely to follow the lead of others, or for the + sake of appearing facetious and amusing, or for the + purpose of building up ourselves by running down those + whom in our hearts we know and believe to be better than + we are.…… But as the gossip attacks the absent because + the absent cannot defend himself or herself, shall not we, + dear readers, form a society to assist the weak and the + persecuted? Shall we not enter into a compact to defend + those who cannot defend themselves? Let us answer as a + love of fair play suggests. If we are at all influenced by + regard for Christian charity, let us remember that it + takes two to carry on a conversation against our neighbor, + and that if our visitor is guilty of being a gossip, a + false witness, or a detractor, we are also guilty by + consenting to officiate as listeners." +</p> +<p> +In a chapter on the "Schooling of the +Imagination," Dr. Cummings shows how +the imaginative faculty may be made to +serve the cause of religion, especially in +the practice of meditation, and how +dangerous it becomes when it is not held +in check: +</p> +<p class="cite"> + "We hear songs and the flutters of many wings at + Bethlehem, and see the light streaming from heaven upon + the face of the new-born Saviour. We look out over the + blue waters of the Lake of Genesareth, and see the quaint + little bark of Peter as it lay near the shore when Jesus + preached to the people from its side, or as it flew before + the wind when the sea waxed wroth, and a great storm + arose, he meanwhile sleeping and they fearing they would + perish. With the aid of this wonderful faculty we see him + before us in the hour of his triumph, surrounded by the + multitudes singing, 'Hosanna to the son of David,' and in + that sad day of his final sorrow, when the same voices + swelled the fearful cry, 'Crucify him, crucify him.'" +</p> +<p> +A GENERAL HISTORY OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH, FROM THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE +CHRISTIAN ERA UNTIL THE PRESENT TIME. By M. L'Abbé J. E. Darras. First +American from the last French edition. With an Introduction and Notes, +by the Most Rev. M. J. Spalding, D.D., Archbishop of Baltimore. Parts +1, 2, and 3. 8vo. New York: P. O'Shea. +</p> +<p> +This valuable work, which Mr. O'Shea, with a laudable spirit of +enterprise, is giving us by instalments, is intended for just that +class of readers who stand most in need of a readable and pretty full +Church history. When completed it will fill four portly volumes, +imperial octavo; yet it is a work adapted more especially to family +reading than to the use of the scholar in his closet. The Abbé Darras +has judiciously refrained from obstructing the flow of his narrative +by minute references and quotations, nor has he suffered his pen to +run away into long discussions of controverted questions. What he says +of the chronology which he has followed, he might have said, if we +have read him <a name="142">{142}</a> aright, of his whole work: "We have adopted a +system already completed, not that it may perhaps be the most exact in +all its details, but because it is the one most generally followed." +This seems to be the principle which he has kept before his eyes +throughout; and considering the purpose for which he wrote, we think +it a good one. With all the simplicity and modesty of his style, +however, he shows a thorough knowledge of the intricacies of his +subject, and an acquaintance with what the best scholars have written +before him. His history, therefore, fills a void which has long been +aching. +</p> +<p> +The translation, made by a lady well known and respected by the +Catholics of the United States, reads smoothly, and we doubt not is +accurate. It has been revised by competent theologians, and has the +special sanction of the Archbishop of Baltimore, beside the +approbation of the Archbishops of New York and Cincinnati. The work in +the original French received the warmest encomiums from the European +clergy, and the author was honored, at the conclusion of his labors, +by a kind letter from the Pope. +</p> +<p> +The mechanical execution of the book is beautiful. The paper is good, +and the type large and clear. We thank Mr. O'Shea for giving us so +important a work in such a rich and appropriate dress. +</p> +<br> +<p> +THE PROGRESS OF THE AGE, AND THE DANGER OF THE AGE. Two lectures +delivered before the St. Xavier Conference of the St. Vincent de Paul +Brotherhood in the Hall of St. Louis University. By the Rev. Louis +Heylen, S. J. 12mo., pp. 107. Cincinnati: John P. Walsh. +</p> +<p> +These two lectures formed parts of a course delivered during the +winter of 1862-63, by some of the professors of the St. Louis +University. They are admirable compositions, redolent of good sense, +learning, and ripe thought, and deeply interesting. The style has a +true oratorical ring. In the first lecture Father Heylen, after +adverting to the fact that every age since the days of Adam has been +marked by some special characteristic, examines the claim set forth by +our own century to be emphatically the age of progress. In part he +admits and in part he denies it. In material progress, and in the +natural sciences, especially as applied to the purposes of industry +and commerce, it stands at the head of ages. But moral progress is not +one of its characteristics. "Here I feel," says he, "that I am +entering upon a difficult question. Has there been, in the last fifty +years, any marked increase of crime? Is our age, all things +considered, really worse than preceding ages? This question I shall +not undertake to decide; but there are some forms of crime which +appear to me decidedly peculiar to our age." A brief review of these +sins of the day leads naturally to the subject of the second lecture. +Father Heylen sees our greatest danger in that practical materialism +which places material interests and materialistic passions above the +interests of the soul and the claims of virtue. He considers +successively its extent, its effects, and the means to avert it—the +last being, of course, the ennobling and spiritualizing influence of +Catholicism. +</p> +<p> +We advise those who wish to see how a scholar and an orator can throw +a fresh charm into a stale subject, to read Father Heylen's review of +the startling discoveries of modern science in the first lecture, and +his brilliant description in the second of the ruins with which +materialism has spread the pages of history and the new life which +Catholicism has infused into effete civilizations. +</p> +<p> +Prefixed to the little volume before us is a short biographical sketch +of Father Heylen, who died in 1863. +</p> +<br> +<p> +UNDINE, OR THE WATER-SPIRIT. Also SINTRAM AND HIS COMPANIONS. +From the German of Friedrich de la Motte Fouqué. I vol. 12mo., pp. +238. New York: James Miller. +</p> +<br> +<p> +THIODOLF, THE ICELANDER. A Romance. From the German of the Baron de la +Motte Fouqué. 12mo., pp. 308. New York: James Miller. +</p> +<p> +For a man of refined and cultivated taste we know of hardly any more +delightful literary recreation than to turn from the novels of our own +day to one of the exquisite romances of La Motte Fouqué. There is a +nobleness of sentiment in his wild and beautiful fancies which seems +to lift us out of this world into a higher sphere. All his writings +are pervaded by an ideal Christian chivalry, <a name="143">{143}</a> spiritualizing and +refining the supernatural machinery which he is so fond of borrowing +from the old Norse legends. No other author has ever treated the +Northern mythology so well; because no other has attempted to give us +its beauties without its grossness. The gods and heroes of the +Norsemen have been very much in fashion of late years; but take almost +any of the Scandinavian tales recently translated—tales which, if +they have any moral, seem to inculcate the morality of lying and +cheating, and the virtue of strong muscles and how immeasurably finer +and more beautiful by the side of them appear the fairy legends which +Fouqué interweaves with his romances, mingling old superstitions with +Christian faith and virtues, in so delicate a manner that we see no +incongruity in the association. This mutual adaptation, if we may call +it so, he effects partly by transporting us back to those early times +when the faith was as yet only half-rooted in the Northern soil, and +when even many Christian converts clung almost unconsciously to some +of their old pagan beliefs; partly by the genuine religious spirit +which inspires every page of his books, no matter what their subject; +and partly by the allegorical significance which his romances +generally convey. So from tales of water-sprites and evil spirits, +devils, dwarfs, and all manner of supernatural appearances, we rise +with the feeling that we have been reading a lesson of piety, truth, +integrity, and honor. Carlyle calls the chivalry of Fouqué more +extravagant than that which we supposed Cervantes had abolished; but +we are far from agreeing in such a judgment. A chivalry which rests +upon "wise and pious thoughts, treasured in a pure heart," deserves +something better to be said of it. +</p> +<p> +The three tales whose titles are given above are specimens of three +somewhat different styles in which Fouqué treats his darling subject +of Christian knighthood. The story of "Undine" has always been a pet +in every language of Europe. Sir Walter Scott called it "ravishing;" +Coleridge expressed unbounded admiration of it; the author himself +termed it his darling child. For the tale of "Sintram" we have a +particular affection. As a work of art, it is not to be compared with +the former: it has but little of that tender aerial fancy which makes +the story of the <a name="144">{144}</a> water-sprite so inexpressibly graceful; but +there is a sombre beauty in it which is not less captivating. It is a +story of temptation and trial, of battle with self and triumph over +sin. Its allegorical meaning is more distinct than that of Undine; it +speaks more unmistakably of faith and heroic virtue. "Thiodolf, the +Icelander," is a picture of Norse and Byzantine manners in the tenth +century, and presents an interesting contrast between the rough +manliness of the former and the luxury of the court of Constantinople. +To the merits of wealth of imagination, skilful delineation of +character, and dramatic power of narration, it is said to add +historical accuracy. +</p> +<br> +<p> +OUR FARM OF FOUR ACRES, AND THE MONEY WE MADE BY IT. 12mo., pp. 128. +New York: James Miller. +</p> +<p> +It is no slight proof of the merit of this little book that it has +gone through at least twelve editions in England, and had so many +imitators that it may almost be called the founder of a school of +literature. Its popularity is still undiminished, and promises long to +continue so. Hardly any one can fail of being interested in this +simple narrative of the blunders, mishaps, and final triumphs of two +city-bred sisters, in their effort to keep a little farm and make it +pay; but to those who, either for health's sake or economy, are about +entering on a similar enterprise, we cannot too strongly recommend it. +It is so practical that we cannot doubt it is all true—indeed its +directness and air of truth and good sense are the secrets of its +remarkable success. We commend it to our readers as an interesting +exemplification of a truth which ought to be more widely known than it +is—that with proper management a small family on a small place in the +country can raise all their own vegetables, not only to their great +comfort, but with considerable pecuniary profit. Men who spend +half-a-year's income in the rent of a city house would do well to take +to heart the lessons of this little book. +</p> +<br> +<p> +THE IRVINGTON STORIES. By M. E. Dodge. Illustrated by F. O. C. Darley. +16mo., pp. 256. New York: James O'Kane. +</p> +<p> +This is a collection of tales for young people, manufactured with +considerable <a name="145">{145}</a> taste and neatness. Some of the stories bear a good +moral, distinctly brought out. +</p> +<br> +<p> +REPLY TO THE CHRISTIAN EXAMINER ON CATHOLICITY AND NATURALISM. +8vo., pp. 24. Boston: Patrick Donahoe. +</p> +<p> +The <i>Christian Examiner</i> for January, 1865, contained an article on +"The Order of St. Paul the Apostle, and the New Catholic Church," in +which the writer, after describing a visit to the Paulist +establishment in Fifty-ninth street, and representing Father Hecker +and his companions as being engaged in the attempt to found a new +Catholic Church, passed on to the consideration of the question what +form of religion is best adapted to the wants of the American people. +It was a remarkable article—remarkable not only for its graceful +diction, but for its curious admissions of the failure of +Protestantism as a religious system. "The process of disintegration," +says the <i>Examiner</i>, "is going forward with immense rapidity +throughout Protestant Christendom. Organizations are splitting +asunder, institutions are falling into decay, customs are becoming +uncustomary, usages are perishing from neglect, sacraments are +deserted by the multitude, creeds are decomposing under the action of +liberal studies and independent thought." But from these falling ruins +mankind will seek refuge not in the bosom of the Catholic Church, says +the Christian Examiner, but in Naturalism. The object of the pamphlet +before us is to show, after correcting certain misstatements +concerning the congregation of Paulists, that Naturalism is utterly +unable to satisfy those longings of the heart which, as the <i>Examiner</i> +confesses, no Protestant sect can appease. +</p> +<br> +<p> +PASTORAL LETTER OF THE MOST REV. MARTIN JOHN SPALDING, D. D., +ARCHBISHOP OF BALTIMORE, ETC., TOGETHER WITH THE LATE ENCYCLICAL OF +THE HOLY FATHER, AND THE SYLLABUS OF ERRORS CONDEMNED. 8vo., pp. 43. +Baltimore: Kelly & Piet. +</p> +<p> +In promulgating the jubilee lately proclaimed by the sovereign +pontiff, the Most Rev. Archbishop Spalding takes occasion to make a +few timely remarks on the Encyclical, the character of Pius IX., the +temporal power of the Popes, and the errors recently condemned. He +explains the true purport of the much-abused Encyclical, shows against +whom it is directed—namely, the European radicals and infidels—and +proves that it never was the intention of the Pope, as has been +alleged, to assail the institutions of this country. In view of the +absurd mistranslations of the Encyclical which have been published by +the Protestant press, Catholics will be glad to have the correct +English version of that important document, which is given by way of +appendix to the pastoral. +</p> +<br> +<p> +We have received the <i>First Supplement to the Catalogue of the Library +of the Young Men's Association of the City of Milwaukee</i>, with the +annual report of the Board of Directors for 1863. +</p> +<hr> +<br> + +<h1>THE CATHOLIC WORLD. +<br><br> +VOL. I., NO. 2. MAY, 1865.</h1> +<br> + + +<h2>From the Dublin Review. +<br><br> +HEDWIGE, QUEEN OF POLAND.</h2> +<br> +<p> +Hedwige was the youngest daughter of Lewis, nephew and successor to +Casimir the Great, who, on account of the preference he evinced for +his Hungarian subjects, drew upon himself the continued ill-will of +the nation he was called upon to govern. Finding he was unable to cope +with the numerous factions everywhere ready to oppose him, he, not +without many humiliating concessions to the nobles of Poland, induced +them to elect as his successor his daughter Maria, wife of Sigismund, +Marquis of Brandenburg (afterward emperor), and having appointed the +Duke of Oppelen regent of the kingdom, retired to his native Hungary, +unwilling to relinquish the shadow of the sceptre which continually +evaded his grasp. +</p> +<p> +On his death, which happened in 1382, Poland became the theatre of +intestine disorders fomented by the turbulent nobles, who, +notwithstanding the allegiance they had sworn to the Princess Maria, +refused to allow her even to enter the kingdom. Sigismund was not, +however, inclined thus easily to forego his wife's claims; and as the +Lord of Mazovia at the same time aspired to the vacant throne, many of +the provinces became so desolated by civil war that the leaders of the +adverse factions threw down their arms, and simultaneously agreed to +offer the crown to the Princess Hedwige, then residing in Hungary +under the care of her mother Elizabeth. By no means approving of a +plan which thus unceremoniously excluded her eldest daughter from the +throne, the queen dowager endeavored to oppose injustice by policy. +Hedwige was at the time only fourteen years of age, and the deputies +were informed that, as the princess was too young to undertake the +heavy responsibilities of sovereignty, her brother-in-law Sigismund +must act in her stead until such time as she herself should be +considered capable of assuming the reins of government. This stratagem +did not succeed; the duke was not allowed to cross the frontiers of +Poland, and Elizabeth found herself compelled to part with her +daughter, if she would not see the crown placed on the brow of +whomever the diet might elect. +</p> +<p> +Now commenced the trials of the young Hedwige, who was thus early +called upon to exercise those virtues of heroic fortitude, patient +endurance, and self-denial which rendered her life a sort of continual +martyrdom, a sacrifice daily offered up at the shrines of religion and +patriotism. At the early age of four years she had been affianced to +William, Duke of Austria, <a name="146">{146}</a> who, in accordance with the custom of +the times, had been educated in Hungary; his affection for his +betrothed growing with his growth, and increasing with his years. +Ambition had no charms for Hedwige; her fervent piety, shrinking +modesty, and feminine timidity sought to conceal, not only her +extraordinary beauty, but those rare mental endowments of which she +was possessed. Bitter were the tears shed by this gentle girl, when +her mother, alarmed at the menaces of the Polish nobles, informed her +she must immediately depart for Cracow, under the protection of +Cardinal Demetrius, Bishop of Strigonia, who was pledged to deliver +her into the hands of those whom she was disposed to regard rather as +her masters than as her subjects. There had been one stipulation made, +which, had she been aware of its existence, would have added a sharper +pang to the already poignant anguish of Hedwige: the Poles required +that their young sovereign should marry only with the consent of the +diet, and that her husband should not only reside constantly in +Poland, but pledge himself never to attempt to render that country +dependent on any other power. Although aware of the difficulties thus +thrown in the way of her union with Duke William, her mother had +subscribed to these conditions; and Hedwige, having been joyfully +received by the prelates and nobles of her adopted country, was +solemnly crowned in the cathedral at Cracow, October 15, 1385, being +the festival of her patron, St. Hedwige. Her youth, loveliness, grace, +and intellectual endowments won from the fierce chieftains an +enthusiastic affection which had been denied to the too yielding +Lewis; their national pride was flattered, their loyalty awakened, by +the innocent fascinations of their young sovereign, and they almost +sought to defer the time which, in her husband, would necessarily give +them a ruler of sterner mould. Nor was Hedwige undeserving of the +exalted station she had been compelled to fill: a worthy descendant of +the sainted Lewis, her every word and action waa marked by a gravity +and maturity which bore witness to the supernatural motives and +heavenly wisdom by which it was inspired; and yet, in the silence of +her chamber, many were the tears she shed over the memory of ties +severed, she feared, for ever. Amongst the earliest candidates for her +hand was Ziemovit, Duke of Mazovia, already mentioned as one of the +competitors for the crown after the death of her father; but the +Poles, still smarting from the effects of his unbridled ambition, +dismissed his messengers with a refusal couched in terms of +undisguised contempt. The question of her marriage once agitated, the +mind of Hedwige naturally turned to him on whom her heart was +unalterably fixed, and whom from her childhood she had been taught to +consider as her future husband; but an alliance with the house of +Austria formed no part of Polish policy, and neither the wishes nor +the entreaties of their queen could induce the diet to entertain the +idea for a moment; in short, their whole energy was employed in +bringing about a union which, however disagreeable to the young +sovereign, was likely to be in every way advantageous to the country +and favorable to the interests of religion. +</p> +<p> +Jagello, the pagan Duke of Lithuania, was from his proximity and the +extent of his possessions (comprising Samogitia and a large portion of +Russia [Footnote 41]) a formidable enemy to Poland. Fame was not slow +in wafting to his ears rumors of the beauty and accomplishments of +Hedwige, which being more than corroborated by ambassadors employed to +ascertain the truth, the impetuous Jagello determined to secure the +prize, even at the cost of national independence. The idolatry of the +Lithuanians and the early betrothal of Hedwige to Duke William were +the chief obstacles with which he had to contend; but, after a brief +<a name="147">{147}</a> deliberation, an embassy was despatched, headed by Skirgello, +brother to the grand-duke, and bearing the most costly presents; +Jagello himself being with difficulty dissuaded from accompanying them +in person. The envoys were admitted into the presence of the council, +at which the queen herself presided, and the prince proceeded to lay +before the astonished nobles the offers of the barbarian suitor, +offers too tempting to be weighed in the balance against such a trifle +as a girl's happiness, or the violation of what these overbearing +politicians were pleased to term a mere childish engagement, +contracted before the parties were able to judge for themselves. After +a long harangue, in which Skirgello represented how vainly the most +illustrious potentates and the most powerful rulers had hitherto +endeavored to effect the conversion of Lithuania, he offered as "a +tribute to the charms of the queen" that Jagello and his brothers, +together with the princes, lords, and people of Lithuania and +Samogitia, should at once embrace the Catholic faith; that all the +Christian captives should be restored unransomed; and the <i>whole of +their extensive dominions be incorporated with Poland</i>; the grand-duke +also pledging himself to reconquer for that country Pomerania, +Silesia, and whatever other territories had been torn from Poland by +neighboring states; and, finally, promising to make good to the Poles +the sum of two hundred thousand florins, which had been sent to +William of Austria as the dowry forfeited by the non-fulfilment of the +engagement entered into by their late king Lewis. A murmur of applause +at this unprecedented generosity ran through the assembly; the nobles +hailed the prospect of so unlooked-for an augmentation of national +power and security; and the bishops could not but rejoice at the +prospect of rescuing so many souls from the darkness of heathenism, +and securing at one and the same time the propagation of the Catholic +faith and the peace of Poland. But the queen herself shared not these +feelings of satisfaction: no sooner had Skirgello ceased than she +started from her seat, cast a hasty glance round the assembly, and, as +if reading her fate in the countenances of the nobles, buried her face +in her hands and burst into a flood of tears. All attempts to soothe +and pacify her were in vain: in a strain of passionate eloquence, +which was not without its effect, she pleaded her affection for Duke +William, the sacred nature of the engagement by which she was pledged +to become his wife, pointed to the ring on her finger, and reminded an +aged prelate who had accompanied her from Hungary that he had himself +witnessed their being laid in the same cradle at the ceremony of their +betrothal. It was impossible to behold unmoved the anguish of so +gentle a creature; not a few of the younger chieftains espoused the +cause of their sovereign; and, at the urgent solicitation of Hedwige, +it was finally determined that the Lithuanian ambassadors, accompanied +by three Polish nobles, should repair to Buda for the purpose of +consulting her mother, the Queen of Hungary. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 41: The territories of many of the Russian or Ruthenian + dukes which were conquered by the Lithuanian pagans.] +</p> +<p> +But Elizabeth, though inaccessible to the temptations of worldly +ambition, was too pious, too self-denying, to allow maternal affection +to preponderate over the interests of religion. Aware that the +betrothal of her daughter to the Duke of Austria had never been +renewed from the time of their infancy, she, without a moment's +hesitation, replied that, for her own part, she desired nothing, but +that the queen ought to sacrifice every human feeling for the glory of +Christianity and the welfare of Poland. To Hedwige herself she wrote +affectionately, though firmly, bidding her lay every natural +inclination at the foot of the cross, and desiring her to praise that +God who had chosen so unworthy an instrument as the means by which the +pure splendor of Catholicity should penetrate the darkness of +Lithuania and the other pagan nations. Elizabeth was aware <a name="148">{148}</a> of +the real power of religion over the mind of her child, and doubted not +but that, after the first paroxysm of grief had subsided, she should +be able to overcome by its means the violence of her daughter's +repugnance to the proposed measure. In order to give a color of +impartiality to their proceedings, a diet was convoked at Cracow, +immediately on the return of the embassy, to deliberate on the +relative claims of Jagello, William of Austria, and the Dukes of +Mazovia and Oppelen, all of whom aspired to the hand of Hedwige and +the crown of Poland. The discussion was long and stormy, for amongst +those nobles more immediately around the queen's person there were +many, including a large body of ecclesiastics, who, although convinced +that no lawful impediment existed to the marriage, yet shrank from the +cruelty of uniting the gentle princess to a barbarian; and these +failed not to insist upon the insult which would be implied by such a +choice to the native Catholic princes. The majority, however, were of +a different opinion, and at the close of the diet it was decided that +an ambassador should be despatched to Jagello, inviting him to Cracow +for the purpose of continuing the negotiations in his own person. But +William of Austria was too secure in the justice of his cause and the +affection of his betrothed to resign his pretensions without an +effort; and his ardor being by no means diminished by a letter which +he received from the queen herself, imploring him to hasten to her +assistance, he placed himself at the head of a numerous retinue, and, +with a treasure by which he hoped to purchase the good-will of the +adverse faction, appeared so suddenly at Cracow as to deprive his +opponents of their self-possession. The determination of Hedwige to +unite herself to the object of her early and deep affection was loudly +expressed, and, as there were many powerful leaders—among others, +Gniewosz, Vice-chamberlain of Cracow—who espoused her cause, and +rallied round Duke William, the Polish nobles, not daring openly to +oppose their sovereign, were on the point of abandoning the cause of +Jagello, when Dobeslas, Castellain of Cracow, one of the staunchest +supporters of the Lithuanian alliance, resolved at any risk to prevent +the meeting of the lovers, and actually went so far as to refuse the +young prince admission into the castle, where the queen at the time +was residing, not only drawing his sword, but dragging the duke with +him over the drawbridge, which he commanded to be immediately lowered. +William, thus repulsed, fixed his quarters at the Franciscan +monastery; and Hedwige, fired by the insult, rode forth accompanied by +a chosen body of knights and her female attendants, determined by the +completion of her marriage to place an insuperable bar between her and +Jagello. +</p> +<p> +In the refectory of the monastery, the queen and the prince at length +met; and, after several hours spent in considering how best to avert +the separation with which they were threatened, it was arranged that +William should introduce himself privately into the castle of Cracow, +where they were to be united by the queen's confessor. Some time +elapsed before this plan could be carried into execution; for although +even Dobeslas hesitated to confine his sovereign within her own +palace, the castle gates were kept shut against the entrance of the +Duke of Austria. Exasperated at this continued opposition, and her +affection augmented by the presence of its object, from whom the +arrival, daily expected, of Jagello would divide her for ever, Hedwige +determined to admit the prince disguised as one of her household, and +a day was accordingly fixed for the execution of this romantic +project. By some means or other the whole plan came to the knowledge +of the vigilant castellain; the adventurous prince was seized in a +passage leading to the royal apartments, loaded with insult, and +driven from the palace, within the walls of which the queen now found +herself a prisoner. <a name="149">{149}</a> It was in vain she wept, and implored to be +allowed to see her betrothed once more, if only to bid him farewell; +her letters were intercepted, her attendants became spies on her +movements, and, on the young prince presenting himself before the +gates, his life was threatened by the barons who remained within the +fortress. This was too much; alarmed for her lover's safety, indignant +at the restraint to which she was subjected, the passion of the girl +triumphed over the dignity of the sovereign. Quitting her apartment, +she hurried to the great gate, which, as she apprehended, was secured +in such a manner as to baffle all her efforts; trembling with fear, +and eager only to effect her escape, she called for a hatchet, and, +raising it with both hands, repeatedly struck the locks and bolts that +prevented her egress. The childish simplicity of the attempt, the +agony depicted in the beautiful and innocent countenance of their +mistress, so touched the hearts of the rude soldiery, that, but for +their dread of the nobles, Hedwige would through their means have +effected her purpose. As it was, they offered no opposition, but stood +in mournful and respectful silence; when the venerable Demetrius, +grand-treasurer of the kingdom, approached, and falling on his knees, +implored her to be calm, and to sacrifice her own happiness, if not to +the wishes of her subjects and the welfare of her country, at least to +the interests of religion. At the sight of that aged man, whose thin +white hairs and sorrowful countenance inspired both reverence and +affection, the queen paused, and, giving him her hand, burst into an +agony of tears; then, hurrying to her oratory, she threw herself on +the ground before an image of the Blessed Virgin, where, after a sharp +interior conflict, she succeeded in resigning herself to what she now +believed to be the will of God—embracing for his sake the heavy cross +which she was to bear for the remainder of her life. +</p> +<p> +Meanwhile Duke William, to escape the vengeance of the wrathful +barons, was compelled to quit Poland, leaving his now useless wealth +in the charge of the vice-chamberlain, who still apparently continued +his friend. Not long after his departure, Jagello, at the head of a +numerous army, and attended by his two brothers, crossed the +frontiers, determined, as it seemed, to prosecute his suit. At the +first rumor of his approach, the most powerful and influential among +the nobles repaired to Cracow, where prayers, remonstrances, and even +menaces were employed to induce the queen to accept the hand of the +barbarian prince. But to all their eloquence Hedwige turned a deaf +ear: in vain did agents, despatched for the purpose, represent the +duke as handsome in person, princely and dignified in manner; her +conscience was troubled, duty had enlisted on the same side as +feeling, and the contest again commenced. Setting inclination aside, +how dared she break the solemn compact she had made with the Duke of +Austria? She persisted in regarding her proposed marriage with Jagello +as nothing short of an act of criminal infidelity; and, independently +of the affliction of her heart, her soul became a prey to the most +violent remorse. To obtain the consent of Duke William to their +separation was of course out of the question; and before the puzzled +council could arrive at any decision, Jagello entered Cracow, more in +the style of a conqueror than a suitor, and repaired at once to the +castle, where he found the queen surrounded by a court surpassing in +beauty and magnificence all that his imagination had pictured. Pale as +she was from the intensity of her sufferings, he was dazzled, almost +bewildered, by the childlike innocence and winning loveliness of +Hedwige; and his admiration was expressed the following day by the +revenues of a province being laid at her feet in the shape of jewels +and robes of the most costly description. But the queen was more +obdurate than ever. With her knowledge and consent Duke William had +returned to Cracow, though compelled <a name="150">{150}</a> to resort to a variety of +disguises to escape the fury of the barons, now determined to put an +end to his pretensions and his existence together; and it is said +that, in order to avoid his indefatigable enemy, Dobeslas, he was once +compelled to seek refuge in a large chimney. Forced eventually to quit +the capital without seeing Hedwige, he still loitered in the environs; +nor did he return to Austria until her marriage with Jagello +terminated those hopes which he had cherished from his earliest +infancy. In order to quiet the queen's religious scruples, a letter is +said to have arrived from Rome, in which, after pronouncing that the +early betrothal involved no impediment to the marriage, the Holy +Father placed before her the merits of the offering she was called +upon to make, reminding her of the torments so cheerfully suffered by +the early martyrs for the honor of God, and calling upon her to +imitate their example. This statement, however, is not sufficiently +authenticated. +</p> +<p> +After the severest interior trials, days spent in tears, fasting, and +the most earnest petitions to the throne of Divine grace, the queen +received strength to consummate the sacrifice demanded from her. +Naturally ardent and impulsive, and at an age when every sentiment is +freshest and most keen, she was called upon to extirpate from her +heart an affection not only deep but legitimate, to inflict a wound on +the object of her tenderest love, and, finally, to transfer her +devotion to one whom she had hitherto regarded with feelings of +unqualified aversion. The path of highest, because self-sacrificing +duty, once clear before her, she determined to act with generosity +toward a God from whom she had received so much: her beauty, talents, +the virtues with which she was adorned, were so many precious gifts to +be placed at the disposal of him by whom they had been bestowed. +Covering herself with a thick black veil, she proceeded on foot to the +cathedral of Cracow, and, repairing to one of the side chapels, threw +herself on her knees, where for three hours, with clasped hands and +streaming eyes, she wrestled with the violent feeling that struggled +in her bosom. At length she rose with a detached heart, having laid at +the foot of the cross her affections, her will, her hopes of earthly +happiness; offering herself, and all that belonged to her, as a +perpetual holocaust to her crucified Redeemer, and esteeming herself +happy so that by this sacrifice she might purchase the salvation of +those precious souls for whom he had shed his blood. Before leaving +the chapel she cast her veil over the crucifix, hoping under that pall +to bury all of human infirmity that might still linger round her +heart, and then hastened to establish a foundation for the perpetual +renewal of this type of her "soul's sorrow." This foundation yet +exists: within the same chapel the crucifix still stands, covered by +its sable drapery, being commonly known as <i>the Crucifix of Hedwige</i>. +</p> +<p> +The queen's consent to the Lithuanian alliance endeared her still more +to the hearts of her subjects, who regarded her as a martyr to the +peace of Poland. On the 14th of February, 1386, her marriage was +celebrated with becoming solemnity, Jagello having previously received +the sacrament of baptism; shortly afterward he was crowned, in the +presence of Hedwige, under his Christian name of Wladislas, which he +had taken in deference to the wishes of the Poles. The unassuming +piety, gentle disposition, and great learning of the young queen +commanded at once the respect and admiration of her husband. So great, +indeed, was his opinion of her prudence, that, being obliged to march +into Upper Poland to crush the rebellion of the Palatine of Posnia, he +took her with him in the capacity of mediatrix between himself and the +disaffected leaders who had for months desolated that province. This +mission of mercy was most acceptable to Hedwige; after the example of +the sainted <a name="151">{151}</a> Elizabeth of Hungary, her generosity toward the +widows, orphans, and those who had lost their substance in this +devastating war, was boundless; whilst ministering to their wants, she +failed not, at the same time, to sympathize with their distress; and, +like an angel of peace, she would stand between her husband and the +objects of his indignation. On one occasion, to supply the necessities +of the court, so heavy a contribution had been laid upon the peasants +that their cattle did not escape; watching their opportunity, they, +with their wives and children, threw themselves in the queen's path, +filling the air with their cries, and conjuring her to prevent their +utter ruin. Hedwige, deeply affected, dismounted from her palfrey, +and, kneeling by their side, besought her husband not to sanction so +flagrant an act of oppression; and when the satisfied peasants retired +fully indemnified for their loss, she is said to have exclaimed, +"Their cattle are restored, but who will recompense them for their +tears?" Having reduced the country to obedience, it was time for +Wladislas to turn his attention to his Lithuanian territories, more +especially Russia Nigra, which, although governed by its own princes, +was compelled to do homage to the house of Jagello. Pomerania, which +by his marriage articles he was pledged to recover for Poland, had +been usurped by the Teutonic Knights, who, sensible with how +formidable an opponent they had to contend, endeavored to frustrate +his intentions, first by carrying fire and sword into Lithuania, and +then by exciting a revolution in favor of Duke Andrew, to whom, as +well as to the heathen nobles, the alliance (by which their country +was rendered dependent on Poland) was displeasing. Olgerd, the father +of Wladislas, was a fierce pagan, and his thirteen sons, if we except +the elder, inherited his cruelty, treachery, and rapacity. The +promised revolution in religion was offensive to the majority of the +people; and, to their shame be it spoken, the Teutonic Knights (whose +order was first established to defend the Christian faith against the +assaults of infidels) scrupled not to adopt a crooked policy, and, by +inciting the Lithuanians against their sovereign, threw every +impediment in the way of their conversion. Before the king had any +suspicion of his intentions, the grand-master had crossed the +frontiers, the duchy was laid waste, and many important fortresses +were already in the hands of the order. +</p> +<p> +Wladislas, then absent in Upper Poland, despatched Skirgello into +Lithuania, who, though haughty, licentious, and revengeful, was a +brave and skilful general. Duke Andrew fled before the forces of his +brother, and the latter attacked the Knights with an impetuosity that +compelled them speedily to evacuate their conquests. The arrival of +the king, with a number of learned prelates, and a large body of +clergy, proved he was quite in earnest regarding the conversion of his +subjects, hitherto immersed in the grossest and most degrading +idolatry. Trees, serpents, vipers, were the inferior objects of their +adoration; gloomy forests and damp caverns their temples; and the most +disgusting and venomous reptiles were cherished in every family as +household gods. But, as with the eastern Magi, fire was the principal +object of the Lithuanian worship; priests were appointed whose office +it was to tend the sacred flame, their lives paying the penalty if it +were allowed to expire. At Wilna, the capital of the duchy, was a +temple of the sun; and should that luminary chance to be eclipsed, or +even clouded, the people fled thither in the utmost terror, eager to +appease the deity by rivers of human blood, which poured forth at the +command of the Ziutz, or high priest, the victims vying with each +other in the severity of their self-inflicted torments. +</p> +<p> +As the most effectual method of at once removing the errors of this +infatuated people, Wladislas ordered the forests to be cut down, the +serpents to <a name="152">{152}</a> be crushed under the feet of his soldiers, and, +after extinguishing with his own hand the sacred fires, he caused the +temples to be demolished; thus demonstrating to the Lithuanians the +impotency of their gods. With the cowardice ever attendant on +ignorance and superstition, the pagans cast themselves with their +faces to the earth, expecting to see the sacrilegious strangers +blasted by the power of the profaned element; but, no such results +following, they gradually lost confidence in their deities, and of +their own free will desired to be instructed in the doctrines of +Christ. Their theological knowledge was necessarily confined to the +Lord's Prayer and the Creed, and a day was fixed for the commencement +of the ceremony of baptism. As, on account of the number of +catechumens, it was impossible to administer the sacrament to each +individual separately, the nobles and their families, after leaving +the sacred font, prepared to act as sponsors to the people, who, being +divided into groups of either sex, were sprinkled by the bishops and +priests, every division receiving the same name. +</p> +<p> +Hedwige had accompanied her husband to Lithuania, and was gratified by +witnessing the zeal with which he assisted the priests in their +arduous undertaking; whilst Wladislas, aware of the value of his young +auxiliary, was not disappointed by the degree of enthusiastic +veneration with which the new Christians regarded the sovereign who, +at the age of sixteen, had conferred upon them peace and the light of +the true faith. Hedwige was admirably adapted for this task: in her +character there was no alloy of passion, pride, or frivolity; an enemy +to the luxury and pomp which her sex and rank might have seemed to +warrant, her fasts were rigid and her bodily mortifications severe. +Neither did her fervor abate during her sojourn in the duchy. By her +profuse liberality the cathedral of St. Stanislas of Wilna was +completed. Nor did she neglect the other churches and religious +foundations which, by her advice, her husband commenced in the +principal cities of his kingdom. Before quitting Lithuania, the +queen's heart was wrung by the intelligence she received of a domestic +tragedy of the deepest dye. Her mother, the holy and virtuous +Elizabeth of Hungary, had during a popular insurrection been put to a +cruel death; whilst her sister Maria, who had fallen into the power of +the rebel nobles, having narrowly escaped the same fate, was confined +in an isolated fortress, subject to the most rigorous and ignominious +treatment. +</p> +<p> +Paganism being at length thoroughly rooted out of Lithuania, a +bishopric firmly established at Wilna, and the seven parishes in its +vicinity amply supplied with ecclesiastics, Wladislas, preparatory to +his return to Poland, appointed his brother Skirgello viceroy of the +duchy. This was a fatal error. The proud barbarians, little disposed +to dependence on a country they had been accustomed to despoil at +pleasure, writhed under the yoke of the fierce tyrant, whose rule soon +became odious, and whose vices were rendered more apparent by the +contrast which his character presented to that of his cousin Vitowda, +whom, as a check upon his well-known ferocity, Wladislas had +designated as his colleague. Scarcely had the court returned to +Poland, when the young prince, amiable, brave, and generous, by +opposing his cousin's unjust and cruel actions, drew upon himself the +vengeance of the latter, and, in order to save his life, was obliged +to seek refuge in Pomerania, from whence, as his honor and patriotism +alike forbade his assisting the Teutonic Knights in their designs upon +his country, he applied to the king for protection. +</p> +<p> +Wladislas, of a weak and jealous disposition, was, however, at the +time too much occupied in attending to foul calumnies uttered against +the spotless virtue of his queen to give heed to the application. +Notwithstanding the prudence of her general conduct, and <a name="153">{153}</a> the +tender devotion evinced by Hedwige toward her husband, the admiration +which her beauty and sweetness of disposition commanded from all who +approached her was a continual thorn in his side. Her former love for +the Duke of Austria and repugnance to himself haunted him night and +day, until he actually conceived suspicions injurious to her fidelity. +In the polluted atmosphere of a court there were not wanting those +who, for their own aggrandizement, were base enough to resort to +falsehood in order to destroy an influence at which the wicked alone +had cause to tremble. It was whispered in the ear of the unfortunate +monarch that his queen had held frequent, and of course clandestine, +interviews with Duke William, until, half frantic, he one day publicly +reproached her, and, turning to the assembled bishops, wildly demanded +a divorce. The proud nobles indignantly interposed, many a blade +rattled in its sheath, eager to vindicate the innocence of one who, in +their eyes, was purity itself; but Hedwige calmly arose, and with +matronly dignity demanded the name of her accuser, and a solemn trial, +according to the custom of her country. There was a dead silence, a +pause; and then, trembling and abashed before the virtue he had +maligned, the Vice-chamberlain Gniewosz, before mentioned as the +friend of Duke William (whose wealth he had not failed to +appropriate), stepped reluctantly forward. A murmur of surprise and +wrath resounded through the council-chamber: many a sword was drawn, +as though eager for the blood of the offender; but the ecclesiastics +having at length calmed the tumult, the case was appointed to be +judged at the diet of Wislica. +</p> +<p> +The queen's innocence was affirmed on oath by herself and her whole +household, after which the castellain, John Tenczynski, with twelve +knights of noble blood and unsullied honor, solemnly swore to the +falsehood of the accusation, and, throwing down their gauntlets, +defied to mortal combat all who should gainsay their assertion. None, +however, appeared to do battle in so bad a cause; and the convicted +traitor, silenced and confounded, sank on his knees, confessed his +guilt, and implored the mercy of her he had so foully aspersed. The +senate, in deference to the wishes of Hedwige, spared his life; but he +was compelled to crouch under a bench, imitate the barking of a dog, +and declare that, like that animal, he had dared to snarl against his +chaste and virtuous sovereign. [Footnote 42] This done, he was +deprived of his office, and banished the court; and Wladislas hastened +to beg the forgiveness of his injured wife. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 42: This was a portion of the punishment specially awarded + by the penal code of Poland to the crime of calumny. Like many other + punishments of those ages, it was symbolical in its character. (See + the valuable work of Albert du Boys, <i>Histoire du Droit Criminel des + Peuples Modernes</i>, liv. ii.; chap. vii.) Similar penalties had been + common in Poland from early times. Thus we find Boloslas the Great + inviting to a banquet and vapor bath nobles who had been guilty of + some transgression; after the bath he administered a paternal + reproof and castigation. Hence the Polish proverb, "to give a person + a bath."] +</p> +<p> +Meanwhile Prince Vitowda, despairing of assistance and pressed on all +sides, after much hesitation joined the Teutonic Knights in an +incursion against Lithuania. The country was invaded by a numerous +army, the capital taken by storm, abandoned to pillage, and finally +destroyed by fire; no less than fourteen thousand of the inhabitants +perishing in the flames, beside numbers who were massacred without +distinction of sex or age. Fortunately the upper city was garrisoned +by Poles, who determined to hold out to the last. The slight +fortifications were speedily destroyed; but, being immediately +repaired, the siege continued so long that Skirgello had time to +assemble an army before which the besiegers were eventually obliged to +retreat. Vitowda, now too deeply compromised to draw back, though +thwarted in his designs on Upper Wilna, gained possession of many of +the frontier towns, and, encouraged by success, aimed at nothing less +than the independent sovereignty of Lithuania. He was, however, +opposed during <a name="154">{154}</a> two or three campaigns by Wladislas person, +until, wearied of the war, the king had the weakness not only to sue +for peace, but to invest Vitowda with the government of the duchy. +This, as might be expected, gave great umbrage to Skirgello, and to +another brother, Swidrigal, so that Lithuania, owing to the ambition +of the rival princes, became for some time the theatre of civil +discord. +</p> +<p> +Among her other titles to admiration, we must not omit to mention that +Hedwige was a munificent patroness of learning. She hastened to +re-establish the college built by Casimir II., founded and endowed a +magnificent university at Prague for the education of the Lithuanian +youth, and superintended the translation of the Holy Scriptures into +Polish, writing with her own hands the greater part of the New +Testament. Her work was interrupted during her husband's absence by +the attack of the Hungarians on the frontiers of Poland; and it was +then that, laying aside the weakness of her sex, she felt herself +called upon to supply his place. A powerful army was levied, of which +this youthful heroine assumed the command, directing the councils of +the generals, and sharing the privations of the meanest soldier. When +she appeared on horseback in the midst of the troops, nothing could +exceed the enthusiasm of these hardy warriors; and the simplicity with +which they obeyed the slightest order of their queen was touching in +the extreme. Hedwige led her forces into Russia Nigra, and, partly by +force of arms, partly by skilful negotiations, succeeded in +reconquering the whole of that vast province, which her father Lewis +had detached from the Polish crown in order to unite it to that of his +beloved Hungary. This act of injustice was repaired by his daughter, +who thus endeared her name to the memory of succeeding generations. +The conquering army proceeded to Silesia, then usurped by the Duke of +Oppelen, where they were equally successful; so that Wladislas was +indebted for the brightest trophies of his reign to the heroism of his +wife. +</p> +<p> +Encouraged by her past success, he determined to reconduct her into +Lithuania, in hopes by her means to settle the dissensions of the +rival princes. Accordingly, in the spring of 1393, they proceeded +thither, when the disputants, subdued by the irresistible charm of her +manners, agreed to refer their claims to her arbitration. Of a solid +and mature judgment, Hedwige succeeded in pacifying them; and then, by +mutual consent, they entered into a solemn compact that in their +future differences, instead of resorting to arms, they would submit +their cause unreservedly to the arbitration of the young Queen of +Poland. +</p> +<p> +Notwithstanding its restoration to internal tranquillity, this +unfortunate duchy was continually laid waste by the Teutonic Knights; +and Wladislas, determined to hazard all on one decisive battle, +commanded forces to be levied not only in Lithuania, but in Poland. +Before the preparations were completed, an interview was arranged to +take place between the king and the grand-master, Conrad de Jungen; +but the nobility, fearing lest the irritable temper of Wladislas would +prove an insurmountable obstacle to all accommodation, implored him to +allow the queen to supply his place. On his consent, Hedwige, +accompanied by the ecclesiastics, the barons, and a magnificent +retinue, proceeded to the place of rendezvous, where she was met by +Conrad and the principal knight-commanders of the order. The terms she +proposed were equitable, and more lenient than the Teutonic Knights +had any reason to expect; but, under one trifling pretext or another, +they refused the restitution of the usurped territories on which the +king naturally insisted, and the queen was at length obliged to +return, prophesying, says the chronicler, that, after her death, their +perversity would receive its deserved punishment at the hands of her +husband. Her prediction was fulfilled. Some years afterward, on the +plains <a name="155">{155}</a> between Grunnervaldt and Tannenberg, the grand-master, +with fifty thousand knights, was slain, and by this decisive victory +the order was placed at the mercy of Poland, though, from the usual +indecision of its king, the fruits of this splendid action were less +than might have been expected. +</p> +<p> +Until her early death, Hedwige continued the guardian angel of that +beloved country for which she had made her first and greatest +sacrifice; and it is likely that but for her watchfulness, its +interests would have been frequently compromised by the Lithuanian +union. Acting on this principle, she refused to recognize the +investiture of her husband's favorite, the Palatine of Cracow, with +the perpetual fief of Podolia; and, undazzled by the apparent +advantages offered by an expedition against the Tartars headed by the +great Tamerlane, she forbade the Polish generals to take part in a +campaign which, owing to the rashness of Vitowda, terminated so +fatally. +</p> +<p> +It was shortly after her unsuccessful interview with the Teutonic +Knights that, by the death of her sister Maria, the crown of Hungary +(which ought to have devolved on her husband Sigismund) became again +an object of contention. The Hungarians, attracted by the report of +her moderation, wisdom, and even military skill—not an uncommon +accomplishment in females of those times—determined to offer it to +Hedwige; but her brother-in-law, trusting to her sense of justice, +hastened to Cracow, praying her not to accept the proposal, and +earnestly soliciting her alliance. The queen, whom ambition had no +power to dazzle, consented, and a treaty advantageous to Poland was at +once concluded. +</p> +<p> +Hedwige was a good theologian, and well read in the fathers and +doctors of the Church; the works of St. Bernard and St. Ambrose, the +revelations of St. Bridget, and the sermons of holy men, being the +works in which she most delighted. In Church music she was an +enthusiast; and not long after the completion of the convent of the +Visitation, which she had caused to be erected near the gates of +Cracow, she founded the Benedictine abbey of the Holy Cross, where +office was daily recited in the Selavonian language, after the custom +of the order at Prague. She also instituted a college in honor of the +Blessed Virgin, where the Psalms were daily chanted, after an improved +method, by sixteen canons. +</p> +<p> +It was toward the close of the year 1398 that, to the great delight of +her subjects, it became evident that the union of Wladislas and +Hedwige would at length be blessed with offspring. To see the throne +filled by a descendant of their beloved sovereign had been the dearest +wish of the Polish people, and fervent had been the prayers offered +for this inestimable blessing. The enraptured Wladislas hastened to +impart his expected happiness to most of the Christian kings and +princes, not forgetting the Supreme Pontiff, Boniface IX., by whom the +merits of the young queen were so well appreciated that, six years +after her accession, he had addressed to her a letter, written with +his own hand, in which he thanked her for her affectionate devotion to +the Catholic Church, and informed her that, although it was impossible +he could accede to all the applications which might be transmitted to +the Holy See on behalf of her subjects, yet, by her adopting a +confidential sign-manual, those requests to which she individually +attached importance should be immediately granted. The Holy Father +hastened to reply in the warmest terms to the king's communication, +promising to act as sponsor to the child, who, if a boy, he desired +might be named after himself. +</p> +<p> +Unfortunately, some time before the queen's delivery, it became +necessary for her husband to quit Cracow, in order to direct an +expedition against his old enemies the Teutonic Knights. During his +absence, he wrote a long letter, in which, after desiring that the +happy event might be attended with all possible magnificence, he +entered <a name="156">{156}</a> into a minute detail of the devices and embroidery to be +used in the adornment of the bed and chamber, particularly requesting +that the draperies and hangings might not lack gold, pearls, or +precious stones. This ostentatious display, though excusable in a fond +husband and a powerful monarch about to behold the completion of his +dearest wishes, was by no means in consonance with Hedwige's intense +love of Christian simplicity and poverty. We find her addressing to +her husband these few touching words, expressing, as the result +proved, that presentiment of her approaching end which has often been +accorded to saintly souls: "Seeing that I have so long renounced the +pomps of this world, it is not on that treacherous couch—to so many +the bed of death—that I would willingly be surrounded by their +glitter. It is not by the help of gold or gems that I hope to render +myself acceptable to that Almighty Father who has mercifully removed +from me the reproach of barrenness, but rather by resignation to his +will, and a sense of my own nothingness." It was remarked after this +that the queen became more recollected than ever, spending whole hours +in meditation, bestowing large alms, not only on the distressed of her +own country, but on such pilgrims as presented themselves, and +increasing her exterior mortifications; wearing a hair shirt during +Lent, and using the discipline in a manner which, considering her +condition, might have been deemed injudicious. She had ever made a +point of spending the vigil of the anniversary of her early sacrifice +at the foot of the veiled crucifix, but on this occasion, not +returning at her usual hour, one of her Hungarian attendants sought +her in the cathedral, then but dimly lighted by the massy silver lamp +suspended before the tabernacle. It was bitterly cold, the wind was +moaning through the long aisles, but there, on the marble pavement, in +an ecstacy which rendered her insensible to bodily sufferings, lay +Hedwige, she having continued in this state of abstraction from the +termination of complin, at which she invariably assisted. +</p> +<p> +At length, on the 12th of June, 1399, this holy queen gave birth to a +daughter, who was immediately baptized in the cathedral of Cracow, +receiving from the Pope's legate, at the sacred font, the name of +Elizabeth Bonifacia. The babe was weak and sickly, and the condition +of the mother so precarious that a messenger was despatched to the +army urging the immediate return of Wladislas. He arrived in time to +witness the last sigh of his so ardently desired child, though his +disappointment was completely merged in his anxiety for his wife. By +the advice of the physicians it had been determined to conceal the +death of the infant, but their precautions were vain. At the very +moment it occurred, Hedwige herself announced it to her astonished +attendants, and then humbly asked for the last sacraments of the +Church, which she received with the greatest fervor. She, however, +lingered until the 17th of July, when, the measure of her merits and +good works being full, she went to appear before the tribunal of that +God whom she had sought to glorify on earth. She died before +completing her twenty-ninth year. +</p> +<p> +A few days previously she had taken a tender leave of her distracted +husband; and, mindful to the last of the interests of Poland, she +begged him to espouse her cousin Anne, by whose claim to the throne of +the Piasts his own would be strengthened. She then drew off her +nuptial ring, as if to detach herself from all human ties, and placed +it upon his finger, and although, from motives of policy, Wladislas +successively espoused three wives, he religiously preserved this +memorial of her he had valued the most; bequeathing it as a precious +relic (and a memento to be faithful to the land which Hedwige had so +truly loved) to the Bishop of Cracow, who had saved his life in +battle. Immediately after her funeral, he retired to his Russian <a name="157">{157}</a> +province, nor could he for some time be prevailed upon to return and +assume the duties of sovereignty. +</p> +<p> +There was another mourner for her loss, William of Austria, who, +notwithstanding the entreaties of his subjects, had remained single +for her sake. He was at length prevailed upon to espouse the Princess +Jane of Naples, but did not long survive the union. +</p> +<p> +The obsequies of Hedwige were celebrated by the Pope's legate with +becoming magnificence. All that honor and respect from which she had +sensitively shrunk during life was lavished on her remains; she was +interred in the cathedral of Cracow on the left of the high altar; her +memory was embalmed by her people's love, and was sanctified in their +eyes. Numerous miracles are said to have been performed at her tomb: +thither the afflicted in mind and body flocked to obtain through her +intercession that consolation which during her life she had so +cheerfully bestowed. Contrary to the general expectation, she was +never canonized; [Footnote 43] her name, however, continued to be +fondly cherished by the Poles, and by the people who under God were +indebted to her for their first knowledge of Christianity, and of whom +she might justly be styled the apostle. On her monument was graven a +Latin inscription styling her the "Star of Poland," enumerating her +virtues, lamenting her loss, and imploring the King of Glory to +receive her into his heavenly kingdom. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 43: Polish writers give her the title of saint, though her + name is not inserted in the Martyrologies.—<i>Butler's Lives of the + Saints</i>, October 17th.] +</p> +<p> +The life of Hedwige is her best eulogium. As it has been seen, she +combined all the qualities not only of her own, but of a more advanced +age. The leisure which she could snatch from the affairs of government +she employed in study, devotion, and works of charity. True to her +principles, she at her death bequeathed her jewels and other personal +property in trust to the bishop and castellain of Cracow, for the +foundation of a college in that city. Two years afterward her wishes +were carried into effect, and the first stone was laid of the since +celebrated university. +</p> +<p> +Wladislas survived his wife thirty-five years. In his old age he was +troubled by a return of his former jealousy, thereby continually +embittering the life of his queen, a Lithuanian princess, who, +although exculpated by oath, as Hedwige had formerly been, was less +fortunate, inasmuch as she was the continual victim of fresh +suspicions. The latter years of his reign were much disturbed by the +hostilities of the Emperor Sigismund, and by the troubles occasioned +in Lithuania by the rebels, who had again combined with the Teutonic +Knights. +</p> +<p> +Wladislas died in 1434, at the age of eighty years. It is said that he +contracted his mortal sickness by being tempted to remain exposed too +long to the night air, captivated by the sweet notes of a nightingale. +Notwithstanding his faults, this monarch had many virtues; his piety +was great, and he practised severe abstinences; and although he at +times gave way to a suspicious temper, his general character was +trusting, frank, and generous even to imprudence. His suspicions, in +fact, did not originate with himself. They sprang, in the case of both +his wives, from the tongues of calumniators, to whom he listened with +a hasty credulity. He raised the glory and extended and consolidated +the dominion of Poland. He was succeeded by his son, a child of eleven +years, who had previously been, elected to the throne, but not until +Jagello had confirmed and even enlarged the privileges of the nobles. +His tardy consent, at the diet of Jedlin, roused their pride, so that +it was not until four years later that they solemnly gave their +adhesion. +</p> +<p> +It has not been our purpose to give more than a page out of the Polish +annals illustrative of the patriotic and Christian spirit of sacrifice +for which Poland's daughters have, down to the <a name="158">{158}</a> present day, been +no less noted than her sons. The mind naturally reverts to the late +cruel struggle in which this generous people has once more succumbed +to the overwhelming power of Russia, and her unscrupulous employment +of the gigantic forces at her command. Europe has looked on +apathetically, and, after a few feeble diplomatic remonstrances, has +allowed the sacrifice to be completed. But the cause of Poland is +essentially the cause of Catholicism and of the Church; and this, +perhaps, may account for the small degree of sympathy it has awakened +in European governments. Russia's repression of her insurgent subjects +became from the first a religious persecution. Her aim is not to +Russify, but to decatholicize Poland. The insurrection, quenched in +blood, has been followed by a wholesale deportation of Poles into the +eastern Russian provinces, where, with their country, it is hoped they +will, ere long, lose also their faith. These are replaced by Russian +colonists transplanted into Poland. To crush, extirpate, and deport +the nobility—to leave the lower class alone upon the soil, who, +deprived of their clergy—martyred, exiled, or in bonds—may become +an easy conquest to the dominant schism—such is the plan of the +autocrat, as we have beheld it actively carried out with all its +accompanying horrors of sacrilege and ruthless barbarity. One voice +alone—that of the Father of Christendom—has been raised to +stigmatize these revolting excesses, and to reprove the iniquity of +"persecuting Catholicism in order to put down rebellion." [Footnote +44] The same voice has exhorted us to pray for our Polish brethren, +and has encouraged that suffering people to seek their deliverance +from the just and compassionate Lord of all. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 44: The terms of the Holy Father's address have been + strangely exaggerated in many continental journals, where he is made + to refer to the subject politically, and loudly to proclaim the + justice of the Polish insurrection in that regard. The Pope entirely + restricted his animadversions on the Czar to his persecution of the + faith of his subjects.] +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>From The Lamp. +<br><br> +MONKS AMONG THE MONGOLS.</h2> +<br> +<p> +In tracing the progress of the various branches of science during the +Middle Ages, there is nothing more striking than the slow stages by +which a knowledge of the truth was reached on the subject of the +earth's form, and the relative positions of the various countries +which compose it. Though from the very earliest period the subject +necessarily occupied a considerable amount of attention, and though +facts began to be observed bearing upon it in the first ages after the +diffusion of mankind, and were largely multiplied in proportion as the +formation of colonies and intercommunication for purposes of commerce +or war became more frequent, yet we find very little advance made in +geographical knowledge from the days of Ptolemy, when the observations +of the ancients were most systematically collected and arranged, till +some centuries after, when the maritime enterprise of the Portuguese +impelled them to the series of discoveries which led to the doubling +of the Cape of Good Hope, and incited the genius of Columbus to the +discovery of a new world. +</p> +<p> +The cause of this slow advance of geographical, in comparison with +other branches of knowledge, was owing in some measure to the absence +of any exact records of the discoveries made, by which they might have +been communicated to others, and become the <a name="159">{159}</a> starting-point for +further investigations; but still more to the imperfect means of +navigation in existence, and to those barbarian uprisings and +migrations which for centuries, at least, were perpetually changing +the state of Europe and Asia, and, by removing the landmarks of +nations, obliging geography to begin as it were anew. During the whole +of this period, however, we find evidences of the patient cultivation +of this, as of all other branches of human knowledge, within the walls +of those monastic institutions which ignorant prejudice still regards +as the haunts of idleness, but to which the learned of all creeds and +countries acknowledge their deep debt of obligation. Formal accounts +of some distant land, either written by the traveller himself or +recorded from the oral information he communicated; historical +chronicles, in which not alone the events, but all that was known of +the country is recorded, and maps in which the position of various +places is attempted to be laid down, were to be found in every +monastery both on the continent and in our own island. The holy men, +too, who preached the gospel to pagan nations were usually careful +also to enlarge their contemporaries' knowledge concerning the places +and the people among whom they labored. Thus the great St. Boniface +not only converted the Sclavonic nations to Catholic truth, but, at +the special injunction of the Pope, wrote an account of them and of +their country. St. Otho, bishop of Bamberg, did the same for the +countries upon the shores of the Baltic; the holy monk Anscaire for +Scandinavia, where he carried on his apostolic labors; and many others +might be mentioned. +</p> +<p> +Among the most valuable of the contributions to the geography of the +Middle Ages were those furnished by some monks of the order of St. +Francis, who in the middle of the thirteenth century penetrated into +the remote east, on special missions to the barbarian hordes that then +threatened the very existence of religion and civilization, and whose +enterprises, embarked in at the call of duty, are in many respects +interesting. +</p> +<p> +History, whether ancient or modern, has few chapters so remarkable as +that which records the rise of the Mongol power. A great chief, who +had ruled over an immense horde of this hitherto pastoral people, +died, leaving his eldest son an infant, and unable to command the +adhesion of his rude subjects. The young chief, as he grew to man's +estate, found his horde dispersed, and only a few families willing to +acknowledge his sway. Determined, however, to regain his power and +carry out the ambitious design which he had formed of conquering the +world, he caused an assembly of the whole people to be summoned on the +banks of the Selinga. At this assembly one of the wise men of the +tribes announced that he had had a vision, in which he saw the great +God, the disposer of kingdoms, sitting upon his throne in council, and +heard him decree that the young chief should be "Zingis Khan," or +"Greatest Chief" of the earth. The shouts of the Mongols testified +their readiness to accept the decree; Zingis Khan was raised to +supreme power over the whole Mongol race. He soon subdued the petty +opposition of his neighbors, and, establishing the seat of his empire +at Karakorum, spread his conquests in every direction with +extraordinary rapidity, and died the ruler of many nations, +bequeathing his power to sons and grandsons as warlike and ambitious +as himself. One of these, Batoo Khan, invaded Europe with an immense +army. He overran Russia, taking Moscow and its other principal places; +subdued Poland and burnt Cracow; defeated the king of Hungary in a +great battle; penetrated to Breslau, which he burned; and defeated, +near Liegnitz, an army composed of Christian volunteers from all +lands;—one of the bloodiest battles ever fought against the eastern +hordes. +</p> +<p> +It was four years after this great battle, namely, in 1246, and when +all <a name="160">{160}</a> Europe was trembling at the expectation of another invasion +of the Mongols (who, having devastated the country with fire and +sword, had retired loaded with spoils), that two embassies were +despatched by the Pope, Innocent IV., to endeavor to induce them to +stop their progress into Europe, and to embrace Christianity. These +important missions were intrusted to monks of the Franciscan order; +Jean du Plan Carpini being despatched toward the north-east, where the +camp of Batoo was fixed, and Nicholas Ascelin, the year after, sent +into Syria and Persia. +</p> +<p> +Ascelin's mission, which comprised three other monks of the same order +beside himself, was the most rapidly terminated. Following the south +of the Caspian Sea, the party traversed Syria, Mesopotamia, and +Persia, and at length reached the Mongol or Tatar encampment of +Baiothnoy Khan. Being asked their object as they approached, the holy +men boldly but undiplomatically declared that they were ambassadors +from the head of the Christian world, and that their mission was to +exhort the Tatars to repent of their wicked and barbarous attacks upon +God's people. Being asked what presents they brought to the khan, +according to eastern custom, they further replied that the Pope, as +the vicar of God, was not accustomed to purchase a hearing or favor by +such means, especially from infidels. The Mongols were astonished at +this bold language used toward a race accustomed to strike terror into +all who came into contact with them. They were still more astonished +when the holy men refused, as a reprehensible act of idolatry, to make +the usual genuflexions on being admitted to the presence of the khan, +unless he first became a Catholic and acknowledged the Pope's +supremacy, when they offered to do so for the honor of God and the +Church. Hitherto the barbarians had borne patiently the display of +what they doubtless regarded as the idiosyncrasies of the good friars, +but this last refusal incited their rage; the ambassadors and their +master the Pope were insulted and threatened, and it was debated in +council whether they should not be flayed alive, their skins stuffed +with hay, and sent back to the Pope. The interposition of the khan's +mother saved their lives, however; but the Mongols could never +understand how the Holy Father, who they found from Ascelin kept no +army and had gained no battles, could have dared to send such a +message to their victorious master, whom they styled the Son of +Heaven. Ascelin and his companions were treated during their stay with +scant courtesy, and were dismissed with a letter to the Pope from +Baiothnoy Khan, commanding him, if he wished to remain in possession +of his land and heritage, to come in his own person and do homage to +him who held just sway over the whole earth. They reached as speedily +as possible the nearest Syrian port, and embarked for France. They +brought back to Europe some valuable information respecting the +country of the Mongols, though small compared with that of the other +ambassadors whom we have to mention. +</p> +<p> +Carpini was a man better fitted the office of ambassador, and able, +without sacrificing his principles or his dignity, to become "all +things to all men." He travelled with a numerous suite through Bohemia +and Poland to Kiow, then the Russian capital. A quantity of skins and +furs was given him in the northern capitals, as presents to the Tatar +chiefs, and all Europe watched with interest the result of the +embassy. On the banks of the Dnieper they first encountered the +barbarians. The purpose of their journey being demanded, they replied +that they were messengers from the Pope to the chief of the Tatar +people, to desire peace and friendship between them, and request that +they would embrace the faith of Christ, and desist from the slaughter +of the Pope's subjects, who had never injured or attempted to injure +them. Their <a name="161">{161}</a> bearing made a very favorable impression. They were +conducted to the tent of the chief, where they did not hesitate to +make the usual salutations; and by his command post-horses and a +Mongol escort were given them to conduct them to Batoo Khan. They +found him at a place on the borders of the Black Sea; and, before +being admitted to an audience, had to pass between two fires, as a +charm to nullify any witchcraft or evil intention on their parts. They +found Batoo seated on a raised throne with one of his wives, and +surrounded by his court. They again made the usual genuflexions, and +then delivered their letters, which Batoo Khan read attentively, but +without giving them any reply. For some months they were "trotted +about," with a view to show them the wealth, power, and magnificence +of the people they were among; and in order that they might +communicate at home what they saw. The holy men passed Lent among the +Mongols; and, notwithstanding the fatigues they had passed through, +observed a strict fast, taking, as their only food for the forty days, +millet boiled in water, and drinking only melted snow. They witnessed +the imposing ceremony of the investiture of a Tatar chief, at which a +large number of feudatory princes were present, with no less than four +thousand messengers bearing tribute or presents from subdued or +submitted states. After the investiture, they also were ushered into +the presence; but, alas, the gifts intrusted to them and their whole +substance were already consumed. The Tatars, however, considerately +dispensed with this usual part of the proceedings; for the coarse garb +of the monks, contrasting as it did with the rich silks and garments +of gold and silver which they describe as being worn generally during +the ceremonies, must have marked them as men who possessed little of +this world's goods. +</p> +<p> +The ceremonials of investiture over, Carpini was at length called upon +to deliver his message to the newly-appointed khan; and a reply was +given, which he was desired to translate into Latin, and convey to the +Pope. It contained only meaningless expressions of good-will; but the +fact was, that the khan intended to carry the war into Europe, though +he did not desire to give notice of his intent. He offered to send +with them an ambassador to the Pope; but Carpini seems to have +surmised his purpose, and that this ambassador would really be only a +spy; and he therefore found means to evade the offer. They returned +homeward through the rigors of a Siberian winter, accompanied by +several Genoese, Pisan, and Venetian traders, who, following the papal +envoys, had found their way, in pursuit of commerce, to the Tatar +encampment. The hardships the good men endured on the return journey +were of the most fearful kind. Often, in crossing the extensive +steppes of that country, they were forced to sleep all night upon the +snow, and found themselves almost buried in snow-drifts in the +morning. Kiow was at length reached; and its people, who had given up +the adventurous travellers as lost, turned out to welcome them, as men +returned from the grave. The rest of Carpini's life was spent in +similar hardships, while preaching the gospel to the savage peoples of +Bohemia, Hungary, Denmark, and Norway; and death came to him with his +reward, at an advanced age, in the midst of his apostolic labors. +</p> +<p> +A few years after the missions of Ascelin and Carpini, another +Franciscan, named William Van Ruysbroeck, better known as Rubriquis, a +native of Brabant, was sent by Saint Louis of France on a similar +errand to the Mongols, one of whose khans, it was reported, had +embraced Christianity. He found the rumor void of foundation; and, +though received courteously, as Carpini had been, could perceive not +the slightest disposition among the barbarians to receive or even hear +the truth. At the camp of Sartach Khan, Rubriquis was commanded to +appear before the chief in his priestly vestments, and did so, +carrying a missal <a name="162">{162}</a> and crucifix in his hands, an attendant +preceding him with a censer, and singing the <i>Salve Regina</i>. Everything +he had with him was examined very attentively by the khan and his +wives, especially the crucifix; but nothing came of this curiosity. +Like Carpini, the party were frequently exposed to great privations, +both at the encampments and on their journeys; and on one occasion +Rubriquis piously records: "If it had not been for the grace of God, +and the biscuit which we had brought with us, we had surely perished." +On one journey from camp to camp, they travelled for five weeks along +the banks of the Volga, nearly always on foot, and often without food. +Rubriquis' companion Barthelemi broke down under the fatigues of the +return journey; but Rubriquis persevered alone, and traversed an +immense extent of country, passing through the Caucasus, Armenia, and +Syria, before he took ship for France, to report the failure of his +mission to the pious king. +</p> +<p> +Bootless as these journeys proved, so far as their main object was +concerned, there is no doubt that in many ways they effected a large +amount of good. The religious creed of the Mongols appears to have +been confined to a belief in one God, and in a place of future rewards +and punishments. For other doctrines, or for ceremonies of religion, +they appear to have cared little. They trampled the Caliph of Bagdad, +the "successor of the Prophet," beneath their horses' hoofs at the +capture of that city; and they tolerated at their camps our Christian +monks, as well as a number of professors of the Nestorian heresy. It +was only on becoming Mohammedans that they, and the kindred but rival +race of Ottomans, became intolerant. But it is to be observed that +Islamism, which allowed polygamy, and avoided interference with their +other national habits and customs, would be likely to attract them, in +consequence of their religious indifference, as naturally as +Christianity, which sought to impose restraints upon their ferocity +and sensualism, would repel them. It is no wonder, therefore, that the +efforts of the zealous Franciscans were unsuccessful. But their zeal +and disinterestedness, their irreproachable lives and simple manners, +were not without producing an effect upon the savage men with whom +their embassies brought them into contact; and by their intercourse, +and that mercantile communication for which their travels pioneered +the way, the conduct of the Mongols toward the Christian races was +sensibly affected beneficially, while on the other side they taught +Europe to regard the Mongols as a people to be feared indeed, and +guarded against, but not as the demons incarnate they had been +pictured by the popular imagination. The benefit these devoted monks +conferred upon the progress of science and civilization is scarcely to +be over-estimated; as not only did they acquaint Europe with a number +of minute, and in the main accurate, details respecting a vast tract +of country previously unknown, and the peoples by whom it was +inhabited, but they opened up new realms to commerce, in the exploring +of which Marco Polo, Clavijo, and subsequent travellers, pushed onward +to China, Japan, and India, and prepared the way for the great +maritime discoveries of the succeeding century. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="163">{163}</a> +<br> +<h2>From The Month. +<br><br> +CONSTANCE SHERWOOD. +<br><br> +AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY. +<br><br> +BY LADY GEORGIANA FULLERTON. +<br><br> +CHAPTER III.</h2> +<br> +<p> +As I entered the library, which my father used for purposes of +business as well as of study, I saw a gentleman who had often been at +our house before, and whom I knew to be a priest, though he was +dressed as a working-man of the better sort and had on a riding coat +of coarse materials. He beckoned me to him, and I, kneeling, received +his blessing. +</p> +<p> +"What, up yet, little one?" he said; "and yet thou must bestir thyself +betimes to-morrow for prayers. These are not days in which priests may +play the sluggard and be found abed when the sun rises." +</p> +<p> +"At what hour must you be on foot, reverend father?" my mother asked, +as sitting down at a table by his side she filled his plate with +whatever might tempt him to eat, the which he seemed little inclined +to. +</p> +<p> +"Before dawn, good Mrs. Sherwood," he answered; "and across the fields +into the forest before ever the laboring men are astir; and you know +best when that is." +</p> +<p> +"An if it be so, which I fear it must," my father said, "we must e'en +have the chapel ready by two o'clock. And, goodwife, you should +presently get that wench to bed." +</p> +<p> +"Nay, good mother," I cried, and threw my arms round her waist, +"prithee let me sit up to-night; I can lie abed all to-morrow." So +wistfully and urgently did I plead, that she, who had grown of late +somewhat loth to deny any request of mine, yielded to my entreaties, +and only willed that I should lie down on a settle betwixt her chair +and the chimney, in which a fagot was blazing, though it was +summer-time, but the weather was chilly. I gazed by turns on my +mother's pale face and my father's, which was thoughtful, and on the +good priest's, who was in an easy-chair, wherein they had compelled +him to sit, opposite to me on the other side of the chimney. He +looked, as I remember him then, as if in body and in mind he had +suffered more than he could almost bear. +</p> +<p> +After some discourse had been ministered betwixt him and my father of +the journey he had been taking, and the friends he had seen since last +he had visited our house, my mother said, in a tremulous voice, "And +now, good Mr. Mush, an if it would not pain you too sorely, tell us if +it be true that your dear daughter in Christ, Mrs. Clitherow, as +indeed won the martyr's crown, as some letters from York reported to +us a short time back?" +</p> +<p> +Upon this Mr. Mush raised his head, which had sunk on his breast, and +said, "She that was my spiritual daughter in times past, and now, as I +humbly hope, my glorious mother in heaven, the gracious martyr Mrs. +Clitherow, has overcome all her enemies, and passed from this mortal +life with rare and marvellous triumph into the peaceable city of God, +there to receive a worthy crown of endless immortality and joy." His +eye, that had been before heavy and dim, now shone with sudden light, +and it seemed as if the cord about his heart was loosed, and his +spirit found vent at last in words after a long and painful silence. +More eloquent still was his countenance than his words as he +exclaimed, "Torments overcame her not, nor the sweetness of life, nor +her vehement affection for <a name="164">{164}</a> husband and children, nor the +flattering allurements and deceitful promises of the persecutors. +Finally, the world, the flesh, and the devil overcame her not. She, a +woman, with invincible courage entered combat against them all, to +defend the ancient faith, wherein both she and her enemies were +baptized and gave their promise to God to keep the same until death. O +sacred martyr!" and, with clasped hands and streaming eyes, the good +father went on, "remember me, I beseech thee humbly, in thy perfect +charity, whom thou hast left miserable behind thee, in time past thy +unworthy father and now most unworthy servant, made ever joyful by thy +virtuous life, and now lamenting thy death and thy absence, and yet +rejoicing in thy glory." +</p> +<p> +A sob burst from my mother's breast, and she hid her face against my +father's shoulder. There was a brief silence, during which many +quickly-rising thoughts passed through my mind. Of Daniel in the +lions' den, and the Machabees and the early Christians; and of the +great store of blood which had been shed of late in this our country, +and of which amongst the slain were truly martyrs, and which were not; +of the vision in the sky which had been seen at Lichfield; and chiefly +of that blessed woman Mrs. Clitherow, whose virtue and good works I +had often before heard of, such as serving the poor and harboring +priests, and loving God's Church with a wonderful affection greater +than can be thought of. Then I heard my father say, "How was it at the +last, good Mr. Mush?" I oped my eyes, and hung on the lips of the good +priest even as if to devour his words as he gave utterance to them. +</p> +<p> +"She refused to be tried by the country," he answered, in a tremulous +voice; "and so they murthered her." +</p> +<p> +"How so?" my mother asked, shading her eyes with her hand, as if to +exclude the mental sight of that which she yet sought to know. +</p> +<p> +"They pressed her to death," he slowly uttered; "and the last words +she was heard to say were 'Jesu, Jesu, Jesu! have mercy on me!' She +was in dying about a quarter of an hour, and then her blessed spirit +was released and took its flight to heaven. May we die the death of +the righteous, and may our last end be like hers!" +</p> +<p> +Again my mother hid her face in my father's bosom, and methought she +said not "Amen" to that prayer; but turning to Mr. Mush with a flushed +cheek and troubled eye, she asked, "And why did the blessed Mrs. +Clitherow refuse to be tried by the country, reverend father, and +thereby subject herself to that lingering death?" +</p> +<p> +"These were her words when questioned and urged on that point," he +answered, "which sufficiently clear her from all accusation of +obstinacy or desperation, and combine the rare discretion and charity +which were in her at all times: 'Alas!' quoth she, 'if I should have +put myself on the country, evidence must needs have come against me +touching my harboring of priests and the holy sacrifice of the mass in +my house, which I know none could give but only my children and +servants; and it would have been to me more grievous than a thousand +deaths if I should have seen any of them brought forth before me, to +give evidence against me in so good a cause and be guilty of my blood; +and, secondly,' quoth she, 'I know well the country must needs have +found me guilty to please the council, who so earnestly seek my blood, +and then all they had been accessory to my death and damnably offended +God. I therefore think, in the way of charity, for my part to hinder +the country from such a sin; and seeing it must needs be done, to +cause as few to do it as might be; and that was the judge himself.' So +she thought, and thereupon she acted, with that single view to God's +glory and the good of men's souls that was ever the passion of her +fervent spirit." +</p> +<p> +"Her children?" my mother murmured in a faint voice, still hiding her +face from him. "That little Agnes <a name="165">{165}</a> you used to tell us of, that +was so dear to her poor mother, how has it fared with her?" +</p> +<p> +Mr. Mush answered, "Her <i>happy</i> mother sent her hose and shoes to her +daughter at the last, signifying that she should serve God and follow +her steps of virtue. She was committed to ward because she would not +betray her mother, and there whipped and extremely used for that she +would not go to the church and hear a sermon. When her mother was +murthered, the heretics came to her and said that unless she would go +to the church, her mother should be put to death. The child, thinking +to save the life of her who had given her birth, went to a sermon, and +thus they deceived her." +</p> +<p> +"God forgive them!" my father ejaculated; and I, creeping to my +mother's side, threw my arms about her neck, upon which she, caressing +me, said: +</p> +<p> +"Now thou wilt be up to their deceits, Conny, if they should practice +the same arts on thee." +</p> +<p> +"Mother," I cried, clinging to her, "I will go with thee to prison and +to death; but to their church I will not go who love not our Blessed +Lady." +</p> +<p> +"So help thee God!" my father cried, and laid his hand on my head. +</p> +<p> +"Take heart, good Mrs. Sherwood," Mr. Mush said to my mother, who was +weeping; "God may spare you such trials as those which that sweet +saint rejoiced in, or he can give you a like strength to hers. We have +need in these times to bear in mind that comfortable saying of holy +writ, 'As your day shall your strength be.'" +</p> +<p> +"'Tis strange," my father observed, "how these present troubles seem +to awake the readiness, nay the wish, to suffer for truth's sake. It +is like a new sense in a soul heretofore but too prone to eschew +suffering of any sort: 'tis even as the keen breezes of our own +Cannock Chase stimulate the frame to exertions which it would shrink +from in the duller air of the Trent Valley." +</p> +<p> +"Ah! and is it even so with you, my friend?" exclaimed Mr. Mush. "From +my heart I rejoice at it: such thoughts are oftentimes forerunners of +God's call to a soul marked out for his special service." +</p> +<p> +My mother, against whom I was leaning since mention had been made of +Mrs. Clitherow's daughter, began to tremble; and rising said she would +go to the chapel to prepare for confession. Taking me by the hand, she +mounted the stairs to the room which was used as such since the +ancient faith had been proscribed. One by one that night we knelt at +the feet of the good shepherd, who, like his Lord, was ready to lay +down his life for his sheep, and were shriven. Then, at two of the +clock, mass was said, and my parents and most of our servants +received, and likewise some neighbors to whom notice had been sent in +secret of Mr. Mush's coming. When my mother returned from the altar to +her seat, I marvelled at the change in her countenance. She who had +been so troubled before the coming of the Heavenly Guest into her +breast, wore now so serene and joyful an aspect, that the looking upon +her at that time wrought in me a new and comfortable sense of the +greatness of that divine sacrament. I found not the thought of death +frighten me then; for albeit on that night I for the first time fully +arrived at the knowledge of the peril and jeopardy in which the +Catholics of this land do live; nevertheless this knowledge awoke in +me more exultation than fear. I had seen precautions used, and +reserves maintained, of which I now perceived the cause. For some time +past my parents had prepared the way for this no-longer-to-be-deferred +enlightenment. The small account they had taught me to make of the +wealth and comforts of this perishable world, and the histories they +had recounted to me of the sufferings of Christians in the early times +of the Church, had been directed unto this end. They had, as it were, +laid the wood on the altar of my heart, which they prayed might one +day burn into <a name="166">{166}</a> a flame. And now when, by reason of the discourse +I had heard touching Mrs. Clitherow's blessed but painful end for +harboring of priests in her house, and the presence of one under our +roof, I took heed that the danger had come nigh unto our own doors, my +heart seemed to beat with a singular joy. Childhood sets no great +store on life: the passage from this world to the next is not terrible +to such as have had no shadows cast on their paths by their own or +others' sins. Heaven is not a far-off region to the pure in heart; but +rather a home, where God, as St. Thomas sings, +</p> +<pre> + "Vitam sine termino + Nobis donet in patria." +</pre> +<p> +But, ah me! how transient are the lights and shades which flit across +the childish mind! and how mutable the temper of youth, never long +impressed by any event, however grave! Not many days after Mr. Mush's +visit to our house, another letter from the Countess of Surrey came +into my hand, and drove from my thoughts for the time all but the +matters therein disclosed. +</p> +<p class="cite"> + "SWEET MISTRESS CONSTANCE"<br> + (my lady wrote),—"In my last letter I made mention, in an obscure + fashion, of a secret which my lord had told me touching a matter of + great weight which Higford, his grace's steward, had let out to him; + and now that the whole world is speaking of what was then in hand, + and that troubles have come of it, I must needs relieve my mind by + writing thereof to her who is the best friend I have in the world, + if I may judge by the virtuous counsel and loving words her letters + do contain. 'Tis like you have heard somewhat of that same matter, + Mistress Constance; for much talk has been ministered anent it since + I wrote, amongst people of all sorts, and with various intents to + the hindering or the promoting thereof. I mean touching the marriage + of his grace the Duke of Norfolk with the Queen of Scots, which is + much desired by some, and very little wished for by others. My lord, + as is reasonable in one of his years and of so noble a spirit, and + his sister, who is in all things the counterpart of her brother, + have set their hearts thereon since the first inkling they had of + it; for this queen had so noted a fame for her excellent beauty and + sweet disposition that it has wrought in them an extraordinary + passionate desire to title her mother, and to see their father so + nobly mated, though not more than he deserves; for, as my lord says, + his grace's estate in England is worth little less than the whole + realm of Scotland, in the ill state to which the wars have reduced + it; and when he is in his own tennis-court at Norwich, he thinks + himself as great as a king. +<br><br> + "As a good wife, I should wish as my lord does; and indeed this + marriage, Mistress Constance, would please me well; for the Queen of + Scots is Catholic, and methinks if his grace were to wed her, there + might arise some good out of it to such as are dependent on his + grace touching matters of religion; and since Mr. Martin has gone + beyond seas, 'tis very little I hear in this house but what is + contrary to the teaching I had at my grandmother's. My lord saith + this queen's troubles will be ended if she doth marry his grace, for + so Higford has told him; but when I spoke thereof to my Lady Lumley, + she prayed God his grace's might not then begin, but charged me to + be silent thereon before my Lord Arundel, who has greatly set his + heart on this match. She said words were in every one's mouth + concerning this marriage which should never have been spoken of but + amongst a few. 'Nan,' quoth she, 'if Phil and thou do let your + children's tongues wag anent a matter which may well be one of life + and death, more harm may come of it than can well be thought of.' So + prithee, Mistress Constance, do you be silent as the grave on what I + have herein written, if so be you have not heard <a name="167">{167}</a> of it but + from me. My lord had a quarrel with my Lord Essex, who is about his + own age, anent the Queen of Scots, a few days since, when he came to + spend his birthday with him; for my lord was twelve years old last + week, and I gave him a fair jewel to set in his cap, for a + love-token and for remembrance. My lord said that the Queen of Scots + was a lady of so great virtue and beauty that none else could be + compared with her; upon which my lord of Essex cried it was high + treason to the queen's majesty to say so, and that if her grace held + so long a time in prison one who was her near kinswoman, it was by + reason of her having murthered her husband and fomented rebellion in + this kingdom of England, for the which she did deserve to be + extremely used. My lord was very wroth at this, and swore he was no + traitor, and that the Queen of Scots was no murtheress, and he would + lay down his head on the block rather than suffer any should style + her such; upon which my lord of Essex asked, 'Prithee, my Lord + Surrey, were you at Thornham last week when the queen's majesty was + on a visit to your grandfather, my Lord Arundel?' 'No,' cried my + lord, 'your lordship being there yourself in my Lord Leicester's + suite, must needs have noticed I was absent; for if I had been + present, methinks 'tis I and not your lordship would have waited + behind her majesty's chair at table and held a napkin to her.' 'And + if you had, my lord,' quoth my Lord Essex, waxing hot in his speech, + 'you would have noticed how her grace's majesty gave a nip to his + grace your father, who was sitting by her side, and said she would + have him take heed on what pillow he rested his head.' 'And I would + have you take heed,' cries my lord, 'how you suffer your tongue to + wag in an unseemly manner anent her grace's majesty and his grace my + father and the Queen of Scots, who is kinswoman to both, and even + now a prisoner, which should make men careful how they speak of her + who cannot speak in her own cause; for it is a very inhuman part, my + lord, to tread on such as misfortune has cast down.' There was a + nobleness in these words such as I have often taken note of in my + lord, though so young, and which his playmate yielded to; so that + nothing more was said at that time anent those matters, which indeed + do seem too weighty to be discoursed upon by young folks. But I have + thought since on the lines which 'tis said the queen's majesty wrote + when she was herself a prisoner, which begin, +</p> +<p class="cite2"> + 'O Fortune! how thy restless, wavering state<br> + Hath fraught with cares my troubled wit;<br> + Witness this present prison, whither fate<br> + Could bear me, and the joys I quit'— +</p> +<p class="cite"> + and wondered she should have no greater pity on those in the same + plight, as so many be at this time. Ah me! I would not keep a bird + in a cage an I could help it, and 'tis sad men are not more tender + of such as are of a like nature with themselves! +<br><br> + "My lord was away some days after this at Oxford, whither he had + been carried to be present at the queen's visit, and at the play of + <i>Palamon and Arcite</i>, which her majesty heard in the common hall of + Christ's Church. One evening, as my lady Margaret and I (like two + twin cherries on one stalk, my lord would say, for he is mightily + taken with the stage-plays he doth hear, and hath a trick of framing + his speech from them) were sitting at the window near unto the + garden practising our lutes and singing madrigals, he surprised us + with his sweet company, in which I find an ever increasing content, + and cried out as he approached, 'Ladies, I hold this sentence of the + poet as a canon of my creed, that whom God loveth not, they love not + music.' And then he said that albeit Italian was a very harmonious + and sweet language which pleasantly tickleth the ear, he for his + part loved English best, even in singing. Upon which, finding him in + the humor for discreet <a name="168">{168}</a> and sensible conversation, which, + albeit he hath good parts and a ready wit, is not always the case, + by reason of his being, as boys mostly are, prone to wagging, I took + occasion to relate what I had heard my Lord of Arundel say touching + his visit to the court of Brussels, when the Duchess of Parma + invited him to a banquet to meet the Prince of Orange and most of + the chief courtiers. The discourse was carried on in French; but my + lord, albeit he could speak well in that language, nevertheless made + use of an interpreter. At the which the Prince of Orange expressed + his surprise to Sir John Wilson, who was present, that an English + nobleman of so great birth and breeding should be ignorant of the + French tongue, which the earl presently hearing, said, 'Tell the + prince that I like to speak in that language in which I can best + utter my mind and not mistake.' And I perceive, my lord,' I said, + 'that you are of a like mind with his lordship, and no lover of + new-fangled and curious terms.' +<br><br> + "Upon which my dear earl laughed, and related unto us how the queen + had been pleased to take notice of him at Oxford, and spoke merrily + to him of his marriage. 'And prithee, Phil, what were her highness's + words?' quoth his prying sister, like a true daughter of Eve. At + which my lord stroked his chin, as if to smooth his beard which is + still to come, and said her majesty had cried, 'God's pity, child, + thou wilt tire of thy wife afore you have both left the nursery.' + 'Alack,' cried Meg, 'if any but her highness had said it, thy hand + would have been on thy sword, brother, and I'll warrant thou didst + turn as red as a turkey-cock, when her majesty thus titled thee a + baby. Nay, do not frown, but be a good lord to us, and tell Nan and + me if the queen said aught else.' Then my lord cleared his brow, and + related how in the hunting scene in the play, when the cry of the + hounds was heard outside the stage, which was excellently well + imitated, some scholars who were seated near him, and he must + confess himself also, did shout, 'There, there—he's caught, he's + caught!' upon which her grace's majesty laughed, and merrily cried + out from her box, 'Those boys in very troth are ready to leap out of + the windows!' 'And had you such pleasant sports each day, brother?' + quoth our Meg. 'No, by my troth,' my lord answered; 'the more's the + pity; for the next day there was a disputation held in physic and + divinity from two to seven; and Dr. Westphaling held forth at so + great length that her majesty sent word to him to end his discourse + without delay, to the great relief and comfort of all present. But + he would not give over, lest, having committed all to memory, he + should forget the rest if he omitted any part of it, and be brought + to shame before the university and the court.' 'What said her + highness when she saw he heeded not her commands?' Meg asked. 'She + was angered at first,' quoth my lord, 'that he durst go on with his + discourse when she had sent him word presently to stop, whereby she + had herself been prevented from speaking, which the Spanish + Ambassador had asked her to do; but when she heard the reason it + moved her to laughter, and she titled him a parrot.' +<br><br> + "'And spoke not her majesty at all?' I asked; and my lord said, 'She + would not have been a woman, Nan, an she had held her tongue after + being once resolved to use it. She made the next day an oration in + Latin, and stopped in the midst to bid my Lord Burleigh be seated, + and not to stand painfully on his gouty feet. Beshrew me, but I + think she did it to show the poor dean how much better her memory + served her than his had done, for she looked round to where he was + standing ere she resumed her discourse. And now, Meg, clear thy + throat and tune thy pipe, for not another word will I speak till + thou hast sung that ditty good Mr. Martin set to music for thee.' I + have set it down here, Mistress Constance, with the notes as <a name="169">{169}</a> + she sung it, that you may sing it also; and not like it the less that + my quaint fancy pictures the maiden the poet sings of, in her 'frock + of frolic green,' like unto my sweet friend who dwells not far from + one of the fair rivers therein named. +</p> +<pre> + A knight, as antique stories tell, + A daughter had named Dawsabel, + A maiden fair and free; + She wore a frock of frolic green, + Might well become a maiden queen, + Which seemly was to see. + + The silk well could she twist and twine, + And make the fine March pine, + And with the needle work; + And she could help the priest to say + His matins on a holy day, + And sing a psalm in kirk. + + Her features all as fresh above + As is the grass that grows by Dove, + And lythe as lass of Kent; + Her skin as soft as Leinster wool, + And white as snow on Penhisk Hull, + Or swan that swims on Trent. + + This maiden on a morn betime + Goes forth when May is in its prime, + To get sweet setywall, + The honeysuckle, the hurlock, + The lily and the lady-smock, + To deck her father's hall. +</pre> +<p class="cite"> + "'Ah,' cried my lord, when Meg had ended her song, beshrew me, if + Monsieur Sebastian's madrigals are one-half so dainty as this + English piece of harmony.' And then,—for his lordship's head is at + present running on pageants such as he witnessed at Nonsuch and at + Oxford,—he would have me call into the garden Madge and Bess, + whilst he fetched his brothers to take part in a May game, not + indeed in season now, but which, he says, is too good sport not to + be followed all the year round. So he must needs dress himself as + Robin Hood, with a wreath on his head and a sheaf of arrows in his + girdle, and me as Maid Marian; and Meg, for that she is taller by an + inch than any of us, though younger than him and me, he said should + play Little John, and Bess Friar Tuck, for that she looks so + gleesome and has a face so red and round. 'And Tom,' he cried, 'thou + needst not be at pains to change thy name, for we will dub thee Tom + the piper.' 'And what is Will to be?' asked my Lady Bess, who, since + I be titled Countess of Surrey, must needs be styled My Lady William + Howard.' 'Why, there's only the fool left,' quoth my lord, 'for thy + sweetheart to play, Bess.' At the which her ladyship and his + lordship too began to stamp and cry, and would have sobbed outright, + but sweet Madge, whose face waxes so white and her eyes so large and + blue that methinks she is more like to an angel than a child, put + out her little thin hands with a pretty gesture, and said, 'I'll be + the fool, brother Surrey, and Will shall be the dragon, and Bess + ride the hobby-horse, an it will please her.' 'Nay, but she is Friar + Tuck,' quoth my lord, 'and should not ride.' 'And prithee wherefore + no?' cried the forward imp, who, now she no more fears her grandam's + rod, has grown very saucy and bold; 'why should not the good friar + ride, an it doth pleasure him?' +<br><br> + "At the which we laughed and fell to acting our parts with no little + merriment and noise, and sundry reprehensions from my lord when we + mistook our postures or the lines he would have us to recite. And at + the end he set up a pole on the grass-plat for the Maying, and we + danced and sung around it to a merry tune, which set our feet flying + in time with the music: +</p> +<pre> + Now in the month of maying, + When the merry lads are playing, + Fa, la, la. + + Each with his bonny lasse, + Upon the greeny grasse, + Fa, la, la. +</pre> +<p class="cite"> + Madge was not strong enough to dance, but she stole away to gather + white and blue violets, and made a fair garland to set on my head, + to my lord's great content, and would have me unloose my hair on my + shoulders, which fell nearly to my feet, and waved in the wind in a + wild fashion; which he said was beseeming for a bold outlaw's bride, + and what he had seen in the Maid Marian, who had played in the + pageant at Nonsuch. Mrs. Fawcett misdoubted that this sport of ours + should be approved by Mr. Charke, who calls all <a name="170">{170}</a> stage-playing + Satan's recreations, and a sure road unto hell; and that we shall + hear on it in his next preachment; for he has held forth to her at + length on that same point, and upbraided her for that she did suffer + such foolish and profane pastimes to be carried on in his grace's + house. Ah me! I see no harm in it; and if, when my lord visits me, I + play not with him as he chooses, 'tis not a thing to be expected + that he will come only to sing psalms or play chess, which Mr. + Charke holds to be the only game it befits Christians to entertain + themselves with. 'Tis hard to know what is right and wrong when + persons be of such different minds, and no ghostly adviser to be + had, such as I was used to at my grandmother's house. +<br><br> + "All, Mistress Constance! when I last wrote unto you I said troubles + was the word in every one's mouth, and ere I had finished this + letter—which I was then writing, and have kept by me ever + since—what, think you, has befallen us? 'Tis anent the marriage of + his grace with the Queen of Scots; which I now do wish it had + pleased God none had ever thought of. Some weeks since my lord had + told me, with great glee, that the Spanish ambassador was about to + petition her majesty the queen for the release of her highness's + cousin; and Higford and Bannister, and the rest of his grace's + household—whom, since Mr. Martin went beyond seas, my lord spends + much of his time with, and more of it methinks than is beseeming or + to the profit of his manners and advancement of his behavior—have + told him that this would prepare the way for the + greatly-to-be-desired end of his grace's marriage with that queen; + and my lord was reckoning up all the fine sports and pageants and + noble entertainments would be enacted at Kenninghall and Thetford + when that right princely wedding should take place; and how he + should himself carry the train of the queen-duchess when she went + into church; who was the fairest woman, he said, in the whole world, + and none ever seen to be compared with her since the days of Grecian + Helen. But when, some days ago, I questioned my lord touching the + success of the ambassador's suits, and the queen's answer thereto, + he said: 'By my troth, Nan, I understand that her highness sent away + the gooseman, for so she entitled Senor Guzman, with a flea in his + ear; for she said he had come on a fool's errand, and gave him for + her answer that she would advise the Queen of Scots to bear her + condition with less impatience, or she might chance to find some of + those on whom she relied shorter by a head.' Oh, my lord,' I cried; + 'my dear Phil! God send she was not speaking of his grace your + father!' 'Nan,' quoth he, 'she looked at his grace the next day with + looks of so great anger and disdain, that my lord of Leicester—that + false and villainous knave—gave signs of so great triumph as if his + grace was even on his way to the Tower. Beshrew me, if I would not + run my rapier through his body if I could!' 'And where is his grace + at present?' I asked. 'He came to town night,' quoth my lord, 'with + my Arundel, and this morning went Kenninghall.' After this for some + days I heard no more, for a new tutor came to my lord, who suffers + him not to stay in the waiting-room with his grace's gentlemen, and + keeps so strict a hand over him touching his studies, that in his + brief hours of recreation he would rather play at quoits, and other + active pastimes, than converse with his lady. Alack! I wish he were + a few years older, and I should have more comfort of him than now, + when I must needs put up with his humors, which be as changeful, by + reason of his great youth, as the lights and shades on the grass + 'neath an aspen-tree. I must be throwing a ball for hours, or + learning a stage-part, when I would fain speak of the weighty + matters which be on hand, such as I have told you of. Howsoever, as + good luck would have it, my Lady Lumley sent for me to spend <a name="171">{171}</a> + the day with her; and from her ladyship I learnt that his grace had + written to the queen that he had withdrawn from the court because of + the pain he felt at her displeasure, and his mortification at the + treatment he had been subjected to by the insolence of his foes, by + whom he has been made a common table talk; and that her majesty had + laid upon him her commands straightway to return to court. That was + all was known that day; but at the very time that I was writing the + first of these woeful tidings to you, Mistress Constance, his grace— + whom I now know that I do love dearly, and with a true daughter's + heart, by the dreadful fear and pain I am in—was arrested at + Burnham, where he had stopped on his road to Windsor, and committed + to the Tower. Alack! alack! what will follow? I will leave this my + letter open until I have further news to send. +<br><br> + "His grace was examined this day before my Lord-keeper Bacon, and my + Lords Northampton, Sadler, Bedford, and Cecil; and they have + reported to her majesty that the duke had not put himself under + penalty of the law by any overt act of treason, and that it would be + difficult to convict him without this. My Lord of Arundel, at whose + house I was when these tidings came, said her majesty was so angered + at this judgment, that she cried out in a passion, 'Away! what the + law fails to do my authority shall effect;' and straightway fell + into a fit, her passion was so great; and they were forced to apply + vinegar to restore her. I had a wicked thought come into my mind, + Mistress Constance, that I should not have been concerned if the + queen's majesty had died in that fit, which I befear me was high + treason, and a mortal sin, to wish for one to die in a state of sin. + But, alack! since I have left going to shrift I find it hard to + fight against bad thoughts and naughty tempers; and when I say my + prayers, and the old words come to my lips, which the preachments I + hear do contradict, I am sometimes well-nigh tempted to give over + praying at all. But I pray to God I may never be so wicked; and + though I may not have my beads (which were taken from me), that the + good Bishop of Durham gave me when I was confirmed, I use my fingers + in their stead; and whilst his grace was at the Tower I did say as + many 'Hail Maries' in one day as I ever did in my life before; and + promised him, who is God's own dear Son and hers, if his grace came + out of prison, never to be a day of my life without saying a prayer, + or giving an alms, or doing a good turn to those which be in the + same case, near at hand or throughout the world; and I ween there + are many such of all sorts at this time. +<br><br> + "Your loving servant to command, whose heart is at present heavier + than her pen,<br> + "ANN SURREY." +<br><br> + "P. S. My Lord of Westmoreland has left London, and his lady is in a + sad plight. I hear such things said on all sides touching Papists as + I can scarce credit, and I pray to God they be not true. But an if + they be so bad as some do say, why does his grace run his head into + danger for the sake of the Popish queen, as men do style her? They + have arrested Higford and Bannister last night, and they are to + taste of the rack to-day, to satisfy the queen, who is so urgent on + it. My lord is greatly concerned thereat, and cried when he spoke of + it, albeit he tried to hide his tears. I asked him to show me what + sort of pain it was; whereupon he twisted my arm till I cried out + and bade him desist. God help me! I could not have endured the pain + an instant longer; and if they have naught to tell anent these plots + and against his grace, they needs must speak what is false when + under the rack. Oh, 'tis terrible to think what men do suffer and + cause others to suffer!" +</p> +<p> +This letter came into my hand on a day when my father had gone into +Lichfield touching some business; and <a name="172">{172}</a> he brought with it the +news of a rising in the north, and that his Grace of Northumberland +and my Lord of Westmoreland had taken arms on hearing of the Duke of +Norfolk's arrest; and the Catholics, under Mr. Richard Norton and Lord +Latimer, had joined their standard, and were bearing the cross before +the insurgents. My father was sore cast down at these tidings; for he +looked for no good from what was rebellion against a lawful sovereign, +and a consorting with troublesome spirits, swayed by no love of our +holy religion but rather contrary to it, as my Lord of Westmoreland +and some others of those leading lords. And he hence foreboded fresh +trials to all such as were of the ancient faith all over England; +which was not long in accruing even in our own case; for a short time +after, we were for the first time visited by pursuivants, on a day and +in such a manner as I will now briefly relate. +</p> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER IV.</h2> +<br> +<p> +On the Sunday morning which followed the day on which the news had +reached us of the rising in Northumberland, I went, as was my wont, +into my mother's dressing-room, to crave her blessing, and I asked of +her if the priest who came to say mass for us most Sundays had +arrived. She said he had been, and had gone away again, and that she +greatly feared we should have no prayers that day, saving such as we +might offer up for ourselves; "together," she added after a pause, +"with a bitter sacrifice of tears and of such sufferings as we have +heard of, but as yet not known the taste of ourselves." +</p> +<p> +Again I felt in my heart a throbbing feeling, which had in it an +admixture of pain and joy—made up, I ween, of conflicting +passions—such as curiosity feeding on the presentment of an +approaching change; of the motions of grace in a soul which faintly +discerns the happiness of suffering for conscience sake; and the fear +of suffering natural to the human heart. +</p> +<p> +"Why are we to have no mass, sweet mother?" I asked, encircling her +waist in my arms; "and wherefore has good Mr. Bryan gone away?" +</p> +<p> +"We received advice late last evening," she answered, "that the +queen's pursuivants have orders to search this day the houses of the +most noted recusants in this neighborhood; and 'tis likely they may +begin with us, who have never made a secret of our faith, and never +will." +</p> +<p> +"And will they kill us if they come?" I asked, with that same +trembling eagerness I have so often known since when danger was at +hand. +</p> +<p> +"Not now, not to-day, Conny," she answered; "but I pray to God they do +not carry us away to prison; for since this rising in the north, to be +a Catholic and a traitor is one and the same in their eyes who have to +judge us. We must needs hide our books and church furniture; so give +me thy beads, sweet one, and the cross from thy neck." +</p> +<p> +I waxed red when my mother bade me unloose the string, and tightly +clasped the cross in both my hands "Let them kill me, mother," I +cried; "but take not off my cross." +</p> +<p> +"Maybe," she said, "the queen's officers would trample on it, and +injure their own souls in dishonoring a holy symbol." And as she spoke +she took it from me, and hid it in a recess behind the chimney; which +no sooner was done, than we heard a sound of horses' feet in the +approach; and going to the window, I cried out, "Here is a store of +armed men on horseback!" Ere I had uttered the words, one of them had +dismounted and loudly knocked at the door with his truncheon; upon +which my mother, taking me by the hand, went down stairs into the +parlor where my father was. It seemed as if those knocks had struck on +her heart, so great a trembling came over her. My father bade the +servants throw <a name="173">{173}</a> open the door; and the sheriff came in, with two +pursuivants and some more men with him, and produced a warrant to +search the house; which my father having read, he bowed his head, and +gave orders not to hinder them in their duty. He stood himself the +while in the hall, his face as white as a smock, and his teeth almost +running through his lips. +</p> +<p> +One of the men came into the library, and pulling down the books, +scattered them on the floor, and cried: +</p> +<p> +"Look ye here, sirs, what Popish stuff is this, fit for the hangman's +burning!" At the which another answered: +</p> +<p> +"By my troth, Sam, I misdoubt that thou canst read. Methinks thou dost +hunt Popery as dogs do game, by the scent. Prithee spell me the title +of this volume." +</p> +<p> +"I will have none of thy gibing, Master Sevenoaks," returned the +other. "Whether I be a scholar or not, I'll warrant no honest +gospeller wrote on those yellow musty leaves, which be two hundred +years old, if they be a day." +</p> +<p> +"And I'll warrant thee in that credence, Master Samuel, by the same +token that the volume in thy hand is a treatise on field-sports, writ +in the days of Master Caxton; a code of the laws to be observed in the +hunting and killing of deer, which I take to be no Popish sport, for +our most gracious queen—God save her majesty!—slew a fat buck not +long ago in Windsor Forest with her own hand, and remembered his grace +of Canterbury with half her prey;" and so saying, he drew his comrade +from the room; I ween with the intent to save the books from his rough +handling, for he seemed of a more gentle nature than the rest and of a +more moderate disposition. +</p> +<p> +When they had ransacked all the rooms below, they went upstairs, and +my father followed. Breaking from my mother's side, who sat pale and +still as a statute, unable to move from her seat, I ran after him, and +on the landing-place I heard the sheriff say somewhat touching the +harboring of priests; to the which he made answer that he was ready to +swear there was no priest in the house. "Nor has been?" quoth the +sheriff; upon which my father said: +</p> +<p> +"Good sir, this house was built in the days of Her majesty's +grandfather, King Henry VII.; and on one occasion his majesty was +pleased to rest under my grandfather's roof, and to hear mass in that +room," he said, pointing to what was now the chapel, "the church being +too distant for his majesty's convenience: so priests have been within +these walls many times ere I was born." +</p> +<p> +The sheriff said no more at that time, but went into the room, where +there were only a few chairs, for that in the night the altar and all +that appertained to it had been removed. He and his men were going out +again, when a loud knocking was heard against the wall on one side of +the chamber; at the sound of which my father's face, which was white +before, became of an ashy paleness. +</p> +<p> +"Ah!" cried one of the pursuivants, "the lying Papist! The egregious +Roman! an oath is in his mouth that he has no priest in his house, and +here is one hidden in his cupboard." +</p> +<p> +"Mr. Sherwood!" the sheriff shouted, greatly moved, "lead the way to +the hiding-place wherein a traitor is concealed, or I order the house +to be pulled down about your ears." +</p> +<p> +My father was standing like one stunned by a sudden blow, and I heard +him murmur, "'Tis the devil's own doing, or else I am stark, staring +mad." +</p> +<p> +The men ran to the wall, and knocked against it with their sticks, +crying out in an outrageous manner to the priest to come out of his +hole. "We'll unearth the Jesuit fox," cried one; "we'll give him a +better lodging in Lichfield gaol," shouted another; and the sheriff +kept threatening to set fire to the house. Still the knocking from +within went on, as if <a name="174">{174}</a> answering that outside, and then a voice +cried out, "I cannot open: I am shut in." +</p> +<p> +"'Tis Edmund!" I exclaimed; "'tis Edmund is in the hiding-place." And +then the words were distinctly heard, "'Tis I; 'tis Edmund Genings. +For God's sake, open; I am shut in." Upon which my father drew a deep +breath, and hastening forward, pressed his finger on a place in the +wall, the panel slipped, and Edmund came out of the recess, looking +scared and confused. The pursuivants seized him; but the sheriff cried +out, surprised, "God's death, sirs! but 'tis the son of the worshipful +Mr. Genings, whose lady is a mother in Israel, and M. Jean de Luc's +first cousin! And how came ye, Mr. Edmund, to be concealed in this +Popish den? Have these recusants imprisoned you with some foul intent, +or perverted you by their vile cunning?" Edmund was addressing my +father in an agitated voice. +</p> +<p> +"I fear me, sir," he cried, clasping his hands, "I befear me much I +have affrighted you, and I have been myself sorely affrighted. I was +passing through this room, which I have never before seen, and the +door of which was open this morn. By chance I drew my hand along the +wall, where there was no apparent mark, when the panel slipped and +disclosed this recess, into which I stepped, and straightway the +opening closed and I remained in darkness. I was afraid no one might +hear me, and I should die of hunger." +</p> +<p> +My father tried to smile, but could not. "Thank God," he said, "'tis +no worse;" and sinking down on a chair he remained silent, whilst the +sheriff and the pursuivants examined the recess, which was deep and +narrow, and in which they brandished their swords in all directions. +Then they went round the room, feeling the walls; but though there was +another recess with a similar mode of aperture, they hit not on it, +doubtless through God's mercy; for in it were concealed the altar +furniture and our books, with many other things besides, which they +would have seized on. +</p> +<p> +Before going away, the sheriff questioned Edmund concerning his faith, +and for what reason he abode in a Popish house and consorted with +recusants. Edmund answered he was no Papist, but a kinsman of Mrs. +Sherwood, unto whose house his father had oftentimes sent him. Upon +which he was counselled to take heed unto himself and to eschew evil +company, which leads to horrible defections, and into the straight +road to perdition. Whereupon they departed; and the officer who had +enticed his companion from the library smiled as he passed me, and +said: +</p> +<p> +"And wherefore not at prayers, little mistress, on the Lord's day, as +all Christian folks should be?" +</p> +<p> +I ween he was curious to see how I should answer, albeit not moved +thereunto by any malicious intent. But at the time I did not bethink +myself that he spoke of Protestant service; and being angered at what +passed, I said: +</p> +<p> +"Because we be kept from prayers by the least welcome visit ever made +to Christian folks on a Lord's morning." He laughed and cried: +</p> +<p> +"Thou hast a ready tongue, young mistress; and when tried for +recusancy I warrant thou'lt give the judge a piece of thy mind." +</p> +<p> +"And if I ever be in such a presence, and for such a cause," I +answered, "I pray to God I may say to my lord on the bench what the +blessed apostle St. Peter spoke to his judges: 'If it be just in the +sight of God to hear you rather than God, judge ye.'" At which he +cried: +</p> +<p> +"Why, here is a marvel indeed—a Papist to quote Scripture!" And +laughing again, he went his way; and the house was for that time rid +of these troublesome guests. +</p> +<p> +Then Edmund again sued for pardon to my father, that through his rash +conduct he had been the occasion of so great fear and trouble to him. +</p> +<a name="175">{175}</a> +<p> +"I warrant thee, my good boy," quoth my father, "thou didst cause me +the most keen anguish, and the most sudden relief from it, which can +well be thought of; and so no more need be said thereon. And as thou +must needs be going to the public church, 'tis time that thou bestir +thyself; for 'tis a long walk there and back, and the sun waxing hot." +</p> +<p> +When Edmund was gone, and I alone with him, my father clasped me in +his arms, and cried: +</p> +<p> +"God send, my wench, thou mayest justify thy sponsors who gave thee +thy name in baptism; for 'tis a rare constancy these times do call +for, and such as is not often seen, saving in such as be of a noble +and religious spirit; which I pray to God may be the case with thee." +</p> +<p> +My mother did not speak, but went away with her hand pressed against +her heart; which was what of late I had often seen her to do, as if +the pain was more than she could bear. +</p> +<p> +One hour later, as I was crossing the court, a man met me suited as a +farmer; who, when I passed him, laid his hand on my shoulder; at the +which I started, and turning round saw it was Father Bryan; who, +smiling as I caught his hand, cried out: +</p> +<p> +"Dost know the shepherd in his wolf's clothing, little mistress?" and +hastening on to the chapel he said mass, at the which only a few +assisted, as my parents durst not send to the Catholics so late in the +day. As soon as mass was over, Mr. Bryan said he must leave, for there +was a warrant issued for his apprehension; and our house famed for +recusancy, so as he might not stay in it but with great peril to +himself and to its owners. We stood at the door as he was mounting his +horse, and my father said, patting its neck: +</p> +<p> +"Tis a faithful servant this, reverend father; many a mile he has +carried thee to the homes of the sick and dying since our troubles +began." +</p> +<p> +"Ah! good Mr. Sherwood," Mr. Bryan replied, as he gathered up the +bridle, "thou hast indeed warrant to style the poor beast faithful. If +I were to shut my eyes and let him go, no doubt but he would find his +way to the doors of such as cleave to the ancient faith, in city or in +hamlet, across moor or through thick wood. If a pursuivant bestrode +him, he might discover through his means who be recusants a hundred +miles around. But I bethink me he would not budge with such a burthen +on his back; and that he who made the prophet's ass to speak, would, +give the good beast more sense than to turn informer, and to carry the +wolf to the folds of the lambs. And prithee, Mistress Constance," said +the good priest, turning to me, "canst keep a secret and be silent, +when men's lives are in jeopardy?" +</p> +<p> +"Aye," cried my father quickly, "'tis as much as worthy Mr. Bryan's +life is worth that none should know he was here to-day." +</p> +<p> +"More than my poor life is worth," he rejoined; "that were little to +think of, my good friends. For five years I have made it my prayer +that the day may soon come—and I care not how soon—when I may lay it +down for his sake who gave it. But we must e'en have a care for those +who are so rash as to harbor priests in these evil times. So Mistress +Constance must e'en study the virtue of silence, and con the meaning +of the proverb which teacheth discretion to be the best part of +valor." +</p> +<p> +"If Edmund Genings asketh me, reverend father, if I have heard mass +to-day, what must I answer?" +</p> +<p> +"Say the queen's majesty has forbidden mass to be said in this her +kingdom; and if he presseth thee more closely thereon, why then tell +him the last news from the poultry-yard, and that the hares have eat +thy mignonette; which they be doing even now, if my eyes deceive me +not," said the good father, pointing with his whip to the +flower-garden. +</p> +<p> +So, smiling, he gave us a last blessing, and rode on toward the Chase, +and I went to drive the hares away <a name="176">{176}</a> from the flower-beds, and +then to set the chapel in fair order. And ever and anon, that day and +the next, I took out of my pocket my sweet Lady Surrey's last letter, +and pictured to myself all the scenes therein related; so that I +seemed to live one-half of my life with her in thought, so greatly was +my fancy set upon her, and my heart concerned in her troubles. +</p> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER V.</h2> +<br> +<p> +Not many days after the sheriff and the pursuivants had been at our +house, and Mr. Bryan, by reason of the bloody laws which had been +enacted against Papists and such as harbor priests, had left us,— +though intending to return at such times as might serve our commodity, +and yet not affect our safety,—I was one morning assisting my mother +in the store-room, wherein she was setting aside such provisions as +were to be distributed to the poor that week, together with salves, +medicines, and the like, which she also gave out of charity, when a +spasm came over her, so vehement and painful, that for the moment she +lost the use of speech, and made signs to me to call for help. I ran +affrighted into the library for my father, and brought him to her, +upon which, in a little time, she did somewhat recover, but desired he +would assist her to her own chamber, whither she went leaning on his +arm. When laid on her bed she seemed easier; and smiling, bade me +leave them for awhile, for that she desired to have speech with my +father alone. +</p> +<p> +For the space of an hour I walked in the garden, with so oppressive a +grief at my heart as I had never before experienced. Methinks the +great stillness in the air added thereunto some sort of physical +disorder; for the weather was very close and heavy; and if a leaf did +but stir, I started as if danger was at hand; and the noise of the +chattering pies over my head worked in me an apprehensive melancholy, +foreboding, I doubt not, what was to follow. At about eleven o'clock, +hearing the sound of a horse's feet in the avenue, I turned round, and +saw Edmund riding from the house; upon which I ran across the grass to +a turning of the road where he would pass, and called to him to stop, +which he did; and told me he was going to Lichfield for his father, +whom my mother desired presently to see. "Then thou shouldst not +tarry," I said; and he pushed on and left me standing where I was; but +the bell then ringing for dinner, I went back to the house, and, in so +doing, took notice of a bay-tree on the lawn which was withered and +dried-up, though the gardener had been at pains to preserve it by +sundry appliances and frequent watering of it. Then it came to my +remembrance what my nurse used to say, that the dying of that sort of +tree is a sure omen of a death in a family; which thought sorely +disturbed me at that time. I sat down with my father to a brief and +silent meal; and soon after the physician he had sent for came, whom +he conducted to my mother's chamber, whereunto I did follow, and +slipped in unperceived. Sitting on one side of the bed, behind the +curtains, I heard her say, in a voice which sounded hollow and weak, +"Good Master Lawrenson, my dear husband was fain to send for you, and +I cared not to withstand him, albeit persuaded that I am hastening to +my journey's end, and that naught that you or any other man may +prescribe may stay what is God's will. And if this be visible to you +as it is to me, I pray you keep it not from me, for it will be to my +much comfort to be assured of it." +</p> +<p> +When she had done speaking, he did feel her pulse; and the while my +heart beat so quick and, as it seemed to me, so loud as if it must +needs impede my hearing; but in a moment I heard him say: "God defend, +good madam, I should deceive you. While there is life, there is hope. +Greater <a name="177">{177}</a> comfort I dare not urge. If there be any temporal matter +on your mind, 'twere better settled now, and likewise of your soul's +health, by such pious exercises as are used by those of your way of +thinking." +</p> +<p> +At the hearing of these his words, my father fetched a deep sigh; but +she, as one greatly relieved, clasped her hands together, and cried, +"My God, I thank thee!" +</p> +<p> +Then, stealing from behind the curtain, I laid my head on the pillow +nigh unto hers, and whispered, "Sweet mother, prithee do not die, or +else take me with thee." +</p> +<p> +But she, as one not heeding, exclaimed, with her hands uplifted, "O +faithless heart! O selfish heart! to be so glad of death!" +</p> +<p> +The physician was directing the maids what they should do for her +relief when the pain came on, and he himself stood compounding some +medicine for her to take. My father asked of him when he next would +come; and he answered, "On the morrow;" but methinks 'twas even then +his belief that there would be no morrow for her who was dying before +her time, like the bay-tree in our garden. She bade him farewell in a +kindly fashion; and when we were alone, I lying on the bed by her +side, and my father sitting at its head, she said, in a low voice, +"How wonderful be God's dealings with us, and how fatherly his care; +in that he takes the weak unto himself, and leaves behind the strong +to fight the battle now at hand! My dear master, I had a dream +yesternight which had somewhat of horror in it, but more methinks of +comfort." My father breaking out then in sighs and tears as if his +heart would break, she said, "Oh, but thou must hear and acknowledge, +my loved master, how gracious is God's providence to thy poor wife. +When thou knowest what I have suffered—not in body, though that has +been sharp too, but in my soul—it will reconcile thine own to a +parting which has in it so much of mercy. Thou dost remember the night +when Mr. Mush was here, and what his discourse did run on?" +</p> +<p> +"Surely do I, sweet wife," he answered; "for it was such as the mind +doth not easily lose the memory of; the sufferings and glorious end of +the blessed martyr Mrs. Clitherow. I perceived what sorrowful heed +thou didst lend to his recital; but has it painfully dwelt in thy mind +since?" +</p> +<p> +"By day and by night it hath not left me; ever recurring to my +thoughts, ever haunting my dreams, and working in me a fearful +apprehension lest in a like trial I should be found wanting, and prove +a traitor to God and his Church, and a disgrace and heartbreak to thee +who hast so truly loved me far beyond my deserts. I have bragged of +the dangers of the times, even as cowards are wont to speak loud in +the dark to still by the sound of their own voices the terrors they do +feel. I have had before my eyes the picture of that cruel death, and +of the children extremely used for answering as their mother had +taught them, till cold drops of sweat have stood on my brow, and I +have knelt in my chamber wringing my hands and praying to be spared a +like trial. And then, maybe an hour later, sitting at the table, I +spake merrily of the gallows, mocking my own fears, as when Mr. Bryan +was last here; and I said that priests should be more welcome to me +than ever they were, now that virtue and the Catholic cause were made +felony; and the same would be in God's sight more meritorious than +ever before: upon which, 'Then you must prepare your neck for the +rope,' quoth he, in a pleasant but withal serious manner; at the which +a cold chill overcame me, and I very well-nigh faulted, though +constraining my tongue to say, 'God's will be done; but I am far +unworthy of so great an honor.' The cowardly heart belied the +confident tongue, and fear of my own weakness affrighted me, by the +which I must needs have offended God, who helps such as trust <a name="178">{178}</a> in +him. But I hope to be forgiven, inasmuch as it has ever been the wont +of my poor thoughts to picture evils beforehand in such a form as to +scare the soul, which, when it came to meet with them, was not shaken +from its constancy. When Conny was an infant I have stood nigh unto a +window with her in my arms, and of a sudden a terror would seize me +lest I should let her fall out of my hands, which yet clasped her; and +methinks 'twas somewhat of alike feeling which worked in me touching +the denying of my faith, which, God is my witness, is dearer to me +than aught upon earth." +</p> +<p> +"'Tis even so, sweet wife," quoth my father; "the edge of a too keen +conscience and a sensitive apprehension of defects visible to thine +own eyes and God's—never to mine, who was ever made happy by thy love +and virtue—have worn out the frame which enclosed them, and will rob +me of the dearest comfort of my life, if I must lose thee." +</p> +<p> +She looked upon him with so much sweetness, as if the approach of +death had brought her greater peace and joy than life had ever done, +and she replied: "Death comes to me as a compassionate angel, and I +fain would have thee welcome with me the kindly messenger who brings +so great relief to the poor heart thou hast so long cherished. Now, +thou art called to another task; and when the bruised, broken reed is +removed from thy side, thou wilt follow the summons which even now +sounds in thine ears." +</p> +<p> +"Ah," cried my father, clasping her hand, "art thou then already a +saint, sweet wife, that thou hast read the vow slowly registered as +yet in the depths of a riven heart?" Then his eyes turned on me; and +she, who seemed to know his thoughts, that sweet soul who had been so +silent in life, but was now spending her last breath in +never-to-be-forgotten words, answered the question contained in that +glance as if it had been framed in a set speech. +</p> +<p> +"Fear not for her," she said, laying her cheek close unto mine. "As +her days, so shall her strength be. Methinks Almighty God has given +her a spirit meet for the age in which her lot is cast. The early +training thou hast had, my wench; the lack of such memories as make +the present twofold bitter; the familiar mention round thy cradle of +such trials as do beset Catholics in these days, have nurtured thee a +stoutness of heart which will stand thee in good stead amidst the +rough waves of this troublesome world. The iron will not enter into +thy soul as it hath done into mine." Upon which she fell back +exhausted and for a while no sound was heard in or about the house +save the barking of our great dog. +</p> +<p> +My father had sent a messenger to a house where we had had notice days +before Father Ford was staying but with no certain knowledge he still +there, or any other priest in neighborhood, which occasioned him no +small disquietude, for my mother's strength seemed to be visibly +sinking which was what the doctor's words had led him to expect. The +man he sent returned not till the evening; in the afternoon Mr. +Genings and son came from Lichfield, which, when my mother heard, she +said God was gracious to permit her once more to see John, which was +Mr. Genings' name. They had been reared in the same house; and a +kindness had always continued betwixt them. For some time past he had +conformed to the times; and since his marriage with the daughter of a +French Huguenot who lived in London, and who was a lady of very +commendable character and manners, and strenuous in her own way of +thinking, he had left off practising his own religion in secret, which +for a while he used to do. When he came in, and saw death plainly writ +in his cousin's face, he was greatly moved, and knelt down by her side +with a very sorrowful countenance; upon which she straightly looked at +him, and said: "Cousin John, my <a name="179">{179}</a> breath is very short, as my time +is also like to be. But one word I would fain say to thee before I +die. I was always well pleased with my religion, which was once thine +and that of all Christian people one hundred years ago; but I have +never been so well pleased with it as now, when I be about to meet my +Judge." +</p> +<p> +Mr. Genings' features worked with a strange passion, in which was more +of grief than displeasure, and grasping his son's shoulder, who was +likewise kneeling and weeping, he said: "You have wrought with this +boy, cousin, to make him a Catholic." +</p> +<p> +"As heaven is my witness," she answered, "not otherwise but by my +prayers." +</p> +<p> +"Hast thou seen a priest, cousin Constance?" he then asked: upon which +my mother not answering, the poor man burst into tears, and cried: +"Oh, cousin—cousin Constance, dost count me a spy, and at thy +death-bed?" +</p> +<p> +He seemed cut to the heart; whereupon she gave him her hand, and said +she hoped God would send her such ghostly assistance as she stood in +need of; and praying God to bless him and his wife and children, and +make them his faithful servants, so she might meet them all in +perpetual happiness, she spoke with such good cheer, and then bade him +and Edmund farewell with so pleasant a smile, as deceived them into +thinking her end not so near. And so, after a while, they took their +leave; upon which she composed herself for a while in silence, +occupying her thoughts in prayer; and toward evening, through God's +mercy, albeit the messenger had returned with the heavy news that +Father Ford had left the county some days back, it happened that Mr. +Watson, a secular priest who had lately arrived in England, and was on +his way to Chester, stopped at our house, whereunto Mr. Orton, whom he +had seen in prison at London, had directed him for his own convenience +on the road, and likewise our commodity, albeit little thinking how +great our need would be at that time of so opportune a guest, through +whose means that dear departing soul had the benefit of the last +sacraments with none to trouble or molest her, and such ghostly aid as +served to smooth her passage to what has proved, I doubt not, the +beginning of a happy eternity, if we may judge by such tokens as the +fervent acts of contrition she made both before and after shrift, such +as might have served to wash away ten thousand sins through his blood +who cleansed her, and her great and peaceable joy at receiving him +into her heart whom she soon trusted to behold. Her last words were +expressions of wonder and gratitude at God's singular mercy shown unto +her in the quiet manner of her death in the midst of such troublesome +times. And methinks, when the silver cord was loosed, and naught was +left of her on earth save the fair corpse which retained in death the +semblance it had had in life, that together with the natural grief +which found vent in tears, there remained in the hearts of such as +loved her a comfortable sense of the Divine goodness manifested in +this her peaceable removal. +</p> +<p> +How great the change which that day wrought in me may be judged of by +such who, at the age I had then reached to, have met with a like +affliction, coupled with a sense of duties to be fulfilled, such as +then fell to my lot, both as touching household cares, and in respect +to the cheering of my father in his solitary hours during the time we +did yet continue at Sherwood Hall, which was about a year. It waxed +very hard then for priests to make their way to the houses of +Catholics, as many now found it to their interest to inform against +them and such as harbored them; and mostly in our neighborhood, +wherein there were at that time no recusants of so great rank and note +that the sheriff would not be lief to meddle with them. We had +oftentimes had secret advices to beware of such and such of our +servants who might betray our hidden conveyances of safety; and my +father scarcely durst <a name="180">{180}</a> be sharp with them when they offended by +slacking their duties, lest they might bring us into danger if they +revealed, upon any displeasure, priests having abided with us. Edmund +we saw no more since my mother's death; and after a while the news did +reach us that Mr. Genings had died of the small-pox, and left his wife +in so distressed a condition, against all expectation, owing to debts +he had incurred, that she had been constrained to sell her house and +furniture, and was living in a small lodging near unto the school +where Edmund continued his studies. +</p> +<p> +I noticed, as time went by, how heavily it weighed on my father's +heart to see so many Catholics die without the sacraments, or fall +away from their faith, for lack of priests to instruct them, like so +many sheep without a shepherd; and I guessed by words he let fall on +divers occasions, that the intent obscurely shadowed forth in his +discourse to my mother on her deathbed was ripening to a settled +purpose, and tending to a change in his state of life, which only his +love and care for me caused him to defer. What I did apprehend must +one day needs occur, was hastened about this time by a warning he did +receive that on an approaching day he would be apprehended and carried +by the sheriff before the council at Lichfield, to be examined +touching recusancy and harboring of priests; which was what he had +long expected. This message was, as it were, the signal he had been +waiting for, and an indication of God's will in his regard. He made +instant provision for the placing of his estate in the hands of a +friend of such singular honesty and so faithful a friendship toward +himself, though a Protestant, that he could wholly trust him. And next +he set himself to dispose of her whom he did term his most dear +earthly treasure, and his sole tie to this perishable world, which he +resolved to do by straightway sending her to London, unto his sister +Mistress Congleton, who had oftentimes offered, since his wife's +death, to take charge of this daughter, and to whom he now despatched +a messenger with a letter, wherein he wrote that the times were now so +troublesome, he must needs leave his home, and take advantage of the +sisterly favor she had willed to show him in the care of his sole +child, whom he now would forthwith send to London, commending her to +her good keeping, touching her safety and religious and virtuous +training, and that he should be more beholden to her than ever brother +was to sister, and, as long as he lived, as he was bound to do, pray +for her and her good husband. When this letter was gone, and order had +been taken for my journey, which was to be on horseback, and in the +charge of a maiden gentlewoman who had been staying some months in our +neighborhood, and was now about in two days to travel to London, it +seemed to me as if that which I had long expected and pictured unto +myself had now come upon me of a sudden, and in such wise as for the +first time to taste its bitterness. For I saw, without a doubt, that +this parting was but the forerunner of a change in my father's +condition as great and weighty as could well be thought of. But of +this howbeit our thoughts were full of it, no talk was ministered +between us. He said I should hear from him in London; and that he +should now travel into Lancashire and Cheshire, changing his name, and +often shifting his quarters whilst the present danger lasted. The day +which was to be the last to see us in the house wherein himself and +his fathers for many centuries back, and I his unworthy child, had +been born, was spent in such fashion as becometh those who suffer for +conscience sake, and that is with so much sorrow as must needs be felt +by a loving father and a dutiful child in a first and doubtful +parting, with so much regret as is natural in the abandonment of a +peaceful earthly home, wherein God had been served in a Catholic +manner for many generations and up to that time without +discontinuance, only of late years as it were by <a name="181">{181}</a> night and +stealth, which was linked in their memories with sundry innocent joys +and pleasures, and such griefs as do hallow and endear the visible +scenes wherewith they be connected, but withal with a stoutness of +heart in him, and a youthful steadiness in her whom he had infected +with a like courage unto his own, which wrought in them so as to be of +good cheer and shed no more tears on so moving an occasion than the +debility of her nature and the tenderness of his paternal care +extorted from their eyes when he placed her on her horse, and the +bridle in the hand of the servant who was to accompany her to London. +Their last parting was a brief one, and such as I care not to be +minute in describing; for thinking upon it even now 'tis like to make +me weep; which I would not do whilst writing this history, in the +recital of which there should be more of constancy and thankful +rejoicing in God's great mercies, than of womanish softness in looking +back to past trials. So I will even break off at this point; and in +the next chapter relate the course of the journey which was begun on +that day. +</p> +<p> +[TO BE CONTINUED. <a href="#349">Page 349</a>] +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>Abridged from Le Correspondant. +<br><br> +THE MARQUIS DE CHASTELLUX.</h2> +<br> +<p> +In the bleak region of Upper Burgundy, not far from the domain of +Vauban, stands the old manor of Chastellux, famous since the fifteenth +century as the birth-place of two brothers, one of whom became an +admiral, the other a marshal of France. From this feudal stronghold +came forth one of the most amiable of the courtiers of Louis XVI.—a +disciple of Voltaire and Hume, a rival of Turgot and Adam Smith, a +friend of Washington and Jefferson, a forerunner of the revolutionists +of 1789, a philosopher, an historian, a political economist, something +of a poet, something of a naturalist, something of an artist, a man of +taste, an enthusiastic student, a brilliant talker, and an elegant +writer. The rude Sieurs de Chastellux would have been not a little +astonished could they have foreseen what character of man was destined +to inherit their title. +</p> +<p> +François Jean de Beauvoir, first known as Chevalier and afterward +Marquis de Chastellux, was born at Paris in 1734. He was a son of the +Count de Chastellux, lieutenant-general of the armies of the king, by +Mlle. d'Aguesseau, daughter of the chancellor. His mother, being left +a widow at an early period, withdrew thereupon into the privacy of +domestic life, and the young marquis had the good fortune to be +brought up under the eyes of the Chancellor d'Aguesseau himself. He +entered the army at sixteen, and was hardly twenty-one before he had +risen to be colonel. He distinguished himself highly during the +campaigns of the Seven Years' War, and it was as a reward of his +gallantry no less than out of compliment to his hereditary rank that +he was selected on one occasion to present to the king the flags of a +conquered city. It is hard to understand how, in the midst of such an +active life, he could find time for study; but for all that he knew +Greek, Latin, English, and Italian, and had some acquaintance with +every branch of science cultivated in his time. From boyhood he showed +a zealous interest in every sort of invention or discovery which +promised to be of practical use <a name="182">{182}</a> to mankind. When the principle +of inoculation for small-pox was first broached in Europe, everybody +shrank in alarm from the experiment. The young marquis had himself +inoculated without his mother's knowledge, and then, running to +Buffon, who knew his family, exclaimed joyfully, "I am saved, and my +example will be the means of saving many others." +</p> +<p> +When peace was declared in 1763, he was not yet thirty. With his +eminent gifts of mind and person, a brilliant career in society lay +open to him, but he aimed to be something more than a mere man of +fashion. His first literary productions were biographical sketches of +two of his brother officers, MM. de Closen and de. Belsunce, which +appeared in the <i>Mercure</i>, in 1765. He wrote a lively and graceful +little essay on the "Union of Poetry and Music,"—the same subject +which Marmontel afterward treated in his poem of <i>Polymnie</i>. The great +quarrel between the schools of Gluck and Piccini did not break out +until ten years later; but mutterings of the coming tempest were heard +already. Italian music had its enthusiastic admirers and its +implacable foes, and in the midst of their disputes Monsigny and +Grétry had just given to France a lyric school of her own by creating +the comic opera. M. de Chastellux, like everybody else in those days, +was passionately fond of the theatre, and he espoused the cause of +Italian music with the ardor that characterized everything he did. +About the same time he fell into the society of the Encyclopoedists, +and allied himself with Helvétius, d'Alembert, Turgot, and the rest of +the philosophical party, who received the illustrious recruit with +open arms. +</p> +<br> +<p> +About the same time that M. de Chastellux left the army, and made his +debut in civil life, the Scottish historian and philosopher, David +Hume, arrived in Paris, with the British ambassador, Lord Hertford. He +became the lion of the day. Courtiers and philosophers fell down and +worshipped him; his skeptical opinions were eagerly imbibed, and the +three years that he spent in the French capital became, owing to his +extraordinary influence, one of the most important epochs in the +literary history of the eighteenth century. M. de Chastellux shared in +the general enthusiasm; and the "Essays" and "Political Discourses" of +Hume, together with the <i>Essai sur les moeurs et l'esprit des nations</i> +of Voltaire, which had appeared a few years before, wrought upon his +mind a deep and lasting impression. The united influence of these two +authors led him to a course of study which resulted in a work upon +which his reputation was finally established. This was his celebrated +treatise, "On Public Felicity; or, Considerations on the Condition of +Man at different Periods of his History," in two volumes. It bears a +resemblance to both its parents. It is historical, like the <i>Essai sur +les moeurs</i>, and dogmatic, like the "Essays" and "Discourses." And +that is one of its defects. The "Considerations" on the condition of +man at various periods serve by way of introduction to the author's +theory of public felicity; but the second part is inferior to the +first. The body of the book is sacrificed to the introduction. +</p> +<p> +This was four years before the appearance of Adam Smith's "Wealth of +Nations." The Marquis de Mirabeau and others of his school had begun +to write; but their notions of political economy were still unfamiliar +to the public. M. de Chastellux may therefore be regarded as one of +the first supporters of that doctrine of human perfectibility which +lies at the bottom of all the prevailing opinions of the eighteenth +century. To this he added another theory, that the only end of +government ought to be "the greatest happiness of the greatest +possible number." Nearly one hundred years ago, therefore, he +discovered and developed the principle which is now one of the most +popular epitomes of social science. His style is good, <a name="183">{183}</a> but +neither very concise nor very brilliant. It is now and then obscure, +sometimes digressive, sometimes declamatory; but for the most part +clear, lively, and abounding in those happy touches which show the +writer to be a man of the world as well as an author. +</p> +<p> +It is said that the immediate occasion of his writing the book was a +conversation with Mably, the author of "Observations on the History of +France," who maintained that the world was constantly degenerating, +and that the men of to-day were not half so good as their +grandfathers. The young philosopher, his head full of the new ideas, +resolved to demonstrate the superiority of the present over the past. +The first edition of his work appeared in 1772, two years before the +death of Louis XV. It was printed anonymously in Holland. Everywhere +it was read with avidity, abroad as well as in France. It was +translated into English, German, and Italian. Voltaire read it at +Ferney, and was so much struck by it that he covered his copy with +marginal notes—not always of approbation—which were reproduced in a +new edition of the work by the author's son, in 1822. +</p> +<p> +Despite great merits, which cannot be denied it, the essay "On Public +Felicity" is now almost forgotten. In the historical portion, M. de +Chastellux passes in review all the nations of ancient and modern +times, for the purpose of showing that the general condition of man +has never before been so good as it is now. The fundamental principle +of his work is disclosed in the following profession of faith: "To say +that man is born to be free, that his first care is to preserve his +liberty when he enjoys it, and to recover it when he has lost it, is +to attribute to him a sentiment which he shares with the whole animal +kingdom, and which cannot be called in question. And if we add that +this liberty is by its very nature indefinite, and that the liberty of +one individual can only be limited by that of another, we do but +express a truth which few in this enlightened age will be found to +contradict. Look at society from this point of view, and you will see +nothing but a series of encroachments and resistances; and if you want +to form a just idea of government, you must consider it as the +equilibrium which ought to result from these opposing struggles.… +Government and legislation are only secondary and subordinate objects. +They ought to be regarded merely as means through which men may +preserve in the social state the greatest possible portion of natural +liberty." +</p> +<p> +It is melancholy to see how, in a work that has so much to recommend +it, the chapter which treats of the establishment of Christianity is +disfigured by the skeptical philosophy of the age. Our regret at this +is perhaps the more keen because the fault was altogether without +excuse. Turgot had argued before the Sorbonne, only a few years +previously, that a belief in the progress of the human race, so far +from being incompatible with the doctrine of redemption, is its +necessary consequence. De Chastellux might have shown that, if the +coming of our Lord did not immediately effect a sensible reformation +throughout the civilized world, it was because the vices and bad +passions of the old pagan society long survived the overthrow of the +old pagan gods. But there is this to be said for him: if he does not +evince an adequate appreciation of the great moral revolution effected +by Christianity, he at least does not speak of it in the same insolent +tone that was fashionable in his day. When he comes down to modern +times, and treats of density of population in its relation to national +prosperity, he repeats the popular fallacy that the multiplication of +religious orders exerts a pernicious influence upon the progress of +population. But when from general views he descends to statistics, he +refutes his own arguments. "The number of monks in France," he says, +"according to a careful enumeration <a name="184">{184}</a> made by order of government, +a few years ago, was 26,674, and it certainly is not less now." In +point of fact, the real number when the property of the clergy was +confiscated in 1790 was only 17,000; and what is that in a population +of 24,000,000 or 26,000,000? The army withdraws from the marriage +state twenty times that number of men, in the vigor of their age; +whereas the greater part of the monks are men in the decline of life. +</p> +<p> +It is a matter of astonishment that a work which professes to treat of +"public felicity" should devote itself entirely to the material +well-being of society, and have nothing to say of the moral condition +of mankind, which is the more important element of the two in making +up the sum of human happiness. Every author, of course, has a right to +fix the limits of his subject; but then he must not promise on the +title-page more than he means to perform. +</p> +<p> +The authorship of the essay on "Public Felicity" was not long a +secret; but de Chastellux received perhaps as much annoyance as glory +from the discovery. His ideas did not please everybody, and among +those who fell foul of him for his philosophical errors were some of +his own family. He made little account of their opposition, and in +1774 came out boldly with an eulogy on Helvétius, with whom he had +lived for a long time on the most intimate terms. Two years later, he +published a second edition of his previous treatise, with the addition +of a chapter of "Ulterior Views," in which he points out the danger of +some of the revolutionary opinions which were then coming more and +more into vogue, and the futility of trying to realize in actual life +that form of government which might be theoretically the best. If he +had been alive in 1789, he would have belonged to the monarchical +party in the Constituent Assembly; and, after having done his part in +paving the way for the revolution, he would have perished as one of +its victims. Among political and social reformers, he must be classed +with the school of Montesquieu rather than with that of Rousseau. +</p> +<br> +<p> +The attention of France, however, was now fixed more and more firmly +upon the contest going on in America between Great Britain and her +rebellious colonies. Louis XVI., after some resistance, yielded to the +demand of public opinion, and, in 1778, not only recognized the +independence of the United States, but sent a fleet under Count +d'Estaing to help them. A second expedition was despatched under Count +de Rochambeau. M. de Chastellux, who then held the grade of maréchal +de camp [equivalent to something between brigadier and major-general +in the present United States army—ED.], obtained permission to join +it, and was appointed major-general. The expeditionary corps arrived +at Newport, capital of the state of Rhode Island, July 10, 1780. It +consisted of eight ships of the line, two frigates, two gunboats, and +over 5,000 troops. The next year came a reenforcement of 3,000 men. +Lord Cornwallis, who commanded the English force was shut up in +Yorktown, Va., and, being closely besieged by the allies and invested +by land and sea, was compelled to surrender in October, 1781. This +forced England to conclude a peace, and the auxiliary corps +re-embarked at Boston on their return to France at the close of 1782. +It had been two years and a half in America, and during this time the +republic had achieved its independence. +</p> +<p> +During his visit to America, M. de Chastellux employed the brief +periods of leisure left him from military occupations in making three +tours through the interior. He wrote down as he travelled a journal of +his observations, and printed at a little press on board the fleet +some twenty copies of it, ten or twelve of which found their way to +Europe. So great was the eagerness <a name="185">{185}</a> with which people there +seized upon every book relating to America, that a number of copies +were surreptitiously printed, and a publisher at Cassel brought out an +imperfect edition. The author then published the book himself in 1786 +(2 vols., 12mo, Paris), under the title, <i>Voyages de M. le Marquis de +Chastellux dans l'Amérique septentrionale en</i> 1780, 1781, <i>et</i> 1782. +Though written originally only for his friends, it has a general +interest, and presents a curious picture of the condition of North +America at the period of which it treats. +</p> +<p> +The author set out from Newport, where the troops had landed and gone +into winter-quarters, in order to visit Pennsylvania. Accompanied by +two aides-de-camp, one of whom was the Baron de Montesquieu, grandson +of the author of the <i>Esprit des lois</i>, and by five mounted servants, +he started, November 11, 1780, on horseback, for that was the only +means of travelling that the country afforded. The ground was frozen +hard, and already covered with snow. The little party directed their +steps first toward Windham, where Lauzun's hussars, forming the +advance-guard of the army, were encamped. They found the Duke de +Lauzun at the head of his troops, and this meeting between the +grandsons of d'Aguesseau and Montesquieu, and a descendant of the +Lauzuns and Birons, all three fighting for the cause of liberty in the +wilds of America, was a curious beginning of their adventures. It was +this same Duke de Lauzun, a friend of Mirabeau and Talleyrand, who +became Duke de Biron after the death of his uncle, was chosen a member +of the States General in 1789, commanded the republican army of La +Vendée, and finished his career on the scaffold. +</p> +<p> +The travellers crossed the mountains which separated them from the +Hudson, and, after passing through a wild and almost desert country, +arrived at West Point, a place celebrated at that time for the most +dramatic incidents of the war of independence (the treason of General +Arnold and the execution of Major André), and now famous as the seat +of the great military school of the United States. The American army +occupying the forts of West Point, which Arnold's treachery had so +nearly given over to the enemy, saluted the French major-general with +thirteen guns—one for each state in the confederation. "Never," says +he, "was honor more imposing or majestic. Every gun was, after a long +interval, echoed back from the opposite bank with a noise nearly equal +to that of the discharge itself. Two years ago, West Point was an +almost inaccessible desert. This desert has been covered with +fortresses and artillery by a people who, six years before, had never +seen a cannon. The well-filled magazines, and the great number of guns +in the different forts, the prodigious labor which must have been +expended in transporting and piling up on the steep rocks such huge +trunks of trees and blocks of hewn stone, give one a very different +idea of the Americans from that which the English ministry have +labored to convey to Parliament. A Frenchman might well be surprised +that a nation hardly born should have spent in two years more than +12,000,000 francs in this wilderness; but how much greater must be his +surprise when he learns that these fortifications have cost the state +nothing, having been constructed by the soldiers, who not only +received no extra allowance for the labor, but have not even touched +their regular pay! It will be gratifying for him to know that these +magnificent works were planned by two French engineers, M. du Portail +and M. Gouvion, [Footnote 45] who have been no better paid than their +workmen." +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 45: MM. du Portail and Gouvion went to America with + Lafayette, and returned with him. Each rose afterward to the rank of + lieutenant-general in the French army. The former, through the + influence of Lafayette, was appointed minister-of-war in 1790; he + fled to the United States during the Reign of Terror. The other was + created major-general of the National Guard of Paris in 1769; he + fell in battle in 1792.] +</p> +<p> +West Point stands on the bank of <a name="186">{186}</a> the Hudson, in a situation +which may well be compared with the most beautiful scenery of the +Rhine. M. de Chastellux describes it with the liveliest admiration; +but he remained there only a short time, because he was in haste to +reach the head-quarters of Washington. +</p> +<p> +"After passing thick woods, I found myself in a small plain, where I +saw a handsome farm. A small camp which seemed to cover it, a large +tent pitched in the yard, and several wagons around it, convinced me +that I was at the head-quarters of <i>His Excellency</i>, for so Mr. +Washington is called, in the army and throughout America. M. de +Lafayette was conversing in the yard with a tall man about five feet +nine inches high, of a noble and mild aspect: it was the general +himself. I was soon off my horse and in his presence. The compliments +were short; the sentiments which animated me and the good-will which +he testified for me were not equivocal. He led me into his house, +where I found the company still at table, although dinner had long +been over. He presented me to the generals and the aides-de-camp, +adjutants, and other officers attached to his person, who form what is +called in England and America the <i>family</i> of the general. A few glasses +of claret and madeira accelerated the acquaintances I had to make, and +I soon felt at my ease in the presence of the greatest and best of +men. The goodness and benevolence which characterize him are evident +from everything about him; but the confidence he inspires never gives +occasion to familiarity, for it originates in a profound esteem for +his virtues and a high opinion of his talents." +</p> +<p> +The next day Washington offered to conduct his guest to the camp of +<i>the marquis:</i> this was the appellation universally bestowed in +America upon Lafayette, who commanded the advance of the army. +</p> +<p> +"We found his troops in order of battle, and himself at their head, +expressing by his air and countenance that he was better pleased to +receive me there than he would be at his estate in Auvergne. +[Footnote 46] The confidence and attachment of his troops are +invaluable possessions for him, well-earned riches of which nobody can +deprive him; but what, in my opinion, is still more flattering for a +young man of his age (he was not more than twenty-three) is the +influence and consideration he has acquired in political as well as +military matters. I do not exaggerate when I say that private letters +from him have often produced more effect upon some of the states than +the most urgent recommendations of the Congress. On seeing him, one is +at a loss to decide which is the stranger circumstance—that a man so +young should have given such extraordinary proofs of ability, or that +one who has been so much tried should still give promise of such a +long career of glory. Happy his country, should she know how to make +use of his talents! happier still, should she never stand in need of +them!" +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 46: M. de Chastellux was cousin-german by the mother's + side to the Duchess of Ayen, the mother of Madame de Lafayette.] +</p> +<p> +This last remark shows that M. de Chastellux, with all his enthusiasm +for the present, was not without anxiety for the future. He spent +three days at head-quarters, nearly all the while at table, after the +American fashion. At the end of each meal nuts were served, and +General Washington sat for several hours, eating them, "toasting," and +conversing. These long conversations only increased his companion's +admiration. +</p> +<p> +"The most striking characteristic of this respected man is the perfect +accord which exists between his physical and moral qualities. This +idea of a perfect whole cannot be produced by enthusiasm, which would +rather reject it, since the effect of proportion is to diminish the +idea of greatness. Brave without rashness, laborious without ambition, +generous without prodigality, noble without pride, virtuous without +severity, he seems always to have <a name="187">{187}</a> confined himself within those +limits where the virtues, by clothing themselves in more lively but +more changeable and doubtful colors, may be mistaken for faults." +</p> +<p> +The city of Philadelphia was the capital of the confederation and the +seat of the Congress. M. de Chastellux did not fail to visit it. He +enjoyed there the hospitality of the Chevalier de la Luzerne, French +minister to the United States, and had the pleasure of meeting several +young French officers, some in the service of the United States, +others belonging to the expeditionary corps, whom the interruption of +military operations had left at liberty, like himself. Among them were +M. de Lafayette, the Viscount de Noailles, the Count de Damas, the +Count de Custine, the Chevalier de Mauduit, and the Marquis de la +Rouérie. Let us give a few particulars about these "Gallo-Americans," +as our author calls them. The Viscount de Noailles, brother-in-law of +Lafayette, and colonel of the chasseurs of Alsace, was afterward a +member of the States General, and principal author of the famous +deliberations of the 4th of August. The Count Charles de Damas, an +aide-de-camp of Rochambeau, in after years took part, on the contrary, +against the revolutionists, and, attempting to rescue Louis XVI. at +Varennes, was arrested with him. The Count de Custine, colonel of the +regiment of Saintonge infantry, is the same who was general-in-chief +of the republican armies in 1792, and who died by the guillotine the +next year, like Lauzun. The Chevalier de Mauduit commanded the +American artillery. At the age of fifteen, with his head full of +dreams of classical antiquity, he ran away from college, walked to +Marseilles, and shipped as cabin-boy on board a vessel bound for +Greece, in order to visit the battle-fields of Plataea and +Thermopylae. The same spirit of enthusiasm carried him, at the age of +twenty, to America. Appointed, after the war, commandant at Port au +Prince, he was assassinated there by his own soldiers in 1791. The +history of the Marquis de la Rouérie, or Rouarie, is still more +romantic. In his youth he fell violently in love with an actress, and +wanted to marry her. Compelled by his family to break off this +attachment, he determined to become a Trappist; but he soon threw +aside the monastic habit and went to America, where he commanded a +legion armed and equipped at his own cost. He abandoned his surname +and title, and would only be known as Colonel Armand. After his return +to France, he was concerned, with others of the nobility of Brittany, +in the troubles which preceded the revolution. He was one of the +twelve deputies sent in 1787 to demand of the king the restoration of +the privileges of that province, and as such was committed to the +Bastile. The next year he had occasion to claim the same privileges, +not from the king, but from the Third Estate. In 1791 he placed +himself at the head of the disaffected, and organized the royalist +insurrection in the west. Denounced and pursued, he saved himself by +taking to the forest, lay hid in one chateau after another, fell sick +in the middle of winter, and died in a fit of despair on hearing of +the execution of Louis XVI. +</p> +<p> +The Chevalier de la Luzerne, brother of the Bishop of Langres, +afterward cardinal, so distinguished for his noble conduct in 1789, +was a man of more coolness and deliberation, but not less devoted to +the cause of the United States. He had given abundant proof of his +friendship by contracting a loan on his own responsibility for the +payment of the American troops. +</p> +<p> +"M. de la Luzerne," says de Chastellux, "is so formed for the station +he occupies, that one would be tempted to imagine no other could fill +it but himself. Noble in his expenditure, like the minister of a great +monarchy, but plain in his manners, like a republican, he is equally +fit to represent the king with the Congress, or the Congress with the +king. He loves the <a name="188">{188}</a> Americans, and his own inclination attaches +him to the duties of his administration. He has accordingly obtained +their confidence, both as a private and a public man; but in both +these respects he is inaccessible to the spirit of party which reigns +but too much around him. He is anxiously courted by all parties, and, +espousing none, he manages all." In acknowledgment of his services in +America, the Chevalier was appointed, after the peace, minister at +London;—rather an audacious action on the part of the government of +Louis XVI. to choose as their representative in England the very man +who had contributed most of all to the independence of the United +States. The state of Pennsylvania, in gratitude for his acts of +good-will, gave the name of Luzerne to one of her counties. +</p> +<p> +The principal occupation of these officers, during their stay at +Philadelphia, was to visit, notwithstanding the inclemency of the +weather, the scenes of the recent conflicts near that city, or to +discuss the causes which had turned the fortune of war, now in favor +of the Americans, and now against them. Our author here shows himself +in a new light, as a tactician who, with a thorough knowledge of the +art of war, points out the circumstances which have led to the success +or failure of this or that manoeuvre. Those affairs in which the +French figured especially attracted his attention. Bravery, +generosity, disinterestedness, all the national virtues were +conspicuous in these volunteers who had crossed the ocean to make war +at their own expense, and who softened the asperity of military +operations by the charm of their elegant manners and chivalric +bearing. +</p> +<p> +Among the battle-fields which these young enthusiasts, while a waiting +something better to do, loved to trace out was that of Brandywine, +where M. de Lafayette, almost immediately after his landing in +America, received the wound in the leg of which he speaks so gaily in +a letter to his wife. Lafayette himself acted as their guide, and +recounted to his friends, on the very scene of action, the incidents +of this day, which was not a fortunate one for the Americans. He did +the honors of another expedition to the heights of Barren Hill, where +he had gained an advantage under rather curious circumstances. He had +with him there about two thousand infantry with fifty dragoons and an +equal number of Indians, when the English, who occupied Philadelphia, +endeavored to surround and capture him. +</p> +<p> +"General Howe [Sir Henry Clinton—ED.] thought he had now fairly +caught the marquis, and even carried his gasconade so far as to invite +ladies to meet Lafayette at supper the next day; and, whilst the +principal part of the officers were at the play, he put in motion the +main body of his forces, which he marched in three columns. The first +was not long in reaching the advanced posts of M. de Lafayette, which +gave rise to a laughable adventure. The fifty savages he had with him +were placed in ambuscade in the woods, after their own manner; that is +to say, lying as close as rabbits. Fifty English dragoons, who had +never seen any Indians, entered the wood where they were hid. The +Indians on their part, had never seen dragoon. Up they start, raising +a horrible cry, throw down their arms, and escape by swimming across +the Schuylkill. The dragoons, on the other hand, as much terrified as +they were, turned tail, and fled in such a panic that they did not +stop until they reached Philadelphia. M. de Lafayette, finding himself +in danger of being surrounded, made such skilful dispositions that he +effected his retreat, as if by enchantment, and crossed the river +without losing a man. The English army, finding the bird flown, +returned to Philadelphia, spent with fatigue, and ashamed of having +done nothing. The ladies did not see M. de Lafayette, and General Howe +[Clinton] himself arrived too late for supper." By the side of these +admirable military sketches, we have an account of a ball at the +Chevalier de la Luzerne's. "There were near twenty women, <a name="189">{189}</a> twelve +or fifteen of whom danced, each having her 'partner,' as the custom is +in America. Dancing is said to be at once the emblem of gaiety and of +love; here it seems to be the emblem of legislation and of marriage: +of legislation, inasmuch as places are marked out, the country-dances +named, and every proceeding provided for, calculated, and submitted to +regulation; of marriage, as it furnishes each lady with a partner, +with whom she must dance the whole evening, without being permitted to +take another. Strangers have generally the privilege of being +complimented with the handsomest women; that is to say, out of +politeness, the prettiest partners are given to them. The Count de +Damas led forth Mrs. Bingham, and the Viscount de Noailles, Miss +Shippen. Both of them, like true philosophers, testified a great +respect for the custom of the country by not quitting their partners +the whole evening; in other respects they were the admiration of the +whole assembly from the grace and dignity with which they danced. To +the honor of my country, I can affirm that they surpassed that evening +a chief justice of Carolina, and two members of Congress, one of whom +(Mr. Duane) passed for being by ten per cent. more lively than all the +other dancers." +</p> +<p> +At Philadelphia, as in camp, a great part of the day was passed at +table. The Congress having met, M. de Chastellux was invited to dinner +successively by the representatives from the North and the +representatives from the South; for the political body was even then +divided by a geographical line, each side having separate reunions at +a certain tavern which they used to frequent: so we see the +differences between North and South are as old as the confederation +itself. He made the acquaintance of all the leading members, and +especially of Samuel Adams, one of the framers of the Declaration of +Independence. [Footnote 47] He saw also the celebrated pamphleteer, +Thomas Paine, who ten years afterward came to France, and was chosen a +member of the National Convention. Together with Lafayette, our author +was elected a member of the Academy of Philadelphia. Despite so many +circumstances to prepossess him in favor of the Americans, he appears +not a very ardent admirer of what he witnesses about him. He shows but +little sympathy with the Quakers, whose "smooth and wheedling tone" +disgusts him, and whom he represents as wholly given up to making +money. Philadelphia he calls "the great sink in which all the +speculations of the United States meet and mingle." The city then had +40,000 inhabitants; it now contains 600,000. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 47: A mistake of the reviewer's. Samuel Adams had no hand + in writing the Declaration, nor does de Chastellux say that he + had.——ED. C. W. ] +</p> +<p> +We can easily conceive that, in contrasting the appearance of this +republican government with the great French monarchy, he should have +found abundant food for study and reflection. He speaks with great +reserve, but what little he says is enough to show that he was not so +much enamored of republican ideas as Lafayette and most of his +friends. The disciple of Montesquieu loses much of his admiration for +the American constitutions when he sees them in operation, and seems +especially loath to introduce them into his own country. The +constitution of Pennsylvania strikes him as particularly defective. +</p> +<p> +"The state of Pennsylvania is far from being one of the best governed +of the members of the confederation. The government is without force; +nor can it be otherwise. A popular government can never have any +whilst the people are uncertain and vacillating in their opinions; for +then the leaders seek rather to please than to serve them, and end by +becoming the slaves of the multitude whom they pretended to govern." +</p> +<p> +This constitution had one capital defect: it provided only for a +single legislative chamber. After a disastrous trial, Pennsylvania was +<a name="190">{190}</a> compelled to change her laws, and adopt the system of two +chambers, like the other states of the Union. +</p> +<p> +Our author betrays his misgivings most clearly in his narrative of an +interview with Samuel Adams. His report of the conversation is +especially curious, as it shows how entirely the two speakers were +preoccupied by different ideas. Samuel Adams, who has been called "the +American Cato," bent himself to prove the revolution justifiable, by +arguments drawn not only from natural right but from historical +precedent. The thoroughly English character of mind of these +innovators led them to make it a sort of point of honor to find a +sanction for their conduct in tradition. M. de Chastellux, like a true +Frenchman, made no account of such reasonings. +</p> +<p> +"I am clearly of opinion that the parliament of England had no right +to tax America without her consent; but I am still more clearly +convinced that, when a whole people say, 'We will be free!' it is +difficult to demonstrate that they are in the wrong. Be that as it +may, Mr. Adams very satisfactorily proved to me that New England was +peopled with no view to commerce and aggrandizement, but wholly by +individuals who fled from persecution, and sought an asylum at the +extremity of the world, where they might be free to live and follow +their own opinions; that it was of their own accord that these +colonists placed themselves under the protection of England; that the +mutual relationship springing from this connection was expressed in +their charters, and that the right of imposing or exacting a revenue +of any kind was not comprised in them." There was no question between +the two speakers of the Federal Constitution, for it did not yet +exist. The states at that time formed merely a confederation of +sovereign states, with a general congress, like the German +confederation. They had no president or central administration. The +constitutions spoken of in this conversation were simply the separate +constitutions of the individual states, and Samuel Adams, being from +Massachusetts, referred particularly to that state. M. de Chastellux, +accustomed to the complex social systems of Europe, was surprised that +no property qualification should be required of voters; the Americans, +on the contrary, who had always lived in a democratic community, both +before and since the declaration of independence, could not comprehend +the necessity of such a restriction. Both were doubtless right; for it +is equally difficult to establish political inequality where it does +not already exist, and to suddenly abolish it where it does exist. The +constitution of Massachusetts, superior in this respect to that of +Pennsylvania, provided for a moderating power by creation of a +governor's council, elected by property-holders. +</p> +<p> +Our author's first journey terminates in the north, near the Canada +frontier. He crosses the frozen rivers in a sleigh, in order to visit +the battle-field of Saratoga, the scene, three years before, the +capitulation of General Burgoyne, the most important success which the +Americans had achieved previous to the arrival of the French. +Returning to Newport in the early part of 1781, after having +travelled, in the course of two months, more than three hundred +leagues, on horseback or in sleighs, he passed the rest of the year +solely occupied in the duties of the glorious campaign which put an +end to the war. He wrote a journal of this campaign, but it has not +been published. He speaks of it in the narrative of his travels. From +the <i>Memoires</i> of Rochambeau, however, we learn something of his +gallant behavior at the siege of Yorktown, where, at the head of the +reserve, he repulsed a sortie of the enemy. +</p> +<p> +His second journey was made immediately after the surrender of +Cornwallis, and was directed toward Virginia, the most important of +the southern, as Pennsylvania was of the northern, states. It was the +birth-place of Washington, of Jefferson, of Madison, and <a name="191">{191}</a> of +Monroe; the state which shared most actively in the war of +independence, and which is now the principal battle-field of the +bloody struggle between North and South. This second journey did not +partake of the military and political character of the first. Now that +the destiny of America seemed settled, the author gave his attention, +principally, to natural history. In every phrase we recognize the +pupil and admirer of Buffon. His chief purpose was to visit a natural +bridge of rock across one of the affluents of the James river, in the +Appalachian mountains. He describes this stupendous arch with great +care, and illustrates his narrative with several drawings which he +caused to be made by an officer of engineers. +</p> +<p> +<i>À propos</i> of this subject, he indulges in speculations upon the +geological formation of the New World, quite after the manner of the +author of <i>Époques de la nature</i>. On the road he amused himself by +hunting. He describes the animals that he kills, and gives an account +of the mocking-bird, which almost equals Buffon's in vivacity, and +excels it in accuracy. He gives several details respecting the +opossum, that singular animal which almost seems to belong to a +different creation. All natural objects interest him, and he studies +them with the zeal of a first discoverer. His description of the +mocking-bird is well worth reproducing: +</p> +<p> +"I rose with the sun, and, while breakfast was preparing, took a walk +around the house. The birds were heard on every side, but my attention +was chiefly attracted by a very agreeable song, which appeared to +proceed from a neighboring tree. I approached softly, and perceived it +to be a mocking-bird, saluting the rising sun. At first I was afraid +of frightening it, but my presence, on the contrary, gave it pleasure; +for, apparently delighted at having an auditor, it sang better than +before, and its emulation seemed to increase when it saw a couple of +dogs, which followed me, draw near to the tree on which it was +perched. It kept hopping incessantly from branch to branch, still +continuing its song; for this extraordinary bird is not less +remarkable for its agility than its charming notes. It keeps +perpetually rising and sinking, so as to appear not less the favorite +of Terpsichore than Polyhymnia. This bird cannot certainly be +reproached with fatiguing its auditors, for nothing can be more varied +than its song, of which it is impossible to give an imitation, or even +to furnish any adequate idea. As it had every reason to be satisfied +with my attention, it concealed from me none of its talents; and one +would have thought that, after having delighted me with a concert, it +was desirous of entertaining me with a comedy. It began to counterfeit +different birds; those which it imitated the most naturally, at least +to a stranger, were the jay, the raven, the cardinal, and the lapwing. +It appeared desirous of detaining me near it; for, after I had +listened for a quarter of an hour, it followed me on my return to the +house, flying from tree to tree, always singing, sometimes its natural +song, at others those which it had learned in Virginia and in its +travels; for this bird is one of those which change climate, although +it sometimes appears here during the winter." +</p> +<p> +Continuing his journey, the traveller visited Jefferson at his +country-home, situated deep in the wilderness, on the skirts of the +Blue Ridge. This visit gives him opportunity for a new historical +portrait: +</p> +<p> +"It was Jefferson himself who built his house and chose the situation. +He calls it Monticello ['little mountain'], a modest title, for it is +built upon a very high mountain; but the name indicates the owner's +attachment to the language of Italy, and above all to the fine arts, +of which that country was the cradle. He is a man not yet forty, of +tall stature and a mild and pleasant countenance; but his mind and +understanding are ample substitutes for every external grace. <a name="192">{192}</a> An +American who, without having ever quitted his own country, is skilled +in music and drawing; a geometrician, an astronomer, a natural +philosopher, a jurist and a statesman; a senator who sat for two years +in the congress which brought about the revolution, and which is never +mentioned without respect, though unhappily not without regret; +[Footnote 48] a governor of Virginia, who filled this difficult +station during the invasions of Arnold, of Phillips, and of +Cornwallis; in fine, a philosopher in voluntary retirement from the +world and public affairs, because he only loves the world so long as +he can flatter himself with the conviction that he is of some use to +mankind. A mild and amiable wife, charming children, of whose +education he himself takes charge, a house to embellish, great +possessions to improve, and the arts and sciences to cultivate—these +are what remain to Mr. Jefferson after having played a distinguished +part on the theatre of the New World. Before I had been two hours in +his company, we were as ultimate as if we had passed our whole lives +together. Walking, books, but above all a conversation always varied +and interesting, sustained by that sweet satisfaction experienced by +two persons whose sentiments are always in unison, and who understand +each other at the first hint, made four days seem to me only so many +minutes. No object had escaped Mr. Jefferson's attention; and it +seemed as if from his youth he had placed his mind, as he has done his +house, on an elevation from which he might contemplate the universe." +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 48: The United States were then passing through a crisis + of anarchy, which lasted until the adoption of the Federal + Constitution in 1788, and the elevation of Washington to the + presidency.] +</p> +<p> +At the period of this visit, Mr. Jefferson thought only of retirement; +but when M. de Chastellux's <i>Voyages en Amérique</i> appeared, three +years afterward, he was minister-plenipotentiary of the United States +in Paris. The death of his wife had determined him to return to public +life. He formed a solid friendship for M. de Chastellux, of which his +correspondence contains abundant proof. The brilliant French soldier +introduced the solitary of Monticello, the "American wild-man of the +mountains," to the <i>salons</i> of Paris; and the republican statesman, with +the manners of an aristocrat, entered, nothing loath, into the society +of the gay and polished capital, where he received the same welcome +and honors that were accorded to Franklin. +</p> +<p> +This portion of the <i>Journal</i> closes with some general remarks upon +Virginia, which possess a new interest now that the people of that +state reappear upon the scene in the same bellicose and indomitable +character which they bore of old. +</p> +<p> +"The Virginians differ essentially from the people of the North, not +only in the nature of their climate, soil, and agriculture, but in +that indelible character which is imprinted on every nation at the +moment of its origin, and which, by perpetuating itself from +generation to generation, justifies the great principle that +'everything which is partakes of that which has been.' The settlement +of Virginia took place at the commencement of the seventeenth century. +The republican and democratic spirit was not then common in England; +that of commerce and navigation was scarcely in its infancy. The long +wars with France and Spain had perpetuated the military spirit, and +the first colonists of Virginia were composed in great part of +gentlemen who had no other profession than that of arms. It was +natural, therefore, for these colonists, who were filled with military +principles and the prejudices of nobility, to carry them even into the +midst of the savages whose lands they came to occupy. Another cause +which operated in forming their character was the institution of +slavery. It may be asked how these prejudices have been brought to +coincide with a revolution founded on such different principles? I +answer <a name="193">{193}</a> that they have perhaps contributed to produce it. While +the insurrection in New England was the result of reason and +calculation, Virginia revolted through pride." +</p> +<br> +<p> +The third and last journey of M. de Chastellux led him through New +Hampshire, Massachusetts, and northern Pennsylvania. This was during +the months of November and December, 1782, on the eve of his return to +France. He started from Hartford, the capital of Connecticut, and, +after visiting several other places, went to Boston, for he could not +leave America without seeing this city, the cradle of the revolution. +He found at this port the French fleet, under command of M. de +Vaudreuil, which was to carry back the expeditionary corps to France. +He closes his <i>Journal</i> with an interesting account of the university +at Cambridge, which Ampère, who was, like him, a member of the French +Academy, visited and described seventy years afterward. In the +appendix to his book he gives a letter written by himself on board the +frigate <i>l'Émeraude</i>, just before sailing, to Mr. Madison, professor +of philosophy in William and Mary College. It is upon a subject which +has not yet lost its appropriateness—the future of the arts and +sciences in America. A democratic and commercial society, always in a +ferment, seemed to him hardly compatible with scientific, and still +less with artistic, progress. But, in his solicitude for the welfare +of the country he had been defending, he would not allow that the +difficulty was insuperable. Some of his remarks upon this subject are +extremely delicate and ingenious. +</p> +<p> +The question which troubled him is not yet fully answered, but it is +in a fair way of being settled. The United States have really made but +little progress in the arts, though they have produced a few pictures +and statues which have elicited admiration even in Europe at recent +industrial exhibitions. They are beginning, however, to have a +literature. Even in the days of the revolution they could boast of the +writings of Franklin, which combined the-most charming originality +with refinement and solid good sense. Now they can show, among +novelists, Fenimore Cooper and the celebrated Mrs. Beecher Stowe, +whose book gave the signal for another revolution; among +story-tellers, Washington Irving and Hawthorne; among critics, +Ticknor; among historians, Prescott and Bancroft; among economists, +Carey; among political writers, Everett; among moralists, Emerson and +Channing; among poets, Bryant and Longfellow. In science they have +done still more. They have adopted and naturalized one of the first of +modern geologists, Agassiz; and the hydrographical labors of Maury, +[late] director of the Washington Observatory, are the admiration of +the whole world. Their immense development in industrial pursuits +implies a corresponding progress in practical science. It was Fulton, +an American, who invented the steamboat, and carried out in his own +country the idea which he could not persuade Europe to listen to; and +only lately the reaping-machine has come to us from the shores of the +great lakes and the vast prairies of the Far West. +</p> +<p> +When the <i>Voyages en Amérique</i> appeared, the revolutionary party in +France were still more dissatisfied with the book than they had been +with the <i>Félicité publique</i>. They were angry at the wise and +unprejudiced judgments which the author passed upon men and things in +the New World; they were angry that he found some things not quite +perfect in republican society, that his praises of democracy were not +louder, his denunciations of the past not more sweeping. Brissot de +Warville, whose caustic pen was already in full exercise, published a +bitter review of the book. Some of the hostile criticisms found their +way to the United States, and M. de Chastellux, in sending a copy of +his work to General Washington, took occasion to <a name="194">{194}</a> defend himself. +He received from the general a long and affectionate reply, written at +Mount Vernon, in April, 1786. +</p> +<br> +<p> +M. de Chastellux also wrote a "Discourse on the Advantages and +Disadvantages which have resulted to Europe from the Discovery of +America," and edited the comedies of the Marchioness de Gléon. This +lady, celebrated for her wit and beauty, was the daughter of a rich +financier. At her house, La Chevrette, near Montmorency, she +entertained all the literary world, and gave representations of her +own plays. Her friend, M. de Chastellux, was himself the author of a +few dramatic pieces, performed either at La Chevrette or at the Prince +de Condé's, at Chantilly; but they have never been published. We shall +respect his reserve, and refrain from giving our readers a taste +either of these compositions or of his "Plan for a general Reform of +the French Infantry," and other unpublished writings. +</p> +<p> +After his return from America, de Chastellux was appointed governor of +Longwy. He had reached the age of nearly fifty and was still +unmarried, when he met at the baths of Spa, which were still the +resort of all the good company in Europe, a young, beautiful, and +accomplished Irish girl, named Miss Plunkett, with whom he fell over +head and ears in love. He married her in 1787, but did not long enjoy +his happiness, for he died the next year. Like most men who devote +themselves to the public welfare, he had sadly neglected his private +affairs. Being the youngest of five children, his fortune was not +large, and it gave him little trouble to run through it. General +officers in those days took a pride in their profuse expenditures in +the field: he ruined himself by his American campaign. His widow was +attached in the capacity of maid of honor to the person of the +estimable daughter of the Duke de Penthièvre, the Duchess of Orléans, +mother of King Louis Philippe. This princess adopted, after a certain +fashion, his posthumous son, who became one of the <i>chevaliers +d'honneur</i> of Madame Adelaide, the daughter of his patroness. He was +successively a deputy and peer of France after the revolution 1830. He +published a short memoir of his father, prefixed to an edition of the +<i>Félicité publique</i>. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="195">{195}</a> +<br> +<h2>From The Month. +<br><br> +THE LEGEND OF LIMERICK BELLS. +<br><br> +BY BESSIE RAYNER PARKES.</h2> +<br> +<pre> + There is a convent on the Alban hill, + Round whose stone roots the gnarlèd olives grow; + Above are murmurs of the mountain rill, + And all the broad Campagna lies below; + Where faint gray buildings and a shadowy dome + Suggest the splendor of eternal Rome. + + Hundreds of years ago, these convent-walls + Were reared by masons of the Gothic age: + The date is carved upon the lofty halls, + The story written on the illumined page. + What pains they took to make it strong and fair + The tall bell-tower and sculptured porch declare. + + When all the stones were placed, the windows stained, + And the tall bell-tower finished to the crown, + Only one want in this fair pile remained, + Whereat a cunning workman of the town + (The little town upon the Alban hill) + Toiled day and night his purpose to fulfil. + + Seven bells he made, of very rare devise, + With graven lilies twisted up and down; + Seven bells proportionate in differing size, + And full of melody from rim to crown; + So that, when shaken by the wind alone, + They murmured with a soft AEolian tone. + + These being placed within the great bell-tower, + And duly rung by pious skilful hand, + Marked the due prayers of each recurring hour, + And sweetly mixed persuasion with command. + Through the gnarled olive-trees the music wound, + And miles of broad Campagna heard the sound. + + And then the cunning workman put aside + His forge, his hammer, and the tools he used + To chase those lilies; his keen furnace died; + And all who asked for bells were hence refused. + With these his best, his last were also wrought, + And refuge in the convent-walls he sought. + + There did he live, and there he hoped to die, + Hearing the wind among the cypress-trees + Hint unimagined music, and the sky + Throb full of chimes borne downward by the breeze; + Whose undulations, sweeping through the air, + His art might claim as an embodied prayer. +</pre> +<a name="196">{196}</a> + +<hr style="width: 50%"> +<pre> + But those were stormy days in Italy: + Down came the spoiler from the uneasy North, + Swept the Campagna to the bounding sea, + Sacked pious homes, and drove the inmates forth; + Whether a Norman or a German foe, + History is silent, and we do not know. + + Brothers in faith were they; yet did not deem + The sacred precincts barred destroying hand. + Through those rich windows poured the whitened beam, + Forlorn the church and ruined altar stand. + As the sad monks went forth, that self-same hour + Saw empty silence in the great bell-tower. + + The outcast brethren scattered far and wide; + Some by the Danube rested, some in Spain: + On the green Loire the aged abbot died, + By whose loved feet one brother did remain + Faithful in all his wanderings: it was he + Who cast and chased those bells in Italy. + + He, dwelling at Marmontier, by the tomb + Of his dear father, where the shining Loire + Flows down from Tours amidst the purple bloom + Of meadow-flowers, some years of patience saw. + Those fringèd isles (where poplars tremble still) + Swayed like the olives of the Alban hill. + + The man was old, and reverend in his age; + And the "Great Monastery" held him dear. + Stalwart and stern, as some old Roman sage + Subdued to Christ, he lived from year to year, + Till his beard silvered, and the fiery glow + Of his dark eye was overhung with snow. + + And being trusted, as of prudent way, + They chose him for a message of import, + Which the "Great Monastery" would convey + To a good patron in an Irish court; + Who, by the Shannon, sought the means to found + St. Martin's off-shoot on that distant ground. + + The old Italian took his staff in hand, + And journeyed slowly from the green Touraine + Over the heather and salt-shining sand, + Until he saw the leaping crested main, + Which, dashing round the Cape of Brittany, + Sweeps to the confines of the Irish Sea. + +<a name="197">{197}</a> + + There he took ship, and thence with laboring sail + He crossed the waters, till a faint gray line + Rose in the northern sky; so faint, so pale, + Only the heart that loves her would divine, + In her dim welcome, all that fancy paints + Of the green glory of the Isle of Saints. + + Through the low banks, where Shannon meets the sea, + Up the broad waters of the River King + (Then populous with a nation), journeyed he, + Through that old Ireland which her poets sing; + And the white vessel, breasting up the stream, + Moved slowly, like a ship within a dream. + + When Limerick towers uprose before his gaze, + A sound of music floated in the air— + Music which held him in a fixed amaze, + Whose silver tenderness was alien there; + Notes full of murmurs of the southern seas, + And dusky olives swaying in the breeze. + + His chimes! the children of the great bell-tower, + Empty and silent now for many a year, + He hears them ringing out the vesper hour, + Owned in an instant by his loving ear. + Kind angels stayed the spoiler's hasty hand, + And watched their journeying over sea and land. + + The white-sailed boat moved slowly up the stream; + The old man lay with folded hands at rest; + The Shannon glistened in the sunset beam; + The bells rang gently o'er its shining breast, + Shaking out music from each lilied rim: + It was a requiem which they rang for him. + + For when the boat was moored beside the quay, + He lay as children lie when lulled by song; + But never more to waken. Tenderly + They buried him wild-flowers and grass among, + Where on the cross alights the wandering bird, + And hour by hour the bells he loved are heard. +</pre> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="198">{198}</a> +<br> +<h2>From London Society. +<br><br> +A PERILOUS JOURNEY. +<br><br> +A TALE.</h2> +<br> +<pre> + There is a tide in the affairs of men, + Which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune— +</pre> +<br> +<p> +So says the sage, and it is not to be gainsayed by any man whom forty +winters have chilled into wisdom. Ability and opportunity are fortune. +Opportunity is not fortune; otherwise all were fortunate. Ability is +not fortune, else why does genius slave? Why? But because it missed +<i>the</i> opportunity that fitted it? +</p> +<p> +What I have—wife, position, independence—I owe to an opportunity for +exercising the very simple and unpretending combination of qualities +that goes by the name of ability. But to my story. +</p> +<p> +My father was a wealthy country gentleman, of somewhat more than the +average of intelligence, and somewhat more than the average of +generosity and extravagance. His younger brother, a solicitor in large +practice in London, would in vain remonstrate as to the imprudence of +his course. Giving freely, spending freely, must come to an end. It +did; and at twenty I was a well educated, gentlemanly pauper. The +investigation of my father's affairs showed that there was one +shilling and sixpence in the pound for the whole of his creditors, and +of course nothing for me. +</p> +<p> +The position was painful. I was half engaged—to that is, I had +gloves, flowers, a ringlet, a carte de visite of Alice Morton. That, +of course, must be stopped. +</p> +<p> +Mr. Silas Morton was not ill-pleased at the prospect of an alliance +with his neighbor Westwood's son while there was an expectation of a +provision for the young couple in the union of estates as well as +persons; but now, when the estate was gone, when I, Guy Westwood, was +shillingless in the world, it would be folly indeed. Nevertheless I +must take my leave. +</p> +<p> +"Well, Guy, my lad, bad job this; very bad job; thought he was as safe +as the Bank. Would not have believed it from any one—not from any +one. Of course all that nonsense about you and Alice must be stopped +now; I'm not a hard man, but I can't allow Alice to throw away her +life in the poverty she would have to bear as your wife; can't do it; +wouldn't be the part of a father if I did." +</p> +<p> +I suggested I might in time. +</p> +<p> +"Time, sir! time! How much? She's nineteen now. You're brought up to +nothing; know nothing that will earn you a sixpence for the next six +months; and you talk about time. Time, indeed! Keep her waiting till +she's thirty, and then break her heart by finding it a folly to marry +at all.' +</p> +<p> +"Ah! Alice, my dear, Guy's come to say 'Good by:' he sees, with me, +that his altered position compels him, as an honorable man, to give up +any hopes he may have formed as to the future." +</p> +<p> +He left us alone to say 'Farewell!'—a word too hard to say at our +ages. Of course we consulted what should be done. To give each other +up, to bury the delicious past, that was not to be thought of. We +would be constant, spite of all. I must gain a position, and papa +would then help us. +</p> +<p> +Two ways were open; a commission in India, a place in my uncle's +office. Which? I was for the commission, Alice for the office. A +respectable influential solicitor; a position not to be despised; +nothing but cleverness wanted; and my uncle's name, and no one to wait +for; no liver <a name="199">{199}</a> complaints; no sepoys; no sea voyages; and no long +separation. +</p> +<p> +"Oh, I'm sure it is the best thing." +</p> +<p> +I agreed, not unnaturally then, that it was the best. +</p> +<p> +"Now, you young people, you've had time enough to say 'Good by,' so be +off, Guy. Here, my lad, you'll need something to start with," and the +old gentleman put into my hands a note for fifty pounds. +</p> +<p> +"I must beg, sir, that you will not insult—" +</p> +<p> +"God bless the boy! 'Insult!' Why I've danced you on my knee hundreds +of times. Look you, Guy,"—and the old fellow came and put his hand on +my shoulder,—"it gives me pain to do what I am doing. I believe, for +both your sakes, it is best you should part. Let us part friends. Come +now, Guy, you'll need this; and if you need a little more, let me +know." +</p> +<p> +"But, sir, you cut me off from all hope; you render my life a burden +to me. Give me some definite task; say how much you think we ought to +have; I mean how much I ought to have to keep Alice—I mean Miss +Morton—in such a position as you would wish." +</p> +<p> +Alice added her entreaties, and the result of the conference was an +understanding that if, within five years from that date, I could show +I was worth £500 a year, the old gentleman would add another £500; and +on that he thought we might live for a few years comfortably. +</p> +<p> +There was to be no correspondence whatever; no meetings, no messages. +We protested and pleaded, and finally he said— +</p> +<p> +"Well, well, Guy; I always liked you, and liked your father before +you. Come to us on Christmas day, and you shall find a vacant chair +beside Alice. There, now; say 'Good by,' and be off." +</p> +<p> +I went off. I came to London to one of the little lanes leading out of +Cannon street. Five hundred a year in five years! I must work hard. +</p> +<p> +My uncle took little notice of me; I fancied worked me harder than the +rest, and paid me the same. Seventy-five pounds a year is not a large +sum. I had spent it in a month before now, after the fashion of my +father: now, I hoarded; made clothes last; ate in musty, cheap, little +cook-shops; and kept my enjoying faculties from absolute rust by a +weekly half-price to the theatres—the pit. +</p> +<p> +The year passed. I went down on Christmas, and for twenty-four hours +was alive; came back, and had a rise of twenty pounds in salary for +the next year. I waited for opportunity, and it came not. +</p> +<p> +This jog-trot routine of office-work continued for two years more, and +at the end of that time I was worth but my salary of £135 per +year—£135! a long way from £500. Oh, for opportunity? I must quit the +desk, and become a merchant; all successful men have been merchants; +money begets money. But, to oppose all these thoughts of change, came +the memory of Alice's last words at Christmas, "Wait and hope, Guy, +dear; wait and hope." Certainly; it's so easy to. +</p> +<p> +"Governor wants you, Westwood. He's sharp this morning; very sharp; so +look out, my dear nephy." +</p> +<p> +"You understand a little Italian, I think?" said my uncle. +</p> +<p> +"A little, sir." +</p> +<p> +"You will start to-night for Florence, in the mail train. Get there as +rapidly as possible, and find whether a Colonel Wilson is residing +there, and what lady he is residing with. Learn all you can as to his +position and means, and the terms on which he lives with that lady. +Write to me, and wait there for further instructions. Mr. Williams +will give you a cheque for £100; you can get circular notes for £50, +and the rest cash. If you have anything to say, come in here at five +o'clock; if not, good morning. By-the-by, say nothing in the office." +</p> +<p> +I need not say that hope made me believe my opportunity was come. +</p> +<p> +I hurried to Florence and discharged my mission; sent home a <a name="200">{200}</a> +careful letter, full of facts without comment or opinion, and in three +weeks' time was summoned to return. I had done little or nothing that +could help me, and in a disappointed state of mind I packed up and +went to the railway station at St. Dominico. A little row with a +peasant as to his demand for carrying my baggage caused me to lose the +last train that night, and so the steamer at Leghorn. The +station-master, seeing my vexation, endeavored to console me: +</p> +<p> +"There will be a special through train to Leghorn at nine o'clock, +ordered for Count Spezzato: he is good-natured, and will possibly let +you go in that." +</p> +<p> +It was worth the chance, and I hung about the station till I was +tired, and then walked back toward the village. Passing a small +wine-shop, I entered, and asked for wine in English. I don't know what +whim possessed me when I did it, for they were unable to understand me +without dumb motions. I at length got wine by these means, and sat +down to while away the time over a railway volume. +</p> +<p> +I had been seated about half an hour, when a courier entered, +accompanied by a railway guard. Two more different examples of the +human race it would be difficult to describe. +</p> +<p> +The guard was a dark, savage-looking Italian, with 'rascal' and +'bully' written all over him; big, black, burly, with bloodshot eyes, +and thick, heavy, sensual lips, the man was utterly repulsive. +</p> +<p> +The courier was a little, neatly-dressed man, of no age in particular; +pale, blue-eyed, straight-lipped, his face was a compound of fox and +rabbit that only a fool or a patriot would have trusted out of arm's +length. +</p> +<p> +This ill-matched pair called for brandy, and the hostess set it before +them. I then heard them ask who and what I was. She replied, I must be +an Englishman, and did not understand the Italian for wine. She then +left. +</p> +<p> +They evidently wanted to be alone, and my presence was decidedly +disagreeable to them; and muttering that I was an Englishman, they +proceeded to try my powers as a linguist. The courier commenced in +Italian, with a remark on the weather. I immediately handed him the +Newspaper. I didn't speak Italian, that was clear to them. +</p> +<p> +The guard now struck in with a remark in French as to the fineness of +the neighboring country. I shrugged my shoulders, and produced my +cigar case. French was not very familiar to me, evidently. +</p> +<p> +"Those beasts of English think their own tongue so fine they are too +proud to learn another," said the guard. +</p> +<p> +I sat quietly, sipping my wine, and reading. +</p> +<p> +"Well, my dear Michael Pultuski," began the guard. +</p> +<p> +"For the love of God, call me by that name. My name is Alexis Alexis +Dzentzol, now." +</p> +<p> +"Oh! oh!" laughed the guard; "you've changed your name, you fox; it's +like you. Now I am the same that you knew fifteen years ago, Conrad +Ferrate—to-day, yesterday, and for life, Conrad Ferrate. Come, lad, +tell us your story. How did you get out of that little affair at +Warsaw? How they could have trusted you, with your face, with their +secrets, I can't for the life of me tell; you look so like a sly +knave, don't you, lad?" +</p> +<p> +The courier, so far from resenting this familiarity, smiled, as if he +had been praised. +</p> +<p> +"My story is soon said. I found, after my betrayal to the police of +the secrets of that little conspiracy which you and I joined, that +Poland was too hot for me, and my name too well known. I went to +France, who values her police, and for a few years was useful to them. +But it was dull work; very dull; native talent was more esteemed. I +was to be sent on a secret service to Warsaw; I declined for obvious +reasons." +</p> +<p> +"Good! Michael—Alexis; good, <a name="201">{201}</a> Alexis. This fox is not to be +trapped." And he slapped the courier on the shoulder heartily. +</p> +<p> +"And," resumed the other, "I resigned. Since then I have travelled as +courier with noble families, and I trust I give satisfaction." +</p> +<p> +"Good! Alexis; good Mich—good Alexis! To yourself you give +satisfaction. You are a fine rascal!—the prince of rascals! So decent; +so quiet; so like the curé of a convent. Who would believe that you +had sold the lives of thirty men for a few hundred roubles?" +</p> +<p> +"And who," interrupted the courier, "would believe that you, bluff, +honest Conrad Ferrate, had run away with all the money those thirty +men had collected during ten years of labor, for rescuing their +country from the Russian?" +</p> +<p> +"That was good, Alexis, was it not? I never was so rich in my life as +then; I loved—I gamed—I drank on the patriots' money." +</p> +<p> +"For how long? Three years?" +</p> +<p> +"More—and now have none left. Ah! Times change, Alexis; behold me." +And the guard touched his buttons and belt, the badges of his office. +"Never mind—here's my good friend, the bottle—let us embrace—the +only friend that is always true—if he does not gladden, he makes us +to forget." +</p> +<p> +"Tell me, my good Alexis, whom do you rob now? Who pays for the best, +and gets the second best? Whose money do you invest, eh! my little +fox? Why are you here? Come, tell me, while I drink to your success." +</p> +<p> +"I have the honor to serve his Excellency the Count Spezzato." +</p> +<p> +"Ten thousand devils! My accursed cousin!" broke in the guard. "He who +has robbed me from his birth; whose birth itself was a vile robbery of +me—me, his cousin, child of his father's brother. May he be accursed +for ever!" +</p> +<p> +I took most particular pains to appear only amused at this genuine +outburst of passion, for I saw the watchful eye of the courier was on +me all the time they were talking. +</p> +<p> +The guard drank off a tumbler of brandy. +</p> +<p> +"That master of yours is the man of whom I spoke to you years ago, as +the one who had ruined me; and you serve him! May he be strangled on +his wedding night, and cursed for ever." +</p> +<p> +"Be calm, my dearest Conrad, calm yourself; that beast of an +Englishman will think you are drunk, like one of his own swinish +people, if you talk so loud as this." +</p> +<p> +"How can I help it? I must talk. What <i>he</i> is, that <i>I</i> ought to be: I +was brought up to it till I was eighteen; was the heir to all his vast +estate; there was but one life between me and power—my uncle's—and +he, at fifty, married a girl, and had this son, this son of perdition, +my cousin. And after that, I, who had been the pride of my family, +became of no account; it was 'Julian' sweet Julian!'" +</p> +<p> +"I heard," said the courier, "that some one attempted to strangle the +sweet child, that was——?" +</p> +<p> +"Me—you fox—me. I wish I had done it; but for that wretched dog that +worried me, I should have been Count Spezzato now. I killed that dog, +killed him, no not suddenly; may his master die like him!" +</p> +<p> +"And you left after that little affair?" +</p> +<p> +"Oh yes! I left and became what you know me." +</p> +<p> +"A clever man, my dear Conrad. I know no man who is more clever with +the ace than yourself, and, as to bullying to cover a mistake, you are +an emperor at that. Is it not so, Conrad? Come, drink good health to +my master, your cousin." +</p> +<p> +"You miserable viper, I'll crush you if you ask me to do that again. +I'll drink—here, give me the glass—Here's to Count Spezzato: May he +die like a dog! May his carcase bring the birds and the wolves +together! May his name be cursed and hated while the sun lasts! And +may purgatory keep him till I pray for his release!" +</p> +<a name="202">{202}</a> +<p> +The man's passion was something frightful to see, and I was more than +half inclined to leave the place; but something, perhaps a distant +murmur of the rising tide, compelled me to stay. I pretended sleep, +allowing my head to sink, down upon the table. +</p> +<p> +He sat still for a few moments, and then commenced walking about the +room, and abruptly asked: +</p> +<p> +"What brought you here, Alexis?" +</p> +<p> +"My master's horse, Signor Conrad." +</p> +<p> +"Good, my little fox; but why did you come on your master's horse?" +</p> +<p> +"Because my master wishes to reach Leghorn to-night, to meet his +bride, Conrad." +</p> +<p> +"Then his is the special train ordered at nine, that I am to go with?" +exclaimed the guard eagerly. +</p> +<p> +"That is so, gentle Conrad; and now, having told you all, let me pay +our hostess and go." +</p> +<p> +"Pay! No one pays for me, little fox; no, no, go; I will pay." +</p> +<p> +The courier took his departure, and the guard kept walking up and down +the room, muttering to himself: +</p> +<p> +"To-night, it might be to-night. If he goes to Leghorn, he meets his +future wife; another life, and perhaps a dozen. No, it must be +to-night or never. Does his mother go? Fool that I am not to ask! Yes; +it shall be to-night;" and he left the room. +</p> +<p> +What should be "to-night?" Some foul play of which the count would be +the victim, no doubt. But how? when? That must be solved. To follow +him, or to wait—which? To wait. It is always best to wait; I had +learned this lesson already. +</p> +<p> +I waited. It was now rather more than half-past eight, and I had risen +to go to the door when I saw the guard returning to the wine-shop with +a man whose dress indicated the stoker. +</p> +<p> +"Come in, Guido; come in," said the guard; "and drink with me." +</p> +<p> +The man came in, and I was again absorbed in my book. +</p> +<p> +They seated themselves at the same table as before, and drank silently +for a while; presently the guard began a conversation in some patois I +could not understand; but I could see the stoker grow more and more +interested as the name of Beatrix occurred more frequently. +</p> +<p> +As the talk went on, the stoker seemed pressing the guard on some part +of the story with a most vindictive eagerness, repeatedly asking, "His +name? The accursed! His name?" +</p> +<p> +At last the guard answered, "The Count Spezzato." +</p> +<p> +"The Count Spezzato!" said the stoker, now leaving the table, and +speaking in Italian. +</p> +<p> +"Yes, good Guido; the man who will travel in the train we take +to-night to Leghorn." +</p> +<p> +"He shall die! The accursed! He shall die to-night!" said the stoker. +"If I lose my life, the betrayer of my sister shall die!" +</p> +<p> +The guard, returning to the unknown tongue, seemed to be endeavoring +to calm him; and I could only catch a repetition of the word "Empoli" +at intervals. Presently the stoker took from the seats beside him two +tin bottles, such as you may see in the hands of mechanics who dine +out; and I could see that one of them had rudely scratched on it the +name "William Atkinson." I fancied the guard produced from his pocket +a phial, and poured the contents into that bottle; but the action was +so rapid, and the corner so dark, that I could not be positive; then +rising, they stopped at the counter, had both bottles filled with +brandy, and went out. +</p> +<p> +It was now time to get to the station; and, having paid my modest +score, I went out. +</p> +<p> +A little in front of me, by the light from a small window, I saw these +two cross themselves, grip each other's hands across right to right, +left to left, and part. +</p> +<p> +The stoker had set down the bottles, and now taking them up followed +the guard at a slower pace. +</p> +<a name="203">{203}</a> +<p> +Arrived at the station, I found the count, his mother, a female +servant, and the courier. +</p> +<p> +The count came up to me, and said, in broken English, "You are the +English to go to Leghorn with me? Very well, there is room. I like the +English. You shall pay nothing, because I do not sell tickets; you +shall go free. Is that so?" +</p> +<p> +I thanked him in the best Italian I could muster. +</p> +<p> +"Do not speak your Italian to me; I speak the English as a native; I +can know all you shall say to me in your own tongue. See, here is the +train special, as you call it. Enter, as it shall please you." +</p> +<p> +The train drew up to the platform; and I saw that the stoker was at +his post, and that the engine-driver was an Englishman. +</p> +<p> +I endeavored in vain to draw his attention to warn him, and was +compelled to take my seat, which I did in the compartment next the +guard's break—the train consisting of only that carriage and another, +in which were the count, his mother, and the servant. +</p> +<p> +The guard passed along the train, locked the doors, and entered his +box. +</p> +<p> +"The Florence goods is behind you, and the Sienna goods is due at +Empoli Junction four minutes before you; mind you don't run into it," +said the station-master, with a laugh. +</p> +<p> +"No fear; <i>we</i> shall not run into <i>it</i>," said the guard, with a marked +emphasis on the "we" and "it" that I recalled afterward. +</p> +<p> +The whistle sounded, and we were off. It was a drizzling dark night; +and I lay down full length on the seat to sleep. +</p> +<p> +As I lay down a gleam of light shot across the carriage from a small +chink in the wood-work of the partition between the compartment I was +in and the guard's box. +</p> +<p> +I was terribly anxious for the manner of the guard; and this seemed to +be a means of hearing something more. I lay down and listened +attentively. +</p> +<p> +"How much will you give for your life, my little fox?" said the guard. +</p> +<p> +"To-day, very little; when I am sixty, all I have, Conrad." +</p> +<p> +"But you might give something for it, to-night, sweet Alexis, if you +knew it was in danger?" +</p> +<p> +"I have no fear; Conrad Ferrate has too often conducted a train for me +to fear to-night." +</p> +<p> +"True, my good Alexis; but this is the last train he will ride with as +guard, for to-morrow he will be the Count Spezzato." +</p> +<p> +"How? To-morrow? You joke, Conrad. The brandy was strong; but you who +have drunk so much could hardly feel that." +</p> +<p> +"I neither joke, nor am I drunk; yet I shall be Count Spezzato +to-morrow, good Alexis. Look you, my gentle fox, my sweet fox; if you +do not buy your life of me, you shall die tonight. That is simple, +sweet fox." +</p> +<p> +"Ay; but, Conrad, I am not in danger." +</p> +<p> +"Nay, Alexis; see, here is the door" (I heard him turn the handle). +"If you lean against the door, you will fall out and be killed. Is it +not simple?" +</p> +<p> +"But, good Conrad, I shall not lean against the door." +</p> +<p> +"Oh, my sweet fox, my cunning fox, my timid fox, but not my strong +fox; you will lean against the door. I know you will, unless I prevent +you; and I will not prevent you, unless you give me all you have in +that bag." +</p> +<p> +The mocking tone of the guard seemed well understood, for I heard the +click of gold. +</p> +<p> +"Good, my Alexis; it is good; but it is very little for a life. Come, +what is your life worth, that you buy it with only your master's +money? it has cost you nothing. I see you will lean against that door, +which is so foolish." +</p> +<p> +"What, in the name of all the devils in hell, will you have?" said the +trembling voice of the courier. "Only a little more; just that belt +<a name="204">{204}</a> that is under your shirt, under everything, next to your skin, +and dearer to you; only a little soft leather belt with pouches in. Is +not life worth a leather belt?" +</p> +<p> +"Wretch! All the earnings of my life are in that belt, and you know +it." +</p> +<p> +"Is it possible, sweet fox, that I have found your nest? I shall give +Marie a necklace of diamonds, then. Why do you wait? Why should you +fall from a train, and make a piece of news for the papers? Why?" +</p> +<p> +"Take it; and be accursed in your life and death!" and I heard the +belt flung on the floor of the carriage. +</p> +<p> +"Now, good Alexis, I am in funds; there are three pieces of gold for +you; you will need them at Leghorn. Will you drink? No? Then I will +tell you why, without drink. Do you know where we are?" +</p> +<p> +"Yes; between St. Dominico and Signa." +</p> +<p> +"And do you know where we are going?" +</p> +<p> +"Yes; to Leghorn." +</p> +<p> +"No, sweet Alexis, we are not; we are going to Empoli: the train will +go no further. Look you, little fox; we shall arrive at the junction +one minute before the Sienna goods train, and there the engine will +break down just where the rails cross; for two blows of a hammer will +convert an engine into a log; I shall get out to examine it; that will +take a little time; I shall explain to the count the nature of the +injury; that will take a little time; and then the goods train will +have arrived; and as it does not stop there, this train will go no +further than Empoli, and I shall be Count Spezzato to-morrow. How do +you like my scheme, little fox? Is it not worthy of your pupil? Oh, it +will be a beautiful accident; it will fill the papers. That beast of +an English who begged his place in the train will be fortunate; he +will cease, for goods trains are heavy. Eh! but it's a grand scheme— +the son, the mother, the servant, the stranger, the engine-driver, all +shall tell no tales." +</p> +<p> +"And the stoker?" said the courier. +</p> +<p> +"Oh, you and he and I shall escape. We shall be pointed at in the +street as the fortunate. It is good, is it not, Alexis, my fox? I have +told him that the count is the man who betrayed his sister. He +believes it, and is my creature. But, little fox, it was not my +cousin, it was myself, that took his Beatrix from her home. Is it not +good, Alexis? Is it not genius? And Atkinson—he, the driver—is now +stupid: he has drunk from his can the poppy juice that will make him +sleep for ever. I will be a politician. I am worthy of office. I will +become the Minister of a Bourbon when I am count, my dear fox, and you +shall be my comrade again, as of old." +</p> +<p> +I was, for a time, lost to every sensation save that of hearing. The +fiendish garrulity of the man had all the fascination of the serpent's +rattle. I felt helplessly resigned to a certain fate. +</p> +<p> +I was aroused by something white slowly passing the closed window of +the carriage. I waited a little, then gently opened it and looked out. +The stoker was crawling along the foot-board of the next carriage, +holding on by its handles, so as not to be seen by the occupants, and +holding the signal lantern that I had noticed at the back of the last +carriage in his hand. The meaning of it struck me in a moment: if by +any chance we missed the goods train from Sienna, we should be run +into from behind by the train from Florence. +</p> +<p> +The cold air that blew in at the open window refreshed me, and I could +think what was to be done. The train was increasing its pace rapidly. +Evidently the stoker, in sole charge, was striving to reach Empoli +before the other train, which we should follow, was due: he had to +make five minutes in a journey of forty-five, and, at the rate we were +going, we should do it. We stopped nowhere, and the journey was more +than half over. We were now between Segua and <a name="205">{205}</a> Montelupo; another +twenty minutes and I should be a bruised corpse. Something must be +done. +</p> +<p> +I decided soon. Unfastening my bag, I took out my revolver, without +which I never travel, and looking carefully to the loading and +capping, fastened it to my waist with a handkerchief. I then cut with +my knife the bar across the middle of the window, and carefully looked +out. I could see nothing; the rain was falling fast, and the night as +dark as ever. I cautiously put out first one leg and then the other, +keeping my knees and toes close to the door, and lowered myself till I +felt the step. I walked carefully along the foot-board by side steps, +holding on to the handles of the doors, till I came to the end of the +carriages, and was next the tender. Here was a gulf that seemed +impassable. The stoker must have passed over it; why not I? Mounting +from the foot-board on to the buffer, and holding on to the iron hook +on which the lamps are hung, I stretched my legs to reach the flat +part of the buffer on the tender. My legs swung about with the +vibration, and touched nothing. I must spring. I had to hold with both +hands behind my back, and stood on the case of the buffer-spring, and, +suddenly leaving go, leaped forward, struck violently against the edge +of the tender, and grasped some of the loose lumps of coal on the top. +Another struggle brought me on my knees, bruised and bleeding, on the +top. I stood up, and at that moment the stoker opened the door of the +furnace, and turned toward me, shovel in hand, to put in the coals. +The bright red light from the fire enabled him to see me, while it +blinded me. He rushed at me, and then began a struggle that I shall +remember to my dying day. +</p> +<p> +He grasped me round the throat with one arm, dragging me close to his +breast, and with the other kept shortening the shovel for an effective +blow. My hands, numbed and bruised, were almost useless to me, and for +some seconds we reeled to and fro on the foot-plate in the blinding +glare. At last he got me against the front of the engine, and, with +horrible ingenuity, pressed me against it till the lower part of my +clothes were burnt to a cinder. The heat, however, restored my hands, +and at last I managed to push him far enough from my body to loosen my +pistol. I did not want to kill him, but I could not be very careful, +and I fired at his shoulder from the back. He dropped the shovel, the +arm that had nearly throttled me relaxed, and he fell. I pushed him +into a corner of the tender, and sat down to recover myself. +</p> +<p> +My object was to get to Empoli before the Sienna goods train, for I +knew nothing of what might be behind me. It was too late to stop, but +I might, by shortening the journey seven minutes instead of five, get +to Empoli three minutes before the goods train was due. +</p> +<p> +I had never been on an engine before in my life, but I knew that there +must be a valve somewhere that let the steam from the boiler into the +cylinders, and that, being important, it would be in a conspicuous +position. I therefore turned the large handle in front of me, and had +the satisfaction of finding the speed rapidly increased, and at the +same time felt the guard putting on the break to retard the train. +Spite of this, in ten minutes I could see some dim lights; I could not +tell where, and I still pressed on faster and faster. +</p> +<p> +In vain, between the intervals of putting on coals, did I try to +arouse the sleeping driver. There I was, with two apparently dead +bodies, on the foot-plate of an engine, going at the rate of forty +miles an hour, or more, amidst a thundering noise and vibration that +nearly maddened me. +</p> +<p> +At last we reached the lights, and I saw, as I dashed by, that we had +passed the dread point. +</p> +<p> +As I turned back, I could see the rapidly-dropping cinders from the +train which, had the guard's break been sufficiently powerful to have +made me <a name="206">{206}</a> thirty seconds later, would have utterly destroyed me. +</p> +<p> +I was still in a difficult position. There was the train half a minute +behind us, which, had we kept our time, would have been four minutes +in front of us. It came on to the same rails, and I could hear its +dull rumble rushing on toward us fast. If I stopped there was no light +to warn them. I must go on, for the Sienna train did not stop at +Empoli. +</p> +<p> +I put on more fuel, and after some slight scalding, from turning on +the wrong taps, had the pleasure of seeing the water-gauge filling up. +Still I could not go on long; the risk was awful. I tried in vain to +write on a leaf of my note-book, and after searching in the tool-box, +wrote on the iron lid of the tank with a piece of chalk, "Stop +everything behind me. The train will not be stopped till three red +lights are ranged in a line on the ground. Telegraph forward." And +then, as we flew through the Empoli station, I threw it on the +platform. On we went; the same dull thunder behind warning me that I +dare not stop. +</p> +<p> +We passed through another station at full speed, and at length I saw +the white lights of another station in the distance. The sound behind +had almost ceased, and in a few moments more I saw the line of three +red lamps low down on the ground. I pulled back the handle, and after +an ineffectual effort to pull up at the station, brought up the train +about a hundred yards beyond Pontedera. +</p> +<p> +The porters and police of the station came up and put the train back, +and then came the explanation. +</p> +<p> +The guard had been found dead on the rails, just beyond Empoli, and +the telegraph set to work to stop the train. He must have found out +the failure of his scheme, and in trying to reach the engine, have +fallen on the rails. +</p> +<p> +The driver was only stupefied, and the stoker fortunately only +dangerously, not fatally, wounded. +</p> +<p> +Another driver was found, and the train was to go on. +</p> +<p> +The count had listened most attentively to my statements, and then, +taking my grimed hand in his, led me to his mother. +</p> +<p> +"Madam, my mother, you have from this day one other son: this, my +mother, is my brother." +</p> +<p> +The countess literally fell on my neck, and kissed me in the sight of +them all; and speaking in Italian said— +</p> +<p> +"Julian, he is my son; he has saved my life; and more, he has saved +your life. My son, I will not say much; what is your name?" +</p> +<p> +"Guy Westwood." +</p> +<p> +"Guy, my child, my son, I am your mother; you shall love me." +</p> +<p> +"Yes, my mother; he is my brother, I am his. He is English too; I like +English. He has done well. Blanche shall be his sister." +</p> +<p> +During the whole of this time both mother and son were embracing me +and kissing my cheeks, after the impulsive manner of their passionate +natures, the indulgence of which appears so strange to our cold blood. +</p> +<p> +The train was delayed, for my wounds and bruises to be dressed, and I +then entered their carriage and went to Leghorn with them. +</p> +<p> +Arrived there, I was about to say "Farewell." +</p> +<p> +"What is farewell, now? No; you must see Blanche, your sister. You +will sleep to my hotel: I shall not let you go. Who is she that in +your great book says, 'Where you go, I will go?' That is my spirit. +You must not leave me till—till you are as happy as I am." +</p> +<p> +He kept me, introduced me to Blanche, and persuaded me to write for +leave to stay another two months, when he would return to England with +me. Little by little he made me talk about Alice, till he knew all my +story. +</p> +<p> +"Ah! that is it; you shall be unhappy because you want £500 every +year, and I have so much as that. I am a patriot to get rid of my +money. So it is that you will not take money. You have saved my life, +and you will <a name="207">{207}</a> not take money; but I shall make you take money, my +friend, English Guy; you shall have as thus." And he handed me my +appointment as secretary to one of the largest railways in Italy. "Now +you shall take money; now you will not go to your fogland to work like +a slave; you shall take the money. That is not all. I am one of the +practice patriots—no, the practical patriots—of Italy. They come to +me with their conspiracies to join, their secret societies to adhere +to, but I do not. I am director of ever so many railways; I make fresh +directions every day. I say to those who talk to me of politics, 'How +many shares will you take in this or in that?' I am printer of books; +I am builder of museums; I have great share in docks, and I say to +these, 'It is this that I am doing that is wanted.' This is not +conspiracy; it is not plot; it is not society with ribbons; but it is +what Italy, my country, wants. I grow poor; Italy grows rich. I am not +wise in these things; they cheat me, because I am an enthusiast. Now, +Guy, my brother, you are wise; you are deep; long in the head; in +short, you are English! You shall be my guardian in these things—you +shall save me from the cheat, and you shall work hard as you like for +all the money you shall take of me. Come, my Guy, is it so?" +</p> +<p> +Need I say that it was so? The count and his Blanche made their +honeymoon tour in England. They spent Christmas day with Alice and +myself at Mr. Morton's, and when they left, Alice and I left with +them, for our new home in Florence. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>From The Cornhill Magazine. +<br><br> +THE WINDS.</h2> +<br> +<pre> + O wild raving west winds.… + Oh! where do ye rise from, and where do ye die? +</pre> +<br> +<p> +The question which is put in these lines is one which has posed the +ingenuity of all who have ever thought on it; and though theories have +repeatedly been propounded to answer it, yet one and all fail, and we +again recur to the words of him who knew all things and said, "The +wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but +canst not tell whence it cometh or whither it goeth." +</p> +<p> +However, though we cannot assign exactly the source whence the winds +rise or the goal to which they tend, the labors of meteorologists have +been so far successful as to enable us to understand the causes of the +great currents of air, and even to map out the winds which prevail at +different seasons in the various quarters of the globe. The problem +which has thus been solved is one vastly more simple than that of +saying why the wind changes on any particular day, or at what spot on +the earth's surface a particular current begins or ends. Were these +questions solved, there would be an end to all uncertainty about +weather. There need be no fear that the farmer would lose his crops +owing to the change of weather, if the advent of every shower had been +foretold by an unerring guide, and the precise day of the break in the +weather predicted weeks and months before. This is the point on which +weather-prophets—'astro-meteorologists' they call themselves +now-a-days—still venture their predictions, undismayed by their +reported and glaring failures. <a name="208">{208}</a> It has been well remarked that +not one of these prophets foretold the dry weather which lasted for so +many weeks during the last summer; yet, even at the present day, there +are people who look to the almanacs to see what weather is to be +expected at a given date; and even the prophecies of "Old Moore" find, +or used to find within a very few years, an ample credence. In fact, +if we are to believe the opinions propounded by the positive +philosophers of the present day, we must admit that it is absurd to +place any limits on the possibility of predicting natural phenomena, +inasmuch as all operations of nature obey fixed and unalterable laws, +which are all discoverable by the unaided mind of man. +</p> +<p> +True science, we may venture to say, is more modest than these +gentlemen would have us to think it; and though in the particular +branch of knowledge of which we are now treating daily prophecies (or +'forecasts,' as Admiral Fitzroy is careful to call them) of weather +appear in the newspapers, yet these are not announced dogmatically, +and no attempt is made in them to foretell weather for more than +forty-eight hours in advance. We are not going to discuss the question +of storms and storm-signals at present, so we shall proceed to the +subject in hand—the ordinary wind-currents of the earth; and in +speaking of these shall confine ourselves as far as possible to +well-known and recorded facts, bringing in each case the best evidence +which we can adduce to support the theories which may be broached. +</p> +<p> +What, then, our readers will ask, is the cause of the winds? The +simple answer is—the sun. Let us see, now, how this indefatigable +agent, who appears to do almost everything on the surface of the +earth, from painting pictures to driving steam-engines, as George +Stephenson used to maintain that he did, is able to raise the wind. +</p> +<p> +If you light a fire in a room, and afterward stop up every chink by +which air can gain access to the fire, except the chimney, the fire +will go out in a short time. Again, if a lamp is burning on the table, +and you stop up the chimney at the top, the lamp will go out at once. +The reason of this is that the flame, in each case, attracts the air, +and if either the supply of air is cut off below, or its escape above +is checked, the flame cannot go on burning. This explanation, however, +does not bear to be pushed too far. The reason that the fire goes out +if the supply of air is cut off is, that the flame, so to speak, feeds +on air; while the sun cannot be said, in any sense, to be dependent on +the earth's atmosphere for the fuel for his fire. We have chosen the +illustration of the flame, because the facts are so well known. If, +instead of a lamp in the middle of a room, we were to hang up a large +mass of iron, heated, we should find that currents of air set in from +all sides, rose up above it, and spread out when they reached the +ceiling, descending again along the walls. The existence of these +currents may be easily proved by sprinkling a handful of fine chaff +about in the room. What is the reason of the circulation thus +produced? The iron, unless it be extremely hot, as it is when melted +by Mr. Bessemer's process, does not require the air in order to keep +up its heat; and, in fact, the constant supply of fresh air cools it, +as the metal gives away its own heat to the air as fast as the +particles of the latter come in contact with it. Why, then, do the +currents arise? Because the air, when heated, expands or gets lighter, +and rises, leaving an empty space, or vacuum, where it was before. +Then the surrounding cold air, being elastic, forces itself into the +open space, and gets heated in its turn. +</p> +<p> +From this we can see that there will be a constant tendency in the air +to flow toward that point on the earth's surface where the temperature +is highest—or, all other things being equal, to that point where the +sun may be at that moment in the zenith. Accordingly, if the earth's +surface were either <a name="209">{209}</a> entirely dry land, or entirely water, and +the sun were continually in the plane of the equator, we should expect +to find the direction of the great wind-currents permanent and +unchanged throughout the year. The true state of the case is, however, +that these conditions are very far from being fulfilled. Every one +knows that the sun is not always immediately over the equator, but +that he is at the tropic of Cancer in June, and at the tropic of +Capricorn in December, passing the equator twice every year at the +equinoxes. Here, then, we have one cause which disturbs the regular +flow of the wind-currents. The effect of this is materially increased +by the extremely arbitrary way in which the dry land has been +distributed over the globe. The northern hemisphere contains the whole +of Europe, Asia, and North America, the greater part of Africa, and a +portion of South America; while in the southern hemisphere we only +find the remaining portions of the two last-named continents, with +Australia and some of the large islands in its vicinity. Accordingly, +during our summer there is a much greater area of dry land exposed to +the nearly vertical rays of the sun than is the case during our +winter. +</p> +<p> +Let us see for a moment how this cause acts in modifying the direction +of the wind-currents. We shall find it easier to make this +intelligible if we take an illustration from observed facts. It takes +about five times as much heat to raise a ton weight of water through a +certain range of temperature, as it does to produce the same effect in +the case of a ton of rock. Again, the tendency of a surface of dry +land to give out heat, and consequently to warm the air above it, and +cause it to rise, is very much greater than that of a surface of water +of equal area. Hence we can at once see the cause of the local winds +which are felt every day in calm weather in islands situated in hot +climates. During the day the island becomes very hot, and thus what +the French call a <i>courant ascendant</i> is set in operation. The air +above the land gets hot and rises, while the colder air which is on +the sea all round it flows in to fill its place, and is felt as a cool +sea-breeze. During the night these conditions are exactly reversed: +the land can no longer get any heat from the sun, as he has set, while +it is still nearly as liberal in parting with its acquired heat as it +was before. Accordingly, it soon becomes cooler than the sea in its +neighborhood; and the air, instead of rising up over it, sinks down +upon it, and flows out to sea, producing a land-wind. +</p> +<p> +These conditions are, apparently, nearly exactly fulfilled in the +region of the monsoons, with the exception that the change of wind +takes place at intervals of six months, and not every twelve hours. In +this district—which extends over the southern portion of Asia and the +Indian ocean—the wind for half the year blows from one point, and for +the other half from that which is directly opposite. The winds are +north-east and south-west in Hindostan; and in Java, at the other side +of the equator, they are south-east and north-west. The cause of the +winds—monsoons they are called, from an Arabic word, <i>mausim</i>, +meaning season—is not quite so easily explained as that of the +ordinary land and sea breezes to which we have just referred. Their +origin is to be sought for in the temperate zone, and not between the +tropics. The reason of this is that the districts toward which the air +is sucked in are not those which are absolutely hottest, but those +where the rarefaction of the air is greatest. When the air becomes +lighter, it is said to be rarefied, and this rarefaction ought +apparently to be greatest where the temperature is highest. This would +be the case if the air were the only constituent of our atmosphere. +There is, however, a very important disturbing agent to be taken into +consideration, viz., aqueous vapor. There is always, when it is not +actually raining, a quantity of water rising from the surface of <a name="210">{210}</a> +the sea and from every exposed water-surface, and mingling with the +air. This water is perfectly invisible: as it is in the form of vapor, +it is true steam, and its presence only becomes visible when it is +condensed so as to form a cloud. The hotter the air is, the more of +this aqueous vapor is it able to hold in the invisible condition. +</p> +<p> +We shall naturally expect to find a greater amount of this steam in +the air at places situated near the coast, than at those in the +interior of continents, and this is actually the case. The amount of +rarefaction which the dry air on the sea-coast of Hindostan undergoes +in summer, is partially compensated for by the increased tension of +the aqueous vapor, whose presence in the air is due to the action of +the sun's heat on the surface of the Indian ocean. In the interior of +Asia there is no great body of water to be found, and the winds from +the south lose most of the moisture which they contain in passing over +the Himalayas. Accordingly the air is extremely dry, and a +compensation, similar to that which is observed in Hindostan, cannot +take place. It is toward this district that the wind is sucked in, and +the attraction is sufficient to draw a portion of the south-east +trade-wind across the line into the northern hemisphere. In our winter +the region where the rarefaction is greatest is the continent of +Australia; and accordingly, in its turn, it sucks the north-east +trade-wind of the northern hemisphere across the equator. Thus we see +that in the region which extends from the coast of Australia to the +centre of Asia we have monsoons, or winds which change regularly every +six months. As to the directions of the different monsoons, we shall +discuss them when we have disposed of the trade-winds—which ought by +rights, as Professor Dove observes, rather to be considered as an +imperfectly developed monsoon, than the latter to be held as a +modification of the former. +</p> +<p> +The origin of the trade-winds is to be sought for, as before, in the +heating power of the sun, and their direction is a result of the +figure of the earth, and of its motion on its axis. When the air at +the equator rises, that in higher latitudes on either side flows in, +and would be felt as a north wind or as a south wind respectively, if +the earth's motion on its axis did not affect it. The figure of the +earth is pretty nearly that of a sphere, and, as it revolves round its +axis, it is evident that those points on its surface which are +situated at the greatest distance from the axis, will have to travel +over a greater distance in the same time than those which are near it. +Thus, for instance, London, which is nearly under the parallel of 50, +has only to travel about three-fifths of the distance which a place +like Quito, situated under the equator, has to travel in the same +time. A person situated in London is carried, imperceptibly to +himself, by the motion of the earth, through 15,000 miles toward the +eastward in the twenty-four hours; while another at Quito is carried +through 25,000 miles in the same time. Accordingly, if the Londoner, +preserving his own rate of motion, were suddenly transferred to Quito, +he would be left 10,000 miles behind the other in the course of the +twenty-four hours, or would appear to be moving in the opposite +direction, from east to west, at the rate of about 400 miles an hour. +The case would be just as if a person were to be thrown into a railway +carriage which was moving at full speed; he would appear to his +fellow-passengers to be moving in the opposite direction to them, +while in reality the motion of progression was in the train, not in +the person who was thrown into it. The air is transferred from high to +low latitudes, but this change is gradual, and the earth, accordingly, +by means of the force of friction, is able to retard its relative +velocity before it reaches the tropics so that its actual velocity, +though still considerable, is far below 400 miles an hour. +</p> +<p> +This wind comes from high latitudes and becomes more and more easterly +<a name="211">{211}</a> reaching us as a nearly true north-east wind; and as it gets +into lower latitudes becoming more and more nearly east, and forming a +belt of north-east wind all round the earth on the northern side of +the equator. In the southern hemisphere, there is a similar belt of +permanent winds, which are, of course, south-easterly instead of +north-easterly. These belts are not always at equal distances at each +side of the equator, as their position is dependent on the situation +of the zone of maximum temperature for the time being. When we reach +the actual district where the air rises, we find the easterly +direction of the wind no longer so remarkable, as has been noticed by +Basil Hall and others. The reason is, that by the time that the air +reaches the district where it rises, it has obtained by means of its +friction with the earth's surface a rate of motion round the earth's +axis nearly equal to that of the earth's surface itself. +</p> +<p> +The trade-wind zones, called, by the Spaniards, the "Ladies' Sea"—<i>El +Golfo de las Damas</i>—because navigation on a sea where the wind never +changed was so easy, shift their position according to the apparent +motion of the sun in the ecliptic. In the Atlantic the north-east +trade begins in summer in the latitude of the Azores; in winter it +commences to the south of the Canaries. +</p> +<p> +In the actual trade-wind zones rain very seldom falls, any more than +it does in these countries when the east wind has well set in. The +reason of this is, that the air on its passage from high to low +latitudes is continually becoming warmer and warmer. According as its +temperature rises, its power of dissolving (so to speak) water +increases also, and so it is constantly increasing its burden of water +until it reaches the end of its journey, where it rises into the +higher regions of the atmosphere, and there is suddenly cooled. The +chilling process condenses, to a great extent, the aqueous vapor +contained in the trade-wind air, and causes it to fall in constant +discharges of heavy rain. Throughout the tropics the rainy season +coincides with that period at which the sun is in the zenith, and in +this region the heaviest rain-fall on the globe is observed. The +wettest place in the world, Cherrapoonjee, is situated in the Cossya +hills, about 250 miles northeast of Calcutta, just outside the torrid +zone. There the ram-fall is upward of 600 inches in the year, or +twenty times as much as it is on the west coasts of Scotland and +Ireland. However, in such extreme cases as this, there are other +circumstances to be taken into consideration, such as the position of +the locality as regards mountain chains, which may cause the clouds to +drift over one particular spot. +</p> +<p> +To return to the wind: When the air rises at the equatorial edge of +the trade-wind zone, it flows away above the lower trade-wind current. +The existence of an upper current in the tropics is well known. +Volcanic ashes, which have fallen in several of the West Indian +islands on several occasions, have been traced to volcanoes which lay +to the westward of the locality where the ashes fell, at a time when +there was no west wind blowing at the sea-level. To take a recent +instance: ashes fell at Kingston, Jamaica, in the year 1835, and it is +satisfactorily proved that they had been ejected from the volcano of +Coseguina, on the Pacific shore of Central America, and must +consequently have been borne to the eastward by an upward current +counter to the direction of the easterly winds which were blowing at +the time at the sea-level. +</p> +<p> +Captain Maury supposes that when the air rises, at either side of the +equator, it crosses over into the opposite hemisphere, so that there +is a constant interchange of air going on between the northern and +southern hemispheres. This he has hardly sufficiently proved, and his +views are not generally accepted. One of the arguments on which he +lays great stress in support of his theory is that on certain +occasions dust has fallen in <a name="212">{212}</a> various parts of western Europe, +and that in it there have been discovered microscopical animals +similar to those which are found in South America. This appears to be +scarcely an incontrovertible proof; as Admiral Fitzroy observes: +"Certainly, such insects may be found in Brazil; but does it follow +that they are not also in Africa, under nearly the same parallel?" +</p> +<p> +This counter-current, or "anti-trade," as Sir J. Herschel has called +it, is at a high level in the atmosphere between the tropics, far +above the top of the highest mountains; but at the exterior edge of +the trade-wind zone, it descends to the surface of the ground. The +Canary islands are situated close to this edge, and accordingly we +find that there is always a westerly wind at the summit of the Peak of +Teneriffe, while the wind at the sea-level, in the same island, is +easterly throughout the summer months. Professor Piazzi Smyth, who +lived for some time on the top of that mountain, making astronomical +observations, has recorded some very interesting details of the +conflicts between the two currents, which he was able to observe +accurately from his elevated position. In winter the trade-wind zone +is situated to the south of its summer position in latitude, and at +this season the southwest wind is felt at the sea-level in the Canary +islands. Similar facts to these have been observed in other localities +where there are high mountains situated on the edge of the trade-wind +zone, as, for instance, Mouna Loa, in the Sandwich islands. There can, +therefore, be no doubt that the warm, moist west wind, which is felt +so generally in the temperate zones, is really the air returning to +the poles from the equator, which has now assumed a south-west +direction on its return journey, owing to conditions the reverse of +those which imparted to it a north-east motion on its way toward the +equator. This, then, is our south-west wind, which is so prevalent in +the North Atlantic ocean that the voyage from Europe to America is not +unfrequently called the up-hill trip, in contradistinction to the +down-hill passage home. These are the "brave west winds" of Maury, +whose refreshing action on the soil he never tires of recapitulating. +</p> +<p> +The south-west monsoons of Hindostan, which blow from May to October, +and the north-west monsoons of the Java seas, which are felt between +November and April, owe their westerly motion to a cause similar to +that of the anti-trades which we have just described. To take the case +of the monsoons of Hindostan: we have seen above how the rarefaction +of the air in Central Asia attracts the southeast trade-wind of the +southern hemisphere across the equator. This air, when it moves from +the equator into higher latitudes, brings with it the rate of motion, +to the eastward, of the equatorial regions which it has lately left, +and is felt as a south-west wind. Accordingly, the directions of the +monsoons are thus accounted for. In the winter months the true +north-east trade-wind is felt in Hindostan; while in the summer months +its place is taken by the south-east trade of the southern hemisphere, +making its appearance as the south-west monsoon. In Java, conditions +exactly converse to these are in operation, and the winds are +south-east from April to November, and north-west during the rest of +the year. +</p> +<p> +The change of one monsoon to the other is always accompanied by rough +weather, called in some places the "breaking out" of the monsoon; just +as with us the equinox, or change of the season from summer to winter, +and <i>vice versa</i>, is marked by "windy weather," or "equinoctial +gales." +</p> +<p> +The question may, however, well be asked, why there are no monsoons in +the Atlantic Ocean? +</p> +<p> +In the first place, the amount of rarefaction which the air in Africa +and in Brazil undergoes, in the respective hot seasons of those +regions, is far less considerable than that which is <a name="213">{213}</a> observed in +Asia and Australia at the corresponding seasons. +</p> +<p> +Secondly, in the case of the Atlantic ocean, the two districts toward +which the air is attracted are situated within the torrid zone, while +in the Indian ocean they are quite outside the tropics, and in the +temperate zones. Accordingly, even if the suction of the air across +the equator did take place to the same extent in the former case as in +the latter, the extreme contrast in direction between the two monsoons +would not be perceptible to the same extent, owing to the fact that +the same amount of westing could not be imparted to the wind, because +it had not to travel into such high latitudes on either side of the +equator. A tendency to the production of the phenomena of the monsoons +is observable along the coast of Guinea, where winds from the south +and south-west are very generally felt. These winds are not really the +south-east trade-wind, which has been attracted across the line to the +northern hemisphere, They ought rather to be considered as of the same +nature as the land and sea breezes before referred to, since we find +it to be very generally the case, that in warm climates the ordinary +wind-currents undergo a deflection to a greater or less extent along a +coast-line such as that of Guinea, Brazil, or north of Australia. +</p> +<p> +Our readers may perhaps ask why it is, that when we allege that the +whole of the winds of the globe owe their origin to a regular +circulation of the air from the Polar regions to the equator, and back +again, we do not find more definite traces of such a circulation in +the winds of our own latitudes? The answer to this is, that the traces +of this circulation are easily discoverable if we only know how to +look for them, In the Mediterranean sea, situated near the northern +edge of the trade-wind zone, the contrast between the equatorial and +polar currents of air is very decidedly marked. The two conflicting +winds are known under various names in different parts of the +district. The polar current, on its way to join the trade-wind, is +termed the "tramontane," in other parts the "bora," the "maestral," +etc.; while the return trade-wind, bringing rain, is well known under +the name of the "sirocco." In Switzerland the same wind is called the +"Fohn," and is a warm wind, which causes the ice and snow to melt +rapidly, and constantly brings with it heavy rain. +</p> +<p> +In these latitudes the contrast is not so very striking, but even here +every one knows that the only winds which last for more than a day or +two at a time are the north-east and the south-west winds, the former +of which is dry and cold, the latter moist and warm. The difference +between these winds is much more noticeable in winter than in summer, +inasmuch as in the latter season Russia and the northern part of Asia +enjoy, relatively to the British Islands, a much higher temperature +than is the case in winter; so that the air which moves from those +regions during the summer months does not come to us from a climate +which is colder than our own, but from one which is warmer. +</p> +<p> +So far, then, we have attempted to trace the ordinary wind-currents, +but as yet there are very many questions connected therewith which are +not quite sufficiently explained. To mention one of these, we hear +from many observers on the late Arctic expeditions, that the most +marked characteristic of the winds in the neighborhood of Baffin's +Bay, is the great predominance of north-westerly winds. It is not as +yet, nor can it ever be satisfactorily, decided how far to the +northward and westward this phenomenon is noticeable. The question +then is, Whence does this north-west wind come? +</p> +<p> +As to the causes of the sudden changes of wind, and of storms, they +are as yet shrouded in mystery, and we cannot have much expectation +that in our lifetime, at least, much will be done to unravel the web. +Meteorology is a very young science—if it deserves <a name="214">{214}</a> the title of +science at all—and until observations for a long series of years +shall have been made at many stations, we shall not be in the +possession of trustworthy facts on which to ground our reasoning. It +is merely shoving the difficulty a step further off to assign these +irregular variations to atmospheric waves. It will be time enough to +reason accurately about the weather and its changes when we ascertain +what these atmospheric waves are, and what causes them. Until the +"astro-meteorologists" will tell us the principles on which their +calculations are based, we must decline to receive their predictions +as worthy of any credence whatever. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>From The Month. +<br><br> +EUGÉNIE AND MAURICE DE GUÉRIN.</h2> +<br> +<p> +The life of Eugénie de Guérin forms a great contrast with those which +are generally brought before the notice of the world. Not only did she +not seek for fame, but the circumstances of her life were the very +ones which generally tend to keep a woman in obscurity. Her life was +passed in the deepest retirement of a country home. The society even +of a provincial town was not within her reach. Poverty placed a bar +between her and the means for study in congenial society. The routine +of her life shut her out from great deeds or unusual achievements. In +fact, her life, so far from being a deviation from the ordinary track +which women have to tread, was a very type of the existence which +seems to be marked out for the majority of women, and at which they +are so often wont to murmur. The want of an aim in life, the necessity +of some fixed, engrossing occupation, and the <i>ennui</i> which follows on +the deprivation of these, forms the staple trial of thousands of +women, especially in England, where there is much intellectual vigor +with so little power for its exercise. That the reaction from this +deprivation is shown by "fastness," or an excessive love of dress and +amusement, is acknowledged by the most keen observers of human nature. +But to the large class of women who, disdaining such means of +distraction, bear their burden patiently, Eugénie de Guérin's <i>Journal +et Lettres</i> possess an intense interest. Her life was so uneventful +that it absolutely affords no materials for a biography, but her +character is so full of interest that her name is now a familiar one +in England and France. +</p> +<p> +Far away in the heart of sunny Languedoc stands the chateau of Le +Cayla, the home of the de Guérins. They were of noble blood. The old +chateau was full of reminiscences of the deeds of their ancestors. De +Guérin, Bishop of Senlis and Chancellor of France, had gone forth, +with a valor scarcely befitting his episcopal character, to animate +the troops at the battle of Bouvines; and from the walls of Le Cayla +looked down from his portrait de Guérin, Grand Master of the Knights +of Malta in 1206. A cardinal, a troubadour, and countless gallant and +noble soldiers filled up the family rolls—the best blood in France +had mingled with theirs; but now the family were obscure, forgotten, +and poor. But these circumstances were no hindrances to the happiness +of Eugénie's early life. +</p> +<p> +"My childhood passed away like one long summer-day," said she <a name="215">{215}</a> +afterward. Thirteen happy years fled by. There was the father, +cherished with tender, self-forgetting love; the brother Eranbert; the +sister Marie, the youngest pet of the household; the beautiful and +precocious Maurice; and the mother, the centre of all, loving and +beloved. But a shadow suddenly fell on the sunny landscape, and Madame +de Guérin lay on her death-bed, when, calling to her Eugénie, her +eldest child, she gave to her especial charge Maurice, then aged +seven, and his mother's darling. The dying lips bade Eugénie fill a +mother's place to him, and the sensitive and enthusiastic girl +received the words into her heart, and never forgot them. +</p> +<p> +From that day her childhood, almost her youth, ended; and it is +without exaggeration we may say that the depth of maternal love passed +into her heart. Henceforth Maurice was the one object and the +absorbing thought of her heart, second only to one other, and that no +love of earth. Sometimes, indeed, that passionate devotion to Maurice +disputed the sway of the true Master, as we shall hereafter see, but +it was never ultimately victorious. It was not likely that their lives +should for long run side by side. The extraordinary brilliancy of +Maurice's gifts made his father determine upon cultivating his mind. +As soon as possible, he was sent first to the <i>petit séminaire</i> at +Toulouse, and then to the college Stanislaus at Paris. +</p> +<p> +Maurice de Guérin was a singularly endowed being. He possessed that +kind of personal beauty so very rare among men, and which is so hard +to describe—a spiritual beauty, which insensibly draws the hearts of +others to its possessor. Added to this, he had that sweetness of tone +and manner, that instinctive power of sympathy, that sparkling +brilliance which made him idolized by those who knew him, which +rendered him literally the darling of his friends. "<i>Il était leur +vie</i>," said those who spoke of him after he was gone from earth. +</p> +<p> +The early and ardent aspirations of this gifted being were turned +heavenward. His youthful head was devoutly bowed in prayer. The +country people called him "<i>le jeune saint</i>;" and his conduct at the +<i>petit séminaire</i> gave such satisfaction that the Archbishop of +Toulouse, and also the Archbishop of Rouen, offered to take the whole +charge of his future education on themselves; but his father refused +both. The temptations of a college life had left him scathless, and +the longing of his soul was for the consecration of the priesthood. +What he might have been, had he fallen into other hands, cannot now be +known. Whether there was an inherent weakness and effeminacy in the +character which would have unfitted him for the awful responsibilities +of the priestly office, we know not. At all events, he was attracted, +as many minds of undoubted superiority were at that time, by the +extraordinary brilliancy and commanding genius of de Lamennais; and +Maurice de Guérin found himself in the solitude of La Chesnaie, a +fellow-student with Hippolyte Lacordaire, Montalembert, Saint-Beuve, +and a group of others. Here some years of his life were spent, divided +between prayer, study, and brilliant conversation, led and sustained +by M. de Lamennais. Maurice, of a shy and diffident disposition, does +not seem to have attached himself to Lamennais, although he admired +and looked up to him, and although the insidious portion of his +teaching was making havoc with his faith. +</p> +<p> +And now, it may be asked, what of Eugénie? Dwelling in an obscure +province, with no other living guide than a simple parish curé, with a +natural enthusiastic reverence for genius, and a predilection for all +Maurice's friends, was she not dazzled from afar off by this great +teacher of men's minds, this earnest reformer of abuses? The instinct +of the single in heart was hers. Long ere others had discerned the +canker eating away the fruit so fair to look on, Eugénie, with +prophetic voice, was warning Maurice. <a name="216">{216}</a> Lacordaire's noble soul +was yet ensnared. Madam Swetchine's remonstrances had not yet +prevailed; while this young girl in the country, whose name no one +knew, was watching and praying for the issue of the deliberations at +La Chesnaie. +</p> +<p> +At length the break-up came—the memorable journey to Rome was over. +Submission had been required, and Lacordaire had given it. "Silence is +the second power in the world," he had said to Lamennais; and he had +withdrawn with him to La Chesnaie for a time of retreat, where he was +soon undeceived as to Lamennais' intentions. And these two great men +parted—one to reap the fruits of patient obedience in the success of +one of the greatest works wrought in his century, to gain a mastery +over the men of his age, and to die at last worn out by labors before +his time, the beloved child of the Church, whose borders he had +enlarged, whose honor he had defended; the other, to follow the course +of self-will, and to quench his light in utter darkness. +</p> +<p> +The students of La Chesnaie went away, and Maurice was thrown on the +world with no definite employment. An unsuccessful attachment deepened +the natural melancholy of his sensitive nature. He went to Paris, and +was soon in the midst of the literary world. He wrote, and obtained +fame; he was admired and sought after; but the beautiful faith of his +youth faded away like a flower, and the innocent pleasures of his +childhood, and the passionate love of his sister, had no attractions +for him compared to the brilliant circles of Parisian society. +</p> +<p> +And thus was Eugénie's fate marked out. From afar off her heart +followed him; and, partly for his amusement, partly to relieve the +outpourings of her intensely-loving heart, she kept a journal, +intended for Maurice's eye only. A few letters to Maurice and one or +two intimate friends make up the rest of the volume, which was, after +her death, most fortunately given to the world. In these pages her +character stands revealed, and no long description of her mode of life +could have made us more thoroughly acquainted with her than these +words, written sometimes in joy, sometimes in sorrow, in weariness and +depression, in all weathers, and at all times; for, believing that she +pleased her brother, nothing would prevent her from keeping her +promise of a daily record of her life and thoughts. Its chief beauty +lies in that she made so much out of so little. "I have just come away +very happy from the kitchen, where I stood a long time this evening, +to persuade Paul, one of our servants, to go to confession at +Christmas. He has promised me, and he is a good boy and will keep his +word. Thank God, my evening is not lost! What a happiness it would be +if I could thus every day gain a soul for God! Walter Scott has been +neglected this evening; but what book could have been worth to me what +Paul's promise is? … <i>The 20th</i>.— I am so fond of the snow! Its +perfect whiteness has something celestial about it. To-day I see +nothing but road-tracks, and the marks of the feet of little birds. +Lightly as they rest, they leave their little traces in a thousand +forms upon the snow. It is so pretty to see their little red feet, as +if they were all drawn with pencils of coral. Winter has its beauties +and its enjoyments, and we find them every-where when we know how to +see them. God spreads grace and beauty everywhere. … I must have +another dish to-day for S.R., who is come to see us. He does not often +taste good things—that is why I wish to treat him well; for it is to +the desolate that, it seems to me, we should pay attentions. No +reading to-day. I have made a cap for a little child, which has taken +up all my time. But, provided one works, be it with the head or the +fingers, it is all the same in the eyes of God, who takes account of +every work done in his name. I hope, then, that my cap has been a +charity—I have given my time, a little material, and a thousand +interesting lines that I could <a name="217">{217}</a> have read. Papa brought me +yesterday <i>Ivanhoe</i>, and the <i>Siècle de Louis XIV</i>. Here are +provisions for some of our long winter evenings." +</p> +<p> +Then she had a keen sense of enjoyment, and a wonderful faculty of +making the best of things. Thus a simple pleasure to her was a source +of delight. Here is her description of Christmas night in Languedoc: +</p> +<p> +"<i>Dec. 31</i>. I have written nothing for a fortnight. Do not ask me why. +There are times when we cannot speak, things of which we can say +nothing. Christmas is come—that beautiful fête which I love the most, +which brings me as much joy as the shepherds of Bethlehem. Truly our +whole soul sings at the coming of the Lord, which is announced to us +on all sides by hymns and by the pretty <i>nadalet</i>. [Footnote 49] +Nothing in Paris can give an idea of what Christmas is. You have not +even midnight mass. [Footnote 50] We all went to it, papa at our +head, on a most charming night. There is no sky more beautiful than +that of midnight: it was such that papa kept putting his head out of +his cloak to look at it. The earth was white with frost, but we were +not cold, and, beside, the air around us was warmed by the lighted +fagots that our servants carried to light us. It was charming, I +assure you, and I wish I could have seen you sliding along with us +toward the church on the road, bordered with little white shrubs, as +if they were flowering. The frost makes such pretty flowers! We saw +one wreath so pretty that we wanted to make it a bouquet for the +Blessed Sacrament, but it melted in our hands; all flowers last so +short a time. I very much regretted my bouquet; it was so sad to see +it melt drop by drop. I slept at the presbytery. The curé's good +sister kept me, and gave me an excellent <i>réveillon</i> of hot milk." +Then, again, the grave part of her nature prevails, and she continues: +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 49: A particular way of ringing the bells during the + fifteen days which precede the feast of Christmas, called in patois + <i>nodal</i>.] +<br><br> + [Footnote 50: Since the period at which Mdlle. de Guérin wrote, + midnight mass has been resumed in Paris.] +</p> +<p> +"These are, then, my last thoughts; for I shall write nothing more +this year; in a few hours it will be over, and we shall have begun a +new year. Oh, how quickly time passes! Alas, alas, can I say that I +regret it? No, my God, I do not regret time, or anything that it +brings; it is not worth while to throw our affections into its stream. +But empty, useless days, lost for heaven, this causes me regret as I +look back on life. Dearest, where shall I be at this day, at this +hour, at this minute, next year? Will it be here, elsewhere; here +below, or above? God only knows; I am before the door of the future, +resigned to all that can come forth from it. To-morrow I will pray for +your happiness, for papa, Mimi, Eran [her other brother and sister], +and all those whom I love. It is the day for presents; I will take +mine from heaven. I draw all from thence, for truly there are few +things which please me on earth. The longer I live, the less it +pleases me, and I see the years pass by without sorrow, because they +are but steps to the other world. Do not think it is any sorrow or +trouble which makes me think this. I assure you it is not, but a +home-sickness comes over my soul when I think of heaven. The clock +strikes; it is the last I shall hear when writing to you." +</p> +<p> +The following is an account of what she called "a happy day:" "God be +blessed for a day without sorrow. They are rare in this life, and my +soul, more than others, is soon troubled. A word, a memory, the sound +of a voice, a sad face, nothing, I know not what, often troubles the +serenity of my soul—a little sky, darkened by the smallest cloud. +This day I received a letter from Gabrielle, the cousin whom I love so +for her sweetness and beautiful mind. I was uneasy about her health, +which is so delicate, having heard nothing of her for more than a +month. I was so pleased to see a letter from her, that I read it +before my prayers. I was so eager to read it. To see a letter, and not +to open it, is <a name="218">{218}</a> an impossible thing. Another letter was given to +me at Cahuzac. It was from Lili, another sweet friend, but quite +withdrawn from the world; a pure soul—a soul like snow, from its +purity so white that I am confounded when I look at it—a soul made +for the eyes of God. I was coming from Cahuzac, very pleased with my +letter, when I saw a little boy, weeping as if his heart were broken. +He had broken his jug, and thought his father would beat him. I saw +that with half a franc I could make him happy, so I took him to a +shop, where we got another jug. Charles X. could not be happier if he +regained his crown. Has it not been a beautiful day?" +</p> +<p> +Here is another instance of the way she had of beautifying the most +simple incidents: "I must notice, in passing, an excellent supper that +we have had—papa, Mimi, and I—at the corner of the kitchen-fire, +with the servants: soup, some boiled potatoes, and a cake that I made +yesterday with the dough from the bread. Our only servants were the +dogs Lion, Wolf, and Tritly, who licked up the fragments. All our +people were in church for the instruction which is given for +confirmation;" and, she adds, "it was a charming meal." +</p> +<p> +The daily devotions of the month of Mary were very recently +established when Eugénie wrote; she speaks thus of them: on one first +of May when absent from home, she writes: "On this day, at this +moment, my holy Mimi (a pet name for her sister) is on her knees +before the little altar for the month of Mary in my room. Dear sister, +I join myself to her, and find a chapel here also. They have given me +for this purpose a room filled with flowers; in it I have made a +church, and Marie, with her little girls, servants, shepherds, and all +the household, assemble together every evening before the Blessed +Virgin. They came at first only to look on, for they had never kept +the month of Mary before. Some good will result to them of this new +devotion, if it is only one idea, a single idea, of their Christian +duties, which these people know so little of, and which we can teach +them while amusing them. These popular devotions please me so, because +they are so attractive in their form, and thereby offer such an easy +method of instruction. By their means, salutary truths appear most +pleasing, and all hearts are gained in the name of our Lady and of her +sweet virtues. I love the month of Mary, and the other little +devotions which the Church permits; which she blesses; which are born +at the feet of the Faith like flowers at the mountain-foot." +</p> +<p> +Speaking of St. Teresa, to whom she had a great devotion, she says: "I +am pleased to remember that, when I lost my mother, I went, like St. +Teresa, to throw myself at the feet of the Blessed Virgin, and begged +her to take me for her daughter." At another time she says: "To-day, +very early, I went to Vieux, to visit the relics of the saints, and, +in particular, those of St. Eugénie, my patron. I love pilgrimages, +remnants of the ancient faith; but these are not the days for them; in +the greater number of people the spirit for them is dead. However, if +M. le Curé does not have this procession to Vieux, there will be +discontent. Credulity abounds where faith disappears. We have, +however, many good souls, worthy to please the saints, like Rose +Drouille, who knows how to meditate, who has learnt so much from the +rosary; then Françon de Gaillard and her daughter Jacquette, so +recollected in church. This holy escort did not accompany me; I was +alone with my good angel and Mimi. Mass heard, my prayers finished, I +left with one hope more. I had come to ask something from St. Eugène? +The saints are our brothers. If you were all-powerful, would you not +give me all that I desired? This is what I was thinking of while +invoking St. Eugène, who is also my patron. We have so little in this +world, at least let us hope in the other." +</p> +<p> +Those who are not of the same faith as Eugénie de Guérin have not +failed <a name="219">{219}</a> to be attracted by the depth and ardor of her faith and +piety. A writer in the <i>Cornhill Magazine</i> observes, "The relation to +the priest, the practice of confession assume, when she speaks of +them, an aspect which is not that under which Exeter Hall knows them." +</p> +<p> +"In my leisure time I read a work of Leitniz, which delighted me by +its catholicity and the pious things which I found in it—like this on +confession: +</p> +<p> +"'I regard a pious, grave, and prudent confessor as a great instrument +of God for the salvation of souls; for his counsels serve to direct +our affections, to enlighten us about our faults, to make us avoid the +occasions of sin, to dissipate our doubts, to raise up our broken +spirit; finally, to cure or to mitigate all the maladies of the soul; +and, if we can never find on earth anything more excellent than a +faithful friend, what happiness is it not to find one who is obliged, +by the inviolable law of a divine sacrament, to keep faith with us and +to succor souls?' +</p> +<p> +"This celestial friend I have in M. Bories, and therefore the news of +his departure has deeply affected me. I am sad with a sadness which +makes the soul weep. I should not say this to any one else; they would +not, perhaps, understand me, and would take it ill. In the world they +know not what a confessor is—a man who is a friend of our soul, our +most intimate confidant, our physician, our light, our teacher—a +friend who binds us to him, and is bound to us; who gives us peace, +who opens heaven to us, who speaks to us while we, kneeling, call him, +like God, our father; and faith truly makes him God and father. When I +am at his feet, I see nothing else in him than Jesus listening to +Magdalen, and pardoning much because she has loved much. Confession is +but an expansion of repentance in love." +</p> +<p> +Again she writes: "I have learnt that M. Bories is about to leave us— +this good and excellent father of my soul. Oh, how I regret him! What +a loss it will be to me to lose this good guide of my conscience, of +my heart, my mind, of my whole self, which God had confided to him, +and which I had trusted to him with such perfect freedom! I am sad +with the sadness which makes the soul weep. My God, in my desert to +whom shall I have recourse? Who will sustain me in my spiritual +weakness? who will lead me on to great sacrifices? It is in this last, +above all, that I regret M. Bories. He knew what God had put into my +heart. I needed his strength to follow it. The new curé cannot replace +him; he is so young; then he appears so inexperienced, so undecided. +It is necessary to be firm to draw a soul from the midst of the world, +and to sustain it against the assaults of flesh and blood. +</p> +<p> +"It is Saturday—the day of pilgrimage to Cahuzac. I will go there; +perhaps I shall come back more tranquil. God has always given me some +blessing in that chapel, where I have left so many miseries.… I was +not mistaken in thinking that I should come back more tranquil. M. +Bories is not going! How happy I am, and how thankful to God for this +favor. It is such a great blessing to me to keep this good father, +this good guide, this choice of God for my soul, as St. Francis de +Sales expresses it. +</p> +<p> +"Confession is such a blessed thing, such a happiness for the +Christian soul; a great good, and always greater in measure when we +feel it to be so; and when the heart of the priest, into which we pour +our sorrow, resembles that Divine Heart <i>which has loved us so much</i>. +This is what attaches me to M. Bories; you will understand it." +</p> +<p> +Nevertheless, when the trial of parting with this beloved friend did +come, at length, it was borne with gentle submission. +</p> +<p> +"Our pastor is come to see us. I have not said much to you about him. +He is a simple and good man, knowing his duties well, and speaking +better of God than of the world, which he knows little of. Therefore, +he does not shine in conversation. <a name="220">{220}</a> His conversation is ordinary, +and those who do not know what the true spirit of a priest is would +think little of him. He does good in the parish, for his gentleness +wins souls. He is our father now. I find him young after M. Bories. I +miss that strong and powerful teaching which strengthened me; but it +is God who has taken it from me. Let us submit and walk like children, +without looking at the hand which leads us." +</p> +<p> +Eugénie's life revolved round that of Maurice. No length of separation +could weaken her affection, nor make her interest in his pursuits less +engrossing. His letters, so few and so scanty, were treasured up and +dwelt upon in many a lonely hour. She suffered with him, wept over his +disappointments, and prayed for his return to the faith of his youth +with all the earnestness of her soul. With exquisite tact she avoided +preaching to him. It was rather by showing him what religion was to +her that she strove to lead him back to its practice. +</p> +<p> +"<i>Holy Thursday</i>.—I have come back all fragrant from the chapel of +moss, in the church where the Blessed Sacrament is reposing. It is a +beautiful day when God wills to rest among the flowers and perfumes of +the springtime. Mimi, Rose, and I made this <i>reposoir</i>, aided by M. le +Curé. I thought, as we were doing it, of the supper-room, of that +chamber well furnished, where Jesus willed to keep the pasch with his +disciples, giving himself for the Lamb. Oh, what a gift! What can one +say of the Eucharist? I know nothing to say. We adore; we possess; we +live; we love. The soul is without words, and loses itself in an abyss +of happiness. I thought of you among these ecstasies, and ardently +desired to have you at my side, at the holy table, as I had three +years ago." +</p> +<p> +Mademoiselle de Guérin occasionally composed; her brother was very +anxious she should publish her productions, but she shrank from the +responsibility. "St. Jean de Damas," she remarks, "was forbidden to +write to any one, and for having composed some verses for a friend he +was expelled from the convent. That seemed to me very severe; but one +sees the wisdom of it, when, after supplication and much humility, the +saint had been forgiven, he was ordered to write and to employ his +talents in conquering the enemies of Jesus Christ. He was found strong +enough to enter the lists when he had been stripped of pride. He wrote +against the iconoclasts. Oh, if many illustrious writers had begun by +a lesson of humility, they would not have made so many errors nor so +many books. Pride has blinded them, and thus see the fruits which they +produce, into how many errors they lead the erring. But this chapter +on the science of evil is too wide for me. I should prefer saying that +I have sewn a sheet. A sheet leads me to reflect, it will cover so +many people, so many different slumbers—perhaps that of the tomb. Who +knows if it will not be my shroud, and if these stitches which I make +will not be unpicked by the worms? While I was sewing, papa told me +that he had sent, without my knowledge, some of my verses to Bayssac, +and I have seen the letter where M. de Bagne speaks of them and says +they are very good. A little vanity came to me and fell into my +sewing. Now I tell myself the thought of death is good to keep us from +sin. It moderates joy, tempers sadness, makes us see that all which +passes by us is transitory." +</p> +<p> +Again she writes: "Dear one, I would that I could see you pray like a +good child of God. What would it cost you? Your soul is naturally +loving, and prayer is nothing else but love; a love which spreads +itself out into the soul as the water flows from the fountain." +</p> +****** +<p> +"<i>Ash-Wednesday</i>.—Here I am, with ashes on my forehead and serious +thoughts in my mind. This 'Remember thou art dust!' is terrible to me. +I hear it all day long. I cannot banish <a name="221">{221}</a> the thought of death, +particularly in your room, where I no longer find you, where I saw you +so ill, where I have sad memories both of your presence and your +absence. One thing only is bright—the little medal of Our Lady, +suspended over the head of your bed. It is still untarnished and in +the same place where I put it to be your safeguard. I wish you knew, +dearest, the pleasure I have in seeing it—the remembrances, the +hopes, the secret thoughts that are connected with that holy image. I +shall guard it as a relic; and, if ever you return to sleep in that +little bed, you shall sleep again near the medal of the Blessed +Virgin. Take from, me this confidence and love, not to a bit of metal, +but to the image of the Mother of God. I should like to know, if in +your new room I should see St. Teresa, who used to hang in your other +room near the <i>bénitier:</i> +</p> +<pre> + 'Où toi, nécessiteux + Défaillant, tu prenais l'aumône dans ce creux.' +</pre> +<p> +You will no longer, I fear, seek alms there. Where will you seek them? +Who can tell? Is the world in which you live rich enough for all your +necessities? Maurice, if I could but make you understand one of these +thoughts, breathe into you what I believe, and what I learn in pious +books—those beautiful reflections of the Gospel—if I could see you a +Christian, I would give life and all for that." +</p> +****** +<p> +Maurice's absence was the great trial of Eugénie's life; but there +were minor trials also, concerning the little things that make up the +sum of our happiness. She suffered intensely and constantly from +<i>ennui</i>. Her active, enterprising mind had not sufficient food to +sustain it, and bravely did she fight against this constant depression +and weariness. +</p> +<p> +A duller life than hers could hardly be found; she had literally +"nothing to do." She had no society, for she lived at a distance from +her friends. Sometimes the curé called, sometimes a priest from a +neighboring parish, and then the monotonous days went on without a +single incident. There was no outward sign of the struggle going on. +Speaking of her father, she says: "A grave look makes him think there +is some trouble, so I conceal the passing clouds from him; it is but +right that he should only see and know my calm and serene side. A +daughter should be gentle to her father. We ought to be to them +something like the angels are to God." +</p> +<p> +Nor would she distract her thoughts by any means which might injure +her soul. "I have scarcely read the author whose work you sent, though +I admired him as I do M. Hugo; but these geniuses have blemishes which +wound a woman's eye. I detest to meet with what I do not wish to see; +and this makes me close so many books. I have had <i>Notre Dame de +Paris</i> under my hands a hundred times to-day; and the style, +<i>Esméralda</i>, and so many pretty things in it, tempt me, and say to me, +'Read—look.' I looked; I turned it over; but the stains here and +there stopped me. I read no more, and contented myself with looking at +the pictures." At another time, when she is staying at a "deserted +house," rather duller than her own, she writes: "The devil tempted me +just now in a little room, where I found a number of romances. 'Read a +word,' he said to me; 'let us see that; look at this;' but the titles +of the books displeased me. I am no longer tempted now, and will go +only to change the books in this room, or rather to throw them into +the fire." +</p> +<p> +There was one sovereign remedy for her ills, and she sought for it +with fidelity, and reaped her reward. +</p> +<p> +"This morning I was suffering. Well, at present, I am calm; and this I +owe to faith, simply to faith, to an act of faith. I can think of +death and eternity without trouble, without alarm. Over a deep of +sorrow there floats a divine calm, a serenity, which is the work of +God only. In vain have I tried other things at a time like this; <a name="222">{222}</a> +nothing human comforts the soul, nothing human upholds it. +</p> +<pre> + 'A l'enfant il faut sa mère, + A mon âme il faut mon Dieu.'" +</pre> +<p> +At another time of suffering she writes: "God only can console us when +the heart is sorrowful: human helps are not enough; they sink beneath +it, it is so weighed down by sorrow. The reed must have more than +other reeds to lean on." +</p> +****** +<p> +"To distract my thoughts, I have been turning over Lamartine, the dear +poet. I love his hymn to the nightingale, and many other of his +'Harmonies' but they are far from having the effect on me that his +'Meditations' used to have. I was ravished and in ecstacy with them. I +was but sixteen, and time changes many things. The great poet no +longer makes my heart vibrate; to-day he has not even power to +distract my thoughts. I must try something else, for I must not +cherish <i>ennui</i>, which injures the soul. What can I do? It is not good +for me to write, to communicate trouble to others. I will leave pen +and ink. I know something better, for I have tried it a hundred times; +it is prayer—prayer which calms me when I say to my soul before God, +'Why art thou sad, and wherefore art thou troubled?' I know not what +he does in answering me, but it quiets me just like a weeping child +when it sees its mother. The Divine compassion and tenderness is truly +maternal toward us." +</p> +****** +<p> +And, further on: "Now I have something better to do than write: I will +go and pray. Oh, how I love prayer! I would that all the world knew +how to pray. I would that children, and the old, and the poor, the +afflicted, the sick in soul and body—all who live and suffer—could +know the balm that prayer is. But I know not how to speak of these +things. We cannot tell what is ineffable." +</p> +<p> +She had said once, as we have seen, that she would give life and all +to see Maurice once more serving God. She had written to him thus, not +carelessly indeed, but as we are too wont to write—not counting the +cost, because we know not what the cost is. She wrote thus, and God +took her at her word, and he asked from her not life, as she then +meant it, but her life's life. First came the trial of a temporary +estrangement. Her journal suddenly stops; she believed it wearied him, +and, without a word of reproach, she silenced her eager pen. Maurice, +however, declared she was mistaken, and she joyfully resumed her task +with words which would evidence, if nothing else were left, us, the +intense depth of her love for her brother. "I was in the wrong. So +much the better; for I had feared it had been your fault." Then +Maurice's health, which had always been delicate, began to fail, and +her heart was tortured at the thought of him suffering, away from her +loving care, unable to send her news of him. +</p> +<p> +"I have, been reading the epistle about the child raised to life by +Elias. Oh, if I knew some prophet, some one who would give back life +and health, I would go, like the Shunamite, and throw myself at his +feet." +</p> +<p> +And again, most touchingly, she says: "A letter from Felicité, which +tells me nothing better about you. When will those who know more +write? If they knew how a woman's heart beats, they would have more +pity." +</p> +<p> +Maurice recovered from these attacks, and in the autumn of 1836 +married a young and pretty Creole lady. He had not the violent +attachment as to the "Louise" of his early youth; but the union seemed +a suitable one on both sides. One of Eugénie's brief visits to Paris +was made for the purpose of being present at her brother's marriage. +It was a romantic scene. It took place in the chapel of the old and +quaint Abbaye aux Bois. The church was filled with brilliant and +admiring friends. The bride and bridegroom, both so beautiful, knelt +before the altar; the Père Bugnet, who had <a name="223">{223}</a> known Maurice as a +boy, blessed the union. The gay procession passed from the church, and +met a funeral cortège! It fell like an omen on Eugénie's heart. Six +short months went by, and Eugénie was again summoned to Paris, to +Maurice's sick-bed—his dying-bed it indeed was, but his sister's +passionate love would not relinquish hope. The physicians, catching at +a straw, prescribed native air, and the invalid caught at the proposal +with feverish impatience. That eager longing sustained him through the +long and terrible journey of twenty days; for, the moment he revived, +he would be laid in the salon, and see the home-faces gathered round +him. Then he was carried to his room, and soon the end came. At last +Eugénie knew that he must go, and all the powers of her soul were +gathered into that one prayer, that he might die at peace with God. +Calmly she bent over him, and kissed the forehead, damp with the dews +of death. +</p> +<p> +"Dearest, M. le Curé is coming, and you will confess. You have no +difficulty in speaking to M. le Curé?" "Not at all," he answered. "You +will prepare for confession, then?" He asked for his prayer-book, and +had the prayers read to him. +</p> +<p> +When the priest came, he asked for more time to prepare. At last the +curé was summoned. +</p> +<p> +"Never have I heard a confession better made," said the priest +afterward. As he was leaving the room, Maurice called him back, and +made a solemn retraction of the doctrines of M. de Lamennais. Then +came the Viaticum and the last anointing. Life ebbed away; he pressed +the hand of the curé, who was by him to the last, he kissed his +crucifix, and died. Eugénie's prayer was heard. He died, but at home; +a wanderer come back; an erring child, once more forgiven, resting on +his Father's breast. +</p> +<p> +And he was gone!—"king of my heart! my other self!" as she had called +him—and Eugénie was left behind. She had loved him too well for her +eternal peace, and it was necessary that she should be purified in the +crucible of suffering. Very gradually she parted from him; the gates +of the tomb closed not on her love; slowly she uprooted the fibres of +her nature which had been entwined in his. Her journal did not end, +and she wrote still to him—to Maurice in heaven: "Oh, my beloved +Maurice! Maurice, art thou far from me? hearest thou me? Sometimes I +shed torrents of tears; then the soul is dried up. All my life will be +a mourning one; my heart is desolate." Then, reproaching herself, she +turns to her only consolation: "Do I not love thee, my God? only true +and Eternal Love! It seems to me that I love thee as the fearful +Peter, but not like John, who rested on thy heart—divine repose which +I so need. What do I seek in creatures? To make a pillow of a human +breast? Alas! I have seen how death can take that from us. Better to +lean, Jesus, on thy crown of thorns. +</p> +****** +<p> +"This day year, we went together to St. Sulpice, to the one o'clock +mass. To-day I have been to Lentin in the rain, with bitter memories, +in solitude. But, my soul, calm thyself with thy God, whom thou hast +received to-day, in that little church. He is thy brother, thy friend, +the well-beloved above all; whom thou canst never see die; who can +never fail thee, in this world or the next. Let us console ourselves +with this thought, that in God we shall find again all we have lost." +</p> +<p> +One great desire was, however, left to her; that of publishing the +letters and writings of Maurice, and of winning for her beloved one +the fame which she so despised for herself. A tribute to his memory +appeared the year after his death, in the <i>Revue des deux Mondes</i>, +from the brilliant pen of Madame Sand; but it was the source of more +pain than pleasure to Eugénie. With the want of candor which is so +often a characteristic of the class of writers to whom Madame Sand +<a name="224">{224}</a> belongs, she represented Maurice as a man totally without faith. +Eugénie believed that he had never actually lost it, although it had +been darkened and obscured; and she was certainly far more in his +confidence than any of his friends. +</p> +<p> +For some time before his death he had gradually been returning to +religious exercises; and, as we have seen, on his death-bed, he had +most fully retracted and repented of whatever errors there had been in +his life. But Madame Sand was not very likely to trouble herself about +the dying moments of her friend, while it was another triumph to +infidelity to let the world think this brilliant young man lived and +died in its ranks. +</p> +<p> +"Madame Sand makes Maurice a skeptic, a great poet, like Byron, and it +afflicts me to see the name of my brother—a name which was free from +these lamentable errors—thus falsely represented to the world." And +again: "Oh, Madame Sand is right when she says that his words are like +the diamonds linked together, which make a diadem; or, rather, my +Maurice was all one diamond. Blessed be those who estimated his price; +blessed be the voice which praises him, which places him so high, with +so much respect and enthusiasm! But on one point this voice is +mistaken—when she says he had no faith. No; faith was not wanting in +him. I proclaim it, and attest it by what I have seen and heard; by +his prayers, his pious reading; by the sacraments he received; by all +his Christian actions; by the death which opened life unto him—a +death with his crucifix." +</p> +<p> +This article of Madame Sand only increased Eugénie's desire to +vindicate her brother, by letting the world judge from his own +writings and letters what Maurice really was. Many projects were set +on foot for publishing this work. Rather than leave it undone, Eugénie +would have undertaken it herself, though her broken spirit shrank more +than ever from any sort of notoriety, or communication with the busy +world outside her quiet home. But she would greatly have preferred the +task should be accomplished by one of his friends; and much of her +correspondence was devoted to the purpose. Time passed, and plan after +plan fell to the ground. This last satisfaction was not to be hers. +She was to see, as she thought, the name of her beloved one gradually +fading away, and forgotten as years went on. To the very last drop she +was to drain the cup of disappointment and loss. Her journal ceased, +and its last sentence was, "Truly did the saint speak who said, 'Let +us throw our hearts into eternity.'" +</p> +<p> +There are a few fragments and letters, which carry us on some years +later; and in one of the last of these letters, dated 15th of June, +1845, we find these consoling words: "I have suffered; but God teaches +us thus, and leads us to willingly place our hearts above. You are +again in mourning, and I have felt your loss deeply. I mean the death +of your poor brother. Alas! what is life but a continual separation? +But you will meet in heaven, and there will be no more mourning nor +tears; and there the society of saints will reward us for what we have +suffered in the society of men. And, while waiting, there is nothing +else to do than to humble one's self, as the Apostle says, 'under the +mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you in the time of visitation; +casting all your care upon him, for he hath care of you.'" +</p> +<p> +These are almost her closing words; and thus we see God comforted her. +Three years more passed, of which we have no record; and we cannot but +deeply regret the determination of M. Trebutien not to give any +account of her beyond her own words. As long as they lasted, they are +indeed sufficient; but we would have fain followed her into the +silence of those last years, and have seen the soul gradually passing +to its rest. We would have liked to know if the friends she loved +soothed her dying hours—whether M. Bories, with his "strong <a name="225">{225}</a> and +powerful words," was by her side in her last earthly struggle. But a +veil falls over it all. We feel assured, as we close the volume, that +whatever human means were wanting, the God she had faithfully served +consoled his child to the last, and sustained her mortal weakness till +she reposed in him. After her death, her heart's wish was fulfilled, +and abundant honor has been rendered to Maurice de Guérin. Nay, more; +for homage is ever given to the majesty of unselfish love; and from +henceforth, if Maurice the poet shall be forgotten, Maurice the +brother of Eugénie will never be. She has embalmed his memory with her +deep and fond devotion; and she has left a living record of how, in +the midst of a wearisome, an objectless, a monotonous life, a woman +may find work to do, and doing it, like Eugénie, with all her might, +leave behind her a track of light by which others may follow after +her, encouraged and consoled.<br> + F. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>THE BUILDING OF MOURNE. +<br><br> +A LEGEND OF THE BLACKWATER. +<br><br> +BY ROBERT D. JOYCE.</h2> +<br> +<p> +Rome, according to the old aphorism, was not built in a day. Neither +was the old town of Mourne, although it was destroyed in a day, and +made fit almost for the sowing of salt upon its foundations, by the +great Lord of Thomond, Murrough of the Ferns, when he gathered around +it his rakehelly kerns, as Spenser in his spleen called them, and his +fierce galloglasses and roving hobbelers. But the present story has +naught to do with the spoliation and burning of towns. Far different, +indeed, was the founding of Mourne, to the story of the disastrous +termination of its prosperity. You will look in vain to the histories +for a succinct or circumstantial account of the building of this +ancient town; but many a more famous city has its early annals +involved in equal obscurity—Rome, for instance. What tangible fact +can be laid hold of with regard to its early history, save the +will-o'-the-wisp light emanating from the traditions of a more modern +day? A cimmerian cloud of darkness overhangs its founding and youthful +progress, through which the double-distilled microscopic eyes of the +historian are unable to penetrate with any degree of certainty. +Mourne, however, though it cannot boast of a long-written history, +possesses an oral one of remarkable perspicuity and certainty. The men +are on the spot who, with a mathematical precision worthy of +Archimedes or Newton, will relate everything about it, from its +foundation to its fall. The only darkness cast upon their most +circumstantial history is the elysian cloud from their luxuriant +dudheens, as they whiff away occasionally, and relate— +</p> +<p> +That there was long ago a certain Dhonal, a nobleman of the warlike +race of Mac Caurha, who ruled over Duhallow, and the wild mountainous +territories extending downward along the banks of the Blackwater. This +nobleman, after a long rule of prosperity and peace, at length grew +weary of inaction, and manufactured in his pugnacious brain some cause +of mortal affront and complaint against a neighboring potentate, whose +territory extended in a westerly direction on the opposite shore of +the river. So he mustered his vassals with all imaginable speed, and +prepared to set out for the domains of his foe on a foray of unusual +ferocity and magnitude. Before departing from his castle, which stood +some miles above Mallow, on the banks of the river, he held a long and +confidential parley with his wife, in which he told her, if he were +defeated or slain, and if the foe should cross the Blackwater to make +reprisals, that she should hold out the fortress while one stone would +stand upon another, and especially that she should guard their three +young sons well, whom, he doubted not, whatever might happen, would +one day gain prosperity and renown. After this, he set out on his +expedition, at the head of a formidable array of turbulent kerns and +marauding horsemen. But his neighbor was not a man to be caught +sleeping; for, at the crossing of a ford near Kanturk, he attacked +Dhonal, slew him in single combat, and put his followers to the sword, +almost to a man. After this he crossed the Blackwater, laid waste the +territories of the invader, and at length besieged the castle, where +the widowed lady and her three sons had taken refuge. For a long time +she held her own bravely against her enemy; but in the end the castle +was taken by assault, and she and her three young sons narrowly +escaped with their lives out into the wild recesses of the forest. +</p> +<p> +After wandering about for some time, the poor lady built a little hut +of brambles on the shore of the Clydagh, near the spot where stand the +ruins of the preceptory of Mourne, or Ballinamona, as it is sometimes +called. Here she dwelt with her children for a long time, in want and +misery. Her sons grew up without receiving any of those +accomplishments befitting their birth, and gained their subsistence, +like the children of the common people around, by tilling a little +plot of land before their hut, and by the products of the chase in the +surrounding forest. One day, as Diarmid, the eldest, with his bow and +arrows ready for the chase, was crossing a narrow valley, he met a +kern, one of the followers of the great lord who had slain his father. +Now, neither Diarmid nor his brothers recollected who had killed their +father, nor the high estate from which they had fallen, for their +mother kept them carefully in ignorance of all, fearing that they +might become known, and that their enemies would kill them also. So +the kern and himself wended their way for some time together along the +side of the valley. At length they started a deer from its bed in the +green ferns. Each shot his arrow at the same moment, and each struck +the deer, which ran downward for a short space, and at last fell dead +beside the little stream in the bottom of the valley. +</p> +<p> +"The deer is mine!" said the strange kern, as they stood over its +body. +</p> +<p> +"No!" answered Diarmid, "it is not. See! your arrow is only stickin' +in the skin of his neck, an' mine is afther rattlin' into his heart, +through an' through!" +</p> +<p> +"No matther," exclaimed the kern, with a menacing look. "I don't care +how he kem by his death, but the deer I must have, body an' bones, +whatever comes of it! Do you think sich a <i>sprissawn</i> as you could +keep me from it, an' I wantin' its darlin' carkiss for the table o' my +lord, the Mac Donogh?" +</p> +<p> +Now Diarmid recollected that his mother and brothers were at the same +time almost dying in their little hut for want of food. So without +further parley he drew his long skian from its sheath. +</p> +<p> +"Very well," said he, "take it, if you're a man; but before it goes, +my carkiss must lie stiff an' bloody in its place!" +</p> +<p> +The kern drew his skian at the word, and there, over the body of the +fallen deer, ensued a combat stern and fierce, which at last resulted +in Diarmid's plunging his skian through and through the body of his +foe into the gritty sand beneath them. +</p> +<a name="227">{227}</a> +<p> +Diarmid then took the spear and other weapons of the dead kern, put +the deer upon his broad shoulders, and marching off in triumph, soon +gained his mother's little hut. There, after eating a comfortable +meal, and telling his adventure, Diarmid began to lay down his future +plans. +</p> +<p> +"Mother," he said, "the time is come at last when this little cabin is +too small for me. I'm a man now, an' able to meet a man, body to body, +as I met him to-day; so I'll brighten up my weapons, an' set off on my +adventures, that I may gain renown in the wars. Donogh here, too, has +the four bones of a man," continued he, turning to his second brother; +"so let him prepare, an' we'll thramp off together as soon as we can, +an' perhaps afther all we'd have a castle of our own, where you could +reign in glory, as big an' grand as Queen Cleena o' the Crag!" +</p> +<p> +"Well, then," answered his mother, "if you must go, before you leave +me, you and your brothers must hunt in the forest for a month, and +bring in as much food as will do me and Rory here for a year and a +day." +</p> +<p> +"But," said Rory, the youngest, or Roreen Shouragh, or the Lively, as +he was called, in consequence of the 'cute and merry temperament of +his mind—"but, Diarmid, you know I am now beyant fifteen years of +age, an' so, if you go, I'll folly you to the worldt's end!" +</p> +<p> +"You presumptious little atomy of a barebones," answered his eldest +brother, "if I only see the size of a thrush's ankle of you follyin' +us on the road, I'll turn back an' bate that wiry an' freckled little +carkiss o' yours into frog's jelly! So stay at home in pace an' +quietness, an' perhaps when I come back I might give you a good purse +o' goold to begin your forthin with." +</p> +<p> +"That for your mane an' ludiacrous purse o' goold!" exclaimed Roreen +Shouragh, at the same time snapping his fingers in the face of his +brother. "Arrah! do you hear him, mother? But never mind. Let us be +off into the forest to-morrow, an' we'll see who'll bring home the +most food before night!" +</p> +<p> +"Well," said his mother, "whether he stays at home or goes away, I +fear he'll come to some bad end with that sharp tongue of his, and his +wild capers." +</p> +<p> +"With all jonteel respect, mother," answered Shouragh again, "I mane +to do no such thing. I think myself as good a hairo this +minnit—because I have the sowl an' heart o' one as King Dathi, who +was killed in some furrin place that I don't recklect the jography of, +or as Con o' the Hundhert Battles, or as the best man amongst them, +Fion himself—an' I'll do as great actions as any o' them yet!" +</p> +<p> +This grandiloquent boast of Roreen Shouragh's set his mother and +brothers into a fit of laughter, from which they only recovered when +it was time to retire to rest. In the morning the three brothers +betook themselves to the forest, and at the fall of night returned +with a great spoil of game. From morning till night they hunted thus +every day for a month, at the end of which time Diarmid said that they +had as much food stored in as would last his mother and Rory for a +year and a day. +</p> +<p> +On a hot summer noon the two brothers left the little hut, with their +mother's blessing on their heads, and set off on their adventures. +After crossing a few valleys, they came at length to the shore of the +Blackwater, and sat down in the shade of a huge oak-tree on the bank +to rest themselves. Beneath them, in a clear, shady pool, a huge pike, +with his voracious jaws ready for a plunge, was watching a merry +little speckled trout, which in its turn was regarding with most +affectionate eyes a bright blue fly, that was disporting overhead on +the surface of the water. Suddenly the trout darted upward into the +air, catching the ill-starred fly, but, in its return to the element +beneath, unfortunately plumped itself into the Charybdis-like jaws of +the villanous <a name="228">{228}</a> pike, and was from that in one moment quietly +deposited in his stomach. +</p> +<p> +"Look at that!" said Diarmid to his brother. "That's the way with a +man that works an' watches everything with a keen eye. He'll have all +in the end, just as the pike has both fly and throut—an' just as I +have both fly, an' throut, an' pike!" continued he, giving his spear a +quick dart into the deep pool, and then landing the luckless pike, +transfixed through and through, upon the green bank. "That's the way +to manage, and the divvle a betther sign o' good luck we could have in +the beginning of our journey, than to get a good male so aisy!" +</p> +<p> +"Hooray!" exclaimed a voice behind them. "That's the way to manage +most galliantly. What a nate dinner the thurminjous monsther will make +for the three of us!" and on turning round, the two brothers beheld +Roreen Shouragh, accoutred like themselves, and dancing with most +exuberant delight at the feat beside them on the grass. +</p> +<p> +"An' so you have follied us afther all my warnin', you outragious +little vagabone!" exclaimed Diarmid, making a wrathful dart at Roreen, +who, however, eluding the grasp, ran and doubled hither and thither +with the swiftness of a hare, around the trunks of the huge oak-trees +on the shore. In vain Diarmid tried every ruse of the chase to catch +him. Roreen Shouragh could not be captured. At length the elder +brother, wearied out, returned to Donogh, who, during the chase, was +tumbling about on the grass in convulsions of laughter. +</p> +<p> +"'Tis no use, Donogh," he said, "we must only let him come with us. +He'll never go back. Come here, you aggravatin' young robber," +continued he, calling out to Roreen, who was still dancing in defiance +beneath a tree, some distance off—"come here, an' you'll get your +dinner, an' may folly us if you wish." +</p> +<p> +Roreen knew that he might depend on the word of his brother. "I towld +ye both," said he, coming up to the spot, "that I'd folly ye to the +worldt's end; so let us have pace, an' I may do ye some service yet. +But may I supplicate to know where ye're preamblin' to at present; for +if ye sit down that way in every umberagious coolin' spot, as the song +says, the divvle a much ye'll have for yeer pains in the ind?" +</p> +<p> +"I'll tell you then," answered Donogh, now recovered from his fit of +laughing. "We're goin' off to Corrig Cleena, to see the Queen o' the +Fairies, an' to ask her advice what to do so as to win wealth an' +renown." +</p> +<p> +"'Tis aisier said than done," said Roreen, "to see Queen Cleena. But +howsomdever, when we're afther devourin' this vouracious thief of a +pike here, we'll peg off to the Corrig as swift as our +gambadin'-sticks will carry us!" +</p> +<p> +After the meal the three brothers swam across the river, and proceeded +on their way through the forest toward Corrig Cleena. On gaining the +summit of a little height, a long, straight road extended before them. +</p> +<p> +On and on the straight road they went, till, turning up a narrow path +in the forest, they beheld the great grey boulders of Corrig Cleena +towering before them. They searched round its base several times for +an entrance, but could find none. At length, as they were turning away +in despair, they saw an extremely small, withered old atomy of a +woman, clad all in sky blue, and sitting beside a clump of fairy +thimbles, or foxgloves, that grew on a little knoll in front of the +rock. They went up and accosted her: +</p> +<p> +"Could you tell us, ould woman," asked Diarmid, "how we can enter the +Corrig? We want to speak to the queen." +</p> +<p> +"Ould woman, inagh!" answered the little atomy in a towering passion. +"How daar you call me an ould woman, you vagabone? Off wid +you—thramp, I say, for if you sted there till your legs would root in +the ground, you'd get no information from me!" +</p> +<a name="229">{229}</a> +<p> +"Be aisy, mother," said Donogh, in a soothing voice; "sure, if you can +tell us, you may as well serve us so far, an' we'll throuble you no +more." +</p> +<p> +"Ould woman an' mother, both!" screamed the little hag, starting up +and shaking her crutch at the brothers; "this is worse than all. You +dirty an' insultin' spalpeens, how daar ye again, I say call me sich +names? What for should I be decoratin' my fingers wid the red blossoms +o' the Lusmore, if I was as ould as you say? Be off out o' this, or be +this an' be that, I ruinate ye both wid a whack o' this wand o' mine!" +</p> +<p> +"Young leedy," said Roreen Shouragh, stepping up cap in hand at this +juncture, and making the old hag an elaborately polite bow—"young, +an' innocent, an' delightful creethur, p'r'aps you'd have the kindness +to exercise that lily-white hand o' yours in pointin' out the way for +us into Queen Cleena's palace!" +</p> +<p> +"Yes, young man," answered the crone, greatly mollified at the +handsome address of Roreen. "For your sake, I'll point out the way. +You at laste know the respect that should be paid to youth an' +beauty!" +</p> +<p> +"Allow me, my sweet young darlint," said Roreen at this, as he stepped +up and offered her his arm—"allow me to have the shuprame pleasure of +conductin' you. I'm sure I must have the honor an' glory of ladin' on +my arm one of the queen's maids of honor. May those enticin' cheeks o' +yours for ever keep the bloomin' an' ravishin' blush they have at the +present minnit, an' may those riglar ivory teeth o' yours, that are as +white as the dhriven snow, never make their conjay from your purty an' +delightful mouth!" +</p> +<p> +The "delightful young creethur" allowed herself, with many a gratified +smirk, to be conducted downward by the gallant Roreen toward the rock, +where, striking the naked wall with her crutch, or wand as she was +pleased to call it, a door appeared before them, and the three +brothers were immediately conducted into the presence of the fairy +queen. +</p> +<p> +It would be long, but pleasant, to tell the gallant compliments paid +by Roreen to the queen, and the queen's polite and gracious acceptance +of them; merry to relate the covert laughter of the lovely maids of +honor, as Roreen occasionally showered down praises on the head of the +"young leedy" who so readily gained him admittance to the palace, and +who was no other than the vain old nurse of the queen; but, despite +all such frivolities, this history must have its course. At length the +queen gave them a gentle hint that their audience had lasted the +proper time, and as they were departing she cast her bright but +love-lorn eyes upon them with a kindly look. +</p> +<p> +"Young man," she said, "you ask my advice how to act so as to gain +wealth and renown. I could give you wealth, but will not, for wealth +thus acquired rarely benefits the possessor. But I will give you the +advice you seek. Always keep your senses sharp and bright, and your +bodies strong by manly exercise. Look sharply round you, and avail +yourselves honorably of every opportunity that presents itself. Be +brave, and defend your rights justly; but, above all, let your hearts +be full of honor and kindness, and show that kindness ever in aiding +the poor, the needy, and the defenceless. Do all this, and I doubt not +but you will yet come to wealth, happiness, and renown. Farewell!" +</p> +<p> +And in a moment, they knew not how, they found themselves sitting in +the front of the Rock of Cleena, upon the little knoll where Roreen +had so flatteringly accosted the "young leedy." Away they went again +down to the shore, swam back across the river, and wandered away over +hill and dale, till they ascended Sliabh Luchra, and lost themselves +in the depths of the great forest that clothed its broad back. Here +they sat down in a green glade, and began to consider what they should +further do with themselves. At length <a name="230">{230}</a> they agreed to build a +little hut, and remain there for a few days, in order to look about +the country. No sooner said than done. +</p> +<p> +To work they went, finished their hut beneath a spreading tree, and +were soon regaling themselves on a young fawn they had killed as they +descended the mountain. Next day they went out into the forest, killed +a deer, brought him back to the hut, in order to prepare part of him +for their dinner. Diarmid undertook the cooking for the first day, +while his two younger brothers went out along the back of the mountain +to kill more game. With the aid of a small pot, which they had +borrowed from a forester at the northern part of the mountain, and a +ladle that accompanied it, Diarmid began to cook the dinner, stirring +the pieces of venison round and round over the fire, in order to have +some broth ready at the return of his brothers. As he was stirring and +tasting alternately with great industry, he heard a light footstep +behind him, and on looking round, beheld sitting on one of the large +mossy stones they used for a seat a little crabbed-looking boy, with a +red head almost the color of scarlet, a red jacket, and tight-fitting +trowsers of the same hue, which, reaching a little below the knee, +left the fire-bedizened and equally rubicund legs and feet exposed in +free luxury to the air. His face was handsomely formed, but brown and +freckled, and he had a pair of dark, keen eyes, which seemed to pierce +into the very soul of Diarmid as he sat gazing at him. There was a +wild, elfish look about him altogether, as, with a vivacious twinkle +of his acute eye, he saluted Diarmid politely, and asked him for a +ladleful of the broth. Diarmid, however, in turning round from the +pot, had spilt the contents of the ladle on his hand, burning it +sorely, and was in consequence not in the most amiable humor. +</p> +<p> +"Give you a ladle of broth, indeed, you little weasel o' perdition!" +exclaimed he. "Peg off out o' my house this minute, or I'll catch you +by one o' them murtherin' legs o' yours, an' bate your brains out +against one o' the stones!" +</p> +<p> +"I'm well acquainted with the cozy an' indestructible fact, that a +man's house is his castle," said the little fellow, at the same time +thrusting both his hands into his pockets, inclining his head slightly +to one side, and looking up coolly at Diarmid; "but some o' that broth +I must have, for three raisons. First, that all the wild-game o' the +forest are mine as well as yours; second, that I'm a sthranger, an' +you know that hospitality is a virthue in ould Ireland; an', third an' +best, because you darn't refuse me! So, sit down there an' cool me a +good rich ladleful, or, be the hole o' my coat! there'll be wigs on +the green bethune you an' me afore you're much ouldher!" +</p> +<p> +"Ther's for your impidence, you gabblin' little riffin!" said Diarmid, +making a furious kick at the imperturbable little intruder, who, +however, evaded it by a nimble jump to one side; and then leaping up +suddenly, before his assailant was aware, hit him right and left two +stunning blows with his hard and diminutive fists in the eyes. Round +and round hopped redhead, at each hop striking the luckless Diarmid +right in the face, till at length, with one finishing blow, he brought +him to the ground, stunned and senseless. +</p> +<p> +"There," he said, as he took a ladleful o' broth and began to cool it +deliberately, "that's the most scientific facer I ever planted on a +man's forehead in my life. I think he'll not refuse me the next time I +ask him." +</p> +<p> +With that he drank off the broth at a draught, laid the ladle +carefully in the pot, stuck his hands in his pockets, and jovially +whistling up, "The cricket's rambles through the hob," he left the +hut, and strutted with a light and cheerful heart into the forest. +</p> +<p> +When Diarmid's brothers returned, they found him just recovering from +his swoon, with two delightful black eyes, and a nose of unusual +dimensions. <a name="231">{231}</a> He told them the cause of his mishap, at which they +only laughed heartily, saying that he deserved it for allowing himself +to be beaten by such an insignificant youngster. Next day, Diarmid and +Roreen went out to hunt, leaving Donogh within to cook the dinner. +When they returned, they found the ill-starred Donogh lying almost +dead on the floor, with two black eyes far surpassing in beauty and +magnitude those received on the preceding evening by his brother. +</p> +<p> +"Let me stay within to-morrow," said Roreen, "for 'tis my turn; an' if +he has the perliteness o' payin' me a visit, I'll reward him for his +condescension." +</p> +<p> +"Arrah!" said both his brothers, "is it a little traneen like you to +be able for him, when he bate the two of us?" +</p> +<p> +"No matther," answered Roreen; "tis my turn, an' stay I will, if my +eyes were to be oblitherated in my purricranium!" +</p> +<p> +And so, when the morrow came, Diarmid and Donogh went out to hunt, and +Roreen Shouragh stayed within to cook the dinner. As the pot commenced +boiling, Roreen kept a sharp eye around him for the expected visitor, +whom he at length descried coming up the glade toward the door of the +hut, whistling cheerfully as he came. +</p> +<p> +"Good-morrow, youngster!" said the chap as he entered, and made a most +hilarious bow; "you seem to have the odor o' charity from your +handsome face here, at laste it comes most aromatically from the pot, +anyhow." +</p> +<p> +"Ah, then! good-morrow kindly, my blushin' little moss-rose!" said +Roreen, answering the salutation with an equally ornamental +inclination of his head—"welcome to the hall o' my fathers. P'r'aps +you'd do me the thurminjous honor o' satin' that blazin' little +carkiss o' yours on the stone fornent me there." +</p> +<p> +"With all the pleasure in the univarse," answered the other, seating +himself; "but as the clay is most obsthreporously hot an' disthressin' +to the dissolute traveller, p'r'aps you'd have the exthrame kindness +o' givin' me a ladleful o' broth to refresh myself." +</p> +<p> +"Well," said Roreen, "I was always counted a livin' respectacle o' the +hospitality of ould Ireland. Yet, although the first law is not to ask +the name of a guest, in regard to the unmerciful way you thrated my +brothers, I must make bowld, before I grant your request, to have the +honor an' glory of hearin' your cognomen." +</p> +<p> +"With shuprame pleasure," answered the visitor. "My name, accordin' to +the orthography o' Ogham characters, is Shaneen cus na Thinné, which, +larnedly expounded, manes John with his Feet to the Fire. But the +ferlosophers an' rantiquarians of ould Ireland, thracin' effect from +cause, call me Fieryfoot, an' by that name I shall be proud to be +addhressed by you at present." +</p> +<p> +"Well," rejoined Roreen, "it only shows their perfound knowlidge an' +love for truth, to be able to make out such a knotty ploberm in +derivations; an' so, out o' compliment to their oceans o' larnin', +you'll get the broth; but," continued he, as he took up a ladleful and +held it to cool, "as there are a few questions now and then thrublin' +my ruminashins, p'r'aps you may be so perlite as to throw a flash o' +lightnin' on them, while we're watin'. One is in nathral history. I've +heerd that of late the hares sleep with one eye shut an' th' other +open. What on earth is the raison of it?" +</p> +<p> +"That," answered Fieryfoot, "is aisily solvoluted. Tis on account o' +the increase o' weasels, and their love for suckin' the blood o' hares +in their sleep. So the hares, in ordher to be on their guard an' +prevent it, sleep with only one eye at a time, an' when that's rested +an' has slept enough, they open it an' shut the other!" +</p> +<p> +"The other," said Roreen, "is in asthronomy, an' thrubbles me most of +all, sleepin' an' noddin', aitin' an' dhrinkin'. Why is it that the +man in the moon always keeps a rapin'-hook in his hand, and never uses +it?" +</p> +<a name="232">{232}</a> +<p> +"Because," answered Fieryfoot, getting somewhat impatient, "because, +you poor benighted crathure, he's not a man at all, but the image of a +man painted over the door of Brian Airach's shebeen there, where those +that set off on a lunarian ramble go in to refresh themselves, as I +want to refresh myself with that ladle o' broth you're delayin' in +your hand!" +</p> +<p> +"Oh! you'll get it fresh an' fastin'!" exclaimed Roreen, and with that +he dashed the ladleful of scalding broth right into the face of +Fieryfoot, who started up with a wild cry, and rushed half-blinded +from the hut. Away went Roreen in hot pursuit after him, with the +ladle in his hand, and calling out to him, with the most endearing +names imaginable, to come back for another supply of broth—away down +the glades, till at length, on the summit of a smooth, green little +knoll, Fieryfoot suddenly disappeared. Roreen went to the spot, and +found there a square aperture, just large enough to admit his body. He +immediately went and cut a sapling with his knife, stuck it by the +side of the aperture, and placed his cap on it for a mark, and then +returned to the hut, and found his brothers just after coming in. He +related all that happened, and they agreed to go together to the knoll +after finishing their dinner. When the dinner was over, the three +brothers went down to the knoll, and easily found out the aperture +through which Fieryfoot had disappeared. +</p> +<p> +"An' now, what's to be done?" asked Diarmid. +</p> +<p> +"What's to be done, is it?" said Roreen; "why just to have me go down, +as I'm the smallest—smallest in body I mane—for, to spake +shupernathrally, my soul is larger than both of yurs put together; +an', in the manetime, to have ye build another hut over the spot an' +live there till I return with a power o' gold an' dimons, and oceans +o' renown an' glory!" +</p> +<p> +With that he crept into the aperture, while his brothers busied +themselves in drawing brambles and sticks to the spot in order to +build a hut as he had directed. As Roreen descended, the passage began +to grow more broad and lightsome, and at length he found himself on +the verge of a delightful country, far more calm and beautiful than +the one he had left. Here he took the first way that presented itself, +and travelled on till he came to the crossing of three roads. He saw a +large, dark-looking house, part of which he knew to be a smith's +forge, from the smoke, and from the constant hammering that resounded +from the inside. Roreen entered, and the first object that presented +itself was Fieryfoot, as fresh and blooming as a trout, and roasting +his red shins with the utmost luxuriance and happiness of heart before +the blazing fire on the hob. +</p> +<p> +"Wisha, Roreen Shouragh," exclaimed Fieryfoot, starting from his seat, +spitting on his hand for good luck, and then offering it with great +cordiality, "you're as welcome as the flowers o' May! Allow me to +offer you my congratulations, <i>ad infinitum</i>, for your superior +cuteness in the art of circumwentin' your visitors. I prizhume you'll +have no objection to be presented to the three workmen I keep in the +house—the smith there, the carpenter, an' the mason. Roreen Shouragh, +gentlemin, the only man in the world above that was able to circumwint +your masther!" +</p> +<p> +"A céad mille fáilté, young gintleman!" said the three workmen in a +breath. +</p> +<p> +Roreen bowed politely in acknowledgment. +</p> +<p> +"Any news from the worldt above?" asked the smith, as he rested his +ponderous hammer on the anvil. +</p> +<p> +"Things are morthially dull," answered Roreen, giving a sly wink at +Fieryfoot. "I've heard that the Danes are making a divarshin in +Ireland; that a shower o' dimons fell in Dublin; that the moon is +gettin' mowldy for want o' shinin'; and that there's a say in the west +that is gradually becoming transmogrified into whiskey. I humbly hope +that the latther intelligence <a name="233">{233}</a> is unthrue, for if not, I'm afraid +the whole worldt will become drunk in the twinklin' of a gooldfrinch's +eye!" +</p> +<p> +"Milé, milé gloiré!" exclaimed the three workmen, "but that's grate +an' wondherful intirely! P'r'aps masther," continued they, addressing +Fieryfoot, and smacking their lips at the thought of whiskey, "p'r'aps +you'd have the goodness o' givin' us a few days' lave of absence!" +</p> +<p> +"Not at present," answered Fieryfoot; "industry is the soul o' +pleasure, as the hawk said to the sparrow before he transported him to +his stomach, so ye must now set to work an' make a sword, for I want +to make my frind here a present as a compliment for his superior +wisdom." +</p> +<p> +To work they went. The smith hammered out, tempered, and polished the +blade, the carpenter fashioned the hilt, which the mason set with a +brilliant row of diamonds; and the sword was finished instantly. +</p> +<p> +"An' now," said Fieryfoot, presenting the sword to Roreen, "let me +have the immorthial pleasure o' presenting you with this. Take it and +set off on your thravels. Let valior and magnanimity be your guide, +and you'll come to glory without a horizintal bounds. In the manetime +I'll wait here till you return." +</p> +<p> +"I accept it with the hottest gratitudinity an' gladness," said +Roreen, taking the sword and running his eye critically along hilt and +blade. "'Tis a darlin', handy sword; 'tis sharp, shinin', an' killin', +as the sighin' lover said to his sweetheart's eyes, an' altogether +'tis the one that matches my experienced taste, for 'tis tough, an' +light, and lumeniferous, as Nero said to his cimitar, whin he was +preparin' to daycapitate the univarsal worldt wid one blow!" +</p> +<p> +Saying this, Roreen buckled the sword to his side, bade a ceremonious +farewell to the polite Fieryfoot and his workmen, left the house, and +proceeded on his adventures. He took the west and broader road that +led by the forge, and travelled on gaily till night. For seven days he +travelled thus, meeting various small adventures by the way, and +getting through them with his usual light-heartedness, till at length +he saw a huge dark castle before him, standing on a rock over a +solitary lake. He accosted an old man by the way-side, who told him +that a huge giant of unusual size, strength, and ferocity dwelt there, +and that he had kept there in thrall, for the past year and a day, a +beautiful princess, expecting that in the end she'd give her consent +to marry him. The old peasant told him also that the giant had two +brothers, who dwelt far away in their castles, and that they were the +strangest objects ever seen by mortal eyes; one being a valiant dwarf +as broad as he was long, and the other longer than he was broad, for +he was tall as the giant, but so slightly formed that he was +designated by the inhabitants of the country round Snohad na Dhial, or +the Devil's Needle. Roreen thanked the old man with great urbanity, +and proceeded on his way toward the castle. When he came to the gate, +he knocked as bold as brass, and demanded admittance. He was quickly +answered by a tremendous voice from the inside, which demanded what he +wanted. +</p> +<p> +"Let me in, ould steeple," said Roreen; "I'm a poor disthressed boy +that's grown wary o' the worldt on account o' my fatness, an' I'm come +to offer myself as a volunthary male for your voracious stomach!" +</p> +<p> +At this the gate flew open with a loud clang, and Roreen found himself +in the great court-yard of the castle, confronting the giant. The +giant was licking his lips expectantly while opening the gate, but +seemed now not a little disappointed as he looked upon the spare, wiry +form standing before him. +</p> +<p> +"If you're engaged, ould cannibal," said Roreen again, "in calkalatin' +a gasthernomical ploberm, as I'm aweer you are, by the way you're +lookin' at me, allow me perlitely to help you in hallucidatin' it. In +the first place, if <a name="234">{234}</a> you intend to put me in a pie, I must tell +you that you'll not get much gravy from my carkiss, an' in the next, +if you intend to ate me on the spot, raw, I must inform you that +you'll find me as hard as a Kerry dimon, an' stickin' in your throat, +before you're half acquainted with the politics of your abdominal +kingdom!" +</p> +<p> +As an answer to this the giant did precisely what Roreen Shouragh +expected he would do. He stooped down, caught him up with his +monstrous hand, intending to chop off his head with the first bite; +but Roreen, the moment he approached his broad, hairy chest, pulled +suddenly out the sword presented to him by Fiery foot, and drew it +across the giant's windpipe, with as scientific a cut as ever was +given by any champion at the battle of Gaura, Clontarf, or of any +other place on the face of the earth. The giant did not give the usual +roar given by a giant in the act of being killed. How could he, when +his windpipe was cut? He only fell down simply by the gate of his own +castle, and died without a groan. Roreen, by way of triumph, leaped +upon his carcass, and with a light heart cut a few nimble capers +thereon, and then proceeded on his explorations into the castle. There +he found the beautiful princess sad and forlorn, whom he soon relieved +from her apprehensions of further thraldom. She told him that she was +not the only lady whose wrongs were unredressed in that strange +country, for that the two remaining brothers of the giant, to wit, the +dwarf and the Devil's Needle, had kept, during her time of thrall, her +two younger sisters in an equally cruel bondage. +</p> +<p> +"An' now, my onrivalled daisy," said Roreen, after some conversation +had passed between them, "allow me, while I'm in the humor for +performin' deeds o' valior, to thramp off an' set them free!" +</p> +<p> +"But," said the princess, "am I to be left behind pining in this +forlorn dungeon of a castle?" +</p> +<p> +"Refulgint leedy," answered Roreen, "a pair of eyes like yours, when +purferrin' a request, are arrisistible, but this Kerry-dimon' heart o' +mine is at present onmovable; and in ferlosophy, when an arrisistible +affeer conglomerates against an onmovable one, nothin' occurs, an' so +I must have the exthrame bowldness of asking you to stay where you are +till I come back, for 'tis always the maxim of an exparienced an' +renowned gineral not to oncumber himself with too much baggage when +settin' out on his advinthures!" +</p> +<p> +And so the young princess consented to stay, and Roreen, with many +bows and compliments, took his leave. For three days he travelled, +till at length he espied the castle of the dwarf towering on the +summit of a great hill. He climbed the hill as fast as his nimble legs +could carry him, blew the horn at the gate, and defied the dwarf to +single combat. To work they went. The skin of the dwarf was as hard +and tough as that of a rhinoceros, but at length Roreen's sword found +a passage through it, and the dwarf fell dead by his own gate. Roreen +went in, brought the good news of her sister's liberation to the lady, +and after directing her to remain where she was till his return, set +forward again. For three days more he travelled, till he came to the +shore of a sea, where he saw the castle of Snohad na Dhial towering +high above the waves. He climbed up the rock on which the castle +stood, found the gate open, and whistling the romantic pastoral of +"The piper in the meadow straying," he jovially entered the first door +he met. On he went, through room after room, and saw no one, till at +last he came before an exceedingly lofty door, with a narrow and +perpendicular slit in it, extending almost from threshold to lintel. +He peeped in through the open slit, and beheld inside the most +beautiful young lady his eyes ever rested upon. She was weeping, and +seemed sorely troubled. Roreen opened the door, presented himself +before her, and told her how he had liberated her <a name="235">{235}</a> sisters. In +return she told him how that very day she was to be married to Snohad +na Dhial, and wept, as she further related that it was out of the +question to think of vanquishing him, for that he was as tall as the +giant, yet so slight that the slit in the door served him always for +an entrance, but then he was beyond all heroes strong, and usually +killed his antagonist by knotting his long limbs around him and +squeezing him to death. +</p> +<p> +"No matther," said Roreen. "I'll sing a song afther my victory, as the +gamecock said to the piper. An' now, most delightful an' bloomin' +darlint o' the worldt, this purriliginious heart o' mine is melted at +last with the conshumin' flame o' love. Say, then, the +heart-sootherin' an' merlifluous word that you'll have me, an' your +thrubbles are over in the twinklin'—" +</p> +<p> +"Not over so soon!" interrupted a loud, shrill voice behind them, and +Roreen, turning round, beheld Snohad na Dhial entering at the slit, +with deadly rage and jealousy in his fiery eyes. Snohad, however, in +his haste to get in and fall upon Roreen, got his middle in some way +or other entangled in the slit, and in his struggles to free himself, +his feet lilted upward, and there he hung for a few moments, inward +and outward, like the swaying beam of a balance. For a few moments +only; for Roreen, running over, with one blow of his faithful sword on +the waist cut him in two, and down fell both halves of Snohad na Dhial +as dead as a door-nail. After this Roreen got the heart-sootherin' +answer he so gallantly implored. He then bethought himself of +returning. After a few weeks he found himself with the three sisters, +and with a cavalcade of horses laden with the most precious diamonds, +pearls, and other treasures belonging to the three castles, in front +of the forge where he had met Fieryfoot, and talking merrily to that +worthy. +</p> +<p> +"An' now," said Fieryfoot, after he had complimented the ladies on +their beauty, and Roreen on his success and bravery, "I am about to +give my three workmen lave of absence. But they must work seven days +for you first. Then they may go on their peregrinations about ould +Ireland. Farewell. Give my ondeniable love to the ladle, and remember +me to your brothers balligerently!" +</p> +<p> +With that the two friends embraced, on which Fieryfoot drew out a +small whistle and blew a tune, which set Roreen Shouragh and the three +princesses into a pleasant sleep; on awakening from which they found +themselves by the side of the little hut on the knoll, with the three +workmen beneath them, holding the horses and guarding their loads of +treasure. Roreen's two brothers had just returned from the chase, and +were standing near them in mute wonderment at the spectacle. After +some brief explanations, the whole cavalcade set out on their journey +home, and travelled on till they came to the hut of the lonely widow +on the banks of the Clydagh. It was nightfall when they reached the +place. Roreen told the three workmen that he wanted to have a castle +built on the meadow beside the hut, and then went in and embraced his +mother. The workmen went to the meadow, and when the next morning +dawned, had a castle of unexampled strength and beauty built for +Roreen and his intended bride. The two succeeding mornings saw two +equally splendid castles built for the two brothers and their brides +elect, for they were about to be married to the two elder princesses. +By the next morning after that they had a castle finished for Roreen's +mother. On the second morning afterward they had a town built, and at +length, on the seventh morning, when Roreen went out, he found both +castles and town' enclosed by a strong wall, with ramparts, gateways, +and every other necessary appliance of defence. The three workmen +then took their leave, and by the loud smacking of their lips as they +departed, Roreen knew that they were going off to the west in search +of the "say" of whiskey. After this the three <a name="236">{236}</a> brothers were +married to the three lovely princesses, mercenary soldiers flocked in +from every quarter, and took service under their banners; the +inhabitants of the surrounding country removed into the town, and +matters went on gaily and prosperously. The name of Roreen's wife was +Mourne Blanaid, or the Blooming, and on a great festival day got up +for the purpose, he called the town Mourne, in honor of her. In a +pitched battle they defeated and killed the slayer of their father, +and drove his followers out of their patrimony, and after that they +lived in glory and renown till their death. +</p> +<p> +For centuries after the town of Mourne flourished, still remaining in +possession of the race of the Mac Carthys. At length the Normans came +and laid their mail-clad hands upon it. In the reign of King John, +Alexander de St. Helena founded a preceptory for Knights Templars near +it, the ruins of which stand yet in forlorn and solitary grandeur +beside the little river. Still the town flourished and throve, though +many a battle was fought within it, and around its gray walls, till at +length, according to Spenser, Murrogh na Ranagh, prince of Thomond, +burst out like a fiery flame from his fastnesses in Clare, overran all +Munster, burnt almost every town in it that had fallen into the +possession of the English, and among the rest Mourne, whose woeful +burning did not content him, for he destroyed it altogether, scarcely +leaving one stone standing there upon another. And now only a few +mounds remain to show the spot where Roreen Shouragh got his town +built, and where he ruled so jovially. +</p> +<p> +And so, gentle reader, if you look with me to the history of Troy, +Rome, the battle of Ventry Harbor, the Pyramids, or Tadmor in the +Desert, I think you will say that there is none of them so clear, so +circumstantial, and so trustworthy as the early history of the old +town of Mourne. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="237">{237}</a> +<br> +<h2>HANS EULER. +<br><br> +FROM THE GERMAN OF J. G. SEIDL.</h2> +<br> +<pre> + "Hark, child—again that knocking! Go, fling wide the door, I pray; + Perchance 'tis some poor pilgrim who has wandered from his way. + Now save thee, gallant stranger! Sit thou down and share our cheer: + Our bread is white and wholesome—see! our drink is fresh and clear." + + "I come not here your bread to share, nor of your drink to speak. + Your name?"—"Hans Euler."—"So! 'tis well: it is your blood I seek. + Know that through many a weary year I've sought you for a foe: + I had a goodly brother once: 'twas you who laid him low. + + "And as he bit the dust, I vowed that soon or late on you + His death should be avenged; and mark! that oath I will keep true." + "I slew him; but in quarrel just. I fought him hand to hand: + Yet, since you would avenge his fall,—I'm ready; take your stand. + + "But I war not in my homestead, by this hearth whereon I tread; + Not in sight of these—my dear ones—for whose safety I have bled. + My daughter, reach me down yon sword,—the same that laid him low; + And if I ne'er come back again, Tyrol has sons enow." + + So forth they fared together, up the glorious Alpine way, + Where newly now the kindling east led on the golden day. + The sun that mounted with them, as he rose in all his pride, + Still saw the stranger toiling on, Hans Euler for his guide. + + They climbed the mountain summit; and behold! the Alpine world + Showed clear and bright before them, 'neath the mists that upward curled. + Below them, calm and happy, lay the valley in her rest, + With the châlets in her arms, and with their dwellers on her breast. + + Amidst were sparkling waters; giant chasms, scarred and riven; + Vast, crowning woods; and over all, the pure, blest air of heaven: + And, sacred in the sight of God, where peace her treasures spread, + On every hearth, on every home, the soul of freedom shed! + + Both gazed in solemn silence down. The stranger stayed his hand. + Hans Euler gently pointed to his own beloved land: + "'Twas this thy brother threatened; such a wrong might move me well. + 'Twas in such a cause I struggled:—'twas for such a fault he fell." + + The stranger paused: then, turning, looked Hans Euler in the face; + The arm that would have raised the sword fell powerless in its place. + "You slew him. Was it, then, for this—for home and fatherland? + Forgive me! 'Twas a righteous cause. Hans Euler, there's my hand!" + + ELEANORA L. HERVEY. +</pre> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="238">{238}</a> +<br> +<h2>From All the Year Round. +<br><br> +THE MODERN GENIUS OF THE STREAMS.</h2> +<br> +<p> +Water to raise corn from the seed, to clothe the meadow with its +grass, and to fill the land with fruit and flowers; water to lie +heaped in fantastic clouds, to make the fairy-land of sunset, and to +spread the arch of mercy in the rainbow; water that kindles our +imagination to a sense of beauty; water that gives us our meat, and is +our drink, and cleans us of dirt and disease, and is our servant in a +thousand great and little ways—it is the very juice and essence of +man's civilization. And so, whether we shall drag over cold water, or +let hot water drag us, is one way of putting the question between +canal and steam communication for conveyance of our heavy traffic. The +canal-boat uses its water cold without, the steam-engine requires it +hot within. Before hot water appeared in its industrial character to +hiss off the cold, canals had all the glory to themselves. They are +not yet hissed off their old stages and cat-called into contempt by +the whistle of the steam-engine, for canal communication still has +advantages of its own, and canal shares are powers in the money +market. +</p> +<p> +Little more than a century ago, not only were there neither canals nor +railroads in this country, but the common high-roads were about the +worst in Europe. Corn and wool were sent to market over those bad +roads on horses' or bullocks' backs, and the only coal used in the +inland southern counties was carried on horseback in sacks for the +supply of the blacksmiths' forges. Water gave us our over-sea +commerce, that came in and went out by way of our tidal rivers; and +the step proposed toward the fostering of our home industries was a +great one when it occurred to somebody to imitate nature, by erecting +artificial rivers that should flow whereever we wished them to flow, +and should be navigable along their whole course for capacious, +flat-bottomed carrying-boats. +</p> +<p> +The first English canal, indeed, was constructed as long as three +hundred years ago, at Exeter, by John Trew, a native of +Glamorganshire, who enabled the traders of Exeter to cancel the legacy +of the spite of an angry Countess of Devon, who had, nearly three +hundred years before that time, stopped the ascent of sea-going +vessels to Exeter by forming a weir across the Exe at Topham. Trew +contrived, to avoid the obstruction, a canal from Exeter to Topham, +three miles long, with a lock to it. John Trew ruined himself in the +service of an ungrateful corporation. +</p> +<p> +After this time, improvements went no further than the clearing out of +some channels of natural water-communication, until the time of James +Brindley, the father of the English canal system. +</p> +<p> +James Brindley was born in the year 1716, the third of the reign of +George the First, in a cottage in the parish of Wormhill, midway +between the remote hamlets of the High Peak of Derby. There his +father, more devoted to shooting, hunting, and bull-running, than to +his work as a cottier, cultivated the little croft he rented, got into +bad company and poverty, and left his children neglected and untaught. +The idle man had an industrious wife, who taught the children, of whom +James was the eldest, what little she knew; but they must all help to +earn as soon as they were able, and James Brindley earned wages at any +ordinary laborer's work that he could get until he was seventeen years +old. <a name="239">{239}</a> He was a lad clever with his knife, who made little models +of mills, and set them to work in mill-streams of his own contrivance. +The machinery of a neighboring grist-mill was his especial delight, +and had given the first impulse to his modellings. He and his mother +agreed that he should bind himself, whenever he could, to a +millwright; and at the age of seventeen he did, after a few weeks' +trial, become apprentice for seven years to Abraham Bennett, +wheelwright and millwright, at the village of Sutton, near +Macclesfield, which was the market-town of Brindley's district. +</p> +<p> +The millwrights were then the only engineers; they worked by turns at +the foot-lathe, the carpenter's bench, and the anvil; and, in country +places where there was little support for division of labor, they had +to find skill or invention to meet any demand on mechanical skill. +Bennett was not a sober man, his journeymen were a rough set, and much +of the young apprentice's time was at first occupied in running for +beer. He was taught little, and had to find out everything for +himself, which he did but slowly; so that, during some time, he passed +with his master for a stupid bungler, only fit for the farm-work from +which he had been taken. But, after two years of this sort of +pupilage, a fire having injured some machinery in a small silk-mill at +Macclesfield, Brindley was sent to bring away the damaged pieces; and, +by his suggestions on that occasion, he showed to Mr. Milner, the mill +superintendent, an intelligence that caused his master to be applied +to for Brindley's aid in a certain part of the repairs. He was +unwillingly sent, worked under the encouragement of the friendly +superintendent with remarkable ability, and was surprised that his +master and the other workmen seemed to be dissatisfied with his +success. When they chaffed him, at the supper celebrating the +completion of the work, his friend Milner offered to wager a gallon of +the best ale that, before the lad's apprenticeship was out, he would +be a cleverer workman than any of them there present, master or man. +This was a joke against Brindley among his fellow-workmen; but in +another year they found "the young man Brindley" specially asked for +when the neighboring millers needed repairs of machinery, and +sometimes he was chosen in preference to the master himself. Bennett +asked "the young man Briudley" where he had learnt his skill in +mill-work, but he could tell no more than that it "came natural like." +He even suggested and carried out improvements, especially in the +application of the water-power, and worked so substantially well, that +his master said to him one day, "Jem, if thou goes on i' this foolish +way o' workin', there will be very little trade left to be done when +thou comes oot o' thy time: thou knaws firmness o' wark's h' ruin o' +trade." +</p> +<p> +But presently Jem's "firmness o' wark" was the saving of his master. +Bennett got a contract to set up a paper-mill on the river Dane, upon +the model of a mill near Manchester. Bennett went to examine the +Manchester mill, brought back a confused and beery notion of it, and, +proceeding with the job, got into the most hopeless bewilderment. An +old hand, who had looked in on the work, reported, over his drink at +the nearest public-house, that the job was a farce, and that Abraham +Bennett was only throwing away his employer's money. Next Saturday, +after his work, young Jem Brindley disappeared. He was just of age, +and it was supposed he had taken it into his head to leave his master +and begin life on his own account. But on Monday morning, there he was +at his work, with his coat off, and the whole duty to be done clear in +his head. He had taken on Saturday night a twenty-five mile walk to +the pattern mill, near Manchester. On Sunday morning he had asked +leave of its proprietor to go in and examine it. He had spent <a name="240">{240}</a> +some hours on Sunday in the study of its machinery, and then had +walked the twenty-five miles back, to resume his work and save his +master from a failure that would have been disastrous to his credit. +The conduct of the work was left to him; he undid what was amiss, and +proceeded with the rest so accurately, that the contract was completed +within the appointed time, to the complete satisfaction of all persons +concerned. After that piece of good service, Bennett left to James +Brindley the chief care over his business. When Bennett died, Brindley +carried on to completion all work then in hand, and wound up the +accounts for the benefit of his old master's family. That done, he set +up in business on his own account at the town of Leek, in +Staffordshire; he was then twenty-six years old, having served seven +years as an apprentice and two years as journeyman. +</p> +<p> +Leek was then but a small market-town, with a few grist-mills, and +Brindley had no capital; but he made himself known beyond Leek as a +reliable man, whose work was good and durable, who had invention at +the service of his employers, and who always finished a job within the +stipulated time. He did not confine himself to mill-work, but was +ready to undertake all sorts of machinery connected with the draining +of mines, the pumping of water, the smelting of iron and copper, for +which a demand was then rising, and became honorably known to his +neighbors as "the Schemer." At first he had no journeyman or +apprentice, and he cut the tree for his own timber. While working as +an apprentice, he had taught himself to write in a clumsy, +half-illegible way—he never learnt to spell—and when he had been +thirteen years in business, he would still charge an employer his +day's work at two shillings for cutting a big tree, for a mill-shaft +or for other use. When he was called to exercise his skill at a +distance upon some machinery, he added a charge of sixpence a day for +extra expenses. +</p> +<p> +When the brothers John and Thomas Wedgwood, potters in a small way at +the outset of their famous career, desired to increase the supply of +flint-powder, they called "the Schemer" to their aid, and the success +of the flint-mill Brindley then erected brought him business in the +potteries from that time forward. +</p> +<p> +About this time, also, a Manchester man was being married to a young +lady of mark in the potteries, and, during the wedding festivities, +conversation once turned on the cleverness of the young millwright of +Leek. The Manchester man wondered whether he was clever enough to get +the water out of some hopelessly drowned coal mines of his, and +thought he should like to see him. Brindley was sent for, told the +case and its hitherto insuperable difficulties, went into a brown +study, then suddenly brightened up, and told in what way he thought +that, without great expense, the difficulty might be conquered. The +gist of his plan was to use the fall of the river Irwell, that formed +one boundary of the estate, and pump the water from the pits by means +of the greater power of the water in the river. His suggestion was +thought good, and, being set to work upon this job, he drove a tunnel +through six hundred yards of solid rock, and by the tunnel brought the +river down upon the breast of an immense water-wheel, fixed in a +chamber thirty feet below the surface of the ground; the water, when +it had turned the wheel, was carried on into the lower level of the +Irwell. That wheel, with its pumps, working night and day, soon +cleared the drowned outworkings of the mine; and for the invention and +direction of this valuable engineering work, he seems only to have +charged his workman's wages of two shillings a day. +</p> +<p> +An engineer from London had been brought down to superintend the +building of a new silk-mill at <a name="241">{241}</a> Congleton, and Brindley was +employed under him to make the water-wheel and do the common work of +his trade. The engineer from London got his work into a mess, and at +last was obliged to confess his inability to carry out his plan. "The +Schemer" Brindley was applied to by the perplexed proprietor. Could he +put the confusion straight? James Brindley asked to see the plans; but +the great engineer refused to show them to a common millwright. "Well, +then," said Brindley to the proprietor of the mill, "tell me exactly +what you want the machinery to do, and I will try to contrive what +will do it. But you must leave me free to work in my own way." He was +told the results desired, and not only achieved them, but achieved +much more, adding new contrivances, which afterward proved of the +greatest value. +</p> +<p> +After this achievement, Brindley was employed by the now prospering +potters to build flint-mills of more power upon a new plan of his own. +One of the largest was that built for Mr. Baddely, of which work there +is record in such trade entries of his as "March 15, 1757. With Mr. +Baddely to Matherso about a now" (new) "flint-mill upon a windey day 1 +day 3s. 6d. March 19 draing a plann 1 day 2s. 6d. March 23 draing a +plann and to sat out the wheelrace 1 day 4s." +</p> +<p> +At this time Brindley is also exercising his wit on an attempt at an +improved steam-engine; but though his ideas are good, it is hard to +bring them into continuously good working order, and after the close +of entries about it in his memorandum-book, when it seems to have +broken down for a second time, he underlines the item "to Run about a +Drinking Is. 6d." But he confined his despair to the loss of a day and +the expenditure of eighteen pence. Not long afterward he had developed +a patent of his own, and erected, in 1763, for the Walker Colliery at +Newcastle, a steam-engine wholly of iron, which was pronounced the +most "complete and noble piece of iron-work" that had up to that time +been produced. But the perfecting of the steam-engine was then safe in +the hands of Watt, and Brindley had already turned into his own path +as the author of our English canal system. +</p> +<p> +The young Duke of Bridgewater, vexed in love by the frailty of fair +woman, had abjured interest in their sex, had gone down to his estate +of Worsley, on the borders of Chat Moss, and, to give himself +something more wholesome to think about than the sisters Gunning and +their fortunes, conferred with John Gilbert, his land steward, as to +the possibility of cutting a canal by which the coals found upon his +Worsley estate might be readily taken to market at Manchester. +Manchester then was a rising town, of which the manufacturers were yet +unaided by the steam-engine, and there was no coal smoke but that +which arose from household fires. The roads out of Manchester were so +bad as to be actually closed in winter, and in summer the coal, sold +at the pit mouth by the horse-load, was conveyed on horses' backs at +an addition to its cost of nine or ten shillings a ton. +</p> +<p> +When the duke discussed with Gilbert old abandoned and new possible +schemes of water conveyance for his Worsley coal, Gilbert advised the +calling in of the ingenious James Brindley of Leek, "the Schemer." +When the duke came into contact with Brindley, he at once put trust in +him, and gave him the direction of the proposed work; whereupon he was +requested to base his advice upon what he enters in his +memorandum-book of jobs done, as an "ochilor," (ocular) "servey or a +ricconitering." +</p> +<p> +Brindley examined the ground, and formed his own plan. He was against +carrying the canal down into Irwell by a flight of locks, and so up +again on the other side to the proposed level, but counselled carrying +the canal by solid embankments and a stone aqueduct right over the +river upon one <a name="242">{242}</a> level throughout. The duke accepted his opinion, +and had plans prepared for a new application to parliament, Brindley +often staying with him at work and in consultation for weeks together, +while still travelling to and fro in full employment upon mills, +water-wheels, cranes, fire-engines, and other mechanical work. Small +as his pay was, he lived frugally. He had by this time even saved a +little money, and gained credit enough to be able, by borrowing from a +friend at Leek, to pay between five and six hundred pounds for a +fourth share of an estate at Turnhurst, in Staffordshire, supposed by +him to be full of minerals. +</p> +<p> +The Duke of Bridgewater obtained his act in the year 1760, but the +bold and original part of Brindley's scheme, which many ridiculed as +madness, caused the duke much anxiety. In England there had never been +so great an aqueduct, but the scheme was not only for the carrying of +water in a water-tight trunk of earth over an embankment, but also for +the carrying of ships on a bridge of water over water. Brindley had no +misgivings. To allay the duke's fears, he suggested calling in and +questioning another engineer, who surprised the man of genius by +ending an adverse report thus: "I have often heard of castles an the +air; but never before saw where any of them were to be erected." +</p> +<p> +The duke, however, with all his hesitation, had most faith in the head +of James Brindley, bade him go on in his own way, and resolved to run +the risk of failure. And so, on a bridge of three arches, the canal +was carried over the Irwell by the Barton aqueduct, thirty-nine feet +above the river. The water was confined within a puddled channel, to +prevent leakage, and the work is at this day as sound as it was when +first constructed. For the safe carrying of water along the top of an +earthen embankment, Brindley had relied upon the retaining powers of +clay puddle. It was by help also of clay puddle that he carried the +weight of the embankment safe over the ooze of Trafford Moss. +</p> +<p> +With great ingenuity, also, Brindley provided for the crossing of his +canal by streams intercepting its course, without breach of his rule +that it is unsafe to let such waters freely mix with the canal stream. +Thus, to provide for the free passage of the Medlock without causing a +rush into the canal, an ingenious form of weir was contrived, over +which its waters flowed into a lower level, and thence down a well +several yards deep, leading to a subterranean passage by which the +stream was passed into the Irwell, near at hand. Arthur Young, who saw +Brindley's canal soon after it was opened, said that "the whole plan +of these works shows a capacity and extent of mind which foresees +difficulties, and invents remedies in anticipation of possible evils. +The connection and dependence of the parts upon each other are happily +imagined; and all are exerted in concert, to command by every means +the wished-for success." At the Worsley end Brindley constructed a +basin, into which coal was brought from different workings of the mine +by a subterranean water channel. Brindley also invented cranes for the +more ready loading of the boats, laid down within the mines a system +of underground railways leading from the face of the coal where the +miners worked, to the wells that he had made at different points in +the tunnels for shooting the coal down into the boats waiting below. +He drained and ventilated with a water-bellows the lower parts of the +mine. He improved the barges, invented water-weights, raising dams, +riddles to wash the coal for the forges. At the Manchester end +Brindley made equally ingenious arrangements for the easy delivery of +the coal at the top of Castle Hill. At every turn in the work his +inventive genius was felt. When the want of lime for the masonry was a +serious impediment, Brindley discovered how to make, of a useless, +unadhesive lime-marl, by tempering it and casting it in <a name="243">{243}</a> moulds +before burning, an excellent lime, a contrivance that alone saved the +duke several thousands of pounds cost. When the water was let in, and +the works everywhere stood firm, people of fashion flocked to see +Brindley's canal, as "perhaps the greatest artificial curiosity in the +world:" and writers spoke in glowing terms of the surprise with which +they saw several barges of great burden drawn by a single mule or +horse along a "river hung in the air," over another river flowing +beneath. +</p> +<p> +As for Manchester, with the price of coal reduced one half, it was +ready to make the best use of the steam-engine when it was established +as the motive-power in our factories. +</p> +<p> +Within two months of the day, seventeenth of July, 1761, when the +first boat-load of coals travelled over the Barton viaduct, Brindley's +notes testify that he was at Liverpool "recconitoring" and by the end +of September he was levelling for a proposed extension of his canal +from Manchester to Liverpool, by joining it with the Mersey, eight +miles below Warrington Bridge, whence there is a natural tideway to +Liverpool, about fifteen miles distant. At that time there was not +even a coach communication over the bad roads between Manchester and +Liverpool, the first stage-coach having been started six years later, +when it required six, and sometimes eight horses to pull it the thirty +miles along the ruts and through the sloughs. The coach started from +Liverpool early in the morning, breakfasted at Prescot, dined at +Warrington, and reached Manchester by supper-time. From Manchester to +Liverpool it made the return journey next day. The Duke of +Bridgewater's proposed canal was strongly opposed as an antagonist +interest by the Mersey and Irwell Navigation Company. The canal +promised to take freights at half the price charged by the Navigation +Company. A son of the Earl of Derby took the part of the "Old +Navigators," and as the Duke of Bridgewater was a Whig, Brindley had +to enter in his note-book that "the Toores" (Tories) had "mad had" +(made head) "agane ye Duk." But at last his entry was: "ad a grate +Division of 127 fort Duk 98 nos for t e Duke 29 Me Jorete," and the +Duke's cause prospered during the rest of the contest. +</p> +<p> +Brindley bought a new suit of clothes to grace his part as principal +engineering witness for the canal, and having upset his mind for some +days by going to see Garrick play Richard the Third, (wherefore he +declared against all further indulgence in that sort of excitement), +he went to the committee-room duly provided with a bit of chalk in his +pocket, and made good the saying that originated from his clear way of +showing what he meant, upon the floor of the committee-room, that +"Brindley and chalk would go through the world." When asked to produce +a drawing of a proposed bridge, he said he had none, but could +immediately get a model. Whereupon he went out and bought a large +cheese, which he brought into the committee-room and cut into two +equal parts, saying, "Here is my model." The two halves of the cheese +represented the two arches of his bridge, the rest of the work +connected with them he built with paper, with books, or with whatever +he found ready to hand. Once when he had repeatedly talked about +"puddling," some of the members wished to know what puddling was. +Brindley sent out for a lump of clay, hollowed it into a trough, +poured water in, and showed that it leaked out. Then he worked up the +clay with water, going through the process of puddling in miniature, +again made a trough of the puddled clay, filled it with water, and +showed that it was water-tight. "Thus it is," he said, "that I form a +water-tight trunk to carry water over rivers and valleys, wherever +they cross the path of the canal." +</p> +<p> +And so the battle was fought, and the canal works completed at a total +<a name="244">{244}</a> cost of two hundred and twenty thousand pounds, of which +Brindley was content to take as his share a rate of pay below that of +an ordinary mechanic at the present day. The canal yielded an income +which eventually reached eighty thousand pounds a year; but three and +sixpence a day, and for a greater part of the time half a crown a day, +was the salary of the man of genius by whom it was planned and +executed. Yet Brindley was then able to get a guinea a day for +services to others, though from the Duke of Bridgewater he never took +more than a guinea a week, and had not always that. The duke was +investing all the money he could raise, and sometimes at his wit's end +for means to go on with the work. Brindley gave his soul to the work +for its own sake, and if he had a few pence to buy himself his dinner +with—one day he enters only "ating and drinking 6d."—he could live, +content with having added not a straw's weight of impediment to the +great enterprise he was bent with all the force of his great genius +upon achieving. It gave him the advantage, also, of being able, as was +most convenient, to treat with the duke on equal terms. He was invited +as a canal maker to Hesse by offers of any payment he chose to demand, +but stuck to the duke, who is said even to have been in debt to him +for travelling and other expenses, which he had left unpaid with the +answer, "I am much more distressed for money than you; however, as +soon as I can recover myself, your services shall not go unrewarded." +After Brindley's sudden death his widow applied in vain for sums which +she said were due to her late husband. +</p> +<p> +The Staffordshire Grand Trunk Canal, Brindley's other great work, +started from the duke's canal, near Runcorn, passed through the +salt-making districts of Cheshire and the Pottery district, to unite +the Severn with the Mersey by one hundred and forty miles of +water-way. This canal went through five tunnels, one of them, that at +Harecastle, being nearly three thousand yards long, a feature in the +scheme accounted by many to be as preposterous as they had called his +former "castle in the air." The work was done; bringing with it +traffic, population, and prosperity into many half-savage midland +districts. It gave comfort and ample employment in the Pottery +district, while trebling the numbers of those whom it converted, from +a half-employed and ill-paid set of savages, into a thriving +community. +</p> +<p> +Once, when Brindley was demonstrating to a committee of the House of +Commons the superior reliableness and convenience of equable canals as +compared with rivers, liable to every mischance of flood and drought, +he was asked by a member, "What, then, he took to be the use of +navigable rivers?" and replied, "To make canal navigations, to be +sure!" From the Grand Trunk, other canals branched, and yet others +were laid out by Brindley before he died. He found time when at the +age of fifty to marry a girl of nineteen, and the house then falling +vacant on the estate of Turnhurst, of which he had, for the sake of +its minerals, bought a fourth share, and by that time had a colliery +at work, he took his wife home as the mistress of that old, roomy +dwelling. He was receiving better pay then as the engineer of the +Grand Trunk Canal, and his new home was conveniently near to the +workings of its great Harecastle Tunnel, into which he and his +partners sent a short branch canal—of a mile and a half long—from +their coal mine, which was only a few fields distant from his house. +</p> +<p> +Water, that made his greatness, was at last the death of Brindley. He +got drenched one day while surveying a canal, went about in his wet +clothes, and when he went to bed at the inn was put between damp +sheets. This produced the illness of which he died, at the age of +fifty-six. It was not the first time that he had taken to his bed. +Scarcely able to read, and if he could have read, engaged on work so +new that no book precedents could have <a name="245">{245}</a> helped him, whenever +Brindley had some difficulty to overcome that seemed for a time +insuperable, he went to bed upon it, and is known to have stopped in +bed two or three days, till he had quietly thought it all over, and +worked his way to the solution. It is said that when he lay on his +death-bed some eager canal undertakers urged to see him and seek from +him the solution of a problem. They had met with a serious difficulty +in the course of their canal, and must see Mr. Brindley and get his +advice. They were admitted, and told him how at a certain place they +had labored in vain to prevent their canal from leaking. "Then puddle +it," murmured Brindley. "Sir, but we have puddled it." "Then"—and +they were almost his last words in life—"puddle it again—and +again." As he had wisely invested his savings in Grand Trunk shares, +they and his share in the colliery enabled him to leave ample +provision for his widow and two daughters. +</p> +<p> +As for the canal system that he established, it has not been made +obsolete by its strong younger brother, the railway system. The duke's +canal is as busy as ever. Not less than twenty million tons of traffic +are at this date carried yearly upon the canals of England alone, and +this quantity is steadily increasing. +</p> +<p> +We have taken the facts in this account of Brindley, from a delightful +popular edition of that part of Mr. Smiles's Lives of the Engineers +which tells of him and of the earlier water engineers. Of Mr. Smiles's +Lives of George and Robert Stephenson there is a popular edition as a +companion volume, and therein all may read, worthily told, the tale of +the foundation and of the chief triumphs of that new form of +engineering which dealt with water, not by the riverful, but by the +bucketful, and made a few buckets of water strong as a river to sweep +men and their goods and their cattle in a mighty torrent from one +corner of the country to another. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>From Chambers's Journal. +<br><br> +A LIE.</h2> +<br> +<pre> + A thistle grew in a sluggard's croft, + Rough and rank with a thorny growth, + With its spotted leaves, and its purple flowers + (Blossoms of Sin, and bloom of Sloth); + Slowly it ripened its baneful seeds, + And away they went in swift gray showers. + + But every seed was cobweb winged, + And they spread o'er a hundred miles of land. + 'Tis centuries now since they first took flight, + In that careless, gay, and mischievous band, + Yet still they are blooming and ripening fast, + And spreading their evil by day and night. +</pre> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="246">{246}</a> +<br> +<h2>From The Dublin Review. +<br><br> +CHRISTIAN ART.</h2> +<br> +<p> +<i>The History of our Lord as exemplified in Works of Art;</i> with that of +the Types, St. John the Baptist and other persons of the Old and New +Testament. Commenced by the late Mrs. JAMESON; continued and completed +by Lady EASTLAKE. 2 vols. London: Longman. 1864. +</p> +<p> +The series of works on Christian Art brought out by the late Mrs. +Jameson, and which earned for her so high a reputation as an art +critic, was conceived upon a plan of progressive interest and +importance. From "Sacred and Legendary Art," published in 1848, she +passed to the special legends connected with Monastic Orders, and in +1852 gave to the public her most charming volume, entitled "Legends of +the Madonna." The series was to have closed with the subject of the +volume now before us, and some progress had been made by Mrs. Jameson +in collecting notes on various pictures, when, in the spring of 1860, +death cut her labors short. The work, however, has passed into hands +well able to complete it worthily. We may miss some of the freshness +and genuine simplicity with which Mrs. Jameson was wont to transfer to +paper rare impression made on her mind and heart; but Lady Eastlake, +while bringing to her task the essential qualification of earnestness +and exhibiting considerable grace and force of style, is possessed of +a far wider and more critical acquaintance with the history of art +than her amiable predecessor either had or pretended to have. It is +pleasant to find in these pages, as in those which preceded them, the +evidence of a desire to avoid controversial matter; and that, without +compromise of personal conviction, care has been generally taken not +to wound the feelings of those who differ from the writer in religious +belief. The primary object of the work is aesthetic and artistic, not +religious; and it is seldom that the laws of good taste are +transgressed in its pages by gratuitous attacks upon the tenets of the +great body of artists who are the immediate subject of criticism. +Indeed, considering that these volumes are the production of a +Protestant, we think that less of Protestant animus could hardly be +shown, at all consistently with honesty of purpose and frankness of +speech. That no traces of the Protestant spirit should appear, would +be next to an impossibility; and the affectation of Catholic feeling, +where it did not exist, would be offensive from its very unreality. So +much self-control in traversing a vast extent of delicate and +dangerous ground deserves all the more hearty acknowledgment, as it +must have been peculiarly difficult to a person of Lady Eastlake's +ardent temperament and evident strength of conviction. If, therefore, +in the course of our remarks, we feel bound to point out the evil +influence which Lady Eastlake's religious views seem to us to have +exercised on her critical appreciations, it will be understood that +theories, not persons, are the object of our animadversions. It is at +all times an ungrateful task to expose the weak points of an author; +it would be especially ungenerous to be hard upon the shortcomings of +one who has done such good service to the cause of truth, in proving, +however unconsciously, by the mere exercise of persistent candor, the +identity of Christian and Catholic art. Catholics, indeed, do not +ordinarily stand in need of such proof. If they know anything of art, +the fact of this identity must be with them an early discovery; but it +is gratifying, especially in a time and country in which scant justice +on such matters is too often dealt out to us, to be able to adduce a +<a name="247">{247}</a> testimony the more valuable because given in despite of an +adverse bias. It is quite possible, indeed, that the writer has not +perceived the full import of her work; but no one, we think, can study +her examples or weigh the force of her criticism with out coming to +the true conclusion upon this subject. +</p> +<p> +But, before establishing the correctness of this assertion, we must +draw attention to one point upon which we are at issue with Lady +Eastlake: a point, moreover, of no small importance, as it vitally +affects the value of a large part of her criticisms. A question arises +at the outset, what standard or test of Christian art is to be set up; +and Lady Eastlake makes an excellent start in the investigation. There +is, perhaps, no principle so steadily kept in view throughout the +work, or so often and earnestly insisted on, as this: that genuine +Christian art and true Christian doctrine are intimately and +essentially connected. Art is bound to depict only the truth in fact +or doctrine (vol. ii., p. 266, note). Departure from sound theology +involves heresy in art. Now, no principle can be more true than this, +or of greater importance toward forming a correct judgment upon works +professing to belong to Christian art. Beauty and truth are +objectively identical, for beauty is only truth lighted up and +harmonized by the reason; and to supernatural beauty, which Christian +art essentially aims at expressing, supernatural truth must +necessarily correspond. For here we have nothing to do with mere +material beauty, "the glories of color, the feats of anatomical skill, +the charms of chiaroscuro, the revels of free handling." Admirable as +these are in themselves, and by no means, theoretically at least, +injurious to Christian art, they belong properly to art as art, and +are more or less separable from art as Christian. Christian art is +never perfect as art, unless material beauty enters into the +composition; but as Christianity is above art, and the soul superior +to the body, so material beauty must never forget its place, never +strive to obtain the mastery, or constitute itself the chief aim of +the artist, upon pain of total destruction of the Christian element. +The soul of Christian art is in the idea—the shadowing out by symbol +or representation, under material forms and conditions, of immaterial, +supernatural, even uncreated beauty, the beauty of heavenly virtue, or +heavenly mystery or divinity itself. But how are these objects, in all +their harmony, proportion, and splendor, to be realized—how is +supernatural beauty to be conceived—except by a soul gifted with +supernatural perceptions? Faith, at least, is indispensably requisite +to the truthfulness of any artistic work intended to represent the +supernatural. Without faith, distortion and caricature are inevitable. +With faith—the foundation of all knowledge of the supernatural in +this life—much, very much, may be accomplished. But it is when faith, +enlivened and perfected by supernatural love, exercises itself in +contemplation, that the spiritual sight becomes keen, and the soul, +from having simply a just appreciation, passes to a vision of +exquisite beauty, sublimity, and tenderness, which a higher perception +of divine mysteries has laid open to its gaze. The hand may falter, +and be faithless to the mental conception, so as to produce imperfect +execution and inadequate artistic result. Faith and love do not make a +man an artist. But, amidst deformity or poverty of art in the material +element, if there is any, however slight, artistic power employed, the +outward defects will be qualified, and almost transformed, to the eye +of an appreciating spectator, through the inner power which speaks +from the painter's soul to his own: just as we learn to overlook, or +even to admire, plain features, and anything short of positive +ugliness of outline, in those whose mental greatness and moral beauty +we have learned to venerate and to love. On the other hand, any amount +of material perfection in contour and color is insipid as a doll, +<a name="248">{248}</a> a mere mask of nothingness, incapable of arresting attention or +captivating the heart, unless within there be a soul of beauty—that +inward excellence which subordinates to itself, while it gives life +and meaning to, the outward form. On the side of the object, truth; on +the part of the spectator, faith and love—these are the palmary +conditions of Christian art and its appreciation. For it must ever be +remembered that supernatural truth lies beyond the ken of any but +souls elevated by faith; and, what is of equal importance, that faith +can have no other object than the truth. Its object is infallible +truth, or it is not faith. No wonder, then, that, when we see a +prodigality of manual skill and grace of form, and even moral beauty +of the natural order, devoid of the inspiration of supernatural faith +and love, we are forced to exclaim with St. Gregory, as he gazed on +the fair Saxon youths, <i>Heit proh dolor! quod tam lucidi vultus +homines tenebrarum auctor possideret, tantaque gratia frontis +conspicui mentem ab aeterna gratia vacuam gestarent.</i> [Footnote 51] +Alas! that so much physical beauty should embody nothing but a pagan +idea! It were as unreasonable to look for Christian art as the product +of an heretical imagination, as to demand Christian eloquence or +Christian poetry from an heretical preacher or a free-thinking poet. +The vision is wanting, the appreciation is not there—how, then, is +the expression possible? +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 51: "Alas! what pain it is to think that men of such + bright countenance should be the possession of the Prince of + Darkness; and that though conspicuous for surprising grace of + feature, they should bear a soul within untenanted by everlasting + grace."] +</p> +<p> +Nor is this a mere abstract theory, erected on <i>a priori</i> +principles. It would be easy to verify our position by a large +induction from the history of art. Is there a picture whose mute +eloquence fills the soul with reverential awe, or holy joy, or +supernatural calm, or deep, deep sympathy with the sufferings of our +Lord, or the sorrows of his Immaculate Mother, we may be sure the +painter was some humble soul, ascetical and pious, who, like Juan de +Joanes, or Zurbaran, spent his days in lifelong seclusion, given up to +the grave and holy thoughts which their pictures utter to us; or that +other Spaniard, Luis de Vargas, famed alike for his austerity and +amiable Christian gaiety; or a Sassoferrato, or a Van Eyck, seeking +in, holy communion the peace of soul which can alone reflect the +calmness of sanctity, or the bliss of celestial scenes; or the holy +friar, John of Fiesoli, known to all as the Angelic whose heroic +humility and Christian simplicity, learned in a life of prayer and +contemplation, invest his pictures with an unearthly charm. These, and +many another pious painter, known or unknown by name to men, looked on +their vocation as a holy trust, and sought to keep themselves +unspotted from the world. Theirs was the practical maxim so dear to +the blessed Angelico, that "those who work for Christ must dwell in +Christ." On the other hand, does a picture, albeit Christian in +subject and in name, offend us by false sentiment, or cold +conventionalism, or sensuality, or affectation, or strain after +theatrical effect, or any of the hundred forms which degraded art +exhibits when it has wandered from the Christian type—we know that we +are looking on the handiwork of some schismatic Greek, or modern +Protestant; or that, if the painter be a Catholic, he lived in the +days or wrought under the influence of the Renaissance, when paganism +made its deadly inroads upon art, substituting the spirit of +voluptuousness for the sweet and austere graces that spring of divine +charity; or under the blighting influence of Jansenism, which killed +alike that queenly virtue and her sister humility by false asceticism +and pharisaic rigor. We might even trust the decision as to the +truthfulness of our view to an inspection of the examples with which +Lady Eastlake has so abundantly illustrated her volumes. Indeed, +hitherto her principle and ours are one. +</p> +<a name="249">{249}</a> +<p> +But unfortunately, though the <i>major</i> premise of the art-syllogism is +granted on both sides, Lady Eastlake adopts a <i>minor</i>, from which we +utterly dissent. It is implied in one and all of the following +statements, and is more or less interwoven with the whole staple of +her work. She tells us that "the materials for this history in art are +only properly derivable from Scripture, and therefore referable back +to the same source for verification" (vol. i., p. 3). And again: "It +may be at once laid down as a principle, that the interests of art and +the integrity of Scripture [by integrity is meant literal adherence to +the text of Scripture] are indissolubly united. Where superstition +mingles, the quality of Christian art suffers; where doubt enters, +Christian art has nothing to do. It may even be averred that, if a +person could be imagined, deeply imbued with aesthetic instincts and +knowledge, and utterly ignorant of Scripture, he would yet intuitively +prefer, as art, all those conceptions of our Lord's history which +adhere to the simple text. … All preference for the simple +narrative of Scripture he would arrive at through art—all +condemnation of the embroideries of legend through the same channel" +(vol. i., p. 6). And again: "The simplicity of art and of the Gospel +stand or fall together. The literal narrative of the agony in the +garden lost sight of, all became confusion and error" (vol. ii., p. +30). +</p> +<p> +Now, whatever obscurity and confusion these passages contain—and they +do contain a great deal—one thing is unmistakably clear, that the +orthodoxy of the ultra-Protestant maxim, "The Bible and the Bible +only," is a fixed principle with Lady Eastlake. And the consequence +is, that, whenever she looks at a religious picture, she refers to the +Gospel narrative for its verification. If it does not stand this test, +it is nowhere in her esteem. What is not in Scripture is legendary and +unartistic, because necessarily at variance with scriptural truth. +Thus whole provinces of art in connection with our Lord are banished +from her pages. Surely such a canon of taste is not only narrow, but +arbitrary: narrow, as excluding whatever comes down to us hallowed by +tradition, considered apart from or beyond the limits of scriptural +statement; arbitrary, because it leaves art at the mercy of the sects, +with their manifold dissensions as to the extent of Scripture, or its +true interpretation. Thus, Lady Eastlake, being herself no believer in +the doctrine of the real presence, does not recognize its enunciation +in the sacred pages, and loses, apparently, all interest in the great +pictures which symbolize or relate to the most holy sacrament of the +altar. So, too, most of the special devotions to the person of our +Lord, which have sprung out of the living faith of the church, and +have furnished subjects for pictures incontestably of a high order, +are totally omitted from her classification of devotional +compositions. We can hardly imagine it possible for her to adhere +consistently to her rule in other departments of Christian art. The +Immaculate Conception, for instance, the Assumption, the Coronation of +our Lady, the marriage of St. Catherine, the stigmata of St. Francis, +the vision of St. Dominic, the miracles of the saints—subjects, many +of which have inspired some of the noblest productions of her favorite +Fra Angelico, or of Raphael, or Murillo, or Velasquez—undoubtedly do +violence to her criteria of artistic merit, though we cannot believe +that she would contest their universally acknowledged claim to the +highest honors in Christian art. Indeed, fidelity to this narrow +Protestant maxim would have rendered these two volumes an +impossibility. Strange, then, that it should not have occurred to the +mind of the authoress that by far the larger part, and, on her own +showing, the most glorious part, of the fraternity of Christian +artists have been men full to overflowing of the spirit of a church +which has never adopted her standard of orthodoxy. +</p> +<a name="250">{250}</a> +<p> +The Catholic Church is at once the parent, historically, of all +Christian art and the upholder of that grand principle of tradition +which gives to art, no less than to doctrine, a range far wider and +more ample than the mere letter of the biblical records. Of course, +contradiction of Scripture, or "alterations of the text, which, +however slight, affect the revealed character of our Lord," must give +offence to every judicious critic; but it is tradition and the voice +of the living Church—together with that instinctive sense of the +faithful which, so long as they live in submission to their +divinely-appointed teachers, is so marvellously true and +unerring—that must be the criteria of orthodoxy, and determine when +the artist's conceptions or mode of treatment are contrary to, or in +accordance with, the spirit of the sacred text. +</p> +<p> +Lady Eastlake does not like the notion of our Lord's falling under the +cross. It is not in the Bible, and she pronounces it to be counter to +the spirit and purport of the Gospel narrative. She grows positively +angry with some painters for having represented an angel holding the +chalice, surmounted by a cross or host, before the eyes of our blessed +Redeemer in his agony. She has her own standard of feeling, abstract +and arbitrary, to which she refers the decision of such points. But +where is the guarantee for the correctness of that standard, or the +security for its general acceptance? The Bible does not tell us what +its own spirit and purport are, and outside the Bible Lady Eastlake, +at least, cannot point to any infallible authority. She is, therefore, +imposing her own judgment, unsupported by any assigned reason, upon +the world, as a rule to be followed. So, too, St. Veronica to her is +always <i>de trop</i>, morally and pictorially, in the Way of the Cross; +and scholastic interpretations, seemingly because they are scholastic, +of the types of the Old Testament, are invariably pronounced by her to +be strained, unreal, and superstitious. So effectually does +Protestantism interfere with the capacity of a critic to appreciate +the higher developments and fuller expression of Christian art. +</p> +<p> +Not that a Protestant or a free-thinker can have no sense at all of +the supernaturally beautiful. If they are trained to a high degree of +moral and intellectual cultivation in the natural order, and in +proportion to the height of their attainments in that order, they will +not fail to be affected by beauty of a superior order. For there is no +contradiction between the truth of nature and the truth which is above +nature. The Protestant, indeed, as sincerely holding large fragments +of Christian truth, will necessarily have much sympathy with many +exhibitions of supernatural beauty. But he lacks the clue to it as a +whole; and if he can often admire, rarely, if ever, can he create. +Both Protestant and unbeliever must therefore labor under much +vagueness and uncertainty of judgment, inasmuch as they can have no +fixity of principle. Often they will not know what they want; they +will praise in one page what they condemn in the next; or, when moved, +will be at a loss to account for their emotion. They will exhibit +phenomena not unlike those so often presented in this country by +unbelievers, who, entering our churches, are one while overawed by a +presence they cannot define, and which bewilders their intellect, +whilst it captivates their imagination; and another while, as +unaccountably, are moved to disgust and derision by what to them is an +insoluble riddle, a perplexity, and an annoyance. To such critics some +phases of the supernatural will never be welcome. The tortures of the +martyrs, the self-inflicted macerations of ascetics, the sublime +self-abandonment of heroic charity—whatever, in a word, embodies and +brings home the grand, sacred, but, to the natural man, repugnant idea +of the cross, will always be offensive, and produce a sense of +irritation, such as even Lady Eastlake, with all her <a name="251">{251}</a> +self-mastery and good taste, cannot wholly suppress or conceal. So +true is it in the sphere of Christian art, as in that of Christian +doctrine and devotion, <i>Nisi credideritis, non intelligetis</i>. Casual +excitement, transient enthusiasm, unmeaning admiration, are at best +the pitiful substitutes for an intelligent and abiding appreciation of +excellence, in those who are not possessed of supernatural ideas in +common with the subjects and authors of the works of genuine Christian +art. +</p> +<p> +It would be unfair, however, not to mention that Lady Eastlake admits +many important modifications of this rigid principle of adherence to +the letter of Scripture. The following secondary canons go far to +soften down the asperity of her Protestantism. They shall be stated in +her own words: +</p> +<p> +"On the other hand, additions to Scripture given in positive images, +if neither prejudicial to art nor inconsistent with our Lord's +character, are not in themselves necessarily objectionable; but will, +according to their merits, be looked upon with indulgence or +admiration. The pictures, for instance, representing the disrobing of +our Lord—a fact not told in Scripture, yet which must have +happened—will be regarded with pathetic interest. The same will be +felt of Paul Delaroche's exquisite little picture, where St. John is +leading the Virgin home; for such works legitimately refresh and carry +on the narrative in a scriptural spirit. Nay, episodes which are more +purely invention—such as the ancient tradition of the Mother of Christ +wrapping the cloth round her son, previous to his crucifixion; or, +again, the picture by Paul Delaroche, of the agony of her and of the +disciples, represented as gathered together in a room while Christ +passes with his cross—even such imaginary episodes will silence the +most arrant Protestant criticism, by their overpowering appeal to the +feelings; since in neither case is the great duty of art to itself or +to its divine object tampered with. +</p> +<p> +"The same holds good where symbolical forms, as in Christian art of +classic descent, are given, which embody the idea rather than the +fact. For instance, where the Jordan is represented as a river god, +with his urn under his arm, at the baptism of our Lord; or when, +later, the same event is accompanied by the presence of angels, who +hold the Saviour's garments. Such paraphrases and poetical imaginings +in no way affect the truth of the facts they set forth, but rather, to +mortal fancy, swell their pomp and dignity. +</p> +<p> +"Still less need the lover of art and adorer of Christ care about +inconsistencies in minor matters. As, for example, that the entombment +takes place in a renaissance monument, in the centre of a beautiful +Italian landscape, and not in a cave in a rock in the arid scenery of +Judea. On the contrary, it is right that art should exercise the +utmost possible freedom in such circumstances, which are the signs and +handwriting of different schools and times, and enrich a picture with +sources of interest to the historian and the archaeologist. It is the +moral expression which touches the heart and adorns the tale, not the +architecture or costume; and whether our Lord be in the garb of a +Roman citizen or of a German burgher (though his dress is usually +conventional in color and form), it matters not, if he be but God in +all." +</p> +<p> +The arbitrariness of the principles set forth in the earlier portion +of this passage, and the quiet assumption that all ancient traditions +are pure inventions, may well be excused by the reader for the sake of +the inconsistency which saves from condemnation not a few glorious +pictures, which could never otherwise have been made to square with +the rule of literal adherence to the Gospel narrative. +</p> +<p> +Another principle essential to the right appreciation of art is +admirably stated by Lady Eastlake: +</p> +<p> +"All will agree that the duty of the Christian artist is to give not +only the <a name="252">{252}</a> temporary fact, but the permanent truth. Yet this +entails a discrepancy to which something must be sacrificed. For, in +the scenes from our Lord's life, fact and truth are frequently at +variance. That the Magdalen took our Lord for a gardener, was the +fact; that he was Christ, is the truth. That the Roman soldiers +believed him to be a criminal, and therefore mocked and buffeted him +without scruple, is the fact; that we know him through all these +scenes to be the Christ, is the truth. Nay, the very cruciform nimbus +that encircles Christ's head is an assertion of this principle. As +visible to us, it is true; as visible even to his disciples, it is +false. There are, however, educated people so little versed in the +conditions of art, as to object even to the nimbus, as a departure +from fact, and, therefore, an offence to truth; preferring, they say, +to see our Lord represented as he walked upon earth. But this is a +fallacy in more than one sense. Our Lord, as he walked upon earth, was +not known to be the Messiah. To give him as he was seen by men who +knew him not, would be to give him not as the Christ. It may be urged +that the cruciform nimbus is a mere arbitrary sign, nothing in itself +more than a combination of lines. This is true; but there <i>must</i> be +something arbitrary in all human imaginings (we should prefer to say +symbolizings) of the supernatural. Art, for ages, assumed this sign as +that of the Godhead of Christ, and the world for ages granted it. It +served various purposes; it hedged the rudest representations of +Christ round with a divinity, which kept them distinct from all +others. It pointed him out to the most ignorant spectator, and it +identified the sacred head, even at a distance." +</p> +<p> +This principle may, indeed, be legitimately extended much further. The +purpose of Christian art is instruction, either in morals or in dogma, +or in both. It is not, therefore, a sin in art to sacrifice upon +occasion some portion of historical truth, in subservience to this +end. Nor in fact, in Catholic ages, was there danger of the people +being led into error on the fundamental facts of religion. The Gospel +narrative was too familiar to them for that. They seem, as is well +remarked by Father Cahier, to have had hearts more elevated than ours, +and more attuned by meditation and habitual catholicity of spirit to +mystery, and its sublimer lessons; and therefore, whenever we find in +early paintings what seems to us anomalous in an historic point of +view, we may conclude with safety that there was a dogmatic intention. +</p> +<p> +There are, however, limits to liberties of this kind, which may not be +transgressed without incurring censure. Overbold speculation has ere +now betrayed even orthodox theologians into accidental error. And a +Catholic artist may depict, as a Catholic schoolman may enunciate, +views which deserve to be stigmatized as rash, offensive, erroneous, +scandalous, or even, in themselves, heretical. There have been +occasions in which the Church has felt herself bound to interfere with +wanderings of the artistic imagination, as injurious, morally or +doctrinally, to the faithful committed to her charge. Nor have +theologians failed to protest from time to time against similar +abuses. Bellarmine frowned upon the muse in Christian art. Savonarola, +in his best days, made open war upon the pagan corruptions which in +his time had begun to abound in Florentine paintings. Father Canisius +denounces those painters as inexcusable who, in the face of Scripture, +represent our Lady as swooning at the foot of the cross; and Father de +Ligny reprobates, on the same grounds, the introduction of St. Joseph +into pictures of the meeting between the Blessed Virgin and St. +Elizabeth. For—whatever we may think as to his having accompanied our +Lady on the journey—had he been present at the interview, he would +have been enlightened upon the mystery, his ignorance of which +afterward threw him into such perplexity. +</p> +<a name="253">{253}</a> +<p> +As to the order of the work, Lady Eastlake gives ample explanation in +the preface: +</p> +<p> +"In the short programme left by Mrs. Jameson, the ideal and devotional +subjects, such as the Good Shepherd, the Lamb, the Second Person of +the Trinity, were placed first; the scriptural history of our Lord's +life on earth next; and, lastly, the types from the Old Testament. +There is reason, however, to believe, from the evidence of what she +had already written, that she would have departed from this +arrangement. After much deliberation, I have ventured to do so, and to +place the subjects chronologically. The work commences, therefore, +with that which heads most systems of Christian art—The Fall of +Lucifer and Creation of the World—followed by the types and prophets +of the Old Testament. Next comes the history of the Innocents and of +John the Baptist, written by her own hand, and leading to the Life and +Passion of our Lord. The abstract and devotional subjects, as growing +out of these materials, then follow, and the work terminates with the +Last Judgment." +</p> +<p> +Mrs. Jameson's own share in the work is confined mainly to some of the +types, the histories specified above, and familiar scenes in the +earlier portions of the Gospel narrative, including a few of the +miracles and parables of our Lord. The notes are fragmentary, but +written in her usual interesting and lively style. How refreshing, for +instance, and characteristic are the following comments upon some +pictures representing the dismissal of Hagar and Ishmael at the +imperious request of Sarah: +</p> +<p> +"I believe the most celebrated example is the picture by Guercino, in +the Brera; but I do not think it deserves its celebrity—the pathetic +is there alloyed with vulgarity of character. I remember that, when I +first saw this picture, I could only think of the praises lavished on +it by Byron and others, as the finest expression of deep, natural +pathos to be found in the whole range of art. I fancied, as many do, +that I could see in it the beauties so poetically described. Some +years later, when I saw it again, with a more cultivated eye and +taste, my disappointment was great. In fact, Abraham is much more like +an unfeeling old beggar than a majestic patriarch, resigned to the +divine will, yet struck to the heart by the cruel necessity under +which he was acting. Hagar cries like a housemaid turned off without +wages or warning, and Ishmael is merely a blubbering boy. For +expression, the picture by Govaert Hiricke (Berlin Gallery, 815) seems +to me much superior; the look of appealing anguish in the face of +Hagar as she turns to Abraham, and points to her weeping boy, reaches +to the tragic in point of conception, but Ishmael, if very natural, +with his fist in his eye, is also rather vulgar. Rembrandt's +composition is quite dramatic, and, in his manner, as fine as +possible. Hagar, lingering on the step of the dwelling whence she is +rejected, weeps reproachfully; Ishmael, in a rich Oriental costume, +steps on before, with the boyish courage of one destined to become an +archer and a hunter in the wilderness, and the father of a great and +even yet unconquered nation; in the background Sarah is seen looking +out of the window at her departing rival, with exultation in her +face." +</p> +Those who are acquainted with Italian paintings of the 15th century +must have remarked the frequency with which the great masters of the +Tuscan school in that era treat the subject of "The Massacre of the +Innocents." Though our Lord is not an actor in the scene, it is +intimately connected with his history. The Innocents were the first +martyrs in his cause, and from the earliest times attracted the +veneration and tender affection of Christians. Painful as the subject +is, it affords scope for the exercise of the highest tragic power. The +mere fact that Herod's sword swept the nurseries of Bethlehem, though +necessarily entering into the picture, becomes subordinate to the +{254} sorrow which then started into life in so many mothers' hearts. +That is the point made most prominent in the Gospel by the citation of +the pathetic words of Jeremias in the prophecy: "In Rama was there a +voice heard, lamentations, and weeping, and great mourning. Rachel +weeping for her children, and would not be comforted, because they are +not." The mind is carried back to the time when the very sound of +those tottering feet sufficed to waken the pulses of love in the +mother's bosom; when those confiding hands were ever locked in hers. +How dear had been the pretty prattle of those little ones, the first +stammerings of the tongue, the silvery laughter, even the cries of +passion or of pain! Hitherto all had bsen sunshine, or once and again +the shadow of some light cloud had drifted across the face of heaven; +but now agony comes on the wings of the whirlwind—a pitiless +storm that leaves nothing but blank, broken hearts behind. Here we see +a bereaved mother, wildly passionate, tossing her frantic arms +heavenward; we almost fancy we hear her rave and moan. There we mark +the wandering footsteps, no longer obedient to the helm of reason. +Another, with clasped hands, kneels, gazing on the purple stains which +dye the ivory limbs of her slaughtered darling. Or the eye rests with +awful compassion on a standing figure, another speechless Niobe, pale +and unconscious as a statue, still pressing her dead infant to her +breast. Upon one or two upturned faces a light has broken; the grand +thought seems just to have flashed upon their souls —that the +purple stains are the dye of martyrdom, destined by a loving +Providence to adorn a robe of unfading glory. And so sorrow passes +almost into joy, and the imagination reaches forward to another +sorrowful Mother —Mother of sorrows—who is to sit in +desolation, yet mastering her deep woe, and, with a sacrificing love +that transcends resignation, entering into and uniting herself with +the mysterious designs of God. In spite, however, of the interest of +the subject, for ages it was rarely depicted. Mrs. Jameson gives the +following account of its sudden rise into general favor: +<p> +"All at once, however, in the latter half of the 15th century—that +is, after 1450—we find the subject of the Holy Innocents assuming an +extraordinary degree of popularity and importance. Then, for the first +time, we find chapels dedicated to them, and groups of martyred +children in altar-pieces round the throne of Christ or the Virgin. +From this period we have innumerable examples of the terrible scene of +the massacre at Bethlehem, treated as a separate subject in pictures +and prints, while the best artists vied with each other in varying and +elaborating the details of circumstantial cruelty and frantic despair. +</p> +<p> +"For a long time, I could not comprehend how this came about, nor how +it happened that through all Italy, especially in the Tuscan schools, +a subject so ghastly and so painful should have assumed this sort of +prominence. The cause, as it gradually revealed itself, rendered every +picture more and more interesting; connecting them with each other, +and showing how intimately the history of art is mixed up with the +life of a people. +</p> +<p> +"There had existed at Florence, from the 13th century, a hospital for +foundlings, the first institution of the kind in Europe. It was +attached to the Benedictine monastery of San Gallo, near one of the +gates of the city still bearing the name. In the 15th century, when +the population and extent of the city had greatly increased, it was +found that this hospital was too small, and the funds of the monastery +quite inadequate to the purpose. Then Lionardo Buruni, of Arezzo, who +was twice chancellor of Florence—the same Lionardo who gave to +Ghiberti the subjects of his famous gates—filled with compassion for +the orphans and neglected children, addressed the senate on the +subject, and made such an affecting appeal in their behalf, that not +the senate only, but the whole people of <a name="255">{255}</a> Florence, responded +with enthusiasm, frequently interrupting him with cries of 'Viva +Messer Lionardo d'Arezzo!' 'And,' adds the historian, 'never was a +question of importance carried with such [more] quickness and +unanimity' (<i>mai con maggior celerità e pienezza de' voti fu vinto +partito di cosa grave come questa</i>). Large sums were voted, offerings +flowed in, a superb hospital was founded, and Brunelleschi was +appointed architect. When finished, which was not till 1444, it was +solemnly dedicated to the '<i>Holy Innocents</i>.' The first child +consigned to the new institution was a poor little female infant, on +whose breast was pinned the name 'Agata,' in remembrance of which an +altar in the chapel was dedicated to St. Agatha. We have proof that +the foundation, progress, and consecration of this refuge for +destitute children excited the greatest interest and sympathy, not +only in Florence, but in the neighboring states, and that it was +imitated in Pisa, Arezzo, and Siena. The union of the two hospitals of +San Gallo and the 'Innocenti' took place in 1463. Churches and chapels +were appended to the hospitals, and, as a matter of course, the +painters and sculptors were called upon to decorate them. Such are the +circumstances which explain, as I think, the popularity of the story +of the Innocents in the 15th century, and the manner in which it +occupied the minds of the great cotemporary artists of the Tuscan +school, and others after them." +</p> +<p> +We cannot pretend to decide upon the truth of this supposed connection +between the establishment of an institution to minister to the wants +of the forsaken and the development of a special branch of Christian +art. Whether true or not, this much is certain, that it is in keeping +with a multitude of instances which go to prove how favorable the +practice of Catholic charity is to the progress of the arts. Love ever +pours itself around in streams of radiance, lighting up whole regions +which lie beyond its immediate object. It copies the creative +liberality of God, who, in providing us with what is necessary for +subsistence, surrounds us at the same time with a thousand superfluous +manifestations of beauty. +</p> +<p> +But it is time to pass on to the second volume of this history, which +we owe almost entirely to the pen of Lady Eastlake. It is mainly +occupied with the Passion of our Lord; and certainly the diligent +attention paid by the authoress to this subject, and the judgment +displayed in the arrangement of the narrative and the selection of +examples, cannot be too highly commended. The style is generally +clear, simple, and earnest. Always dignified, it sometimes rises to +eloquence, as in the description of Rembrandt's etching of the "Ecce +Homo," and in the following criticism of Leonardo da Vinci's +celebrated "Last Supper." After a clever disquisition on the +difficulties of the subject, and the conditions essential to its +effective treatment, she thus proceeds: +</p> +<p> +"We need not say who did fulfil these conditions, nor whose Last +Supper it is—all ruined and defaced as it may be—which alone arouses +the heart of the spectator as effectually as that incomparable shadow +in the centre has roused the feelings of the dim forms on each side of +him. Leonardo da Vinci's <i>Cena</i>, to all who consider this grand +subject through the medium of art, is <i>the</i> Last Supper—there is no +other. Various representations exist, and by the highest names in art, +but they do not touch the subtle spring. Compared with this <i>chef +d'oeuvre</i>, their Last Suppers are mere exhibitions of well-drawn, +draped, or colored figures, in studiously varied attitudes, which +excite no emotion beyond the admiration due to these qualities. It is +no wonder that Leonardo should have done little or nothing more after +the execution, in his forty-sixth year, of that stupendous picture. It +was not in man not to be fastidious, who had such an unapproachable +standard of his own <a name="256">{256}</a> powers perpetually standing in his path. +</p> +<p> +"Let us now consider this figure of Christ more closely. +</p> +<p> +"It is not sufficient to say that our Lord has just uttered this +sentence, viz., 'Verily, verily, I say unto you, one of you shall +betray me;' we must endeavor to define in what, in his own person, the +visible proof of his having spoken consists. The painter has cast the +eyes down—an action which generally detracts from the expression of a +face. Here, however, no such loss is felt. The outward sight, it is +true, is in abeyance, but the intensest sense of inward vision has +taken its place. Our Lord is looking into himself—that self which +knew 'all things,' and therefore needed not to lift his mortal lids to +ascertain what effect his words had produced. The honest indignation +of the apostles, the visible perturbation of the traitor, are each +right in their place, and for the looker-on, but they are nothing to +him. Thus here at once the highest power and refinement of art is +shown, by the conversion of what in most hands would have been an +insipidity into the means of expression best suited to the moment. The +inclination of the head, and the expression of every feature, all +contribute to the same intention. This is not the heaviness or even +the repose of previous silence. On the contrary, the head has not yet +risen, nor the muscles of the face subsided from the act of mournful +speech. It is just that evanescent moment which all true painters +yearn to catch, and which few but painters are wont to observe—when +the tones have ceased, but the lips are not sealed—when, for an +instant, the face repeats to the eye what the voice has said to the +ear. No one who has studied that head can doubt that our Lord has just +spoken: the sounds are not there, but they have not travelled far into +space. +</p> +<p> +"Much, too, in the general speech of this head is owing to the skill +with which, while conveying one particular idea, the painter has +suggested no other. Beautiful as the face is, there is no other beauty +but that which ministers to this end. We know not whether the head be +handsome or picturesque, masculine or feminine in type—whether the +eye be liquid, the cheek ruddy, the hair smooth, or the beard +curling—as we know with such painful certainty in other +representations. All we feel is, that the wave of one intense meaning +has passed over the whole countenance, and left its impress alike on +every part. Sorrow is the predominant expression—that sorrow which, +as we have said in our Introduction, distinguishes the Christian's +God, and which binds him, by a sympathy no fabled deity ever claimed, +with the fallen and suffering race of Adam. His very words have given +himself more pain than they have to his hearers, and a pain he cannot +expend in protestations as they do, for this, as for every other act +of his life, came he into the world. +</p> +<p> +"But we must not linger with the face alone; no hands ever did such +intellectual service as those which lie spread on that table. They, +too, have just fallen into that position—one so full of meaning to +us, and so unconsciously assumed by him—and they will retain it no +longer than the eye which is down and the head which is sunk. A +special intention on the painter's part may be surmised in the +opposite action of each hand: the palm of the one so graciously and +bountifully open to all who are weary and heavy-laden; the other +averted, yet not closed, as if deprecating its own symbolic office. Or +we may consider their position as applicable to this particular scene +only; the one hand saying, 'Of those that thou hast given me none is +lost,' and the other, which lies near Judas, 'except the son of +perdition.' Or, again, we may give a still narrower definition, and +interpret this averted hand as directing the eye, in some sort, to the +hand of Judas, which lies nearest it, 'Behold, the hand of him that +<a name="257">{257}</a> betrayeth me is with me on the table.' Not that the science of +Christian iconography has been adopted here, for the welcoming and +condemning functions of the respective hands have been reversed—in +reference, probably, to Judas, who sits on our Lord's right. Or we may +give up attributing symbolic intentions of any kind to the painter—a +source of pleasure to the spectator more often justifiable than +justified—and simply give him credit for having, by his own exquisite +feeling alone, so placed the hands as to make them thus minister to a +variety of suggestions. Either way, these grand and pathetic members +stand as preeminent as the head in the pictorial history of our Lord, +having seldom been equalled in beauty of form, and never in power of +speech. +</p> +<p> +"Thus much has been said upon this figure of our Lord, because no +other representation approaches so near the ideal of his person. Time, +ignorance, and violence have done their worst upon it; but it may be +doubted whether it ever suggested more overpowering feelings than in +its present battered and defaced condition, scarcely now to be called +a picture, but a fitter emblem of him who was 'despised and rejected +of men.'" +</p> +<p> +Perhaps there is no other passage in the work so lovingly elaborated +as this. Rivalling in energy, it surpasses in delicate discrimination +even such brilliant criticisms as that of the eloquent Count de +Montalembert on Fra Angelico's "Last Judgment"—a criticism which must +have struck all readers of "Vandalism and Catholicism in Art" as +worthy of the painting it describes. But the mention of the blessed +friar of Fiesoli reminds us that he is a special favorite with Lady +Eastlake also. The spell of his tender and reverent contemplations has +told upon her with considerable power, to an extent, indeed, which +makes her scarcely just toward Raphael himself. Several graphic pages +are devoted to a description of Fra Angelico's "Last Judgment." His +"Adoration of the Cross" also is dwelt upon with much affection, and +in great detail. But our readers will be enabled, we hope, to form +some idea of the feelings with which Lady Eastlake regards this most +Christian of all artists, from the shorter extracts which we subjoin. +After criticizing a fine fresco by Giotto of "Christ washing the +Disciples' feet," she thus comments upon Fra Angelico's treatment of +the same subject: +</p> +<p> +"Of all painters who expressed the condescension of the Lord by the +impression it produced upon those to whom it was sent, Fra Angelico +stands foremost in beauty of feeling. Not only the hands, but the feet +of poor shocked Peter protest against his Master's condescension. It +is a contest for humility between the two; but our Lord is more than +humble, he is lovely and mighty too. He is on his knees; but his two +outstretched hands, so lovingly offered, begging to be accepted, go +beyond the mere incident, as art and poetry of this class always do, +and link themselves typically with the whole gracious scheme of +redemption. True Christian art, even if theology were silent, would, +like the very stones, cry out and proclaim how every act of our Lord's +course refers to one supreme idea." +</p> +<p> +And, once more, speaking of the same artist's picture of the "Descent +from the Cross," she thus contrasts his conception with those of Luca +Signorelli, Michael Angelo, Raphael, Razzi, Da Volterra, and other +Italian versions of the 15th and 16th centuries: +</p> +<p> +"After contemplating these conceptions of the deposition in which a +certain parade of idle sorrow, vehement action, and pendent +impossibilities are conspicuous, it is a relief to turn to one who +here, as ever, stands alone in his mild glory. Fra Angelico's Descent, +painted for the Sta. Trinita at Florence, now in the Accademia there, +is the perfect realization of the most pious idea. No more Christian +conception of the subject, and no more probable <a name="258">{258}</a> setting forth, +of the scene, can perhaps be attained. All is holy sorrow, calm and +still; the figures move gently, and speak in whispers. No one is too +excited to help, or not to hinder. Joseph and Nicodemus, known by +their glories, are highest in the scale of reverential beings who +people the ladder, and make it almost look as if it lost itself, like +Jacob's, in heaven. They each hold an arm close to the shoulder. +Another disciple sustains the body as he sits on the ladder, a fourth +receives it under the knees; and St. John, a figure of the highest +beauty of expression, lifts his hands and offers his shoulder to the +precious burden, where in another moment it will safely and tenderly +repose. The figure itself is ineffably graceful with pathetic +helplessness, but <i>Corona gloriae</i>, victory over the old enemy, +surrounds a head of divine peace. He is restored to his own, and rests +among them with a security as if he knew the loving hands so quietly +and mournfully busied about him. And his peace is with them already: +'Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you.' In this picture it +is as if the pious artist had sought first the kingdom of God, and all +things, even in art, had been added unto him. … We have taken only +the centre group (the size forbidding more), leaving out the sorrowing +women on the right, with the Mother piously kneeling with folded +hands, as if so alone she could worthily take back that sacred form." +</p> +<p> +Such a picture might have been supposed to be the source of Father +Faber's most pathetic description of the same scene in his "Foot of +the Cross," did we not know that there is sure to be a strong family +likeness between the conceptions of two gentle, humble souls, deriving +their inspiration from the same exercise of prayerful and +compassionate contemplation. +</p> +<p> +It would be a pity to mar the impression made upon our readers by +passages such as we have quoted, and of which there are many kindred +examples scattered throughout Lady Eastlake's volume, by the painful +contrast of a sad passage upon the Agony in the Garden (vol. ii., p. +30). Though not the sole, it is the most serious, blot upon her work. +Misconceiving altogether the symbolic intention of Catholic artists in +placing the chalice and host in the hand of the ministering angel, +Lady Eastlake for once allows the Protestant spirit within to break +through all bounds of decorum. In what sense the eucharistic chalice, +introduce it where you will, can be a <i>profane</i> representation, it is +impossible to conceive. Good taste, not to say reverence, should have +proscribed the employment of such an epithet. A little patient +reflection, or the still easier and surer method of inquiry at some +Catholic source, would, we venture to think, have overcome her +repugnance, and have saved her Catholic readers some unnecessary pain. +But we are willing to let this offence pass, and to leave the logic of +the accompanying strictures, bad as it is, unchallenged, in +consideration of the eminent service rendered by the work, as a whole, +to the cause of Christian art. Few could have brought together a +larger amount of instructive and interesting matter. Few, perhaps no +one, at least among Protestants, could have undertaken the task with +so much to qualify, so little to disqualify, them for the office of +historian and critic of the glorious series of monuments which +Christian artists have bequeathed to us. +</p> +<p> +One lesson, above all, every unprejudiced reader ought to derive from +these volumes—that Christian art and Catholic art are identical. Not +to every Catholic artist is it given to produce true Christian art; +but he, <i>caeteris paribus</i>, is most certain of attaining the true +standard who is most deeply imbued with true Catholic principles, most +highly gifted with the Catholic virtues of supernatural faith and +love. Looking at the whole range of Christian art, it may be safely +averred that whatever shortcomings there have been within the Church +have been owing to <a name="259">{259}</a> the influence of principles foreign to her +spirit; and that, outside the Church (we say it in spite of Lady +Eastlake's admiration of Rembrandt), there has simply never existed +any Christian art at all. In our own days the rule is not reversed. +Whom have Protestants to set against Overbeck, Cornelius, Deger, +Molitor, and we are proud to add our own illustrious countryman, +Herbert? Not surely the Pre-Raphaelite school in England, though it is +the only one that has the least pretensions to the cultivation of +Christian art. No, it is the Catholic Church alone that can stamp upon +the painter's productions the supernatural impress of those notes by +which she herself is recognizable as true. +</p> +<p> +There is a unity of intention, scope, and spirit in Catholic art of +every age and clime. Like the doctrines and devotions of the Church, +Catholic art, in all its various forms—symbolical, historical, +devotional, ideal—ever revolves round one centre, and is referable to +one exemplar. Divine beauty "manifest in the flesh"—the image of the +Father clothed in human form and living in the Church—he is the +inspirer of Christian art. <i>Deum nemo vidit unquam: unigenitus Filius, +qui est in sinu Patris, ipse narravit</i>. [Footnote 52] The God-man is +the primary object of artistic contemplation. As in doctrine, so in +aestheticism, every truly Catholic artist may exclaim, <i>Verbum caro +factum est, et habitavit in nobis; et vidimus gloriam ejus, gloriam +quasi unigeniti a Patre, plenum gratia et veritatis</i>. [Footnote 53] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 52: "No man hath seen God at any time: the only-begotten + Son who is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him."—John + i. 18.] +<br><br> + [Footnote 53: "The Word was made flesh and dwelt among us; and we + saw his glory, the glory as it were of the only-begotten of the + father, full of grace and truth."—John i. 14.] +</p> +<p> +But this unity, how exuberant in its fertility! The unity of the +Church is the source of her catholicity. The two stand or fall +together. And, so, too, the oneness of Catholic art is the secret of +its universality. It admits of no partial view, excludes no variety or +difference. Unity of spirit binds all together in perfect harmony, +just as diversity of race and multiplicity of individual gifts, in her +members, are fitted together, organized, and held in balance by the +unity of the Church. Unity is the basis and safeguard of catholicity; +catholicity the glory and crown of unity. +</p> +<p> +Nor is the note of apostolicity wanting. For the Bible, and the Bible +only, as the rule and standard of art, substitute Catholic tradition +handed down from the apostles, inclusive of all that is in Scripture, +but reaching beyond the limits of the written word, and ever +interpreted to the artist, no less than to the rest of the faithful, +by the living voice of the teaching Church, and then the principle +which identifies orthodoxy with Christian art may safely be applied as +a test to religious painting. +</p> +<p> +Lastly—we had almost said above all—the beauty of holiness is +stamped exclusively upon all art created after the mind of the Church. +For Catholic art is nothing else than the product of contemplation in +souls gifted with artistic capacities; and contemplation is only +another word for the gaze of supernatural faith, quickened and +perfected by supernatural love, upon one or other of those mysteries +which the Church sets before the minds of her children. So at least we +have learned from the Angelic Doctor; who tells us [Footnote 54] that +beauty is found primarily and essentially in the contemplative life. +For, although St. Gregory teaches that contemplation consists in the +love of God, we are to understand this rather of the motive than of +the precise act. The will inflamed with love desires to behold the +beauty of the beloved object, either for its own sake—the heart +always being where the treasure is—or for the sake of the knowledge +itself which results from the act of vision. Sometimes it is the +senses which are thus compelled to act, sometimes the intellect which +is prompted to this gaze, according as the object is material or +spiritual. But how is the beauty of the object <a name="260">{260}</a> perceived? What +is the faculty whose office it is to light up and reduce to order and +due proportion what is seen? Evidently, the reason. For reason is +light, and where there is reason there is harmony and proportion. And +so beauty, whose essence is brightness and due proportion, is, as we +have said, primarily and necessarily found in the contemplative life; +or, which is the same thing, in the exercise of the reason—its +natural exercise, if the beauty contemplated be in the natural order; +its supernatural exercise, if revealed mystery be that which attracts +and occupies the soul. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 54: 2. 2. Q. clxxx. a. 1, and a. 2. ad 3.] +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>From Chambers's Journal. +<br><br> +POUCETTE.</h2> +<br> +<p> +Nearly seven years ago, I was walking hurriedly along the boulevards +of Paris one winter's evening; it was Christmas-eve, and had been +ushered in by thick fog and miserable drizzling rain, which provoked +the inhabitants of the gay capital to complain loudly of the change +which they fancied had taken place in the seasons of late years, +whereby the detested <i>brouillards de Londres</i> had been introduced into +their once clear, pure atmosphere. The weather was certainly most +unseasonable, and took away almost entirely the small remnant of +Christmas-like feeling, which an Englishman, with all his efforts, can +manage to keep up in a foreign land. I had sat chatting with a friend +over a cosey fire until dusk; and, on leaving his house, neither a +<i>remise</i> nor a <i>fiacre</i> was to be met with empty; so I made up my mind +to a wet walk, and amused myself, as I went on, by observing the +various groups of passengers, some of them suddenly benighted like +myself, as they sped on their way along the crowded thoroughfare. The +brilliant lamps hung from the shops threw a glare over each face as it +flitted past, or paused to look in at the windows; and the noise of +hammers resounded incessantly from the edge of the pavement, where +workmen were busy erecting small wooden booths for the annual +New-Year's fair. Some were already completed, and their owners hovered +about, ever and anon darting forth from behind their small counters, +to pounce upon a likely customer, to whom they extolled the beauty and +cheapness of their wares in tempting terms. +</p> +<p> +"Tenez, monsieur!" cries an old woman, whose entire stock-in-trade +consists of a few pairs of doll's shoes of chocolate, displayed upon a +tin tray, over which she carefully holds a weather-beaten umbrella. +"Two sous the pair, two sous!" "Voilà, mesdames," bawls a youth of +ten, who, in London, would probably execute an unlimited number of +Catherine-wheels under the feet of paterfamilias, as he crosses a +crowded street; here he is carefully watching a basinful of water, in +which float a number of glass ducks of the most brilliant and +unnatural colors. "Pour un sou!" and he holds up one tiny image +between his finger and thumb, with a business-like air. "Fi done!" +answers a sharp-visaged elderly woman, as she withdraws six of the +ducks from their watery bed, and places them gently in a corner of her +capacious basket, offering the owner at the same time four sous, <a name="261">{261}</a> +which he accepts with the invariable "Merci, madame," and the polite +Parisian bow; and depositing the coins in some deep recess of his huge +trouser-pockets, he resumes his cry of "Un sou, mesdames, pour un +sou," with unblushing mendacity. Just at the corner of the boulevard, +where the Rue de la Paix joins it, stood a lively, wiry-looking little +man, whose bows and cries were incessant, holding something in his +outstretched hands carefully wrapped in wet grass, which he entreats +the bystanders to purchase. As I approach him, he uncovers it, and +discloses a small tortoise, who waves his thin neck from side to side +deprecatingly, and looks appealingly out of his dark eyes. "Buy him, +monsieur," cries the little owner: "he is my last; he will be your +best friend for many years, and afterward he will make an excellent +soup!" A laugh from some of the passers-by rewarded this very naive +definition of a pet; and leaving the lively bustle of the boulevard, I +turned down the Rue de la Paix, and into the dark-looking Rue Neuve +St. Augustin; a little way down which, I perceived a small knot of +people gathered under the arched entrance to a <i>hôtel</i>. +</p> +<p> +There were not many—a few bloused workmen returning from their daily +toil, two or three women, and the usual amount of active <i>gamins</i> +darting about the outskirts; within, I could perceive the cocked-hat +of the ever-watchful <i>sergent de ville</i>. Prompted by that gregarious +instinct which leads most men toward crowds, I went up to it; and, by +the help of a tolerably tall figure, I looked over the heads of the +people into the centre, at a group, the first sight of whom I shall +not soon forget. There, before me, on the cold pavement, now wet with +wintry rain, lay a little, a very little girl, fainting. Her face, +which was deadly pale, looked worn and pinched by want into that aged, +hard look so touching to see in the very young, because it tells of a +premature exposure to trial and care, if not of a struggle literally +for life. Her jet-black hair, of which she had a profusion, lay +unbound over her shoulders like a mantle. Her dress was an old black +velvet frock, covered with spangles, with a piece of something red +sewn on the skirt, and a scarlet bodice. Her neck and arms were bare; +and the gay dress, where it had been opened in front, showed nothing +underneath it but the poor thin body. Her legs were blue and mottled +with cold; and the tiny feet were thrust into wooden <i>sabots</i>, one of +which had dropped off, a world too wide for the little foot it was +meant to protect. A kind-looking elderly woman knelt on the pavement, +and supported the child's head in her arms, chafing her cold hands, +and trying, by every means in her power, to restore animation; and +wandering uneasily up and down beside them, was a curious-looking +non-descript figure, such as one can rarely meet with out of Paris. It +was a poodle—at least so its restless, bead-like, black eyes and +muzzle betokened, and also a suspicious-looking tuft of hair, now +visible, waving above its garments—but the animal presented a most +ludicrous appearance, from being dressed up in a very exact imitation +of the costume of a fine lady during the century of Louis le Grand. +The brilliant eyes were surmounted by a cleverly contrived wig, +frizzed, powdered, and sparkling with mock jewels; the body decked out +in a cherry-colored satin bodice, with a long peaked stomacher, +trimmed with lace, and a stiff hoop, bell-like in shape, but, in +proportion, far within the dimensions of a modern crinoline; even the +high-heeled shoes of scarlet leather were not forgotten; and the +strange anomaly between the animal and its disguise was irresistibly +ludicrous. The dog was perfectly aware that something was going +on—something strange, pitiful, and, what was more to the purpose, +nearly concerning himself; and clever as he was, he could not yet see +a way through his difficulties. +</p> +<p> +His misery was extreme; he pattered piteously up and down the space +<a name="262">{262}</a> round the fainting child, and raised himself up anxiously on his +hind-legs to peer into her little wan face, presenting thus a still +more ludicrous aspect than before. With his wise doggish face peeping +out curiously from the ridiculous human head-dress, he sniffed all +over the various feet which encircled his precious mistress, +suspiciously; and finally placing himself, still on his hind-legs, +close by her side, he laid his head lovingly to her cheek, and uttered +a low dismal howl, followed, after an instant's pause, by an impatient +bark. The child stirred—roused apparently by the familiar +sound—gasped for breath once or twice; and presently opening her +eyes, she cried feebly, "Mouton, où es tu done?" He leaped up in an +ecstacy, trying, in the height of his joy, to lick her face; but this +was not to be: she pushed him away as roughly as the little feeble +hand had strength to do. +</p> +<p> +"Ah, wicked dog, go away; you do mischief," she said, fixing a pair of +eyes as round and almost as black as his own upon the unfortunate +animal. He dropped instantly, and with a subdued, sorrowful air, lay +down, licking diligently, in his humility, the little foot from which +the sabot had fallen: he had evidently proved that submission was the +only plan to pursue with his imperious mistress. The girl was stronger +now, and able to sit up with the help of the good woman's knee, and +she drank off a cup of milk which the compassionate wife of the +<i>concierge</i> handed to her. "Thanks, madame," said the child, with native +politeness; "I am better now. You are a good Christian," she added, +turning her head so as to look in the face of the woman who supported +her. +</p> +<p> +"What are you called, my child?" asked her friend. "Where do you +live?" +</p> +<p> +"Antoinette Elizabeth is my baptismal name," answered the child, with +odd gravity; "but I am generally called <i>Poucette</i>, because, you see, +I am small;" and a faint tinge of color came into her pale cheeks. +</p> +<p> +No wonder the name was bestowed upon her, for we could see that she +was small, very small; and, from the diminutive size of her limbs, she +seemed likely to remain so till the end of her days. +</p> +<p> +"Will you go home now?" asked the woman, after a moment's pause. +</p> +<p> +"No, not just yet," said the tiny being. "I have had no supper. I +shall go to Emile, but Mouton may go home. Go!" she cried, +imperiously, to the dog, as she swiftly slid off the marvellous dress +and wig, out of which casing Mouton came forth an ordinary looking and +decidedly dirty poodle. He hesitated for an instant, when she raised +her little clenched fist, and shook it fiercely at him, repeating +"Go!" in louder tones. He wagged his tail deprecatingly, licked his +black lips, looked imploringly at her out of his loving eyes, and +seemed to beg permission to remain with her; but in vain; then, seeing +her endeavor to rise, he turned, fled up the street with the swiftness +of a bird, and disappeared round the corner. His mistress, in the +meantime, folded up the dog's finery carefully, and deposited it +inside her own poor garments; then, after an instant's pause, she rose +to her feet, and looked round at us. She was well named Poucette: in +stature she did not exceed a child of four years old; but she was +perfectly made, and the limbs were in excellent proportion with the +stature, only her face showed age. There was a keen, worldly look +about the mouth, with its thin scarlet lips; and a vindictive +expression shining in the bold, black eyes—altogether a hard-looking +face, not at all attractive in its character; and yet I felt myself +drawn to the poor child. +</p> +<p> +She was evidently half-starved, fighting her own hard battle with the +world, and keeping her struggle as much to herself as she could; and +when, scanning curiously over the faces surrounding her, her eyes +rested on mine, I stepped forward, and offered her a five-franc piece. +To my surprise, she threw the money on the pavement <a name="263">{263}</a> with the +bitterest scorn. "I don't want money," she shrieked, passionately—"I +want my supper. Go away, <i>canaille!</i>" I stooped down toward her, and +took her hand. "Come with me," I said to her, "and you shall have some +supper. I live close by." She stood on tiptoe even then, and peered +into my face with her sharp eyes. Apparently, however, a short +inspection satisfied her, for she said softly, "Thank you," and tried +to hold my hand. Finding it too much for her small grasp, she clung to +my trousers with one hand, and with the other she waved off the +wondering bystanders with a most majestic air. I offered payment for +the milk, which the good woman civilly refused; and then I sent for a +<i>fiacre</i> in which to get to my lodgings in the Rue Rivoli, shrinking, +I must confess, from the idea of the ridiculous figure I should cut +walking along the streets with this absurd though unfortunate +creature. Presently the concierge arrived with one, and we stepped in, +Poucette entering majestically first. I gave the word, and we started. +Hardly had we turned out of the street, when the impulsive child +beside me seized me with both hands, and in an ecstacy of gratitude +thanked me with streaming eyes for what I was doing for her. "I am +starving," she sobbed—"I fainted from hunger. I have been dancing on +the boulevards all day with Mouton, who is hungry, too, poor fellow, +for he only ate a small bit of bread which a good little gentleman +gave him this morning." +</p> +<p> +"Why did you not take the money, then?" I asked. "You might have +bought food for yourself and Mouton." +</p> +<p> +"I did not want money," said the girl proudly—"I don't beg." +</p> +<p> +"But you say you are hungry." +</p> +<p> +"That is nothing. I never beg; I dance; and tonight, when I have had +some supper, I shall dance for you, and you shall see," drawing +herself up. +</p> +<p> +At this speech I hesitated. What in the world had I to do with a +dancing-girl in my quiet bachelor rooms? Did she intend taking them by +storm, and quartering herself upon me, whether I liked it or not? The +question was a difficult one; but yet, when I looked down at the tiny +figure, with its poor, woe-begone face, so thin and weary-looking, its +utter weakness and dependence, I felt that, come what might, I could +not act otherwise than I was doing. "There, go up stairs, <i>au +troisième</i>" said I to my charge, as the fiacre stopped, and we got +out; when lo! from behind a large stone close by the entrance to the +<i>porte-co-chère</i>, the black round eyes of Mouton glanced furtively out +upon us. His behavior was exceedingly reserved; he durst not even wag +his tail for fear of giving offence, but he glanced at me in the +meekest, humblest entreaty ever dog did. "Don't send him away," I said +to Poucette: "take him up stairs with you; I wish him to remain." +</p> +<p> +She made no reply, but snapped her fingers encouragingly at him, and +he followed her closely, as she walked up stairs. I paused a moment +with the concierge, to ask her to provide some dinner for my +unexpected guests; and then mounted the stairs after them. I found +Antoinette Elizabeth and her faithful follower seated at my door, +gravely awaiting my arrival. Mouton recognized me as a friend, and +faintly wagged his tail; evidently he was careful, in the presence of +his mistress, upon whom he bestowed his favors. We entered my room, +all three of us; and presently the dinner arrived, and was done ample +justice to. Poucette ate heartily, but not ravenously; and after the +meal was over, we drew our chairs round the fire, and sat eating +walnuts. She asked then, with more timidity than she had yet shown: +"When shall we have the honor of dancing for monsieur?" raising her +large black eyes, which had lost their fierce look, to my face. +</p> +<p> +"Not just yet, Poucette," I replied. "Tell me something about yourself +first, and eat more walnuts." +</p> +<a name="264">{264}</a> +<p> +She looked up sharply at this, as if to say, What business is that of +yours? then away into the fire, which was evidently a novel luxury to +her; and finally her glance rested on Mouton, who, having devoured +every superfluous piece of meat, and gnawed the only bone at table, +had now stretched himself on the hearth-rug, and slumbered peacefully +at her feet. "Monsieur is very good," she said presently, with a sigh, +still with her eyes fixed on Mouton. "My history is nothing very +great. I am not a Parisian; my father was a Norman." +</p> +<p> +"Is he alive now?" I asked, as she paused here. +</p> +<p> +"I don't know about that," she answered haughtily. "He was a wicked +man. Monsieur understands me?" she said questioningly, with a piercing +look. +</p> +<p> +"Yes, poor child. And your mother, what of her?" +</p> +<p> +"She is an angel," faltered the girl. "She went up to heaven last +Christmas;" and the tears filled her eyes as she said it. +</p> +<p> +"How have you lived since?' +</p> +<p> +"Oh, that was at Marseilles; and I came on here with Mouton. We +dance," she continued in a firmer voice; "we go out with a man called +Emile, who plays the organ very well, and he has another dog like +Mouton,' only not at all clever: the stupid creature can only hold a +basket in his mouth, and beg for sous; he has no talent." She shrugged +her shoulders, and continued, "We live with Emile and his wife; they +are not always kind to me; but I love Jean." +</p> +<p> +"Who is this Jean?" I asked. +</p> +<p> +"Ah! he is a poor boy," she replied; the whole expression of her +countenance softening at his name, and her sallow cheeks crimsoning +with a tender flush. "He is lame; he cannot walk, and is pulled about +in a little carriage; but he does not like to beg, so Emile will not +take him out with us." +</p> +<p> +"Is Emile his father?" I asked. +</p> +<p> +"No, monsieur; his father is dead but his mother is Emile's wife. I +take care of Jean myself." +</p> +<p> +"Are they good to you?" +</p> +<p> +"Yes, pretty well. You see I dance for them, and people give more +money because I am there; and then Mouton is so clever; one does not +easily meet with a dog like that, who will stand on his hind-legs for +an hour together, and dance as he does. Look at his dress too;" and +she pulled out of the bosom of her frock Mouton's paraphernalia, and +displayed it with evident pride. "In my opinion now, there is no such +dress as that for a dog in all Paris," she said, as she held it up +admiringly to the lamp. "Jean made those shoes; ar'n't they droll? And +the wig; look, that is superb!" +</p> +<p> +"Who made the wig?" I asked. +</p> +<p> +"Ah! it was a little boy who is apprenticed to a wigmaker," she +answered. "Monsieur, it was a bargain between us; he wanted something +from me, and—and I said I would give it him if he made a wig for +Mouton; and this is the wig. He is not bad himself, that little boy; +but he is not at all so good as Jean." +</p> +<p> +"How old is Jean?" I asked. +</p> +<p> +"He is twelve years old, monsieur." +</p> +<p> +"And you?" +</p> +<p> +"I am ten," she replied, with a little sigh and a blush. "But I may +grow still, may I not?" she asked timidly, looking up into my face so +pathetically, that I had hardly sufficient gravity to answer, "Yes, of +course; you will doubtless grow for a long time yet." +</p> +<p> +"Ah! that is exactly what Jean says," she exclaimed gaily; then added +in a lower voice, "Jean says he likes little people best; but, you +see, he may say that because he likes me." +</p> +<p> +I answered nothing to this; and presently she roused herself from a +little reverie, and said, "Now we shall dance for you, because it gets +late, and I must go home." +</p> +<p> +"If you like to remain here all night," I said, "the wife of the +concierge will let you sleep in a little <a name="265">{265}</a> room off theirs, down +stairs; and when you have had some breakfast, you can then return." +</p> +<p> +"No, no," she repeated sharply; "I will not sleep here; I go home to +Jean." +</p> +<p> +"Will Emile be glad to see you?" +</p> +<p> +"That depends; if he is cross, he will beat me for staying so long; +but it does not matter; I wished to stay, and I liked my dinner, and +this warm fire" (she looked wistfully at it). "Monsieur is very good. +Come, Mouton, my friend; wake yourself up." +</p> +<p> +The dog rose, shook himself, and patiently allowed himself to be +dressed once more. He took an unfair advantage of his mistress, +however, when she knelt down to put on his shoes, and licked her face. +"Ah, <i>cochon</i>, how often must I box your ears for that trick!" she +said, as she gave him a tap on the side of his head, for the liberty. +"Come now, walk along." The dog paced soberly toward the door on his +hind-legs.—"That is the <i>ancien régime</i>," she explained to me.— "Now, +Mouton, show us how people walk at the present day." The dog stopped, +and at once imitated the short, mincing step of a Parisian belle, +shaking his hoop from side to side in most ludicrous fashion; and as +he reached his mistress, he dropped a little awkward courtesy. +</p> +<p> +"That is well," she said. "Now sing for us like Madame G——," naming +a famous opera-singer, whose fame was then at its height, and she laid +a light piece of music-paper across his paws. The dog looked closely +down on the paper for an instant, licked his lips, looked round at an +imaginary audience, and then throwing back his head, and fixing his +black eyes on the ceiling, he uttered a howl so shrill and piercing +that I stopped my ears; he then ceased for an instant, looked at his +music attentively, then at his audience, and again uttered that +ear-piercing howl. "That is enough," said Poucette; "bow to the +company." The dog rose and sank with the grace almost of the prima +donna herself. +</p> +<p> +"Now, Mouton, we are going to dance;" and taking the animal by its +paw, she put the other arm round it, and the two whirled round in a +waltz, keeping admirable time to a tune which Poucette whistled. "Now +read a book, and rest yourself whilst I dance;" and again the piece of +music was laid on Mouton's paws, and he bent his eyes on it, +apparently with the most devoted attention, whilst Poucette slipped +off her heavy sabots, and with naked feet thrust into a pair of old +satin slippers, which she produced from some pocket in her dress, she +executed a sort of fancy dance, half Cachuca, half Bolero, throwing +herself into pretty, graceful attitudes, with a step as light as a +fairy's; then, as she approached Mouton in the figure, she lifted the +music, and taking him by one paw, she led him forward to the front of +my chair on the points of her toes, the two courtesying nearly to the +ground, when Mouton affectionately kissed his mistress on the cheek. +</p> +<p> +"There, it is over now," said Poucette; "that is all. He does not know +the minuet perfectly yet: next week, perhaps, we shall try it for the +<i>Jour de l'An</i>." +</p> +<p> +"Well done!" I exclaimed, and clapped my hands. "He is a famous dog; +and you—you dance beautifully." +</p> +<p> +Mouton came to be patted and made much of; and his mistress now +announced her intention of going home at once. Finding it useless to +try and induce her to stay, I offered to go with her myself, and see +her safely through the still crowded streets; but this she firmly +declined. +</p> +<p> +"No, not to-night," she said. "You may come to-morrow, if you will be +so kind, but not to-night. You have been very good, monsieur; I am not +ungrateful. You may come to-morrow; Rue——, No.——, quite close to +Notre Dame." She took my hand, raised it to her lips, courtesied, and +was gone. +</p> +<a name="266">{266}</a> +<p> +I followed her down stairs, and watched the little figure hurrying +along with a firm step, upright as a dart, the light from the +gas-lamps falling now and then on the spangles of her dress, and +making them twinkle for an instant; and the dark outline of Mouton +following closely behind her, under the shadow of the houses. +Presently they crossed the street, and disappeared in the distance; +and I turned and walked up stairs to my cosey well-lighted room, to +think over the strange life of a street dancing-girl. +</p> +<p> +After this, I made inquiries about Poucette in the part of the town +where she lived, and visited the man Emile and his wife often. Here I +found the cripple boy Jean, to whom Poucette clung with a tenacity of +affection that was touching to witness. He had had a fall as an +infant, so his mother said, and never had walked; but his fingers were +skilful in making toys, baskets, and small rush-mats, which Poucette +sold during her daily rounds. To him she devoted her affections, her +life, with a steady ardor not often met with at her age. Toward +others, she was always grave, distant, often haughty and bitter in her +expressions of anger, but to him never. However tired she might return +home after dancing or selling his wares on the boulevard, she never +showed him that she was so; if he wished to go out, she drew him in a +rude wooden sledge to the gardens of the Luxembourg; and the two would +sit there by the hour together on Sundays, criticising the passers-by +as they walked about in their gay dresses. At night, if the invalid +was restless or in pain, Poucette sat beside him, sometimes till day +dawned, with a sympathizing cheerful face, ready to attend upon every +want. There she shone; but take away Jean out of her world, and +Poucette stood forth a vixen. Madame Emile, who was herself somewhat +of a shrew, vowed that if it were not that she and Jean were so bound +up together, and nothing could separate them, she must have sent away +Poucette long ago. "No one could endure her temper, monsieur," she +would declare to me; and when she began upon this subject, madame +waxed eloquent. "She is a girl such as there is not besides in Paris. +For Jean, she will give up dress, company, the theatre, everything; +but except for him, she would not go one step out of her way to be +made an empress. It is not natural that. After she first came here, we +had a great deal of trouble with her, and Emile beat her well; but +then she would run away in a rage, and come back again during the +night, for fear Jean should want something. Now we are more used to +her, and we let her have her own way pretty much." +</p> +<p> +Jean I could get nothing out of except a "Bonjour, monsieur" at +entering and on leaving his house. He sat silently plaiting his mats +or carving toys with his long fingers, looking as if he neither heard +nor understood what we were talking about; but he carefully repeated +all the conversation afterward to his friend Poucette, for she told me +so often when we were together. She used to come and see me at my +rooms, when it was wet, or business was slack; and I succeeded in +finding a customer for her wares in a toy-merchant, who promised to +take all Jean's work at a reasonable price, and was liberal toward the +two children. Poucette was thus able to give up her public dancing, +and stay more at home; and the toyman's daughter taught her dainty +embroidery, in which her skilful fingers soon excelled. She tamed down +wonderfully that winter, and even made some efforts to learn reading, +as I suggested to her what a source of pleasure it would be to Jean, +whose thirst for hearing stories related was intense, if he could read +them for himself. But she was very slow at this; the letters proved a +heavy task to learn, and when we came to spelling, I often despaired; +still she toiled on, and when I left Paris in May, she could read a +very little. +</p> +<a name="267">{267}</a> +<p> +Six months passed, and again I turned my steps to my old +winter-quarters. The summer and autumn had been spent by me partly in +England, partly in Switzerland. My protege was unable to write, and I +had heard nothing of her since I left Paris. I had not returned there +longer than a week, when I set off into the <i>cité</i>, to discover again +my little pupil. It was much the same sort of a day as that on which +we had first met; cold, dank, misty rain kept falling, and streets +were wet and sloppy. The part of the town where Poucette lived was +wretchedly poor, dingy, and dirty-looking, especially in such weather +as I now visited it, and the reputed haunt of thieves and evil-doers +of various kinds. I picked my way along narrow ill-paved streets, with +the gutters in the middle, and at last I reached her old abode. There +was no one stirring about; but the door was ajar. I pushed it open, +and walked in. The dwelling had once been some nobleman's hotel in +bygone days, and its rooms were large and lofty, and at present each +inhabited by different poor families. Emile's was on the ground +floor—a long room, formerly used either as a guard-room or for +playing billiards in. It had one large window, opening in the center, +and crossed outside with thick iron bars, which partially excluded the +light. I was confused on entering from the outer air, and at first +could only perceive that the room was filled with a crowd of people, +of various ages and sexes, but all of the lowest order, some sitting, +some standing. A woman came forth to meet me, whom I recognized as +Madame Emile, sobbing and holding her apron to her eyes. "Ah, mon +Dieu, mon Dieu!" she whispered, as she looked at me and clasped her +hands piteously; "the poor Poucette, how hard it is! Monsieur, you are +welcome; but this is a sorrowful time; she is much hurt." She led me +gently through the various groups, all sorrowfully silent, toward a +low pallet, at the head of the room, where, crushed, bleeding, and now +insensible from pain, lay the form of poor Poucette. "What is this?" I +asked in a whisper. "How did it happen?" +</p> +<p> +"Ah, it was a vile remise," eagerly answered a dozen voices. "She was +returning home yesterday from selling the mats, and the driver was +drunk. She fell in crossing, and he did not see her. The wheel crushed +her poor chest. Ah, she will die, the unhappy child!" +</p> +<p> +"Where is Jean?" I asked. +</p> +<p> +His mother silently pointed out what looked like a bundle of clothes +huddled up in the bed beside the dying child. She was dying, my poor +Poucette. One of the kind-hearted surgeons from the <i>hôpital</i> had been +to see her early that morning, and pronounced that beside the blow on +her chest, which was of itself a dangerous one, severe internal +injuries had taken place, which must end her life in a few hours. Poor +Poucette! I seated myself by the little couch in the dark room, which +was so soon to be filled by the presence of death, and presently the +surgeon came again. All eyes turned anxiously toward him as he walked +to the bed, and kneeling down beside it, carefully examined the poor +little sufferer, whose only sign of consciousness was a groan of +anguish now and then. +</p> +<p> +"Can nothing be done for her?" I asked, as he rose to his feet and +stood by the bed, looking pityingly down at the two children. +</p> +<p> +"Nothing whatever," he said, with a mournful shake of his head. "She +will not last through the night." +</p> +<p> +"Does she suffer?" I asked. +</p> +<p> +"Acutely, but it will not be for long. Mortification is setting in +rapidly." He paused, then added: "She will probably regain +consciousness at the last;" and left the room. +</p> +<p> +Slowly the weary hours glided on; gradually the moans became weaker, +and the pulse quick and fitful. Suddenly she opened her eyes, and +looked at me inquiringly; then her eyes fell <a name="268">{268}</a> on Jean, who lay at +her side, and uttered an exclamation of joy. "I am not in pain now," +she said faintly; "that is over.—Ah, my good monsieur, you said you +would return. I am glad." +</p> +<p> +"I am grieved to find you thus, Poucette," I whispered. "Can I do +anything for you?" +</p> +<p> +"Perhaps you would like to have Mouton," she said calmly, as if +thinking aloud. +</p> +<p> +"I will keep him, if you like it," I replied. "Is there anything else +you would like?" + +"Only Jean, dear Jean," and her soft dark eyes were fixed timidly yet +imploringly on my face. +</p> +<p> +"I will take care of Jean." +</p> +<p> +"The good God reward you, my kind monsieur! That is all that I want.— +Adieu, madame. Adieu, my good friends. It is over." Just then Mouton +raised himself on his hind-legs by the bed, and peered anxiously into +her face. She put out her little right hand, and gently patted his +head; then, with a last effort, she turned round from us, and flung +one tiny arm round the crippled boy at her side. "Je t'aime toujours," +she whispered, as she bent over and kissed him. It was a last effort. +A slight shiver passed over the little figure; one long-drawn sigh +escaped the white lips. Poucette was gone to her mother; the wanderer +had been taken home; the desolate one was comforted! +</p> +<p> +My tale is ended, except to say that, from that evening, Mouton has +been my inseparable companion. He is by no means, however, as +complaisant to me as he was to his mistress; on the contrary, Mouton, +like many other <i>nouveaux riches</i>, is rather a spoiled dog, and the +tyrant of my small household. Jean became a basket-maker, and it is +not improbable that my fair readers may have in their possession some +of the productions of his skilful fingers. Such was the fruit of my +Christmas-eve in Paris six years ago. I have never spent one there +since. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>Translated from Der Katholik. +<br><br> +DANTE'S DIVINA COMMEDIA.</h2> +<br> +<p> +There is none of the Christian poets who has exercised so great an +influence in the intellectual world as Dante Alighieri. His "Vision of +Hell, Purgatory, and Paradise" has been, ever since its appearance, a +mine in which artists, poets, philosophers, theologians, historians, +and statesmen have found treasures. In Italy, immediately after his +death, professors were appointed in the universities to explain his +work, and numbers of both lay and clerical savants, among them even +princes, bishops, and archbishops, took delight in its study and +exposition. With the spread of the Italian language, on which Dante +has stamped for ever the impress of his genius, and with the progress +of Italian culture, all Europe became acquainted with the Commedia, +and learned to admire its beauty and its grandeur. It was translated +into other tongues; learned foreigners undertook to fathom its depths; +and even the spirit of religious unity in the sixteenth century did +not check its influence over the Roman-Germanic nations. Protestant +translators and expositors contended with the Catholic writers who +made of the work of Dante a special study. The Germans especially have +<a name="269">{269}</a> not been backward in this respect, and to prove it we need only +name Kannegieser, Strecksufs, Kofisch, Witte, Wegele, and Philalethes +(the present king of Saxony). +</p> +<p> +When we wish to assign Dante his proper place in Christian art and +poetry, by comparison with antiquity, we are reminded at once of Homer +and the veneration in which he was held by the Greeks. But how has the +Florentine poet merited such high consideration? Is it by the might of +his genius and the peculiarity of his chosen theme? By the perfection +and the poetic charm of his expression and language? By his deep +knowledge of life and of human nature? By the philosophic and moral +truths which he has woven into his poem? By his religious and +political views? Or by his judgment of historical personages and +facts? +</p> +<p> +No doubt all these have been helping causes to establish Dante's fame +and give him the position which he holds. But the true reason of all +the singular prerogatives of the poet and of the poem, the reason +which gives us the key to the right understanding of the "Divine +Comedy," and of the various and discrepant explanations of it, must be +sought deeper. There is a principal cause of Dante's greatness, from +which the secondary causes, just named, diverge, as rays of light from +a common centre, and to the knowledge of which only a philosophical +comprehension of history, and especially of poetry, can lead us. We +shall endeavor in this essay to discover this cause, after having +given a brief sketch of the contents and the scope of the great poem. +</p> +<br> +<h2>I.</h2> +<p> +The <i>Commedia</i>, which, in the form of a vision, paints the condition +of the soul after death, is divided into three parts, Hell, Purgatory, +and Paradise. Each part consists of thirty-three cantos, which, with +the introductory canto, make the round number one hundred. Surrounded +by trials and troubles of various kinds, Dante is guided into the +regions of the invisible by his favorite poet Virgil, who comes to his +assistance. Virgil here represents poetry and the idea of the poem. It +was through him that Dante was first led to the serious study of +truth, and to direct his mind to the philosophical consideration of +the condition of mankind. +</p> +<p> +Our poet now proceeds into the realm of the damned souls, into the +regions of night and hell, which he represents in the form of a funnel +having nine gradually narrowing eddies, in which the souls of the +damned are revolving to the throne of Satan, who sits at the top of +the cone. The narrower grow the circles, the more intense become the +punishments inflicted, in proportion to the increasing guilt of the +culprits. The lowest place among the lost souls is occupied by the +traitors, Brutus, Cassius, and Judas. +</p> +<p> +The power of the devil over men, and the inexorable character of the +Christian idea of retributive justice, is grandly portrayed in this +part of the work, by interweaving the most moving and striking +episodes, in which well-known characters are described as receiving +punishment equal to their crimes. Even paganism is made to lend its +graces to increase the sublimity of the picture, and clothe the +thoughts of the writer in poetic garments. +</p> +<p> +Both poets then leave the darkness and horror of hell behind them, and +approach the regions of purification or purgatory, over which +perpetual twilight reigns. This realm of temporary suffering is +supposed by the poet to be on the opposite side of the earth, where +the antipodes dwell. This abode of those souls who are being purified +and doing penance for minor offences, and whose pains are lessened by +the hope of future happiness, is represented in the form of a +mountain, to whose summit one ascends by nine successive degrees, as +the descent through the <a name="270">{270}</a> funnel of hell was by nine lessening +circles. At the top of the mountain is placed that earthly paradise +which was lost by the sins of our first parents, and from which the +way to heaven leads. Having arrived in the terrestrial paradise, Dante +suddenly finds himself deserted by Virgil, who from the beginning had +promised to guide him only so far. But Beatrice meets our poet here, +Beatrice the beloved of his youth. She teaches him the science of God, +and, aided by the light of faith and revelation, which Virgil had not, +she shows him the higher knowledge given to human reason under the +influence of Christianity. At her voice and teaching, Dante is moved +to repentance for his transgressions, and she becomes his future +guide. +</p> +<p> +Dante paints in the most lively colors, and describes with the +greatest beauty, in episodes and conversations, the intimate relation +of the souls in purgatory with each other, and with those they left +behind them on earth, and with the blessed in heaven. This latter +point is illustrated by the frequent appearance of angels, who descend +from time to time into the dusky realms of purgatory. +</p> +<p> +Led by his beloved Beatrice, our poet now mounts to heaven, and +traverses its various spheres, which are represented according to the +system of Ptolemy. Beginning by the moon, the poet travels through +Mercury, Venus, the Sun, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn, the glory and +happiness of the beatified increasing as he advances, in proportion +with their virtues and holiness, till he arrives at the so-called +Empyrean, at the very throne of God. In the highest sphere Dante +beholds the mystical rose, that is, the glory of the Blessed Virgin, +who is surrounded by the highest saints and angels in the form of a +rose; and among these glorified spirits he sees with delight his +Beatrice near the Mother of God, who gives an honorable place to those +who had been her fervent followers during life. The Vision of Heaven +ends by a glance at the mysteries of the Holy Trinity and the +Incarnation, which mortal eye, though supernaturally strengthened, is +unable to dwell upon for excess of light. +</p> +<p> +Dante in this part of his work treats the most difficult questions, +not only of philosophy, which he had also done in the preceding +cantos, but also of theology, with the greatest clearness, depth, and +poetic grace. He treats in it of the fundamental ideas of +Christianity, of faith, hope, and charity. The spirits that he +represents to the reader in hell, purgatory, and paradise are by no +means the mere wilful creations of his fancy, but for the most part +are historical characters, some of them but little removed from his +own time, others contemporary; and even those which he borrows from +Judaism or paganism to embellish his poem are symbolical, and have an +intimate connection with some reality. On this very account we should +not judge the Vision as an allegory, although in many respects it has +the peculiarities of an allegorical poem. It is, rather, a mystic +poem, in which the deepest religious and philosophical truths are +represented under the shadow of visionary forms and ethereal +similitudes; and realities are raised to an ideal sphere, where the +mind's eye can penetrate through their misty covering and contemplate +them to satiety. But what is the cause of the great influence which +this poem has exerted on mankind? This is the question which we have +undertaken to answer, and which we shall now endeavor to solve. +</p> +<br> + +<h2>II.</h2> +<p> +As in the history of nations and of mankind there are certain epochs +in which the elements that had formed the groundwork of society, and +of national life, in their gradual development, culminate in a certain +point, where the mental powers of the people put forth all their +strength in the production of facts, or works of various kinds that +give expression to the spirit <a name="271">{271}</a> of the age; so in the history of +poetry there are poets and poems in which the ruling ideas of their +time and nation appear in all their truth and power. +</p> +<p> +In the works of great poets we have, as it were, a copy of God's +creative power. He seems to lend it to the poet. Of all the +productions of the human mind, the poem has the greatest similarity +with the works of Almighty power, and both offer to human +contemplation beauties ever varying and ever new. But between the +works of divine and of human skill there is an essential difference. +The works of God express the thoughts of the Creator, whose glory and +invisibility, according to the Psalmist, the heavens declare, and +whose eternal might and divinity creatures proclaim; but with the +effects of human genius it is entirely different. +</p> +<p> +Every individual is but a member of the great whole, which we call the +human family; he can do nothing alone, but depends on others both for +his material and spiritual support; and the degree of culture which he +attains, the aim which he proposes to himself in life, and the germ of +his future progress, are as much the result of the influences +exercised on him from the cradle to the grave, by the family circle, +by the school, and by the associations of society, as they are the +effects of his own independent strength and originality. Hence the +work of the poet, no matter how great he may be, is not to be +considered the exclusive product of the individual, for it must bear +on it the stamp of his education, and of the people among whom he +dwells, and of the age in which he lives. As the waters of a lake do +not merely reflect their own color, but also the green shore of the +surrounding woods and hills, the passing clouds, the deep blue of the +heavens above, and of the stars that glitter in it; so in the poem we +see not only the soul of its creator, but every great emotion that +swelled in the breast of the men of his age and nation. In a word, we +see the whole circle of contemporary ideas more or less vividly +expressed in it. Nor are the productions of human genius lessened by +this fact; they are, on the contrary, enhanced in value. For it is no +longer one person, with his subjective views of his own world and +life, who speaks to us in them, but it is the spirit of a portion of +mankind, expressing to us the ideas of a certain stage in the progress +of civilization. +</p> +<p> +Now, if such a work of genius be at the same time the foundation of a +further development in the future, and of such a character that it +represents the condition not only of one nation, but of several; and +if the ideas which it contains and which sway men be such as by their +truth and universality overleap the limits of time and space; then +such a power will maintain its hold upon the admiration and esteem of +men, not only in a certain epoch and among a certain people, but for +ever and among all nations where the same order of civilization +reigns. Poets who are distinguished above others by the creative power +and superiority of their genius in the production of such a work, are +not merely the poets of one age, or of one nation, but they belong to +all times and to all nations. They will not be merely read once, and +then thrown aside; but they will be reperused and studied with ever +increasing pleasure. +</p> +<p> +The age of Dante was an epoch of this character among the Christian +nations. He has hardly his superior as a poet, either among the +ancients or the moderns. Hence, if we contemplate the <i>Commedia</i> from +this point of view, we shall be able not only to understand the +general scope of the work, but even to comprehend with ease all its +details and peculiarities. +</p> +<p> +But in order to show that the period at which Dante appeared (the +second half of the thirteenth and the beginning of the fourteenth +century) was one like that which we have described, we must briefly +recall to mind the condition of the Church, of the state of science +and art, and give <a name="272">{272}</a> expression to the spirit of the age in a +scientific formula. +</p> +<p> +If we then look at the Church, we find her displaying such fecundity +and power as we shall hardly find at any other period in her history. +She is not only busy in the work of converting the still pagan nations +of Europe, especially in the north, and strengthening the faith among +believers by missions, voyages, and diplomacy; by the foundation of +new congregations and bishoprics; by councils; by stringency of +external discipline, and greater solemnity in the public worship; but +also by the internal reformation effected by such men as popes +Alexander III., Innocent III., and Innocent IV., who continued the +good work begun by Gregory VII., of freeing the Church from the +oppressions of secular power. They succeeded at length in propagating +and realizing among the Christian nations of the West the idea of one +vast spiritual community, under the headship of one spiritual ruler, +who, instead of destroying national diversity and independence, +protected and favored them. This idea prevailed through the agency of +the supreme pontiffs over the pagan idea so cherished by the emperors +of a universal monarchy. The crusades, too, fostered and led by the +Church, and which are the clearest expression of the thoroughly +Christian spirit of those centuries, bring the West into closer +intimacy with the East, and enrich the former with all the material +and spiritual treasures of the latter. Then arise those great orders +which—half religious and half secular, as the Knights Hospitallers +and the Templars, or entirely religious, like the Dominicans and +Franciscans—defended the Church, cared for the sick and the poor, +sacrificed themselves in spreading Christian faith and morality, and +gave birth to countless institutions of charity. +</p> +<p> +If we now glance at the political condition of the people, a spectacle +equally grand as that just described offers itself to our view. On the +imperial throne of Germany appear those powerful princes of the house +of Hohenstaufen, who contended so heroically with the papacy for the +success of the Ghibelline idea of a universal monarchy, but who in the +end were worsted in the fight; while in France a St. Louis IX., and in +England a Richard the Lion-hearted, excite the admiration of the +world. In Italy, even in the midst of the struggle between the secular +and the spiritual powers, and between the Guelphs and Ghibellines, +mighty republics spring up under the protection of the Church; and in +the other nations also we see a powerful effort for national +independence and freedom appearing in the many guilds, corporations, +free cities, states, and parliaments which were everywhere rising into +a dignified existence. But above all, the order of chivalry in the +twelfth and thirteenth centuries—an order which even yet throws such a +halo of poetry and romance around the middle ages in which it +nourished, walking hand in hand with religion, which had consecrated +it—helped much to civilize the barbarian character of the age, and +improve the moral condition of society. +</p> +<p> +As to science in the epoch of which we write, it was mostly occupied +in the investigation of those subjects which lay next the Christian +heart of the people; namely, in theology, philosophy, and ethics. And +how great has been its success! What great results has not mediaeval +science effected! I need only mention the immortal names of Anselem of +Canterbury, of St. Bernard, Albert the Great, Thomas Aquinas, +Bonaventure, Roger Bacon, and Vincent of Beauvais; men whose works in +theology, philosophy, history, and in the natural sciences, remain to +the present time as monuments of genius, hardly equalled by ancient or +modern productions. +</p> +<p> +At this period, too, sprang up the universities, which realize in +their conception the universal idea of catholicity. They were founded +in every land, and all the sciences were taught in <a name="273">{273}</a> them. The +Church herself, in the Council of Vienne, in 1311, decreed that, +beside the chairs of theology, philosophy, medicine, and +jurisprudence, there should be in the four principal universities, and +wherever the papal court should be held, professors of Hebrew, +Chaldaic, Arabic, and Greek. But what especially shows the +intellectual bent of this age is the zeal and youthful ardor +manifested in every rank for all the different branches of science. +Popes, emperors, kings, and nobles emulated each other in this +respect, and consecrated their energies to the furtherance of +learning. +</p> +<p> +If we now turn to the state of art and poetry, on every side the old +cathedrals and monuments erected in the twelfth and thirteenth +centuries meet our eyes, and in their various styles of Gothic and +Roman architecture excite our admiration, fill us with holy awe, and, +as they lift their spires to heaven, speak more eloquently of the +greatness of the spirit and aesthetic feeling of the people than any +words of ours could do. In the suite of architecture the other arts +followed and were elevated to its height; and even before Dante, and +contemporaneously with him, lived the founders of the Italian schools +of painting and sculpture, which so soon after attained to such +perfection. As for poetry, we need only remember that at this time +most of the modern languages began to be developed and become the +mediums of literature. "It was the gay time of the troubadours and +incense-singers," says Vilmar, in his History of German National +Literature, "in which the melody of song rang out from hamlet to +hamlet, from city to city, from castle to castle, and court to court, +and a thousand harmonious echoes, near and far, from hill and valley, +answered out of the people's heart." It was the first classic period +of German literature, in which the national and artistic epic appear +well developed in such works as the <i>Nibelungen, Gudrun, Parceval</i>, +and others. +</p> +<p> +No doubt there are shadows on the picture of the age just described, +as there are in our own. But still, whoever considers the facts we +have alleged, cannot fail to admit the age as a real epoch in the +history of the Christian world, unless he is blind or wilfully shuts +his eyes to the light. In view of these facts, also, he must perceive +that the civilization of the various western nations was most +intimately connected; that it rested on the same common foundation; +and that the ideas which ruled them and constituted their vital +principle were eternally and universally true, and became the platform +of succeeding intellectual evolution. Hence, those nations, though +differing in origin and political independence, made but one grand +spiritual community, bound together by a common faith and a common +church. But if we would now express the spirit of this epoch in a +philosophical formula, we should say that it was the period in which +the Roman and Germanic races were converted to Christianity after the +decease of the old world and of pagan civilization; and after these +races had become a spiritual community under the hierarchy of the +popes, and become bound together under the government of one worldly +empire, after various combats with outward enemies and triumphs over +internal elements of discord; when these races had appropriated to +themselves Christianity as their vital element, and recognized it as +the power which moved and governed the world, and sought to produce, +realize, and use Christian ideas in every direction, in the sciences, +in arts, in society, in the state, and in the Church. The Protestant, +Vilmar, whom we have already cited, agrees with this assertion, when +he writes: "It was the spirit of Christianity which had become the +spirit of the western nations, and which inspired, in the highest +degree, the higher ranks of society, the nobility, and the clergy; and +which penetrated into the masses, not so much as a theory, but as a +fact—not as a science, but as an element of their life; it was +Christianity, not as a simple doctrine or idea, but as a practical +<a name="274">{274}</a> boon and benefit; it was a joy to the Christian Church and to +its internal and external glory, and a blessing with its gifts, more +general than it has been since, and so strong that even the struggle +between the popes and the emperors, for over two centuries, could not +affect the great happiness of men whose social and individual +existence was actuated by the spirit of Christianity." +</p> +<br> + +<h2>III.</h2> +<p> +Taking, therefore, this comprehensive view of the state of society; +considering the triumph of the Christian idea in history, the +consciousness of Christianity as the principle of life in the +newly-organized world, and the struggle of this element to mould and +fashion everything according to its nature, we may easily answer the +question as to the character of a poem which should thoroughly express +the spirit of the age. It would not be hard to show that the Divine +Comedy of Dante derived its matter, its form, its name, and its +sentiment from the peculiar condition of the epoch. In fact, any poem +that represents, the conquest of the Christian idea in all conditions +of private and public life must ever exercise great influence over +men. But in order to give a poetical representation of this thought, +the poet should choose a framework sufficiently large to contain the +vast picture in which God and man, heaven and earth, nature and grace, +creation and redemption, past, present, and future, science and life, +church and state, appear; and such a framework was offered to him in +the Christian idea of the judgment, of God, and of the existence of +the other world, in its three divisions of hell, purgatory, and +paradise. +</p> +<p> +Now, only by carrying up ordinary facts to this higher, ideal sphere +was it possible to overleap the limits of time and space, and give +greater unity to the picture, and make it a masterpiece. But he who +lives here below is ignorant of the future, and of the condition of +the departed souls. Only by a supernatural revelation can we know +their lot. Consequently, the form of a wonderful vision, in which the +poet enters into communion with the spirits of the dead, and wanders +through their regions, is the most natural manner of representing his +idea in the poem; consequently, it should be called by right a "divine +drama," a <i>Divina Commedia</i>, as the most appropriate title. +</p> +<p> +The true scope of the poem, therefore, must not be sought for either +in a purely religious, or a purely political, or a purely scientific +or personal point of view; but in the prosecution of a far more +general, comprehensive, higher, philosophic, theological, and +particularly moral or ethical object, to which all the details of the +work are subordinated. Hence, he who examines these details from this +or that stand-point may give them the most different explanations, as +in fact many commentators of the poem do—not having fathomed its +depths and perceived the general object of the sacred epic. +</p> +<p> +Dante himself leaves us no reason to doubt on this point. In his +dedicatory epistle to Cardinal Grande della Scala, he speaks thus: +"The meaning of this poem is not simple, but multiple. The first sense +is in the words, the second in the things expressed: the one is called +literal, the other moral or allegorical. Taken literally, the whole +work is simple, and expresses the condition of souls after death, for +this is expressed by the whole tenor of the poem. But taken in the +higher sense, its object is man, either deserving rewards or +chastisements through the exercise of his free will. And if we wish to +name the kind of philosophy contained in the work, we must call it +moral, or ethics. For the whole tends to practice and action, and is +not content with simple contemplation and speculation." +</p> +<p> +Giacomo di Dante, the son of the poet, develops more clearly the scope +of the work, in the preface to his <a name="275">{275}</a> commentary. "The whole work," +says he, "is divided into three parts; the first of which treats of +hell, the second of purgatory, and the third of paradise. In order to +understand the general allegorical bearing, I say that the object of +the poet is to represent to us in figurative language the three +several divisions of mankind. The first part considers vice in man, +and is called hell, to show us that mortal sin by its depth of +iniquity is directly opposed to the sublimity of virtue. The second +contemplates those who detach themselves from vice and strive after +virtue. His place for such persons he calls purgatory, or place of +purification, to show the condition of the soul, which cleanses itself +from its sins in time, for time is the medium in which all changes +happen. The third considers perfect man, and is called paradise, in +order to express the greatness of its bliss, and the elevation of mind +connected with it; two things without which a knowledge of the supreme +good cannot be attained. And thus the poet pursues his object through +the three several parts of his poem by means of the figures and +representations with which he surrounds himself." +</p> +<p> +But the poet, in order to realize his grand idea, should be gifted not +only with the highest poetical genius in order to represent the +philosophical principles of Christianity in the peculiar characters +and types of Christian art, and give them a new, independent, and +majestic appearance; but he should be also possessed, on the one hand, +of a clear and perfect knowledge of Christian doctrine and ethics, and +a deep and extensive knowledge of philosophy and theology; and, on the +other, of a profound and extensive acquaintance with men and human +life, as well as with the history of the human race. Both these +requisites are found in Dante in the highest degree. Christian faith +and morality is as well and correctly explained by him as by the best +approved theologians. But this fact will not excite our surprise if we +consider that, in his Vision, without however sacrificing his +individuality, he adheres strictly to the great doctors of the age, +Saints Thomas Aquinas and Bonaventure, as King John of Saxony clearly +proves in his commentary on the Divine Comedy. +</p> +<p> +Hence, at an early period Dante's work became a favorite theme of +scholastic study, and under the portal of the cathedral at Florence +there is seen an old statue of the poet near that of the patron saint +of the city, with this inscription: <i>Theologus Dante, nullius dogmatis +expers</i>—"Dante the theologian, to whom no dogma was unknown." In the +Raphael chamber in the Vatican, he is represented crowned with laurel +on the famous painting of the <i>disputa</i>, among the popes, bishops, and +doctors assembled round the holy sacrament of the altar. +</p> +<p> +An occasional writer has suspected the faith of Dante, because in his +poem he deplores several abuses in the Church, such as the corruption +of some of the clergy and monks, and lashes some of the popes and the +relation of the papacy to the secular power in his time. But such a +suspicion is unwarranted when we consider that many Catholic +reformers, even saints like Peter Damien, Saint Thomas of Canterbury, +Saint Bernard, Saint Hildegard, Jacopone, and others, have spoken even +more strongly than Dante against abuses; and that he never confounds +the use with the abuse, excrescences of an institution with the +institution itself, or persons with principles. +</p> +<p> +Dante's thorough knowledge of human life and of history is fully shown +in his surprising explanations, and by the manner in which with one +trait he paints the famous characters and facts in the <i>Commedia</i>, as +well as by the examples and narrations which he takes from all times, +regions, and nations of the earth. But in his judgment of persons and +facts in the past and present, Dante is not always impartial or just, +for, being <a name="276">{276}</a> subject to human frailties and prejudices, he is +often guilty of great injustice to those against whom he had motives +of hatred. Consequently, in order to appreciate Dante's poem on this +point, we must consider the character of his life and fortunes, as +well as the history of his native city and country. +</p> +<p> +Dante Alighieri was born at Florence in the year 1265, and received in +baptism the name of Durante, which was shortened to that of Dante. +Early in his youth an event happened which determined his life, and to +which posterity is indebted for his great work. In the year 1274, in +the ninth year of his age, Dante saw, at a church festival, the +daughter of Falco Portinari, Beatrice, a child eight years old, whom +he says, in one of his poems, no one could see without crying out, +"This is not a woman, but one of the most beautiful of the heavenly +angels!" He conceived for her, on the spot, the most violent passion, +but, at the same time, one so pure and holy that Beatrice, even on +earth and wedded to another, became for him and his muse a perfect +ideal that inspired all his first and tenderest poems, and moved him +to high and holy thoughts. But after Beatrice's untimely death, she +became, in the imagination of the poet, a holy spirit, whose glory he +undertook to exalt after a wonderful vision which he had, and who +became, in all the sorrows of his life, a star of hope and anchor of +safety to him. A few years after the decease of his beloved, Dante +espoused Gemma di Donati, a lady of a noble family in Florence, and +through this marriage, as well as by his profound theological and +philosophical studies, he was drawn into the vortex of the politics of +his native city, in which, after many struggles, the Guelph party +gained the ascendency, toward the end of the thirteenth century. +</p> +<p> +Sprung from a Guelph family and surrounded by Guelph influences, and +prominent by his genius in the party, although keeping clear of its +excesses, Dante, from 1293 to 1299, filled many posts of honor, +especially many places of ambassador, and was elected, with five +others, in the year 1300, to the priorate, the highest office in the +republic. But soon after his prosperous career was changed to one of +misfortune. In 1292 a division was made in the Guelph party, when, +under the tribune Giano della Bella, the constitution of the state was +changed, the nobles driven from the magistracy, and the government of +the city given entirely into the hands of the plebeians; and this +division led gradually to an open rupture between the parties called +the Blacks and the Whites "<i>Neri</i>" and "<i>Bianchi</i>." The latter were by +far the more moderate, and the Ghibellines, both nobles and plebeians, +joined them. Dante belonged to the Whites, who stood at the head of +affairs. But by the interference of Charles of Valois, whom the Blacks +called to Florence in order to seize the government with his aid, the +Whites lost their power, and Dante, who was then on an embassy to +Rome, together with the other chiefs of the party, was exiled by a +decree, which was repealed in the year 1302. +</p> +<p> +This trial was important in two ways to our poet. It excited his +hatred against one party of the Guelphs, and then against them all; +and evoked his inclination for the Ghibellines and his dislike toward +the popes, who gave assistance to the Guelph party, and finally made +him a strong partisan of the Ghibellines and their operations against +Florence, and of the empire against the papacy. On the other hand, he +became, by his misfortunes, more devoted to virtue, his studies, and +his poem, from the prosecution of which he had been distracted by +political cares; so that the whole history of his exile is nothing +else than the history of his scientific life and the execution of the +Divine Comedy. After having wandered from city to city, from country +to country, to Verona, Bologna, Padua, Paris, and England, and dwelt +for a time in Pisa, and in <a name="277">{277}</a> Lucca at the monastery of +Fonteavelluna and in Udine, and after having finished his great +works—"The Banquet," "<i>De Vulgari Eloquio</i>," "<i>De Monarchia</i>"—and +the three parts of his great poem, he rested at last in Ravenna, +where, in the year 1321, he fell sick and died, in the 56th year of +his age, after having received, as Boccacio tells us, the last +sacraments with humility and piety, and become reconciled to God by +true repentance for all he had done contrary to his holy will. The +poet was buried in the Franciscan church, where his ashes still +repose. +</p> +<p> +This sketch of his life and fortunes gives us the key to the solution +of many peculiarities of the Divine Comedy. We can now understand why +politics play so conspicuous a <i>rôle</i> in the great poem, in spite of +its higher philosophico-theological and ethical scope; and why some +should have considered the work as of a purely political character. +This sketch of his life also shows the partial truth contained in the +assertion of Wegele, a German commentator on Dante. This writer says +the leading thought of the poet was to work out his own salvation by +considering the state of the world at his time; and in fact Dante +found consolation and strength against earthly misfortune, found the +way of virtue and eternal salvation, in the execution of his poem. For +similar reasons, others considered the poem as purely didactic, and +this view has a foundation in the confession of the poet himself. +</p> +<p> +But above all, the life of Dante explains his ideas about the +relations between the papacy and the empire, expressed not only in his +book on monarchy, but also in the Divine Comedy; and his strange +judgments about persons and circumstances, especially of his own age. +It is true Dante never for a moment disputes the primacy and divine +appointment of the popes in the Church; and even in hell he describes +those pontiffs whom he condemns to it as having certain distinctions. +He maintains in the clearest manner the freedom and independence of +the divine power in regard to the secular, and acknowledges a certain +superiority in the former, for he requires that Caesar should have +that reverence for Peter which the first-born son should have to his +father, so that Caesar, illuminated by the light of paternal grace, +might shine more brilliantly over the earth. But as Dante was +possessed with the Ghibelline idea, and as he saw in the temporal +power of the popes, who were the head of the Guelph party, the +greatest obstacle to the success of his principles, we must not be +surprised to find him the enemy of the pope's temporal power, and, in +his judgment of men and things, to see him frequently led away by +party rage and revenge for injuries received. +</p> +<p> +Dante, however, was noble and Christian enough to keep his eyes open +even to the faults of his own party, and he spared not even the heads +of the Ghibellines, as Frederic II. and other noble and popular +persons, if they seemed to him deserving of blame. Nor must we imagine +that Dante really thought all those were in hell whom he places there, +any more than he thought the real pains of hell were such as he +described them: only the vulgar could believe this. Those persons were +only such as in his eyes were guilty of mortal sins; and the +punishments inflicted were such as his fancy conceived to be adequate +to the guilt. But we must bear in mind that his judgments must always +be received with caution when there is question of facts, persons, and +circumstances connected with the opposite party; and we have the right +to examine and correct the criticisms of Dante by the light of +history. Dante, for instance, goes so far as to put in hell even Pope +Celestine, who, after governing the Church for six months, tired of +the tiara, went into solitude; because, in the opinion of the poet, +Celestine renounced the pontificate through timidity and weakness, and +made way <a name="278">{278}</a> for the hated Boniface, VIII. The Church, on the +contrary, puts Celestine among the saints on account of his +extraordinary virtues. +</p> +<p> +But let us now turn from the dark side of the picture, and from the +weakness of the great man, to take a view of the fortunes of the +<i>Commedia</i> in the course of six centuries. We have already in the +beginning of this essay spoken of the great number of editions, +translations, and commentaries on the great work, and in this respect +no other work can compare with it except the Holy Scripture and the +Following of Christ. But these proofs of admiration and study of the +Divine Comedy are not equally divided among the centuries, and the +recent and renowned writer of Dante's life, Count Caesar Balbo, justly +remarks that, at those periods in which an earnest religious and truly +patriotic feeling pervaded the fatherland of the poet and Christian +Europe in general, those proofs are to be found in greater number than +when the knowledge and study of supreme truth had grown less, love of +religion and country had died or gone astray, and the minds of men +sunk in the earthly and the sensible. Thus, in the fifteenth century, +after the invention of the art of printing, nineteen or twenty +editions of Dante appeared; in the sixteenth century, forty; in the +seventeenth, only three; in the eighteenth, thirty-four; in the +nineteenth, up to 1839, over seventy, and perhaps up to the present +year one hundred. This is a striking proof of the increasing love of +the spiritual in our century, in spite of the great influence of +materialism. +</p> +<p> +But in this age of surprises and contradictions, a new glory of which +he had never dreamt has been added to Dante's name. For some time in +Italy that political party which aims at the subversion of the +existing order of things, and the establishment of a single republic +or monarchy, and which finds in the papacy or States of the Church the +principal obstacle to the carrying out of its plans, has made use of +commentaries on the Divine Comedy, among other means, to spread its +principles among the people. Hence, two Italian refugees, Ugo Foscolo +and Rosetti, during their sojourn in England, undertook the dreary +task of explaining Dante's poem in a purely political point of view, +and with learning and wit they have attempted to prove that the poet +was opposed to the temporal power of the pope, and the head, or at +least a member, of a secret society. +</p> +<p> +In Italy, however, and in Germany, especially by the great critic, +Schlegel, this theory has been refuted. It falls to the ground by the +simple consideration of the fact, that if the Divine Comedy was as +clear in every point as where he speaks against the popes of his time +and their earthly possessions, no commentary on the poem would be +necessary. Yet, no sooner was war against Rome proclaimed at Paris and +Turin, than recourse was had to Dante, and an attempt made to conjure +up his spirit as a partisan in the fight. Rosetti already occupies a +chair in the Sardinian capital, from which he expounds Dante in the +interest of Italian unity, and in Germany the secret societies applaud +his course; so that, if in 1865 there be in Italy a celebration of +Dante's six hundredth birthday, as in Germany there is of Schiller, we +may expect to find the politicians make use of it to further their +ends. +</p> +<p> +So then we have lived to see the day when Dante, the Ghibelline and +fanatical adherent of the German empire; who was opposed to the +temporal power of the pope only because it stood in the way of a +universal secular monarchy; who invoked the wrath of heaven on the +German Albert because he delayed coming to subjugate Italy; and who +wrote the famous letter to the Emperor Henry VII., inviting him to +come and chastise his native city; when that Dante, I say, has become +the herald and standard-bearer of a party which calls itself the old +national Guelph party, whose <a name="279">{279}</a> watch-word is "Death to the Germans +and foreign rulers," and which, like the ancient Guelphs, is aided by +French soldiers in its struggle against the German emperors. +</p> +<p> +In spite of his Ghibelline proclivities, Dante was filled with lively +faith, and he had so great a veneration for the power of the keys +entrusted by Christ to Peter and his successors that even in hell he +bowed with respect before one of those who had borne them, and even in +his narration of the arrest and ill-treatment of Boniface VIII., whom +he hated and placed in hell, he breaks out into the following strains: +</p> +<pre> + "Lo! the flower de luce + Enters Alagna; in his Vicar Christ? + Himself a captive, and his mockery + Acted again. Lo! to his holy lip + The vinegar and gall once more applied; + And he 'twixt living robbers doomed to bleed. + Lo! the new Pilate, of whose cruelty + Such violence cannot fill the measure up, + With no decree to sanction, pushes on + Into the temple his yet eager sails. + O sovereign Master! when shall I rejoice + To see the vengeance, which thy wrath, well pleased, + In secret silence broods?" + + (Purg. xx. 85-97. <i>Carey's translation</i>.) +</pre> +<br> +<p> +So we have lived to see the day when the author of the above lines is +represented as the herald of a party which has treated so shamefully +the gentle successor of Boniface VIII., Pius IX., whose only fault was +to have opened the prison doors to his enemies, and recalled them from +exile with too great indulgence. They have made him drink the chalice +of humiliation to the dregs, and, leagued with a French despot, they +renew in the Vicar of Christ all the insults heaped of old on the +Saviour by the Roman soldiers, when, putting on him the mantle of +purple and the crown of thorns, they mocked him, saying, "Hail, King +of the Jews!" Dante was no such Christ-killer. +</p> +<p> +And what folly is it not to imagine Dante, the haughty aristocrat, +whose pride of birth shows itself everywhere in his poem, a partisan +of a faction which, like that which governed Florence during the +middle ages, is made up of the rabble and of levelers, haters of all +nobility. +</p> +<p> +In another age, when it was not the principle of public life to have +no principle at all, such contradictions as those of which we write +would have been incomprehensible; but in our own century, in which +truth wages an unequal conflict with falsehood, not so much because +men do not know how to separate truth from falsehood, as because men +find truth less useful for their purposes than falsehood, the conduct +of the so-called national party in Italy is easily explained. But if +Dante were to rise up from the grave, how strongly he would rebuke +those who are making such an unwarrantable use of his name! He would +quote for them, perhaps, as he does in many parts of his great work, +an apt text of the Holy Scriptures; and none, probably, would come +sooner to his mind than the following: +</p> +<p> +"Why have the Gentiles raged, and the people devised vain things? +</p> +<p> +"The kings of the earth stood up, and the princes met together, +against the Lord and against his Christ. +</p> +<p> +"Let us break their bonds asunder: and let us cast away their yoke +from us. +</p> +<p> +"He that dwelleth in heaven shall laugh at them; and the Lord shall +deride them. Then shall he speak to them in his anger, and trouble +them in his rage." +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="280">{280}</a> +<br> + +<h2>MISCELLANY. +<br><br> +SCIENCE.</h2> + +<p> +<i>Important Geological Discovery</i>.—Sir Charles Lyell, in his address +to the British Association a few months ago, mentioned the discovery +of a fossil animal much more ancient than any previously supposed to +exist. Heretofore, as is well known, an immense series of rocks below +the silurians have been termed <i>azoic</i>, as exhibiting no remains of +animal life; but this term must now be dismissed. +</p> +<p> +It is well known that a staff of competent geologists, under the +direction of Sir William E. Logan, have been engaged for some years in +a geological survey of Canada. The oldest rocks in that country are +granite, described as upper and lower Laurentian, their thickness +being 40,000 feet, with bands of limestone intervening. In one of +these bands in the lower series of rocks, which are the most ancient, +there were discovered, in 1858, certain flattish rounded masses, which +seemed to be of organic origin. These were examined under the +microscope by Dr. Dawson of Montreal, who, from their structure, +declared them to be <i>foraminifera</i>, similar in character, but by no +means in size, to the <i>foraminifera</i> living at the present day in vast +multitudes at the bottom of the sea; and to this newly-discovered and +wonder-exciting creature he gave the significant name <i>Eozoon +Canadense</i>, or the Dawn-animal of Canada. +</p> +<p> +The <i>foraminifer</i> of the present day is a microscopic creature; the +<i>eozoon</i> was enormous in comparison, about twelve inches diameter, and +from four to six inches in thickness, presenting the general form of a +much flattened globe. Its growth was by the process technically known +as gemmation, or the continued development of cells upon the surface; +hence, these cells form successive layers of chambers, separated by +exceedingly thin walls or laminae of calcareous matter. They are now +all filled with solid matter, mineral silicates, serpentine, and +others; but sections or slices cut from the mass, and examined, show +the form of the cells still perfect, and what is more remarkable, the +very minute tubes (tubuli) by which communication was maintained from +one to the other throughout the entire animal. Mr. Sterry Hunt, the +chemist employed on the Canadian survey, is of opinion that the +silicates and solid matters were directly deposited in waters in the +midst of which the <i>eozoon</i> was still growing, or had only recently +perished, and that these solid matters penetrated, enclosed, and +preserved the structure of the animals precisely as carbonate of lime +might have done. Here, then, we have an example of fossilization, +accomplished by reactions going on at the earth's surface, not by slow +metamorphism in deeply-buried sediments. +</p> +<p> +Papers on this subject and one by Sir W. Logan himself—have been read +before the Geological Society, and will shortly be published; and at a +recent meeting of the Royal Society, a highly, interesting +communication in further elucidation of the matter was made by Dr. +Carpenter, who has devoted himself for some years to the study of +<i>foraminifera</i>. He confirms Dr. Dawson's general conclusions, and +identifies among living <i>foraminifera</i> the species which has most +affinity with this very ancient dawn-animal. He makes out the +identification in an ingenious way, resting his proof on the peculiar +structure of the cell-walls, and of the minute tubuli by which, as +before observed, communication between the cells was maintained. +Henceforth, we shall have to regard the silurian fossils as modern. +</p> +<p> +Since this discovery was made public, it has been ascertained that +there are fossil remains of the eozoon in the serpentine rocks of +Great Britain. The importance of this of course depends on the age of +serpentine, and that is a question which geologists have not yet +settled; but some of them are of opinion that the British serpentines +are of the same age as the Laurentian rocks in which the Canadian +eozoon was found. Pending their decision of the question, keen +explorers are on the search for other specimens. +</p> +<br> +<p> +<i>Curious and Delicate Experiments</i>.—Dr. Bence Jones recently +communicated to the Royal Society of Great Britain the result of a +series of experiments by <a name="281">{281}</a> which he had attempted to ascertain the +time required for certain crystallized substances to reach the +textures of the body after being taken into the stomach. In other +words, he proposed to solve these problems: If a dose of medicine be +given, what becomes of it, and does it arrive quickly or slowly at the +parts for which it is intended? It is obvious, that if these questions +could be accurately determined, medical men would have a better +knowledge than at present of the action and progress, so to speak, of +medicine within the body. Substances, when taken into the stomach, +pass into the blood, which may be supposed to distribute them to all +parts of the body. If, in ordinary circumstances, no trace of a +particular substance can be found in a body, but is found after doses +of the substance have been administered, it is clear that the doses +are the source from which that trace is derived. +</p> +<p> +Lithium is a substance sometimes given as medicine. Dr. Jones gave +half a grain of chloride of lithium to a guinea-pig, on three +successive days; and, by means of the spectrum analysis, he found +lithium in every tissue of the animal's body, even in the cartilages, +the cornea, and the crystalline lens of the eye. In another +experiment, the lithium was found in the eye eight hours after the +dose had been administered; and in another, four hours after. In +another, the lithium was found after thirty-two minutes, in the +cartilage of the hip, and in the outer part of the eye. These cases +show that chemical substances do find their way very quickly into the +tissues of the body; and a similar result appears from experiments on +the human subject. A patient, dying of diseased heart, took fifteen +grains of nitrate of lithia thirty-six hours before death, and a +similar quantity six hours before death. Lithium was afterward found +distinctly in the cartilage of one of the joints, and faintly in the +eye and the blood. A like result was obtained with a patient who had +taken ten grains of carbonate of lithia five and a half hours before +death. And to this Dr. Bence Jones adds, that he expects to find +lithium in the lens of the eye after operation for cataract. +</p> +<br> +<p> +<i>Giant Trees of California</i>.—Some time ago, much regret was expressed +that the giant trees (<i>Wellingtonia</i>) of California had been +recklessly cut down. Their fall was a loss to the world. But Sir +William Hooker has received a letter in which Professor Brewer, of the +California State Geological Survey, reports that "an interesting +discovery has been made this year of the existence of the big trees in +great abundance on the western flanks of the Sierra Nevada. They +abound along a belt at 5,000-7,000 feet of altitude for a distance of +more than twenty-five miles, sometimes in groves, at others scattered +through the forest in great numbers. You can have no idea of the +grandeur they impart to the scenery, where at times a hundred trees +are in sight at once, over fifteen feet in diameter, their rich +foliage contrasting so finely with their bright cinnamon-colored bark. +The largest I saw was 106 feet in circumference at four feet from the +ground, and 276 feet high. +</p> +<p> +"There seems no danger of the speedy extinction of the species, as it +is now known in quite a number of localities; and, contrary to the +popular notion, there are immense numbers of younger trees of all +sizes, from the seedling up to the largest. There has been much +nonsense and error published regarding them." +</p> +<br> +<p> +<i>Photographing the Interior of the Great Pyramid</i>.—Our readers may +remember that some time last winter a distinguished English savant, +Professor Piazzi Smyth, went out to Egypt for the purpose of taking +photographic views of the interior chambers of the great pyramid. The +impossibility of lighting these vast halls had hitherto proved an +insuperable bar to the undertaking; ordinary methods of illumination +seemed, if we may so speak, to make no impression upon the thick +darkness. But with the discovery of the wonderful powers of the +magnesium wire light, this difficulty was removed. Professor Smyth +writes as follows to the London Chemical News; his letter is dated +East Tomb, Great Pyramid, February 2d: +</p> +<p> +"We are settled down at last to the measuring; the chief part of the +time hitherto (about three weeks) having been occupied in concert with +a party of laborers, furnished by the Egyptian government, in clearing +away rubbish from important parts of the interior, <a name="282">{282}</a> and in +cleansing and preparing it for nice observation. The magnesium wire +light is something astounding in its power of illuminating difficult +places. With any number of wax candles which we have yet taken into +either the king's chamber or the grand gallery, the impression left on +the mind is merely seeing the candles and whatever is very close to +them, so that you have small idea whether you are in a palace or a +cottage; but burn a triple strand of magnesium wire, and in a moment +you see the whole apartment and appreciate the grandeur of its size +and the beauty of its proportions. This effect, so admirably complete, +too, as it is, and perfect in its way, probably results from the +extraordinary intensity of the light, apart from its useful +photographic property; for side by side with the magnesium light the +wax candle flame looked not much brighter than the red granite of the +walls of the room. …Whatever can be reached by hand is chipped, and +hammered, and fractured to a frightful degree; and this maltreatment +by modern men, combined with the natural wear and tear of some of the +softer stones under so huge a pressure as they are exposed to, and for +so long duration, has made the measuring of what is excessively +tedious and difficult, and the concluding what <i>was</i>, in some cases, +rather ambiguous." +</p> +<br> +<h2>ART.</h2> +<p> +<i>Domestic</i>.—The National Academy exhibition will probably be open +before our readers receive these pages; and from those cognizant of +the internal arrangements of the new building, and of the preparations +making by our resident artists, we learn that the collection will +exceed in the number, and probably in the merit of the pictures, any +of its predecessors. The make-shift character and unsuitableness of +the rooms in which the Academy has of late years held its annual +exhibitions, have deterred many of its most prominent members from +sending in contributions, which they were satisfied could not be seen +to advantage; and this sin of omission was so evident in the last two +or three exhibitions, that one of the leading objects of the +Academy—the improvement of public taste by the display of the annual +productions of our best artists—seemed in danger of being defeated. +The new galleries, it is said, can exhibit to advantage more than +fifteen hundred pictures, and a capacity so ample, in conjunction with +the prestige attending the opening of the new building, ought to cover +the walls to their fullest extent. The public will not be surprised +then to learn that an unusual number of artists have been, and are +still, busily applying the final touches to their works, in +anticipation of "opening day" (to borrow a phrase from the milliners); +and it is to be hoped that the Academy, having now "ample room and +verge enough" to satisfy fastidious members, may soon become the +fostering abode of art which its projectors intended to make it. A +slight foretaste of what the exhibition is likely to contain was +afforded at the recent reception of the Brooklyn Art Association, +where an elaborate and effective work by Grignoux, entitled "Among the +Alps," and several by Leutze, Gifford, Huntington, Stone, White, Hart, +Beard, and others, were on view. A number of pictures destined for the +Academy were also exhibited at the monthly social gatherings of the +Century and Athenaeum clubs of this city in the beginning of April. We +propose to give an extended notice of the new building and its art +collections in our next number. +</p> +<p> +The inaugural ceremonies of the New York association for "The +Advancement of Science and Art" took place at the Cooper Institute on +the evening of March 31st. One of the objects of the association is +the collection and preservation of works of art, and one of the +fifteen sections into which it is divided is devoted to the fine arts. +Amid the multiplicity of special branches, which the association +proposes to investigate and promote, from jurisprudence and the +prevention of pauperism down to chronology, the fine arts must +necessarily receive but a limited share of attention; but even this, +if guided by taste and intelligence, is better than the indifference +to aesthetic matters which is too often characteristic of a commercial +metropolis; and the association will find plenty of well-wishers, and, +we trust, some who will add substantial aid to their sympathy. +</p> +<p> +Among the attractions of the Central Park will be a hall of statuary, +now in the course of preparation in the old <a name="283">{283}</a> arsenal building +near the Fifth Avenue, which is not yet open to public inspection. It +will contain, what ought to prove a boon to all students of form, a +collection of casts from Crawford's principal works. The Park +Commissioners have, in this instance, shown an enlightened enterprise +which might be imitated by wealthy private individuals. A few bronze +statues of American statesmen, soldiers, or authors, placed on +appropriate sites in the park, would add greatly to its attractions. +And if it should be thought desirable to illustrate a national era, +what one more worthy than the memorable epoch through which we are now +passing, the termination of which will be coeval with the completion +of the park? +</p> +<p> +A new group by Rogers, entitled "The Home Guard—Midnight on the +Border," attracts throngs of gazers before the windows of Williams and +Stevens's art emporium in Broadway. The story is naturally and +effectively told. A mother and her daughter, the only inmates, +probably, of some lonely farm-house, have been aroused from their +slumbers by marauding bushwhackers, and tremblingly prepare to repel +the assailants, or sell their lives dearly. The elder of the two +females, with her body slightly poised on one foot, stands in attitude +of rapt attention, while mechanically cocking a revolver, her sole +weapon of defence. The daughter, less resolute in expression and +action, cowers at her side. As a work of art, it is perhaps inferior +to the "Wounded Scout" or "One Shot More," which exhibit the artist's +highest efforts in characteristic expression and the management of +details; but it presents a vivid idea of a scene we fear only too +frequently enacted along the border, and will speak to aftertimes of +the horrors of civil war. The steady improvement which Mr. Rogers has +shown in his groups, illustrating the episodes of our great struggle, +can be readily seen by an inspection of his collected works, the +earliest of which were scarcely better than clever caricatures; and it +is not surprising to learn that there is a demand for them in Europe, +whither the artist himself proposes going during the present season. +Foreign critics may now obtain a correct notion of the outward aspects +of the participators in the war, if they cannot appreciate its motives +or character. Mr. Rogers is at present engaged upon a group entitled +"The Bushwhacker," which he will finish before his departure. +According to one of the daily newspapers it "represents a wife in the +act of drawing away from her husband—an old, grizzled, and care-worn +fighter—his gun, and at the same time appealing to him to leave his +perilous vocation. The Bushwhacker clasps in his arms his little +child, who is toying with his shaggy beard. If we may judge from the +half-relenting expression of his countenance, we can safely conclude +that the wife will not sue in vain, although he still resistingly +grasps his musket with one hand. The pose and execution of the figures +are carefully attended to, and the work is one of the most spirited +and successful of Mr. Rogers' productions." +</p> +<p> +Among other American artists who intend to visit Europe the present +season, are Ives, the sculptor, and Haseltine and Dix, painters of +coast and marine scenery. The last named gentleman four years ago +forsook his profession, in which he had begun to attain some skill, to +accept a place on the military staff of his father, Major General Dix, +and now, with renewed ardor, resumes his pencil. He will study +principally along the Mediterranean coasts. +</p> +<p> +A very miscellaneous collection of pictures, containing a vast deal of +rubbish, and a few good specimens of foreign artists, was disposed of +at auction by Messrs. Leeds & Miner, in the latter part of March, at +tolerably fair prices. The following will serve as examples: "Snow +Scene" by Gignoux, $900 (quite as much as it was worth); "Lady with +Flowers," by Plassan, $750; "A Reverie," by Chavet, $850; "Evening +Prayer," by E. Frère, $1,000; "The Alchemyst," by Webb, $380. A +curious essay of Col. Trumbull in the perilous regions of "high art," +entitled "The Knighting of De Wilton," fetched the moderate sum of +$150. As an example of the style of composition and treatment affected +by the painters who illustrated Boydell's Shakespeare Gallery, it was +both amusing and instructive. Fortunately for his reputation, the +painter of "Bunker Hill" and the "Sortie from Gibraltar" did not often +recur to Walter Scott for subjects. +</p> +<p> +Quite recently there has been on exhibition at Goupil's gallery a +remarkable picture by the French artist Jean Léon Gérôme, entitled +<i>L'Almée</i>, which <a name="284">{284}</a> may be thus briefly described: Scene, a +dilapidated Egyptian Khan or coffee shop; in the foreground and centre +of the picture a Ghawazee, or dancing girl, performing a striking but +immodest dance, which consists wholly of movements of the body from +the hips, the legs remaining stationary; a group of fierce looking and +fantastically bedizened Bashi-Bazouks, sitting cross-legged on a +divan, spectators of the performance; and in the background some +musicians and an attendant or two. It would be almost impossible to +over-praise the marvellous finish of this work, the skilful blending +of the colors, the subdued yet appropriate tone, or the dramatic force +of the composition. If these qualities were all that are demanded in a +work of art, we might stop here; but when the subject is repulsive, +they prove a source of aggravation rather than of pleasure, and few, +we think, will deny that the scene depicted by Gérôme, though +illustrating a peculiar and perhaps important phase of Oriental life, +is one of too gross a character to subserve the purposes of true art. +A vast deal of sentiment has been wasted upon the "moral significance" +of pictures of this type. The less said upon that score, the better. +We do not instruct children to abstain from vice by putting immoral +books into their hands, trusting that some innate sense of propriety +may prompt them thereby to see virtue in a clearer light. If disposed +to criticise the technical part of this work, we should say that the +finish is too elaborate. Everything, to the smallest minutiae, is +polished almost to the degree of hardness, and one instinctively longs +for an occasional roughness or evidence of the brush—something of +that manual movement which indicates the passing thought of the +painter. Where all is of so regular and level a merit, the contrasts +which should give strength and spirit to a painting are sure to be +wanting. In this respect Gérôme compares unfavorably with Meissonier. +Both finish with scrupulous exactness; but the latter never makes +finish paramount to the proper expression of his subject. Hence the +life and action, so to speak, of his most nicely elaborated figures. +In the <i>Almée</i>, on the other hand, the group of soldiers, though +wearing an admirable expression of stoical sensuality, are too rigid +and immovable, too much like well painted copies of the lay figures +which served as models for them. So, too, of many of the details, +excepting always the draperies, which could not be improved. A little +more attention to the <i>ars celare artem</i> would render Gérôme almost +unapproachable in his peculiar style. +</p> +<p> +Before leaving Goupil's, we cannot avoid drawing attention to some +studies of trees and foliage, by Richards, of Philadelphia, now +exhibited there. One of them, representing the interior of a wood in +early autumn, is the best delineation of that phase of nature we have +recently seen. Generally, the pictures of this artist are wanting in +relief; his foliage lies flat upon the canvas; the trunks of his trees +have no rounded outline, nor can the eye penetrate through the +recesses of the wood; there is, in fact, no atmosphere to speak of. +These defects have been happily overcome in the present instance, and, +with no lack of Pre-Raphaelite power in delineating the outward aspect +of nature, there is a pervading tone of melancholy appropriate to the +scene and the season. Less remarkable than this, but of considerable +merit, is a mountain landscape, in which the season depicted is also +the autumn. +</p> +<br> +<p> +<i>Foreign</i>.—Abroad there seems to be a perfect fever to buy and sell +works of art. "Everybody," says the London Athenaeum, "who has a +collection, seems determined to dispose of it, and accident has thrown +a large number of works on the art-market; but as those who have taste +and means seem just as eager to buy as the collectors are to sell, the +activity of the art-marts is but a natural consequence of the law of +supply and demand, the natural limit having been extended in several +instances by the accidental re-appearance of many works twice or three +times during the season." This has been the case especially with +respect to the pictures of Delacroix. It is always dangerous to assume +the prophetic character; but it appears very improbable that, on the +average, works of art will fetch higher sums than they have during the +present season.'' In Paris the Pourtalès sale continues, and is daily +crowded by eager <i>virtuosi</i>, whose competition runs up prices to an +extent bordering on the extravagant. The proceeds of the third portion +of the sale, which occupied three days, and included the engraved +<a name="285">{285}</a> gems, antique jewelry and glass, were 45,743 francs; those of +the fourth section, the coins and medals, 18,430 francs; and of the +fifth, which comprised the sculpture in ivory and wood, the +renaissance bronzes, arms, <i>faiences</i>, glass, and some miscellaneous +articles, 505,640 francs. The following are some of the prices +obtained for the sculptures in ivory, of which there was a magnificent +collection of 70 pieces: A statuette of Hercules resting on his club, +one foot on the head of the Hydra, purchased for England, +$3,280.—Venus with Cupid at her side, left by Fiamingo as security in +the house at Leghorn wherein he died, $1,180.—A renaissance bronze +bust of Charles IX., of France, life size, artist unknown, formerly +the property of the Duc de Berri, brought $9,000.—"Henry II. ware," +the well-known <i>biberon</i>, with cover bearing the arms of France, +surmounted by a coronet, and bearing the arms and initials of <i>Diane +de Poitiers</i>, uninjured, just over ten inches in height, $5,500.—The +celebrated Marie Stuart cup, presented to her when affianced to the +Dauphin, was disposed of for $5,420. It is but a few inches in height, +but is covered, inside and out, with designs illustrating classical +mythology and allegory, and with profuse ornamentation, all in +exquisite taste and of perfect workmanship. It was executed by Jean +Court <i>dit</i> Vigier, about 1556.—A round basin, in grisaille, by +Pierre Raymond (1558), representing the history of Adam and Eve, in +enamel on a black ground, brought $4,040; a large oval salver, by Jean +Courtois, enamelled in the richest manner, representing the passage of +the Red Sea, with borders decorated with figures, medallions, etc., +$6,000. These prices, it may be observed, were considered by competent +judges to be rather low! The vases and goblets of rock crystal were +also well contested. A magnificent head, of Apollo, in marble, +formerly in the Justiniani gallery, was bought, it is said, for the +British Museum, for $9,000; and the celebrated Pallas vase, the most +perfect specimen of Greek work in porphyry extant, fetched $3,400. +</p> +<p> +The new chapel of the Palais de l'Elysée has just been completed, and +is said to be a perfect gem of artistic decoration. The style is +Byzantine, the mosaic work of the altar being executed in marbles of +the rarest kinds; but the pillars and vaulted roof are in stucco, +imitating porphyry, vert antique, and gold, in such perfection that it +is difficult to believe that the mines of Sweden and Russia had not +been ransacked to produce the rich coloring and massive effect which +strikes the eye of the visitor. The twelve patron saints of France are +represented—including Charlemagne and St. Louis. +</p> +<p> +The Aguado pictures were announced for sale, in Paris, on the 10th of +April. They include the famous "Death of Sainte Claire," by Murillo, +brought from the convent of Saint François d'Asrise in Seville, by +Mathieu Fabirer, Commissary-General of Napoleon's army—a very large +canvas, including no less than twenty-eight figures. +</p> +<p> +The collection of ancient and modern pictures and water-color drawings +formed by Mr. Thomas Blackburn, of Liverpool, was recently disposed of +at auction in London for £8,763. Some of the water-color drawings by +Copley Fielding, Louis Haghe, John Gilbert, Prout, Birket Foster, and +others, realized very large sums. +</p> +<p> +Theed's colossal statue of the Prince Consort, which has been cast in +bronze at Nuremberg, has recently arrived in London. The model of this +figure was originally executed by command of her majesty, and sent as +a present to Coburg, where it at present remains, a bronze cast having +been taken from it. The town of Sydney being desirous of erecting a +statue of the prince, this second cast was executed by command of the +Duke of Newcastle, on the ground that of all the numerous likenesses +now extant this was the best. The figure is ten feet high, and +represents the prince in a commanding attitude, dressed in the robes +of the garter. +</p> +<p> +The alterations in progress in the Wolsey Chapel, at Windsor Castle, +have brought to light three full-length portraits of knights of the +garter, attired in the military costume of the order, capped with +helmets, and wearing cloaks with the insignia. These were hidden by +stone slabs, and as there are upwards of twenty similar slabs, it is +probable that other similar paintings may be discovered. +</p> +<p> +Mr. G. T. Doo's large line-engraving from Sebastiano del Piombo's +"Resurrection of Lazarus," in the National Gallery, by far the most +important of its kind produced for many years past, is <a name="286">{286}</a> now +finished. The figure of Christ is 13 inches high, that of Lazarus is +still larger, and, being naked, invoked the utmost care and knowledge +of the engraver to deal with its superbly drawn forms and perfect +surface. The execution, if not the whole design, of this figure has +been, on good grounds, attributed to Michael Angelo. Mr. Doo has +rendered these with great success, even to giving the somewhat hard +and positive tone of the original; and with one or two exceptions, the +drawing is described as admirable throughout. In view of the few +really good line-engravings now produced, and of the prospect of the +art perhaps becoming extinct within the present century, the +production of such a work possesses a genuine though somewhat +melancholy interest. +</p> +<br> +<p> +Kaulbach, it is said, will finish his paintings in the Berlin Museum +this spring. The price he has received for them is given at $187,000, +with an addition of $18,700 for the cost of materials. One of the +smaller pictures for the series represents Germany absorbed in reading +Humboldt's "Cosmos," and letting the imperial crown fall off her head +in the abstraction caused by her studies. Underneath, the various +small states that compose the confederation are poking out their heads +as far as possible to escape from under a hat which is coming down +upon them—an illusion to the popular phrase of uniting the whole of +Germany "under one hat." +</p> +<br> +<p> +The Pontifical Academy of Roman Archaeology has decreed that the +collossal statue of Hercules in gilt bronze, recently discovered among +the ruins of Pompey's theatre, and sent to the Vatican, shall bear the +name of "The Hercules Mastai," in honor of Pius IX. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>NEW PUBLICATIONS.</h2> +<br> +<p> +THE BOYNE WATER: A TALE. By John Banim. Post 8vo., pp. 578, Boston: +Patrick Donahoe. [For sale in New York by P. O'Shea, Bleecker street]. +This story is reprinted from <i>The Boston Pilot</i>, of whose columns it has +formed for some months past a principal attraction. It is one of the +earliest of Banim's works, and the favorable judgment which it +received on its first appearance has now a success of forty years to +confirm it. It is a novel of the historical school which Scott made so +popular in the last generation, the incidents upon which it is founded +belonging to the revolution of 1688, which established William of +Orange on the throne of Great Britain. It gives a graphic picture of +the siege and capitulation of Limerick, and brings upon the scene +James and William, Sarsfield, Tyrconnel, Ginkell, and other familiar +characters of that stirring epoch. Banim delights, also, in +descriptions of natural scenery. In these he is spirited, and, we +believe, accurate. He spared no pains to make himself thoroughly +familiar with the localities of which he wrote. While he was engaged +upon his novels he used to journey, in company with his brother, +through the theatre of action, and study each historical spot with the +care of an antiquary. The perfect acquaintance thus obtained with the +places of which he wrote had, of course, no little effect upon the +vivacity of his narrative. +</p> +<p> +His pictures of Irish life are vivid and truthful, though he is +happier in narrative or description than in dialogue. His heroes and +heroines are too much addicted to stilted conversation and to +sentimental remarks, which look very well in print, but are never +heard in ordinary life. The minor characters, especially those of the +peasant class, such as Rory na Choppell, the "whisperer," or +horse-tamer, have the gift of speech in a much more natural and +agreeable manner. The subordinate parts of the book, in fact, are its +best parts. The Gaelic chieftain, reduced to poverty by the English +conquerors, but retaining all his pride of spirit and <a name="287">{287}</a> authority +over his people, in a sequestered hut among the mountains; the blind +harper; the old priest; the mad woman of the cavern; the fanatical +soldier of Cromwell; and the lawless Rapparees, are depicted with +great skill. The heroes of the story—for there are two—are the one a +Catholic, the other a Protestant. They fight on opposite sides, and in +the delineation of their characters, and the division of fine +sentiments between them, Banim holds an even hand. He wrote for an +English public, and fearful of offending by too warm an avowal of his +religious convictions, he seems to us to have gone occasionally to the +opposite extreme, and penned several passages which Catholics cannot +read without displeasure. But, despite these faults, which are neither +very many nor very serious, "The Boyne Water" ranks among the best of +Irish novels, and Banim as a worthy companion of Carleton and Gerald +Griffin. +</p> +<br> +<p> +SERMONS ON MORAL SUBJECTS. By his Eminence Cardinal Wiseman. 8vo., +pp.434. New York: D. & J. Sadlier & Co. +</p> +<p> +The discourses contained in this volume form an appropriate supplement +to the "Sermons on our Lord and on His Blessed Mother" which we +noticed last month. They were delivered under the same circumstances +as the previous collection—that is, for the most part, at the English +College in Rome—and ought not, therefore, to be considered as a +regular course. But if they do not pretend to be a complete series of +moral instructions, they will, nevertheless, be found to touch upon +nearly all the fashionable sins, and to afford ample food for +reflection to all classes of persons. They have the same +characteristics of thought and expression which mark the cardinal's +other writings—the same kind tone of remonstrance with sinners and +encouragement for the penitent, the same earnest love of God and man, +and the same, rich, sometimes exuberant, diction. Cardinal Wiseman +ranged through a great variety of subjects, and touched nothing that +he did not adorn, but his style never varied much; from one of his +books you can easily judge of all. There is little difference between +the style of the "Sermons on Moral Subjects" and that, for instance, +of "Fabiola," or the "Lectures on Science and Revealed Religion." It +is an ornate mode of writing which accommodates itself to a diversity +of subjects, and never, in the cardinal's pages, seems out of place. +</p> +<p> +The sermons now before us are eminently practical; and, although a +large proportion of them are addressed directly to irreligious +persons, and treat of such subjects as "The Love of the World," +"Scandal," "Detraction," "Unworthy Communion," "Unprepared Death," and +the "Hatefulness of Sin," they display, in a very marked manner, that +affectionateness to which we have elsewhere alluded as a +characteristic of the cardinal's discourses. He seems to love rather +to expostulate than to upbraid; rather to remind us of the happiness +we have lost by sin than to threaten us with the punishment of +impenitence; and even when his subject calls for stern language, the +kindly spirit continually breaks out. +</p> +<p> +The last sermon in the volume is entitled "Conclusion of a Course." It +contains the following passage, explanatory of the purpose of the +whole collection: +</p> +<p> +"These instructions, my dear brethren, have obviously one tendency; +they are all directed to expound what the law of God commands us to +believe and to practice, in order to reach those rewards which he has +prepared for his faithful servants. They are directed to suggest such +motives as may induce us to fulfil these commands; to encourage those +who are already on the path to persevere in it; to bring back those +who have wandered; to impart strength to the weak and resolution to +the wavering and undecided." +</p> +<br> +<p> +AT ANCHOR; A STORY OF OUR CIVIL WAR. By an American. 12mo., pp. 311. +New York: D. Appleton & Company. +</p> +<p> +The writer of this novel is evidently a Catholic, but the story is +political, not religious. It purports to be the autobiography of a +loyal Massachusetts woman. She marries a Carolinian whom she does not +love, and accompanies him to his plantation-home. At the breaking out +of the war, the husband accepts a commission in the Confederate +service. He is reported killed, and the wife, having learned during +his absence to love him, devotes herself to the sick and wounded in +Richmond. After a time she makes her way back to Massachusetts, and +there, at the end of the book, the missing lord turns up; not only +safe and sound, but converted from the political errors of his ways, +and eager to fight under the Federal <a name="288">{288}</a> flag. He enlists as a +private, and has risen to be sergeant when a wound disables him for +further service, and husband and wife are at last united and happy in +each other. This plot, if it is a plot, is interwoven—we cannot say +complicated—with several interesting incidents. The heroine has +another lover, toward whom she leans a willing ear, both in maiden +life and during her supposed widowhood; and he, on his part, has +another mistress, who turns out to be our heroine's half-sister. Of +course he marries this lady; and so both couples, after much tossing +about, are peacefully "at anchor." +</p> +<p> +This is something far better than the common sort of sensational +war-stories. It contains neither a guerrilla nor a spy; narrates no +thrilling deed of blood or hair's-breadth escape; describes no battle; +and admits that both parties embrace many noble and honorable men. The +writer (it needs little penetration to see that she is a woman) +expresses herself fearlessly, but without undue bitterness, on +political matters, and scatters over her pages many excellent +reflections. +</p> +<br> +<p> +THE MYSTICAL ROSE; OR, MARY OF NAZARETH, THE LILY OF THE HOUSE OF +DAVID. By Marie Josephine. 12mo., pp. viii., 290. New York: D. +Appleton & Company. +</p> +<p> +The authoress of this work is a Vermont lady of some literary +experience. Her book gives ample evidence of a cultivated and +well-stored mind. It is an attempt to present, in irregular verse, a +legendary narrative of the life of the Blessed Virgin; and if the +poetry is not all of the first order, it is at least devotional, or +perhaps we should, say consistent with devotional ideas—for the +writer deals more with the poetical than the religious aspect of her +subject. She has drawn the rough materials for her poem from a great +variety of sources, to which she gives reference in copious notes. She +claims to have "appropriated every coveted relic or tradition handed +down by historian, Christian or pagan, from the archives of Latin +Church, Hebrew, or Greek, coming within scope of her original plan." +She has certainly succeeded in bringing together a great number of +beautiful legends, which she handles in the most affectionate manner. +</p> +<br> +<p> +THE CORRELATION AND CONSERVATION OF FORCES: A series of Expositions, +by Prof. Grove, Prof. Helmholtz, Dr. Mayer, Dr. Faraday, Prof. Liebig, +and Dr. Carpenter. With an Introduction and brief Biographical Notices +of the Chief Promoters of the New Views. By Edward L. Youmans, M. D. +12mo., pp. xlii., 438. New York: D. Appleton & Company. +</p> +<p> +This excellent work reached us too late for an extended notice in the +present number. We shall speak of it at greater length next month. In +the meantime we warmly recommend our readers to buy it. +</p> +<br> +<p> +We have received the April number of <i>The New Path: a Monthly Art +Journal</i>, the publication of which, after an interval of several +months, is resumed under the auspices of James Miller, 522 Broadway. +This little periodical represents radical and peculiar views or art, +Being allied in opinions to the Pre-Raphaelite school; but its +independent and out-spoken, and often valuable, criticisms must have +struck the limited circle of readers to whom it formerly appealed. We +hope under its new management it will exercise a healthful influence +on American art. The present number contains articles on Miss Hosmer's +Statue of Zenobia, "Our Furniture," notices of recent exhibitions, +etc., etc. +</p> +<p> +Murphy & Co., Baltimore, send us <i>The Mysteries of the Living Rosary</i>, +printed in sheets, and accompanied by appropriate instructions, +prayers, and meditations. +</p> + +<hr> +<br> +<a name="289">{289}</a> +<br> + +<h1>THE CATHOLIC WORLD, +<br><br> +VOL. I., NO. 3. JUNE, 1865. +<br><br> +THE WORKINGS OF THE HOLY SPIRIT IN THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND.</h1> +<br> +<br> +<h2>A LETTER TO THE REV. E. B. PUSEY, D.D. BY HENRY EDWARD MANNING, D.D.</h2> +<br> +<p> +MY DEAR FRIEND,—I do not know why twelve years of silence should +forbid my calling you still by the name we used both to give and to +accept of old. Aristotle says indeed— +<span style="vertical-align:-25%"> +<img alt="" src="images/i289.jpg"> +</span> +but he did not know the basis and the affections of a Christian +friendship such as that to which—though I acknowledge in myself no +claim to it—you were so kind as to admit me. Silence and suspension +of communications cannot prevail against the kindliness and confidence +which springs from such years and such events as once united us. +Contentions and variances might indeed more seriously try and strain +such a friendship. But, though we have been both parted and opposed, +there has been between us neither variance nor contention. We have +both been in the field indeed where a warfare has been waging, but, +happily, we have not met in contest. Sometimes we have been very near +to each other, and have even felt the opposition of each other's will +and hand; but I believe on neither side has there ever been a word or +an act which has left a needless wound. That I should have grieved and +displeased you is inevitable. The simple fact of my submitting to the +Catholic Church must have done so, much more the duties which bind me +as a pastor. If, in the discharge of that office, I have given you or +any one either pain or wound by personal faults in the manner of its +discharge, I should be open to just censure. If the displeasure arise +only from the substance of my duties, "necessity is laid upon me," and +you would be the last to blame me. +</p> +<p> +You will perhaps be surprised at my beginning thus to write to you. I +will at once tell you why I do so. Yesterday I saw, for the first +time, your pamphlet on the legal force of the Judgment of the Privy +Council, and I found my name often in its pages. I have nothing to +complain of in the way you use it. And I trust that in this reply you +will feel that I have not forgotten your example. But your mention of +me, and of old days, kindled in me a strong desire to pour out many +things which have been for years rising in my mind. I have long wished +for the occasion to do so, but I <a name="290">{290}</a> have always felt that it is +more fitting to take than to make such an occasion: and as your +kindness has made it, I will take it. +</p> +<p> +But before I enter upon the subject of this letter I wish to say a few +words of yourself, and of some others whom I am wont to class with +you. +</p> +<p> +Among the many challenges to controversy and public disputation which +it has been my fortune to receive, and, I may add, my happiness to +refuse, in the last twelve or thirteen years, one was sent me last +autumn at Bath. It was the only one to which, for a moment, I was +tempted to write a reply. The challenger paid me compliments on my +honesty in leaving the Church of England, denouncing those who, +holding my principles, still eat its bread. I was almost induced to +write a few words to say that my old friends and I are parted because +we hold principles which are irreconcileable; that I once held what +they hold now, and was then united with them; that they have never +held what I hold now, and therefore we are separated; that they are as +honest in the Church of England now as I was once; and that our +separation was my own act in abandoning as untenable the Anglican +Church and its rule of faith, Scripture and antiquity, which you and +they hold still, and in submitting to the voice of the Catholic and +Roman Church at this hour, which I believe to be the sole +authoritative interpreter of Scripture and of antiquity. This +principle no friend known to me in the Church of England has ever +accepted. In all these years, both in England and in foreign +countries, and on occasions both private and public, and with persons +of every condition, I have borne this witness for you and for others. +</p> +<p> +I felt no little indignation at what seemed to me the insincerity of +my correspondent, but on reflection I felt that silence was the best +answer. +</p> +<p> +I will now turn to your pamphlet, and to the subject of this letter. +</p> +<p> +You speak at the outset of "the jubilee of triumph among +half-believers" on the occasion of the late Judgment of the Crown in +Council; and you add, "A class of believers joined in the triumph. And +while I know that a very earnest body of Roman Catholics rejoice in +all the workings of God the Holy Ghost in the Church of England +(whatever they think of her), and are saddened in what weakens her who +is, in God's hands, the great bulwark against infidelity in this land, +others seemed to be in an ecstasy of triumph at this victory of +Satan." [Footnote 55] Now, I will not ask where you intended to class +me. But as an anonymous critic of a pamphlet lately published by me +accused me of rejoicing in your troubles, and another more +recently—with a want of candor visible in every line of the attack— +accused me of being "merry" over these miseries of the Church of +England, I think the time is made for me to declare how I regard the +Church of England, and events like these; and I know no one to whom I +would rather address what I Have to say than to yourself. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 55: "Legal Force of the Judgment of the Privy Council," by + the Rev. E. B. Pusey, D.D., pp. 3, 4.] +</p> +<p> +I will, then, say at once: +</p> +<p> +1. That I rejoice with all my heart in all the workings of the Holy +Ghost in the Church of England. +</p> +<p> +2. That I lament whensoever what remains of truth in it gives way +before unbelief. +</p> +<p> +3. That I rejoice whensoever what is imperfect in it is unfolded into +a more perfect truth. +</p> +<p> +4. But that I cannot regard the Church of England as "the great +bulwark against infidelity in this land," for reasons which I will +give in their place. +</p> +<p> +1. First, then, I will say what I believe of the Church of England, +and why I rejoice in every working of the Holy Spirit in it. And I do +this the more gladly because I have been sometimes grieved at hearing, +and once at even seeing in a handwriting which I reverence with +affection, the <a name="291">{291}</a> statement that Catholics—or at least the worst +of Catholics called converts—deny the validity of Anglican baptism, +regard our own past spiritual life as a mockery, look upon our +departed parents as heathen, and deny the operations of the Holy +Spirit in those who are out of the Church. I do not believe that those +who say such things have ever read the Condemned Propositions, or are +aware that a Catholic who so spoke would come under the weight of at +least two pontifical censures, and the decrees of at least two general +councils. +</p> +<p> +I need not, however, do more than remind you that, according to the +faith and theology of the Catholic Church, the operations of the Holy +Spirit of God have been from the beginning of the world co-extensive +with the whole human race. [Footnote 56] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 56: Suarez, <i>De Divina Gratia</i>. Pars Secunda, lib. iv., c. + viii. xi. xii. Ripalda, <i>De Ente Supenaturali</i>, lib. i., disp. xx., + s. xii. and s. xxii. Viva, <i>Cursus Theol</i>., pars iii., disp. i., + quaest. v. iii.] +</p> +<p> +Believing, then, in the operations of the Holy Spirit, even among the +nations of the world who have neither the revelation of the faith nor +the sacraments, how much more must we believe his presence and grace +in those who are regenerate by water and the Holy Ghost? It would be +impertinent for me to say to you—whose name first became celebrated +for a tract on baptism, which, notwithstanding certain imperfections +inseparable from a work written when and where you wrote it, is in +substance deep, true, and elevating—that baptism, if rightly +administered with the due form and matter, is always 'valid by +whatsoever hand it may be given. [Footnote 57] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 57: <i>Concil. Florent. Decretum Eugenii IV. Mansi Concil.</i>, + tom, xviii. 547. "In casu autem necessitatis non solum sacerdos vel + diaconus sed etiam laicus vel mulier, immo etiam paganus et + haereticus baptizare potest, dummodo formam servet Ecclesiae, et + facere intendat quod facit Ecclesia." The Council of Trent repeats + this under anathema, Sess. vii., can. iv.: "Si quis dixerit + Baptismum qui etiam datur ab haereticis in Nomine Patris, et Filii, + et Spiritus Sancti, cum intentione esse verum Baptismum, anathema + sit." See also Bellarm. <i>Controversial, De Baptismo</i>, lib. i., c.] +</p> +<p> +Let me, then, say at once +</p> +<p> +1. That in denying the Church of England to be the Catholic Church, or +any part of it, or in any divine and true sense a church at all, and +in denying the validity of its absolutions and its orders, no Catholic +ever denies the workings of the Spirit of God or the operations of +grace in it. +</p> +<p> +2. That in affirming the workings of grace in the Church of England, +no Catholic ever thereby affirms that it possesses the character of a +church. +</p> +<p> +They who most inflexibly deny to it the character of a church affirm +most explicitly the presence and the operations of grace among its +people, and that for the following reasons: +</p> +<p> +In the judgment of the Catholic Church, a baptized people is no longer +in the state of nature, but is admitted to a state of supernatural +grace. And though I believe the number of those who have never been +baptized to be very great in England, and to be increasing every year, +nevertheless I believe the English people, as a mass, to be a Baptized +people. I say the number of the unbaptized is great, because there are +many causes which contribute to produce this result. First, the +imperfect, and therefore invalid, administration of baptism through +the carelessness of the administrators. You, perhaps, think that this +is exaggerated, through an erroneous belief of Catholics as to the +extent of such carelessness among the Protestant ministers, both in +and out of the Church of England. It is, however, undeniable, as I +know from the evidence of eye-witnesses, that such carelessness has, +in times past, been great and frequent. This I consider the least, but +a sufficient, reason for believing that many have never been baptized. +Add to this, negligence caused by the formal disbelief of baptismal +regeneration in a large number of Protestant ministers. There are, +however, two other reasons far more direct. The one is the studied +rejection, as a point of religious profession, of the practice of +infant baptism. Many therefore grow up without baptism who in adult +life, for various causes, never seek it. <a name="292">{292}</a> The other, the sinful +unbelief and neglect of parents in every class of the English people, +who often leave whole families of children to grow up without baptism. +Of the fact that many have never been baptized, I, or any Catholic +priest actively employed in England, can bear witness. There are few +among us who have not had to baptize grown people of every condition, +poor and rich; and, of children, often whole families together. There +has indeed been, in the last thirty years, a revival of care in the +administration of baptism on the part of the Anglican ministers, and +of attention on the part of parents in bringing their children to be +baptized; but this reaction is by no means proportionate to the +neglect, which on the other side has been extending. My fear is that, +after all, the number of persons unbaptized in England is greater at +this moment than at any previous time. +</p> +<p> +Still the English people as a body are baptized, and therefore +elevated to the order of supernatural grace. Every infant, and also +every adult baptized, having the necessary dispositions, is thereby +placed in a state of justification; and, if they die without +committing any mortal sin, would certainly be saved. They are also, in +the sight of the Church, Catholics. St. Augustine says, "Ecclesia +etiam inter eos qui foris sunt per baptismum generat suos." A mortal +sin of any kind, including <i>prava voluntatis electio</i>, the perverse +election of the will, by which in riper years such persons chose for +themselves, notwithstanding sufficient light, heresy instead of the +true faith, and schism instead of the unity of the Church, would +indeed deprive them of their state of grace. But before such act of +self-privation all such people are regarded by the Catholic Church as +in the way of eternal life. With perfect confidence of faith, we +extend the shelter of this truth over the millions of infants and +young children who every year pass to their Heavenly Father. We extend +it also in hope to many more who grow up in their baptismal grace. +Catholic missionaries in this country have often assured me of a fact, +attested also by my own experience, that they have received into the +Church persons grown to adult life, in whom their baptismal grace was +still preserved. Now how can we then be supposed to regard such +persons as no better than heathens? To ascribe the good lives of such +persons to the power of nature would be Pelagianism. To deny their +goodness, would be Jansenism. And, with such a consciousness, how +could any one regard his past spiritual life in the Church of England +as a mockery? I have no deeper conviction than that the grace of the +Holy Spirit was with me from my earliest consciousness. Though at the +time, perhaps, I knew it not as I know it now, yet I can clearly +perceive the order and chain of grace by which God mercifully led me +onward from childhood to the age of twenty years. From that time the +interior workings of his light and grace, which continued through all +my life, till the hour in which that light and grace had its perfect +work, to which all its operations had been converging, in submission +to the fulness of truth of the Spirit of the Church of God, is a +reality as profoundly certain, intimate, and sensible to me now as +that I live. Never have I by the lightest word breathed a doubt of +this fact in the divine order of grace. Never have I allowed any one +who has come to me for guidance or instruction to harbor a doubt of +the past workings of grace in them. It would be not only a sin of +ingratitude, but a sin against truth. The working of the Holy Spirit +in individual souls is, as I have said, as old as the fall of man, and +as wide as the human race. It is not we who ever breathe or harbor a +doubt of this. It is rather they who accuse us of it. Because, to +believe such an error possible in others shows how little +consciousness there must be of the true doctrine of grace in +themselves. And such, I am forced <a name="293">{293}</a> to add, is my belief, because +I know by experience how inadequately I understood the doctrine of +grace until I learned it of the Catholic Church. And I trace the same +inadequate conception of the workings of grace in almost every +Anglican writer I know, not excepting even those who are nearest to +the truth. +</p> +<p> +But, further, our theologians teach, not only that the state of +baptismal innocence exists, and may be preserved out of the Church, +but that they who in good faith are out of it, if they shall +correspond with the grace they have already received, will receive an +increase or augmentation of grace. [Footnote 58] I do not for a +moment doubt that there are to be found among the English people +individuals who practise in a high degree the four cardinal virtues, +and in no small degree, though with the limits and blemishes +inseparable from their state, the three theological virtues of faith, +[Footnote 59] hope, and charity, infused into them in their baptism. I +do not think, my dear friend, in all that I have said or written in +the last fourteen years, that you can find a word implying so much as +a doubt of the workings of the Holy Spirit among all the baptized who +are separated from the Catholic Church. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 58: Suarez, <i>De Div. Gratia</i>, lib. iv., c. xi. Ripalda, + <i>De Ente Supernaturali</i>, lib. i., disp. xx., sect. xii. <i>et seq. S. + Alphonsi Theol. Moral.</i>, lib. i., tract, 1. 5, 6. ] +<br><br> + [Footnote 59: De Lugo, <i>De Virtute divinae Fidei</i>, disp. xvii., + sect. iv, v. Viva, <i>Cursus Theol.</i>, p. iv., disp. iv., quaest. iii. 7.] +</p> +<p> +I will go further still. The doctrine, "<i>Extra ecclesiam nulla salus</i>" +is to be interpreted both by dogmatic and by moral theology. As a +dogma, theologians teach that many belong to the Church who are out of +its visible unity; [Footnote 60] as a moral truth, that to be out of +the Church is no personal sin, except to those who sin in being out of +it. That is, they will be lost, not because they are <i>geographically</i> +out of it, but because they are <i>culpably</i> out of it. And they who are +culpably out of it are those who know—or might, and therefore ought +to, know—that it is their duty to submit to it. The Church teaches +that men may be <i>inculpably</i> out of its pale. Now they are inculpably +out of it who are and have always been either physically or morally +unable to see their obligation to submit to it. And they only are +culpably out of it who are both physically and morally able to know +that it is God's will they should submit to the Church; and either +knowing it will not obey that knowledge, or, not knowing it, are +culpable for that ignorance. I will say then at once, that we apply +this benign law of our Divine Master as far as possible to the English +people. First, it is applicable in the letter to the whole multitude +of those baptized persons who are under the age of reason. Secondly, +to all who are in good faith, of whatsoever age they be: such as a +great many of the poor and unlettered, to whom it is often physically, +and very often morally, impossible to judge which is the true +revelation or Church of God. I say physically, because in these three +hundred years the Catholic Church has been so swept off the face of +England that nine or ten generations of men have lived and died +without the faith being so much as proposed to them, or the Church +ever visible to them; and I say morally, because the great majority of +the poor, from lifelong prejudice, are often incapable of judging in a +question so far removed from the primary truths of conscience and +Christianity. Of such simple persons it may be said that, <i>infantibus +aequiparantur</i>, they are to be classed morally with infants. Again, to +these may be added the unlearned in all classes, among whom many have +no contact with the Catholic Church, or with Catholic books. Under +this head will come a great number of wives and daughters, whose +freedom of religious inquiry and religious thought is unjustly <a name="294">{294}</a> +limited or suspended by the authority of parents and husbands. Add, +lastly, the large class who have been studiously brought up, with all +the dominant authority of the English tradition of three hundred +years, to believe sincerely, and without a doubt, that the Catholic +Church is corrupt, has changed the doctrines of the faith, and that +the author of the Reformation is the Spirit of holiness and truth. It +may seem incredible to some that such an illusion exists. But it is +credible to me, because for nearly forty years of my life I was fully +possessed by this erroneous belief. To all such persons it is morally +difficult in no small degree to discover the falsehood of this +illusion. All the better parts of their nature are engaged in its +support: dutifulness, self-mistrust, submission, respect for others +older, better, more learned than themselves, all combine to form a +false conscience of the duty to refuse to hear anything against "the +religion of their fathers," "the church of their baptism," or to read +anything which could unsettle them. Such people are told that it is +their duty to extinguish a doubt against the Church of England, as +they would extinguish a temptation against their virtue. A conscience +so subdued and held in subjection exercises true virtues upon a false +object, and renders to a human authority the submissive trust which is +due only to the divine voice of the Church of God. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 60: See Perrone <i>Praelect. Theolog</i>., pars i., c. ii. 1, 2: +<br><br> + "Omnes et soli justi pertinent ad Ecclesiae animam." +<br><br> + "Ad Christi Ecclesiae corpus spectant fideles omnes tam justi quam + peccatores." +<br><br> + St. Augustine expresses these two propositions in six words, + "Multae oves foris, multi lupi intus." St. Aug., tom, iii., p. ii. + 600.] +</p> +<p> +One last point I will add. I believe that the people of England were +not all guilty of the first acts of heresy and schism by which they +were separated from the Catholic unity and faith. They were robbed of +it. In many places they rose in arms for it. The children, the poor, +the unlearned at that time, were certainly innocent: much more the +next generation. They were born into a state of privation. They knew +no better. No choice was before them. They made no perverse act of the +will in remaining where they were born. Every successive generation +was still less culpable, in proportion as they were born into a +greater privation, and under the dominion of a tradition of error +already grown strong. For three centuries they have been born further +and further out of the truth, and their culpability is perpetually +diminishing; and as they were passively borne onward in the course of +the English separation, the moral responsibility for the past is +proportionately less. +</p> +<p> +The divine law is peremptory—"to him who knoweth to do good, and +doeth it not, to him it is sin." [Footnote 61] Every divine truth, as +it shines in upon us, lays its obligation on our conscience to believe +and to obey it. When the divine authority of the Church manifests +itself to our intellect, it lays its jurisdiction upon our conscience +to submit to it. To refuse is an act of infidelity, and the least act +of infidelity in its measure expels faith; one mortal act of it will +expel the habit of faith altogether. [Footnote 62] Every such act of +infidelity grieves the Holy Ghost by a direct opposition to his divine +voice speaking through the Church; the habit of such opposition is one +of the six sins against the Holy Ghost defined as "impugning the known +truth." All that I have said above in no way modifies the absolute and +vital necessity of submitting to the Catholic Church as the only way +of salvation to those who know it, by the revelation of God, to be +such. But I must not attempt now to treat of this point. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 61: St. James iv. 17.] +<br><br> + [Footnote 62: De Lugo, <i>De Virtute Fidel Divinae</i>, disp. xvii., + sect. iv. 53 <i>et seq</i>.] +</p> +<p> +Nevertheless for the reasons above given we make the largest allowance +for all who are in invincible ignorance; always supposing that there +is a preparation of heart to embrace the truth when they see it, at +any cost, a desire to know it, and a faithful use of the means of +knowing it, such as study, docility, prayer, and the like. But I do +not now enter into the case of the educated or the learned, or of +those who have liberty of mind and means of inquiry. I cannot class +them under <a name="295">{295}</a> the above enumeration of those who are inculpably out +of the truth. I leave them, therefore, to the only Judge of all men. +</p> +<p> +Lastly, I will not here attempt to estimate how far all I have said is +being modified by the liberation and expansion of the Catholic Church +in England during the last thirty years. It is certain that the +restoration of the Catholic hierarchy, with the universal tumult which +published it to the whole world, still more by its steady, +wide-spread, and penetrating action throughout England, is taking away +every year the plea of invincible ignorance. +</p> +<p> +It is certain, however, that to those who, being in invincible +ignorance, faithfully co-operate with the grace they have received, an +augmentation of grace is given; and this at once places the English +people, so far as they come within the limits of these conditions, in +a state of supernatural grace, even though they be out of the visible +unity of the Church. I do not now enter into the question of the state +of those who fall from baptismal grace by mortal sin, or of the great +difficulty and uncertainty of their restoration. This would lead me +too far; and it lies beyond the limits of this letter. +</p> +<p> +It must not, however, be forgotten, for a moment, that this applies to +the whole English people, of all forms of Christianity, or, as it is +called, of all denominations. What I have said does not recognize the +grace <i>of</i> the Church of England as such. The working of grace <i>in</i> the +Church of England is a truth we joyfully hold and always teach. But we +as joyfully recognize the working of the Holy Spirit among Dissenters +of every kind. Indeed, I must say that I am far more able to assure +myself of the invincible ignorance of Dissenters as a mass than of +Anglicans as a mass. They are far more deprived of what survived of +Catholic truth; far more distant from the idea of a Church; far more +traditionally opposed to it by the prejudice of education; I must add, +for the most part, far more simple in their belief in the person and +passion of our Divine Lord. Their piety is more like the personal +service of disciples to a personal Master than the Anglican piety, +which has always been more dim and distant from this central light of +souls. Witness Jeremy Taylor's works, much as I have loved them, +compared with Baxter's, or even those of Andrews compared with +Leighton's, who was formed by the Kirk of Scotland. +</p> +<p> +I do not here forget all you have done to provide ascetical and +devotional books for the use of the Church of England, both by your +own writings, and, may I not say it, from your neighbor's vineyard? +</p> +<p> +With truth, then, I can say that I rejoice in all the operations of +the Holy Spirit out of the Catholic Church, whether in the Anglican or +other Protestant bodies; not that those communions are thereby +invested with any supernatural character, but because more souls, I +trust, are saved. If I have a greater joy over these workings of grace +in the Church of England, it is only because more that are dear to me +are in it, for whom every day I never fail to pray. These graces to +individuals were given before the Church was founded, and are given +still out of its unity. They are no more tokens of an ecclesiastical +character, or a sacramental power in the Church of England, than in +the Kirk of Scotland, or in the Wesleyan connexion; they prove only +the manifold grace of God, which, after all the sins of men, and in +the midst of all the ruins he has made, still works in the souls for +whom Christ died. Such, then, is our estimate of the Church of England +in regard to the grace that works not <i>by</i> it, nor <i>through</i> it, but <i>in</i> +it and among those who, without faults of their own, are detained by +it from the true Church of their baptism. +</p> +<p> +And here it is necessary to guard against a possible misuse of what I +have said. Let no one imagine that he may still continue in the Church +of England because God has hitherto mercifully bestowed his grace upon +<a name="296">{296}</a> him. As I have shown, this is no evidence that salvation is to +be had <i>by</i> the Church of England. It is an axiom that <i>to those who do +all they can God never refuses his grace</i>. He bestows it that he may +lead them on from grace to grace, and from truth to truth, until they +enter the full and perfect light of faith in his only true fold. The +grace they have received, therefore, was given, not to detain them in +the Church of England, but to call them out of it. The grace of their +past life lays on them the obligation of seeking and submitting to the +perfect truth. God would "have all men to be saved, and to come to the +knowledge of the truth." [Footnote 63] But his Church is an eminent +doctrine, and member of that truth; and all grace given out of the +Church is given in order to bring men into the Church, wheresoever the +Church is present to them. If they refuse to submit to the Church they +resist the divine intention of the graces they have hitherto received, +and are thereby in grave danger of losing them, as we see too often in +men who once were on the threshold of the Church, and now are in +rationalism, or in states of which I desire to say no more. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 63: 1 Tim. ii. 4.] +</p> +<p> +2. Let me next speak of the truths which the Church of England still +retains. I have no pleasure in its present trials; and the anonymous +writer who describes me as being "positively merry" over its disasters +little knows me. If I am to speak plainly, he seems to me to be guilty +of one of the greatest offences—a rash accusation against one whom he +evidently does not know. I will further say that I lament with all my +heart whensoever what remains of truth in the Anglican system gives +way before unbelief. +</p> +<p> +I do not, indeed, regard the Church of England as a teacher of <i>truth</i>, +for that would imply that it teaches the truth in all its +circumference, and in all its divine certainty. Now this is precisely +what the Church of England does not, and, as I will show presently, +has destroyed in itself the power of doing. I am willing to call it a +teacher of <i>truths</i>, because many fragmentary truths, shattered, +disjointed from the perfect unity of the Christian revelation, still +survive the Reformation, and, with much variation and in the midst of +much contradiction, are still taught in it. I have been wont always to +say, and to say with joy, that the Reformation, which has done its +work with such a terrible completeness in Germany, was arrested in +England; that here much of the Christian belief and Christian order +has survived. Until lately I have been in the habit of saying that +there are three things which missionaries may take for granted in +England: first, the existence of a supernatural world; secondly, the +revelation of Christianity; and thirdly, the inspiration of Scripture. +The Church of England has also preserved other doctrines with more or +less of exactness, such as the doctrine of the Holy Trinity, the +incarnation, baptism, and the like. I will not now enter into the +question as to what other doctrines are retained by it, because a few +more or a few less would make little difference in the final estimate +a Catholic must make of it. A teacher of Christian truths I gladly +admit it to be. A teacher of Christian truth—no, because it rejects +much of that truth, and also the divine principle of its perpetuity in +the world. Nevertheless, I rejoice in every fragment of doctrine which +remains in it; and I should lament the enfeebling or diminution of any +particle of that truth. I have ever regarded with regret the so-called +Low-Church and Latitudinarian schools in the Anglican Church, because +I believe their action and effect is to diminish what remains of truth +in it. I have always regarded with joy, and I have never ceased to +regard with sympathy, notwithstanding much which I cannot either like +or respect, the labors of the High-Church or Anglo-Catholic party, +because I believe that their action and effect are "to strengthen the +things which remain, which were ready <a name="297">{297}</a> to die." For myself, I am +conscious how little I have ever done in my life; but as it is now +drawing toward its end, I have at least this consolation, that I +cannot remember at any time, by word or act, to have undermined a +revealed truth; but that, according to my power, little enough as I +know, I have endeavored to build up what truth I knew, truth upon +truth, if only as one grain of sand upon another, and to bind it +together by the only bond and principle of cohesion which holds in +unity the perfect revelation of God. A very dear friend, whose +friendship has been to me one of the most instructive, and the loss of +which was to me one of the hardest sacrifices I had to make, has often +objected to me, with the subtlety which marks his mind, that my act in +leaving the Church of England has helped forward the unbelief which is +now invading it. No doubt he meant to say that the tendency of such an +act helped to shake the confidence of others in the Church of England +as a teacher of truth. This objection was, like his mind, ingenious +and refined. But a moment's thought unravelled it, and I answered it +much in these words: +</p> +<p class="cite"> + I do not believe that by submitting to the Catholic Church any one + can weaken the witness of the Church of England for the truth which + it retains. So far as it holds the truth, it is in conformity to the + Catholic Church. In submitting to the Catholic Church, I all the + more strongly give testimony to the same truths which the Church of + England still retains. If I give testimony against the Church of + England, it is in those points in which, being at variance with the + truth, the Church of England is itself undermining the faith of + Christianity. +</p> +<p> +It was for this reason I always lamented the legalizing of the +sacramentarian errors of the Low-Church party by the Gorham Judgment; +and that I lament now the legalizing of the heresies of the "Essays +and Reviews," and the spreading unbelief of Dr. Colenso. I believe +that anything which undermines the Christianity of England is drawing +it further and further from us. In proportion as men believe more of +Christianity, they are nearer to the perfect truth. The mission of the +Church in the world is to fill up the truth. Our Divine Lord said, "I +am not come to destroy, but to fulfil;" and St. Paul did not overthrow +the altar of the Unknown God, but gave to it an object of divine +worship and a true adoration. For this cause I regard the present +downward course of the Church of England and the Christianity of +England with great sorrow and fear. And I am all the more alarmed +because of those who are involved in it so many not only refuse to +acknowledge the fact, but treat us who give warning of the danger as +enemies and accusers. +</p> +<p> +One of my critics has imagined, that I propose to myself and others +the alternative of Catholicism or atheism. I have never attempted to +bring any one to the perfect truth by destroying or by threatening the +imperfect faith they might still possess. I do not believe that the +alternative before us is Catholicism or atheism. There are lights of +the natural order, divine witnesses of himself inscribed by the +Creator on his works, characters engraven upon the conscience, and +testimonies of mankind in all the ages of the world, which prove the +existence and perfections of God, the moral nature and responsibility +of man anterior to Catholicism, and independently of revelation. If a +man, through any intellectual or moral aberration, should reject +Christianity, that is Catholicism, the belief of God and of his +perfections stands immutably upon the foundations of nature. +Catholicism, or deism, is indeed the only ultimately logical and +consistent alternative, though, happily, few men in rejecting +Catholicism are logically consistent enough to reject Christianity. +Atheism is an aberration which implies not only an intellectual +blindness, but a moral insensibility. The theism <a name="298">{298}</a> of the world +has its foundation on the face of the natural world, and on the +intellect and the heart of the human race. The old paganism and modern +pantheism are reverent, filial, and elevating compared with the +atheism of Comte and of our modern secularists. It would be both +intellectually and morally impossible to propose to any one the +alternative of Catholicism or atheism. Not only then do I lament to +see any truth in the Church of England give way before unbelief, but I +should regard with sorrow and impatience any attempt to promote the +belief of the whole revelation of Christianity by a mode of logic +which undermines even the truths of the natural order. The Holy See +has authoritatively declared that the existence of God may be proved +by reason and the light of nature, [Footnote 64] and Alexander VIII. +declared that men who do not know of the existence of God are without +excuse. [Footnote 65] Atheism is not the condition of man without +revelation. As Viva truly says in his comment on this declaration, +atheists are anomalies and exceptions in the intellectual tradition of +mankind. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 64: "Ratiocinatio Dei existentiam, animae spiritualitatem, + hominis libertatem, cum certitudine probare potest." <i>Theses a SS. + D. N. Pio IX. approbatae</i>, 11 <i>Junii</i> 1855. Denzinger's Enchiridion, + p. MS. Ed. 1856. ] +<br><br> + [Footnote 65: Viva, <i>Propos. damnatae,</i> p. 372. Ripalda, De <i>Ente + Supernaturali</i>. disp. xx., s. 12, 59. ] +</p> +<p> +Nay, I will go further. I can conceive a person to reject Catholicism +without logically rejecting Christianity. He would indeed reject the +divine certainty which guarantees and proposes to us the whole +revelation of the day of Pentecost. But, as Catholic theologians +teach, the infallible authority of the Church does not of necessity +enter into the essence of an act of faith. [Footnote 66] It is, +indeed, the divine provision for the perfection and perpetuity of the +faith, and <i>in hac providentia</i>, the ordinary means whereby men are +illuminated in the revelation of God; but the known and historical +evidence of Christianity is enough to convince any prudent man that +Christianity is a divine revelation. It is quite true that by this +process he cannot attain an explicit faith in all the doctrines of +revelation, and that in rejecting Catholicism he reduces himself to +human and historical evidence as the maximum of extrinsic certainty +for his religion, and that this almost inevitably resolves itself in +the long run into rationalism. It is an inclined plane on which, if +individuals may stand, generations cannot. Nevertheless, though the +alternative in the last analysis of speculation be Catholicism or +deism, the practical alternative may be Catholicism and fragmentary +Christianity. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 66: De Lugo,—De Virtute Fidei Divinae, disp. i., sect. + xii. 250-53. Viva, <i>Cursus Theol.</i>, p. iv., disp. i., quaest. iv., + art. iii. Ripalda, <i>De Ente Supern.</i>, disp. xx., seet. xxii. 117.] +</p> +<p> +I have said this to show how far I am from sympathizing with those, if +any there be, and I can truly say I know none such, who regard the +giving way of any lingering truth in the Church of England under the +action of unbelief with any feeling but that of sorrow. The Psalmist +lamented over the dying out of truths. "Diminutae sunt veritates a +filiis hominum," and I believe that every one who loves God, and +souls, and truth must lament when a single truth, speculative or +moral, even of the natural order, is obscured; much more when any +revealed truth of the elder or of the Christian revelation is rejected +or even doubted. Allow me also to answer, not only for myself, which +is of no great moment, but for an eminent personage to whom you have +referred in your pamphlet. I can say, with a personal and perfect +knowledge, that no other feeling has ever arisen in His Eminence's +mind, in contemplating the troubles of the Anglican Church, than a +sincere desire that God may use these things to open the eyes of men +to see the untenableness of their positions; coupled with a very +sincere sorrow at the havoc which the advance of unbelief is making +among the truths which yet linger in the Church of England. +</p> +<p> +3. It is, however, but reason that I <a name="299">{299}</a> should rejoice when +whatsoever remains in it of imperfect truth is unfolded into a more +perfect faith: and that therefore I desire to see not only the +conversion of England, but the conversion of every soul to whom the +more perfect truth can be made known. You would not respect me if I +did not. Your own zeal for truth and for souls here speaks in my +behalf. There are two kinds of proselytism. There are the Jews whom +our Lord condemned. There are also the Apostles whom he sent into all +the world. If by proselytizing be meant the employing of unlawful and +unworthy means, motives, or influences to change a person's religion, +I should consider the man who used such means to commit <i>lèse-majesté</i> +against truth, and against our Lord who is the truth. But if by +proselytizing be meant the using all the means of conviction and +persuasion which our divine Master has committed to us to bring any +soul who will listen to us into the only faith and fold, then of this +I plead guilty with all my heart. I do heartily desire to see the +Church of England dissolve and pass away, as the glow of lingering +embers in the rise and steady light of a reviving flame. If the Church +of England were to perish to-morrow under the action of a higher and +more perfect truth, there would be no void left in England. All the +truths hitherto taught in fragments and piecemeal would be still more +vividly and firmly impressed upon the minds of the English people. All +of Christianity which survives in Anglicanism would be perfected by +the restoration of the truths which have been lost, and the whole +would be fixed and perpetuated by the evidence of divine certainty and +the voice of a divine Teacher. No Catholic desires to see the Church +of England swept away by an infidel revolution, such as that of 1789 +in France. But every Catholic must wish to see it give way year by +year, and day by day, under the intellectual and spiritual action of +the Catholic Church: and must watch with satisfaction every change, +social and political, which weakens its hold on the country, and would +faithfully use all his power and influence for its complete removal as +speedily as possible. +</p> +<p> +4. But lastly, I am afraid we have reached a point of divergence. +Hitherto I hope we may have been able to agree together; but now I +fear every step of advance will carry us more wide of each other. I am +unable to consider the Church of England to be "in God's hands the +great bulwark against infidelity in this land." And my reasons are +these: +</p> +<p> +1.) First, I must regard the Anglican Reformation, and therefore the +Anglican Church, as the true and original source of the present +spiritual anarchy of England. Three centuries ago the English people +were in faith <i>unius labii:</i> they were in perfect unity. Now they are +divided and subdivided by a numberless multiplication of errors. What +has generated them? From what source do they descend? Is it not +self-evident that the Reformation is responsible for the production of +every sect and every error which has sprung up in England in these +three hundred years, and of all which cover the face of the land at +this day? It is usual to hear Anglicans lament the multiplication of +religious error. But what is the productive cause of all? Is it not +Anglicanism itself which, by appealing from the voice of the Church +throughout the world, has set the example to its own people of +appealing from the voice of a local and provincial authority? +</p> +<p> +I am afraid, then, that the Church of England, so far from, a barrier +against infidelity, must be recognized as the mother of all the +intellectual and spiritual aberrations which now cover the face of +England. +</p> +<p> +2.) It is true, indeed, that the Church of England retains many truths +in it. But it has in two ways weakened the evidence of these very +truths which it retains. It has detached them from <a name="300">{300}</a> other truths +which by contact gave solidity to all by rendering them coherent and +intelligible. It has detached them from the divine voice of the +Church, which guarantees to us the truth incorruptible and changeless. +The Anglican Reformation destroyed the principle of cohesion, by which +all truths are bound together into one. The whole idea of theology, as +the science of God and of his revelation, has been broken up. +Thirty-nine Articles, heterogeneous, disjointed, and mixed with error, +is all that remains instead of the unity and harmony of Catholic +truth. Surely this has been among the most prolific causes of error, +doubt, and unbelief. So far from the bulwark against it, Anglicanism +appears to me to be the cause and spring of its existence. As I have +already said, the Reformation placed the English people upon an +inclined plane, and they have steadily obeyed the law of their +position, by descending gradually from age to age, sometimes with a +more rapid, sometimes with a slower motion, but always tending +downward. Surely it would be unreasonable to say of a body always +descending, that it is the great barrier against reaching the bottom. +</p> +<p> +I do not, indeed, forget that the Church of England has produced +writers who have vindicated many Christian truths. I am not unmindful +of the service rendered by Anglican writers to Christianity in +general, nor, in particular, of the works of Bull and Waterland in +behalf of the Holy Trinity; of Hammond and Pearson in behalf of +Episcopacy; of Butler and Warburton in behalf of Revelation, and the +like. But whence came the errors and unbeliefs against which they +wrote? Were they not generated by the Reformation abroad and in +England? This is like the spear which healed the wounds it had made. +But it is not the divine office of the Church to make wounds in the +faith that it may use its skill in healing. They were quelling the +mutiny which Protestantism had raised, and arresting the progress of +the Reformation which, like Saturn, devours its own children. +</p> +<p> +Moreover, to be just I must say that if the Church of England be a +barrier against infidelity, the Dissenters must also be admitted to a +share in this office and commendation. And in truth I do not know +among the Dissenters any works like the Essays and Reviews, or any +Biblical criticism like that of Dr. Colenso. They may not be very +dogmatic in their teaching, but they bear their witness for +Christianity as a divine revelation, for the Scriptures as an inspired +book, and, I must add further, for the personal Christianity of +conversion and repentance, with an explicitness and consistency which +is not less effectual against infidelity than the testimony of the +Church of England. I do not think the Wesleyan Conference or the +authorities of the three denominations would accept readily this +assumed superiority of the Anglican Church as a witness against +unbelief. They would not unjustly point to the doctrinal confusions of +the Church of England as causes of scepticism, from which they are +comparatively free. And I am bound to say that I think they would have +an advantage. I well remember that while I was in the Church of +England I used to regard Dissenters from it with a certain, I will not +say aversion, but distance and recoil. I never remember to have borne +animosity against them, or to have attacked or pursued them with +unkindness. I always believed many of them to be very earnest and +devoted men. I did not like their theology, and I believed them to be +in disobedience to the Church of England; but I respected them, and +lived at peace with them. Indeed, I may say that some of the best +people I have ever known out of the Church were Dissenters or children +of Dissenters. Nevertheless, I had a dislike of their system, and of +their meeting-houses. They seemed to me to be rivals of the Church of +England, and my loyalty to it made me look somewhat impatiently upon +them. But I remember, from <a name="301">{301}</a> the hour I submitted to the Catholic +Church, all this underwent a sensible change. I saw that the whole +revelation was perpetuated in the Church alone, and that all forms of +Christianity lying round about it were but fragments more or less +mutilated. But with this a sensible increase of kindly feeling grew +upon me. The Church of England and the dissenting communions all alike +appeared to me to be upon the same level. I rejoiced in all the truth +that remains in them, in all the good I could see or hope in them, and +all the workings of the Holy Spirit in them. I had no temptation to +animosity toward them; for neither they nor the Church of England +could be rivals of the imperishable and immutable Church of God. The +only sense, then, in which I could regard the Church of England as a +barrier against infidelity, I must extend also to the dissenting +bodies; and I cannot put this high, for reasons I will give. +</p> +<p> +3.) If the Church of England be a barrier to infidelity by the truths +which yet remain in it, I must submit that it is a source of unbelief +by all the denials of other truths which it has rejected. If it +sustains a belief in two sacraments, it formally propagates unbelief +in five; if it recognizes an undefined presence of Christ in the +sacrament, it formally imposes on its people a disbelief in +transubstantiation and the sacrifice of the altar; if it teaches that +there is a church upon earth, it formally denies its indissoluble +unity, its visible head, and its perpetual divine voice. +</p> +<p> +It is not easy to see how a system can be a barrier against unbelief +when by its Thirty-nine Articles it rejects, and binds its teachers to +propagate the rejection, of so many revealed truths. +</p> +<p> +4.) But this is not all. It is not only by the rejection of particular +doctrines that the Church of England propagates unbelief. It does so +by principle, and in the essence of its whole system. What is the +ultimate guarantee of the divine revelation but the divine authority +of the Church? Deny this, and we descend at once to human teachers. +But it is this that the Church of England formally and expressly +denies. The perpetual and ever-present assistance of the Holy Spirit, +whereby the Church in every age is not only preserved from error, but +enabled at all times to declare the truth, that is the infallibility +of the living Church at this hour—this it is that the Anglican Church +in terms denies. But this is the formal antagonist of infidelity, +because it is the evidence on which God wills that we should believe +that which his veracity reveals. Do not be displeased with me. It +appears to me that the Anglican system, by this one fact alone, +perpetually undoes what it strives to do in behalf of particular +doctrines. What are they, one by one, when the divine certainty of all +is destroyed? Now, for three hundred years the Anglican clergy have +been trained, ordained, and bound by subscriptions to deny not only +many Christian truths, but the divine authority of the +<span style="vertical-align:-25%"> +<img alt="" src="images/i301.jpg"> +</span> +the living Church of every age. The barrier against infidelity is the +divine voice which generates faith. But this the Anglican clergy are +bound to deny. And this denial opens a flood-gate in the bulwark, +through which the whole stream of unbelief at once finds way. +Seventeen or eighteen thousand men, educated with all the advantages +of the English schools and universities, endowed with large corporate +revenues, and distributed all over England, maintain a perpetual +protest, not only against the Catholic Church, but against the belief +that there is any divine voice immutably and infallibly guiding the +Church at this hour in its declaration of the Christian revelation to +mankind. How can this be regarded as "the great bulwark in God's hand +against infidelity?" +</p> +<p> +It seems to me that the Church of England, so far from being a bulwark +against the flood, has floated before it. Every age has exhibited an +advance to a more indefinite and heterogeneous state of religious +opinion within its <a name="302">{302}</a> pale. I will not go again over ground I have +already traversed. Even in our memory the onward progress of the +Church of England is manifest. That I may not seem to draw an +unfavorable picture from my own view, I will quote a very unsuspected +witness. Dr. Irons, in a recent pamphlet, says: "The religion of the +Church has sunk far deeper into conscience now than the surviving men +of 1833-1843 are aware of. <i>And all that Churchmen want</i> of their +separated brethren is that they accept nothing, and profess nothing, +and submit to nothing which has 'no root' in their conscience." +[Footnote 67] If this means anything, it means that objective truth +has given place to subjective sincerity as the Anglican rule of faith. +You will know better than I whether this be the state of men's minds +among you. To me it is as strange as it is incoherent, and a sign how +far men have drifted. This certainly was not the faith or religion +that we held together in the years when I had the happiness of being +united in friendship with you. Latitudinarian sincerity was not our +basis, and if the men of 1833 and 1843 have arrived at this, it is +very unlike the definite, earnest, consistent belief which animated us +at that time. You say in your note (page 21) kindly, but a little +upbraidingly, that my comment on your letter to the <i>"Record"</i> was not +like me in those days: forasmuch as I used then to join with those +with whom even then you could not. It was this that made me note your +doing so now. It was this which seemed to me to be a drifting backward +from old moorings. For myself, it is true, indeed, that I have moved +likewise. I have been carried onward to what you then were, and beyond +it. What I might have done then, I could not do now. What you do now +seems to me what you would not have done then. I did not note this +unkindly, but with regret, because, as I rejoice in every truth, and +in every true principle retained in the Church of England, it would +have given me great joy to see you maintaining with all firmness, not +only all the particular truths you held, but also the impossibility of +uniting with those who deny both those truths and the principles on +which you have rested through your laborious life of the last thirty +years. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 67: "Apologia pro vita Ecclesias Anglicanae," p. 22.] +</p> +<p> +And now I will add only a few more words of a personal sort, and then +make an end. It was not my fate in the Church of England to be +regarded as a contentious or controversial spirit, nor as a man of +extreme opinions, or of a bitter temper. I remember indeed that I was +regarded, and even censured, as slow to advance, somewhat tame, +cautious to excess, morbidly moderate, as some one said. I remember +that the Catholics +<span style="vertical-align:-25%"> +<img alt="" src="images/i302.jpg"> +</span> +used to hold me somewhat cheap, and to +think me behindhand, uncatholic, over-English, and the like. But now, +is there anything in the extreme opposite of all this which I am not? +Ultramontane, violent, unreasoning, bitter, rejoicing in the miseries +of my neighbors, destructive, a very Apollyon, and the like. Some who +so describe me now are the same who were wont then to describe me as +the reverse of all this. They are yet catholicizing the Church of +England, without doubt more catholic still than I am. Well, what shall +I say? If I should say that I am not conscious of these changes, you +would only think me self-deceived. I will therefore only tell you +where I believe I am unchanged, and then where I am conscious of a +change, which, perhaps, will account for all you have to say of me. +</p> +<p> +I am unconscious, then, of any change in my love to England in all +that relates to the natural order. I am no politician, and I do not +set up for a patriot; but I believe, as St. Thomas teaches, that love +of country is a part of charity, and assuredly I have ever loved +England with a very filial love. My love for England <a name="303">{303}</a> begins with +the England of St. Bede. Saxon England, with all its tumults, seems to +me saintly and beautiful. Norman England I have always loved less, +because, though more majestic, it became continually less Catholic, +until the evil spirit of the world broke off the light yoke of faith +at the so-called Reformation. Still, I loved the Christian England +which survived, and all the lingering outlines of dioceses and +parishes, cathedrals and churches, with the names of saints upon them. +It is this vision of the past which still hovers over England and +makes, it beautiful, and full of memories of the kingdom of God. Nay, +I loved the parish church of my childhood, and the college chapel of +my youth, and the little church under a green hillside, where the +morning and evening prayers, and the music of the English Bible, for +seventeen years, became a part of my soul. Nothing is more beautiful +in the natural order, and if there were no eternal world I could have +made it my home. But these things are not England, they are only its +features, and I may say that my love was and is to the England which +lives and breathes about me, to my countrymen whether in or out of the +Church of England. With all our faults as a race, I recognize in them +noble Christian virtues, exalted characters, beautiful examples of +domestic life, and of every personal excellence which can be found, +where the fulness of grace and truth is not, and much, too, which puts +to shame those who are where the fulness of grace and truth abounds. +So long as I believed the Church of England to be a part of the Church +of God I loved it, how well you know, and honored it with a filial +reverence, and labored to serve it, with what fidelity I can affirm, +with what, or if with any utility, it is not for me to say. And I love +still those who are in it, and I would rather suffer anything than +wrong them in word or deed, or pain them without a cause. To all this +I must add, lastly, and in a way above all, the love I bear to many +personal friends, so dear to me, whose letters I kept by me till two +years ago, though more than fifty of them are gone into the world +unseen, all these things are sweet to me still beyond all words that I +can find to express it. +</p> +<p> +You will ask me then, perhaps, why I have never manifested this +before? It is because when I left you, in the full, calm, deliberate, +and undoubting belief that the light of the only truth led me from a +fragmentary Christianity into the perfect revelation of the day of +Pentecost, I believed it to be my duty to walk alone in the path in +which it led me, leaving you all unmolested by any advance on my part. +If any old friend has ever written to me, or signified to me his wish +to renew our friendship, I believe he will bear witness to the +happiness with which I have accepted the kindness offered to me. But I +felt that it was my act which had changed our relations, and that I +had no warrant to assume that a friendship, founded upon agreement in +our old convictions, would be continued when that foundation had been +destroyed by myself, or restored upon a foundation altogether new. And +I felt, too, a jealousy for truth. It was no human pride which made me +feel that I ought not to expose the Catholic Church to be rejected in +my person. Therefore I held on my own course, seeking no one, but +welcoming every old friend—and they have been many—who came to me. +This has caused a suspension of nearly fourteen years in which I have +never so much as met or exchanged a line with many who till then were +among my nearest friends. This, too, has given room for many +misapprehensions. It would hardly surprise me if I heard that my old +friends believed me to have become a cannibal. +</p> +<p> +But perhaps you will say, This does not account for your hard words +against us and the Church of England. When I read your late pamphlet I +said to myself, Have I ever written such hard words as these? I will +not quote them, but truly I do not think <a name="304">{304}</a> that, in anything I +have ever written, I have handled at least any person as you, my dear +friend, in your zeal, which I respect and honor, have treated certain +very exalted personages who are opposed to you. But let this pass. It +would not excuse me even if I were to find you in the same +condemnation. +</p> +<p> +One of my anonymous censors writes that "as in times past I had +written violently against the Church of Rome, so now I must do the +same against the Church of England." Now I wish he would find, in the +books I published when out of the Church, the hard sayings he speaks +of. It has been my happiness to know that such do not exist. I feel +sure that my accuser had nothing before his mind when he risked this +controversial trick. I argued, indeed, against the Catholic and Roman +Church, but I do not know of any railing accusations. How I was +preserved from it I cannot tell, except by the same divine goodness +which afterward led me into the perfect light of faith. +</p> +<p> +But I have written, some say, hard things of the Church of England. +Are they hard truths or hard epithets? If they are hard epithets, show +them to me, and I will erase them with a prompt and public expression +of regret; but if they be hard facts, I cannot change them. It is +true, indeed, that I have for the last fourteen years incessantly and +unchangingly, by word and by writing, borne my witness to the truths +by which God has delivered me from the bondage of a human authority in +matters of faith. I have borne my witness to the presence and voice of +a divine, and therefore infallible, teacher, guiding the Church with +his perpetual assistance, and speaking through it as his organ. I have +also borne witness that the Church through which he teaches is that +which St. Augustine describes by the two incommunicable notes—that it +is "spread throughout the word" and "united to the Chair of Peter." +[Footnote 68] I know that the corollaries of these truths are severe, +peremptory, and inevitable. If the Catholic faith be the perfect +revelation of Christianity, the Anglican Reformation is a cloud of +heresies; if the Catholic Church be the organ of the Holy Ghost, the +Anglican Church is not only no part of the Church, but no church of +divine foundation. It is a human institution, sustained as it was +founded by a human authority, without priesthood, without sacraments, +without absolution, without the real presence of Jesus upon its +altars. I know these truths are hard. It seems heartless, cruel, +unfilial, unbrotherly, ungrateful so to speak of all the beautiful +fragments of Christianity which mark the face of England, from its +thousand towns to its green villages, so dear even to us who believe +it to be both in heresy and in schism. You must feel it so. You must +turn from me and turn against me for saying it; but if I believe it, +must I not say it? And if I say it, can I find words more weighed, +measured, and deliberate than those I have used? If you can, show them +to me, and so that they are adequate, I will use them always +hereafter. God knows I have never written a syllable with the intent +to leave a wound. I have erased, I have refrained from writing and +speaking, many, lest I should give more pain than duty commanded me to +give. I cannot hope that you will allow of all I say. But it is the +truth. I have refrained from it, not only because it is a duty, but +because I wish to disarm those who divert men from the real point at +issue by accusations of bitterness and the like. It has been my lot, +more than of most, to be in these late years on the frontier which +divides us. And—why I know not—people have come to me with their +anxieties and their doubts. What would you have done in my place? That +which you have done in your own; which, <i>mutato nomine</i>, has been my +duty and my burden. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 68: <i>S. Aug. Op.</i>, tom, ii., pp. 119, 120; torn, x., p. 93] +</p> +<p> +And now I have done. I have a hope that the day is coming when all +<a name="305">{305}</a> in England who believe in the supernatural order, in the +revelation of Christianity, in the inspiration of Holy Scripture, in +the divine certainty of dogmatic tradition, in the divine obligation +of holding no communion with heresy and with schism, will be driven in +upon the lines of the only stronghold which God has constituted as +"the pillar and ground of the truth." This may not be, perhaps, as +yet; but already it is time for those who love the faith of +Christianity, and look with sorrow and fear on the havoc which is +laying it waste among us, to draw together in mutual kindness and +mutual equity of judgment. That I have so ever treated you I can truly +say; that I may claim it at your hands I am calmly conscious; but +whether you and others accord it to me or not, I must leave it to the +Disposer of hearts alone to determine. Though we are parted now, it +may not be for ever; and morning by morning, in the holy Sacrifice, I +pray that the same light of faith which so profusely fell upon myself, +notwithstanding all I am, may in like manner abundantly descend upon +you who are in all things so far above me, save only in that one gift +which is not mine, but his alone who is the Sovereign Giver of all +grace. +</p> +<p class="cite"> + Believe me, my dear friend,<br> + Always affectionately yours,<br> + HENRY EDWARD MANNING.<br> +<br><br> + ST. MARY'S, BAYSWATER,<br> + Sept. 27, 1864. +</p> +<p> +P.S.—My attention has just been called to the concluding pages of the +last number of the <i>Quarterly Review</i>, in which I am again described +by a writer who evidently has abilities to know better, to be in +"ecstasies." The writer represents, as the sum or chief argument of my +"Second Letter to an Anglican Friend," the passing reference I there +made to the Lord Chancellor's speech. I quoted this to prove that the +late judgment is a part of the law, both of the land and of the Church +of England. But the whole of the letter, excepting this single point, +is an argument to show that the vote of the Convocation carries with +it no divine certainty, and resolves itself into the private judgment +of the majority who passed it. For all this argument the writer has +not a word. I cannot be surprised that he fills out his periods with +my "ecstasies," "shouts of joy," "wild paeans," a quotation from +"Shylock," and other things less fitting. This is not to reason, but +to rail. Is it worthy? Is it love of truth? Is it good faith? Is it +not simply the fallacy of evasion? I can assure him that this kind of +controversy is work that will not stand. We are in days when +personalities and flimsy rhetoric will not last long. Neither will it +bear to be tried by "the fire," nor will it satisfy, I was about to +say, nor will it mislead, men who are in earnest for truth or for +salvation. I had hoped that this style of controversy had been cured +or suppressed by a greater sincerity and reality of religious thought +in these days of anxiety and unbelief. There either is, or is not, a +divine Person teaching perpetually through the Church in every age, +and therefore now as always, generating faith with divine certainty in +the minds of men. This question must be answered; and, as men answer +it, we know where to class them, and how to deal with them. All the +evasions and half-arguments of such writers are becoming daily more +and more intolerable to those of the English people—and they are a +multitude—who would give all that they count dear, and life itself, to +know and to die in the full and certain light of the revelation of God +in Jesus Christ. +<br><br> +H. E. M. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="306">{306}</a> +<br> +<h2>Translated from Le Correspondant. +<br><br> +A RUSSIAN RELIGIOUS. +<br><br> +BY PRINCE AUGUSTIN GALITZIN.</h2> +<br> +<p> +On the 6th of May, 1840, in a little hut upon the slope of that chain +of mountains which separates the northern from the southern states of +the American Union, died an old man who had spent his life in +spreading the faith through those distant regions. A crowd of persons +surrounded his bed in tears; for during half a century he had been the +depositary of public misfortunes, domestic troubles, and spiritual +distress. Though known by the humble name of Father Smith, this priest +was not a native of the land which received his last breath: he was a +Russian by birth, and his name was Galitzin. +</p> +<p> +On the 1st of September in the same year eight women landed at New +York, clad all in black, and wearing no ornament but a cross on the +breast. They came to educate new generations in the New World. The +eldest of them was not, like her sisters, a Frenchwoman; the same +blood ran in her veins as in those of the missionary just dead, and +her heart beat with the same love. She too was a Russian, and her name +was Madame Elizabeth Galitzin. +</p> +<p> +Born at St. Petersburg in 1795, the Princess Elizabeth was the +daughter of a woman of whom it is praise enough to say that she was +the worthiest and most intimate friend of Madame Swetchine, who called +her "her second conscience." [Footnote 69] On the day when Elizabeth +reached her fifteenth year, her mother confided to her the secret that +she had become a Catholic, and told the reasons which had induced her +not, as is still supposed in Russia, to abandon the faith of her +fathers, but to return to it in all its integrity. Elizabeth thus +describes the emotion which she felt in listening to this disclosure, +and the influence which it had upon her own future. [Footnote 70] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 69: <i>Lettres de Mme. Swetchine</i>, I. 321. ] +<br><br> + [Footnote 70: This extract and the details that follow are taken + from or confirmed by the Rev. A. Guidée's <i>Vie du P. Rozaven</i> and + the Rev. J. Gagarin's notice of Madame Galitzin in his <i>Etudes de + théologie, de philosophie et d'histoire</i>, vol. ii.] +</p> +<p> +"The secret which my mother confided to me filled me with despair; I +burst into tears, without uttering a word. For several days I wept +bitterly whenever I was alone, and during the night. I believed that +my mother had committed a great sin, because the government punished +so severely those who forsook the religion of the country. The reasons +which she gave made no impression on me; I did not even understand +them: the moment of the <i>fiat lux</i> was not yet come. From that day I +felt an implacable hatred of the Catholic religion and its ministers, +especially of the Jesuits, who, as I supposed, had effected my +mother's conversion. One night, as I was lamenting my isolated +condition, separated from my mother by this division of sentiments, I +was struck by the sudden thought, 'If the Jesuits have gained over so +excellent a woman as mamma,—a woman so reasonable, so well-informed, +and of so much experience, what will they not do with an ignorant, +unsophisticated girl like me? I must protect myself against their +persecutions. I firmly believe that the Greek Church is the true +church; I am resolved to be faithful to it unto death. To withdraw +myself effectually from the seductions of the Jesuits, I will write +down a vow that I will never change my religion.' No sooner said than +<a name="307">{307}</a> done. I rose at once, and despite the darkness wrote out my vow +in due form, invoking the wrath of God if I ever broke it. Then I went +back to bed, feeling much more composed, and believing that I had +gained a great victory over the devil. Alas! it was he that guided my +pen. For four years I repeated that vow every day when I said my +prayers; I never omitted it. I gloried in my obstinacy, and took every +opportunity to show my aversion to the Catholic religion, and above +all to the Jesuits. In this I was encouraged by my confessor. He asked +me one day if I had any leaning toward Catholicism. +</p> +<p> +"'I, father! I detest the Catholic religion and the Jesuits!' +</p> +<p> +"'Good, good!' said he; 'that is as it should be.' +</p> +<p> +"I let slip no occasion of defaming these holy men. I delighted in +repeating all the absurd stories that I heard against them, and +believed them as much as if they were articles of faith. But about the +middle of the fourth year an excellent Italian priest, who had given +me lessons, died. My mother sometimes requested me to go to the +Catholic church on days of great ceremony, and I durst not refuse, +though I used to go with rage in my heart. When she invited me, +however, to go with her to the funeral of the poor priest, I consented +willingly, out of gratitude, and respect for the memory of the +deceased. As soon as I entered the church a voice within me seemed to +say, 'You hate this church, but you will one day belong to it +yourself.' The words sank into my heart. I was deeply moved, and shed +abundance of tears all the while I remained in the church—I could not +tell why. A thought all at once occurred to me: 'You hate the +Jesuits,' said I to myself; 'is not hatred a sin? When did you learn +to consider this feeling a virtue? If it is a sin, I must not commit +it again: I will not hate the Jesuits then; I will pray for them.' And +so, in fact, I did, every day from that moment. I struggled against my +dislike for them. +</p> +<p> +"In the meanwhile we went to pass the summer away from home. In this +retirement our good Lord vouchsafed to speak to my heart and inspire +me with such a lively sorrow for my sins that I often passed part of +the night in weeping. I watered my couch with tears, and judging +myself unworthy to sleep on a bed, I cast myself on the ground, and +used to lie there until fatigue obliged me to return to my pillow. At +the end of three months we went back to St. Petersburg, and I there +learned that a cousin of mine [Footnote 71] had become a convert. I +was deeply pained. I accused the Jesuits of being the cause of the +step, and had hard work not to yield to my old hatred of them. I +avoided speaking with my cousin alone, because I did not want to +receive the confidence which I knew she was anxious to give me. But at +last, to my great regret, I had to listen to her. When she had told me +what I was so unwilling to know, I burst into tears, and replied: +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 71: The lady here mentioned was the mother of Monseigneur + de Ségur. ] +</p> +<p> +"'If you believe that the Catholic religion is the true one, you were +right to embrace it; but I do not understand how you could believe +it.' +</p> +<p> +"'Oh,' said she, 'if you would only read something that my mother +[Footnote 72] has written on the Greek schism and the truth of the +Catholic Church, you would be persuaded as I was.' +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 72: The Countess Rostopchine, whom Madame de Staël + mentions with so much praise in her <i>Dix années d'exil</i>. ] +</p> +<p> +"'You may send me whatever you wish,' I answered, 'but you may be +certain that it will not affect me. I am too firmly convinced that +truth lives in the Greek Church.' +</p> +<p> +"I went home in great distress of mind. For the first time in four +years I omitted to repeat my vow before going to bed; it seemed to me +rash. I retired, but God would not let me sleep; he filled my mind +with salutary thoughts. 'I must examine this matter,' said I, 'it is +certainly worth the <a name="308">{308}</a> trouble; it is something of too much +consequence to be deceived about.' I thought over all that I knew +about the Catholic faith, and at that moment God opened my eyes. I saw +as clear as day that hitherto I had been in the wrong, and the truth +was to be found only in the Catholic Church. 'It is our pride,' I +exclaimed, 'which prevents our acknowledging the supremacy of the +Pope: to-morrow I will embrace the truth. Yet how can I? And my vow? +Ah, but the vow is null; it can be no obstacle to the fulfilment of my +resolution. If I had taken an oath to commit a murder, the oath would +have been a sin, and to fulfil it would be another. I will not commit +the second sin. I will not put off being a Catholic beyond to-morrow.' +</p> +<p> +"I waited impatiently for day that I might read my aunt's little +treatise,—not because I needed arguments to convince me, but I +wanted to have it to say that I had read something. At day-break I +wrote to my cousin these words: 'Send me the manuscript, pray for me, +and hope.' I read it quickly; it consisted of not more than thirty +pages. I found in it all that I had said to myself during the night. I +hesitated no longer, but hastened to my mother, declared myself a +Catholic, and begged her to send for Father Rozaven. He came the same +morning. He was not a little surprised at the unexpected intelligence, +and asked me if I was ready to suffer persecution, even death itself, +if need were, for the love of the religion which I was going to +embrace. My blood froze in my veins, but I answered: 'I hope +everything from the grace of God.' The good father doubted no longer +the sincerity of my conversion, and promised to hear my confession the +next day but one, that is, the 18th of October. It was during the +night of the 15th and 16th of October, 1815, that God spoke for me the +words <i>fiat lux.</i>" +</p> +<br> +<p> +After she had been received into the Church, Father Rozaven said to +her: "I wish to establish in your heart a great love of God which +shall manifest itself not by fine sentiments but by practical results, +and shall lead you to fulfil with zeal and courage all your duties +without exception. I want you to strive ardently to acquire the solid +virtues of humility, love of your neighbor, patience and conformity to +the will of God. I want to see in you a grandeur, an elevation, and a +firmness of soul, and to teach you to seek and find your consolation +in God." +</p> +<p> +The princess became all that her wise director wished her to be; and +the constant practice of the fundamental Christian virtues soon led +her to aim at a still more perfect life. Even her mother for a long +time opposed her design. Her friends ridiculed her for wanting to lead +what they called a "useless" life. Sensitive to this reproach, so +constantly made by people who themselves do nothing at all, she begged +the learned Jesuit to furnish her with weapons to repel it. Her +request called forth the following excellent reply, which may be read +with especial profit just now, when so much is said about the +uselessness of nuns: +</p> +<p> +"Tell me, my child, have you read the catechism? One of the first +questions is, Why has God created us and placed us in this world? To +know him, love him, and serve him, and by this means to obtain +everlasting life. It does not say, to be 'useful.' Even when a nun is +of no use to others, she is useful to herself, and to be so is her +first duty; she labors to sanctify herself and to save her soul. Is +not this the motive which led St. Paul, St. Anthony, and so many +thousands of anchorets into the desert? These saints were certainly +not fools. Beside, is it true that nuns are useless? Was it not the +story of the virtues of St. Anthony which determined the conversion of +St. Augustine? and certainly this conversion was something far greater +than all that St. Anthony could have done by remaining in the world. +But to say nothing of the example of the saints, are not nuns useful +to each <a name="309">{309}</a> other? Do you see no advantage in the union of twenty or +thirty persons, more or less, who incite each other to the acquisition +of virtue, and take each other by the hand in their journey to the +same goal, the salvation of their souls? And then again, many +religious communities devote themselves to the education of youth; and +surely there are few occupations more useful than bringing up in the +knowledge and practice of religion young girls who are destined to +become mothers of families, and to fulfil all the duties of society +that belong to their sex." +</p> +<br> +<p> +A devotion of this sort commended itself especially to our young +convert. She made choice of the new order of the Sacred Heart, and +after eleven years' delay finally entered it at Metz in 1826. She made +her vows in 1828 at Rome, and remained there until she was ordered to +France in 1834 and made general secretary of the congregation. In 1839 +she was chosen assistant mother, and appointed to visit the houses of +the Sacred Heart in America, and to found some new ones. Her +correspondence during this period with her mother is now before me, +and will show, far better than any words of mine, not only her piety, +but the serenity of her soul and that love of country and kindred, +which religion, far from extinguishing, can alone purify by carrying +it beyond the narrow boundaries of this life. Like those austere +Christians whose lives Count de Montalembert has written, she kept a +large place in her heart for love and friendship, and clung ardently +to those natural ties which she did not feel called upon to break when +she gave herself to God. +</p> +<p> +I shall then leave Madame Elizabeth to speak in her own words; and in +so doing, it seems to me that I am fulfilling the wish of Madame +Swetchine, who wrote thus to Father Gagarin (ii. 360): "There are many +details respecting her life which might be found and authenticated, +and I am convinced that many interesting particulars might be obtained +from her correspondence during her two journeys in America." +</p> +<br> +<p class="cite"> + NEW YORK, Sept. 1, 1840. +<br><br> + MY DEAREST MAMMA,—I arrived at New York a few hours ago, after a + voyage of forty-five days. Our voyage, thank God, was a good one, + despite thirty-two days of contrary winds. We had neither storms nor + rough weather; the trip was a long one, that is all. Having two + priests with us, we had mass often; you may imagine what a + consolation it was to us. I was sea-sick only one week; after that, + so well that I passed a great part of my time in drawing. +<br><br> + "I am here for only four days; at least I trust that the business + which I have to transact with the bishop will not keep me longer. + Then I shall go with my seven companions and a worthy priest who has + us in charge, to St. Louis in the state of Missouri, 2,000 versts + from New York. They say that we shall reach there in twelve days; by + this reckoning we shall arrive at our first house about the 20th of + September. I believe that I shall die of joy when I get there; for + here in the midst of the world, though surrounded by excellent + people, who show us a thousand attentions, I am like a fish out of + water. I will write to you as soon as I reach St. Louis. I cannot + remain with our family of the Sacred Heart there more than a + fortnight, for I must then visit two other establishments not far + distant. I shall return to St. Louis, and leave there about the + middle of November for our house at St. Michael, near New Orleans, + which is 1,500 versts from St. Louis. After a few days' rest I shall + then go to our house at Grand Coteau, also in Louisiana; and after + staying there three weeks I shall return to pass the winter at St. + Michael. I hope to do well there, for the climate is warmer than + that of Rome. In the spring I shall make another visitation of the + houses in Missouri, and then go back to New York to begin the + foundation <a name="310">{310}</a> of a new establishment there. So you see I shall + not be very long in any one place. +<br><br> + "What a consolation it will be for me if I find a letter from you at + St. Louis! I am impatient for news of you and my brothers. How did + they take the news of my departure for America? With indifference + perhaps; but they are far from being indifferent to me. God knows + what wishes I form for them, and how sweet it is to me to be able to + offer up for them the fatigues and petty sufferings which divine + Providence sends us. When you write to my brothers do not fail to + remember me to them, for, they are dearer to me than ever in our + Lord. +<br><br> + "I was in hopes of finding our relative in America; but he is dead. + He died universally regretted. Everybody looked upon him as a saint. + I will make it a point to obtain his works and send them to you." +</p> +<br> +<p class="cite"> + "St. Louis, Nov. 9, 1840. +<br><br> + "I have had the consolation of receiving your letter dated the 15th + of July. Write to me now at St. Louis, at the <i>Academy</i> of the + Ladies of the Sacred Heart, for so they call here those religious + houses which receive pupils as boarders. For my part, I am + determined to send you this letter at once, because I am afraid that + Paris will be turned topsy-turvy by the remains of Bonaparte, which + are to be removed thither in the month of November. +<br><br> + "It is too true that our 'American uncle' is dead. You may suppose + how deeply I regret it. He was not a bishop; only a simple + missionary. He invariably refused all dignities, and devoted himself + for more than forty years to the missions, in which he displayed a + zeal worthy of an apostle. He died at the age of seventy-two, like a + saint as he had lived, having given himself to God since his + seventeenth year. The whole country in which he preached the gospel + weeps for him as for a father. His memory is revered in America + among Protestants as well as Catholics. I have been shown an article + about him in the <i>Gazette</i>: it gives his whole history, and it would + be impossible to write a more touching eulogy of him. I have some of + his works; they are excellent. +<br><br> + "I expected that my departure for America would have but little + effect upon my brothers. Our good Lord permits it to be so, and we + must wish whatever he wishes. A day will come, I trust, when their + hearts will be touched. Let us wait and pray, and suffer with more + fervor than ever. Remember me to them and to my aunts. Beg for me + the light of the Holy Ghost: I need it sorely, for my post is a very + difficult one." +</p> +<br> +<p class="cite"> + "ST. MICHAEL, Dec. 6, 1840., +<br><br> + "Here I am, near New Orleans; but I shall soon start on another + journey, and not be at rest again before the month of June. I am now + in the land of the sugar-cane; it is very nice to eat, or rather to + suck. As if I brought the cold with me in all my travels, I had + scarcely arrived here when bitter cold weather set in, and the ice + was as thick as a good fat finger. The weather has moderated since + then—to my great satisfaction, for I have not enough of the spirit + of mortification to bear cold very well. I begin to believe that + there is not a single warm country under the sun, and that the + reputation of those lands that are called so is not well-founded. +<br><br> + "I send you only these few words, that you may not be uneasy about + me; for I have no leisure. Remember me to my brothers. Bless me, and + believe, dear mamma, in my tender and respectful attachment." +</p> +<br> +<p class="cite"> + "ST. MICHAEL, Feb. 28, 1841. +<br><br> + "I leave this place on the 15th of March, and shall be in St. Louis + for the feast of the Annunciation. I shall remain three weeks at + three of our houses in Missouri, and then go to Cincinnati and + Philadelphia; so I hope to be in New York by the beginning of May. + Do not fear on my <a name="311">{311}</a> account the dangers of railroads and + steamboats. Those who are sent on a mission are under the special + protection of divine Providence. I have never met with the slightest + accident; and this constant journeying about has moreover rid me of + my fever. I am perfectly well. I rise every morning at twenty + minutes after four; I fast and abstain; and nothing hurts me. So + don't be uneasy about me. I think I shall stay in New York until + November, if God opposes no obstacle to my doing so; I shall then + make a last visit to our houses in Louisiana and Missouri, and sail + for Europe probably during the summer of 1842. In fifteen months I + shall be afloat again on the great ocean. I hope Alexander will not + be off again before that, so that I may have the consolation of + seeing him once more. He is the only one of my brothers whom I may + never see again, and he was my Benjamin. Tell them I do not forget + them in my prayers, and I wish they would also remember me before + God: that will come some day, I hope. Pray have some masses said for + me; I have great need of them. If you only knew what it was to hold + such an office as mine! The responsibility is enough to make one + tremble." +</p> +<br> +<p class="cite"> + "LOUISIANA, March 29, 1841. +<br><br> + "Before starting on my journey I must send you a few lines. It is a + little before my accustomed time for writing; but I shall be nearly + two months on the route before reaching New York, and I am afraid I + shall have no opportunity of writing except on my arrival in that + city, and after my return here. So do not be anxious on account of + my future silence: it will not be a sign of anything bad. I am + better than ever. Make your mind at rest about my health. Our Lord + gives me astonishing strength. Fatigue has no effect upon me." +</p> +<br> +<p class="cite"> + "NEW YORK, May 15, 1841. +<br><br> + "I arrived here without accident, and take comfort in thinking that + I shall be stationary now until October. Since I left Rome I have + not been six weeks at a time in any one place. I am about founding + an establishment here, and the task is no easy one, in any point of + view. The expenses to be incurred are enormous, and our resources, + to say the best of them, are very moderate. So I have begged our + mother-general to allow the 200 francs which you were so good as to + send us for postage, to be devoted to the first expenses of the + chapel. +<br><br> + "You have no idea how deeply our 'relative' is regretted here. He + was universally loved and respected. People look upon me with favor, + because I bear the same name." +</p> +<br> +<p class="cite"> + "NEW YORK, June 20, 1841. +<br><br> + "The climate of New York is very disagreeable. It was so cold + yesterday that even with a woollen coverlid I had hard work to keep + warm through the night. It is not cold two days in succession. The + temperature varies even between morning and evening—that is, when it + is not continually raining. I believe after all that the climate of + St. Petersburg is the best. Oar summers at least are superb, and we + have long days; but here it is hardly light, this time of year, at + half after four in the morning, and by half after seven in the + evening we need lamps. In fact, you must go to a cold climate if you + want to keep warm and to see well! +<br><br> + "I have had an agreeable surprise here, and you would never guess + what it is. It is to have <i>klioukva</i> [Footnote 73 ] to eat nearly + every day; it is the first time I have seen them since I left + Russia. This is absurd, I know, but I cannot tell you what pleasure + it gave me. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 73: Cranberries. ] +</p> +<p class="cite"> + "New York is an immense city; it has nearly 400,000 inhabitants, and + is as noisy as Paris. There are some 80,000 Catholics and only eight + churches, but religion is making progress. The next time I write to + you, it will be from our house of the Sacred <a name="312">{312}</a> Heart. I am + burning with impatience to be in it; for though we are extremely + comfortable with the good Sisters of Charity, who are truly sisters + to us, we nevertheless long to be at home, where we can live in + conformity to our rule and customs. +<br><br> + "What news of my brothers? How happy I shall be when you can tell me + that all is well with them! I would give a thousand lives for that. + The day and hour of God will come; let us be patient and pray. Say a + thousand affectionate things to them for me." +</p> +<br> +<p class="cite"> + "NEW YORK, Aug. 2, 1841. +<br><br> + "I dare say you will be pleased to learn, dear mamma, that I have + just opened a little mission among the Indian savages in Missouri, + 300 miles beyond St. Louis. Four of our community have been + established there. The population consists of 900 Indians, all + converted by the Jesuits. Thanks be to God, his kingdom is extending + itself, and what it loses on one side through the wiles of the + enemy, it gains on another. +<br><br> + "I never let a month pass without writing to you, despite my many + occupations, because I know your anxiety; but do not distress + yourself. I am, if possible, but too well, in every respect. Our + houses here are like those in Europe; while within doors we never + could suspect that we had been transplanted into the new world (that + used to be). Don't be afraid about crocodiles. The country abounds + in them, as it does in snakes; but nobody thinks of them, and I have + never even seen one. Several, however, have been pointed out to me; + but as my eyes were cast down, I saw nothing." +</p> +<br> +<p class="cite"> + "NEW YORK, Sept. 13, 1841. +<br><br> + "Our establishment is well under way; the house is finished, and we + have already twelve pupils. I have no doubt their number will + increase next month to twenty, and perhaps more, for there have been + already at least forty applications. Beside this, I have just + established a mission among the Potawatamie Indians in the Indian + Territory. There is a population of 3,000 Indians in the place where + our ladies are, 1,000 of whom are fervent Catholics; the others are + pagans, but to some extent civilized. We have there already a school + of fifty little girls, and a great many women come to learn from us + how to work. +<br><br> + "I shall leave New York and pass the winter in Louisiana. I am quite + well—better than in Europe; but I am over-burdened with work. You + may readily believe it when I tell you that beside governing this + house, and my province, which comprises seven houses, I have had to + paint three large pictures for the chapel, and to finish them in six + weeks. At last, thank God, they are done, and our chapel is really + charming. What a pity that you cannot come and hear mass in it!" +</p> +<br> +<p class="cite"> + "<i>En route</i>, between St. Michael and Grand Coteau, Dec. 4, 1841. +<br><br> + "From a tavern on the banks of the Mississippi I write to wish you + and all the family a happy New Year! I pray devoutly that it may be + fertile in graces and divine blessings; everything else is + superfluous and valueless, and therefore unnecessary. I have + travelled a good deal since I wrote you from Harrisburg, Penn. I am + now going to our house at Grand Coteau, where I shall stay about + five weeks; then I shall spend an equal time at St. Michael. This + will bring me to the end of February; after which I shall start for + St. Louis, and visit our other establishments in Missouri, including + our new mission among the Potawatamie savages. Don't let the word + 'savages' frighten you. They won't eat me; for they are more than + civilized. One thousand of them are Catholics, in the place to which + I have sent our sisters, who are only four in number, and have a + school which succeeds admirably. Our good savages are so fervent + that they come every day to church at half-past five in the morning. + They say their prayers, meditate for half an hour, and then hear + mass, <a name="313">{313}</a> during which they sing canticles in their savage + fashion. After mass one of the Indians teaches the catechism to + about thirty little boys and a like number of girls; that over, they + go off to their respective employments, and about six in the evening + they come back to the church to say their prayers together. It was + the Jesuits who converted this tribe, and they are still doing a + vast amount of good out there. I shall probably go there in April; + it will be a three-weeks' journey. After that I mean to return to + New York, and probably about the 1st of June I shall sail for Havre. + So there you have my route; you see that I lead the life of a + regular courier more than ever. But fortunately, to one who has the + happiness of being a religious, all things are indifferent, provided + they are in accordance with holy obedience. I am very much afraid I + shall miss some of your letters, for they must follow me at a + gallopping pace or they will not overtake me. +<br><br> + "Assure yourself, my dear mamma, that Russia is not the coldest + country in the world. The so-called burning Louisiana is colder. + From the 25th to the 30th of November we had hard frosts which + chilled us through and through. Perhaps I am mistaken, but I have a + pleasant recollection that in November at St. Petersburg we have + more rain than frost. In a word, now that I have tried, so to speak, + all climates, I am firmly persuaded that there is not a warm country + on the face of the earth, and I have resigned myself to look for + pleasant and eternal warmth only in the next world. +<br><br> + "What news of my brothers and my sisters-in-law? Are they as great + vagabonds as I? Ah, if their hearts and minds could only be composed + and settled in God alone! It will come, some day or other; we must + hope, even against all hope. Our Lord is the master of hearts, and + he wills from all eternity that these hearts shall be wholly his. A + touch of his grace will soften those of my brothers; the day of + illusions will pass away, and we shall sing eternally with them that + God is good and his mercies are unspeakable. A thousand kisses, dear + mamma; bless your dutiful and grateful daughter<br> + ELIZABETH." +</p> +<p> +In 1842 Madame Elizabeth went to Rome to give an account of her +fruitful mission to her superiors. I have before me a last letter of +hers, written to her mother, whom she had just lost at St. Petersburg +almost at the same hour in which her eldest brother died in Paris in +the bosom of the Catholic Church. +</p> +<p class="cite"> + "I confess to you," she says, "that for several months past, I have + continually felt impelled to make a sacrifice of my life for my + brothers. Perhaps you will think this presumptuous on my part, so I + will explain myself. When I am making my preparation for death, + according to custom, the thought often comes into my mind to offer + the sacrifice of my life in advance, and to beseech our Lord to + accept it, as well as all the sufferings I may have to undergo, + especially at that terrible moment when the soul is separated from + the body, in order that I may obtain the conversion of my brothers. + I have asked permission to transfer to them all the merit which, by + God's grace, I may acquire through resignation or suffering—not only + in my last sickness, but even during the period of life which yet + remains to me—so that, accumulating no more merits by way of + satisfaction for my own sins, I may have, for my part, purgatory + without any alleviation; for in that place of propitiation and peace + I can no longer be of any use to them. I hope our Lord will grant my + request: all I know is that since that time my habitual gladness of + heart is increased a hundred-fold, and that I think of death with + unspeakable consolation." +</p> +<p> +This sacrifice, which reminds one of a similar incident in the life of +St. Vincent de Paul, [Footnote 74] seems to have been <a name="314">{314}</a> accepted +by God. Returning to America in 1843, Madame Elizabeth had not time to +enjoy the fruits of her labors. She was attacked at St. Michael by the +yellow fever, and there fell asleep in the Lord on the feast of the +Immaculate Conception, saying: "I do not fear death; I long for it, if +it is God's will." [Footnote 75] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 74: One day, moved with compassion at the state of an + unfortunate priest, a doctor of theology, who had lost his faith, + because he had ceased to study the science of divinity, St. Vincent + de Paul besought God to restore to this man the liveliness of his + faith, offering to take up himself, if necessary, the burden which + this poor brother was unable to bear. His prayer was heard at once, + and for four years this great saint remained as it were deprived of + that faith which was nevertheless his life. "Do you know how he + passed through this trial?" says an admirable master of the + spiritual life. "He passed through it by becoming St. Vincent de + Paul; that is to say, all that this name signifies."—GRATRY, <i>Les + Sources</i>, p. 82.] +<br><br> + [Footnote 75: Writing from Lyons to Bishop Hughes in September, + 1842, Madame Galitzm said: "I avail myself of this opportunity to + write a few lines, although detained in my bed with the fever for + upward of three weeks. My health is in a poor state, and if I go + on as I did these two months, there is more prospect for me to go + to heaven next year than to return to America." The letter is in + English, which she wrote with apparent ease and considerable + approach to purity. ED. CATH. WORLD. ] +</p> +<p> +"What more glorious title of nobility," says Monseigneur the Duke +d'Aumale, "than to count saints and martyrs among one's ancestors?" My +object is not so much to lay claim to this distinction, as to show, +for the honor of my country, the part which some of her children have +taken in the genesis of civilization and Catholicism in America. And +this ambition will perhaps seem excusable to those who admit that +every gift of God ought to be an object of our most religious care. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>From The Month. +<br><br> +THE STOLEN SKETCH.</h2> +<br> +<p> +I was sitting in the National Gallery, copying one of Murillo's +glorious little beggar-boys. A tube of color fell from my box and +rolled out upon the floor. A gentleman passing picked it up, and +restored it to me. I thanked him; and then he lingered some minutes by +my chair, watching my work and giving me some useful hints with the +air of a person who thoroughly understands the art. I was striving to +be an artist, struggling through difficult uphill labor. I was not +acquainted with any one of the profession. I had no one to give me +counsel. Those few friendly words of advice from a stranger fell on my +ear like so many pearls, and I gathered them gratefully and stored +them fast in memory's richest jewel-casket. +</p> +<p> +After that he seemed to take an interest in my progress, gave me +valuable lessons, and occasionally lent me colors or brushes. I +wondered at myself for conversing with him fearlessly, for I was +usually shy of strangers; but his manner was so quiet and easy, his +tone so deferential, and he spoke so well on the subjects which +interested me most, that I forgot to be nervous, and listened and +answered with delight. He was copying a picture quite near to me, and +I felt humbled when returning to my own effort after glancing at his +masterly work. But he cheered me with kind words of encouragement, +which had a different effect upon me from my mother's fond admiration +and Hessie's eloquent praises. It was so new to be told to expect +success by one whose words might be hailed as a prophecy. I grew to +look forward with increased interest to my long day's work in the +gallery, and to think the place lonely when the kind artist <a name="315">{315}</a> was +not there. Before my picture was finished I felt that I had gained a +friend. +</p> +<p> +One afternoon on leaving the gallery I was dismayed to find that it +rained heavily. Quite unprepared for the wet, I yet shrank from the +expense of a cab. While standing irresolute upon the steps, I +presently saw my artist friend at my side. He shot open his umbrella, +and remarked on the unpleasant change in the weather. Perhaps he saw +my distress in my face, for he asked me how far I had to go. He also +was going to Kensington, he said, and begged permission to shelter me. +I was obliged to accept his offer, for it was getting late. It was one +of those evenings so dreaded by women who are forced to walk alone in +London, when the light fades quickly out, and darkness drops suddenly +upon the city. +</p> +<p> +Tying my thick veil over my face, and wondering at myself, I took his +arm and walked by his side through the twilight streets. I thought of +a time long ago when I used to get upon tiptoe to clasp my father's +arm, he laughing at my childish pride, while we sauntered up and down +the old garden at home, far away. Never, since that dear arm had been +draped in the shroud, had my hand rested on a man's sleeve. Memory +kept vexing me sorely; and I, who seldom cried, swallowed tears behind +my veil and went along in silence. Still I liked the walk. As we +passed on, sliding easily through those rough crowds which at other +times I dreaded so much, I felt keenly how good it is to be taken care +of. I seemed to be moving along in a dream. Even when it began to +thunder, and lightning flashed across our eyes, the storm could not +rouse me from my reverie. I felt no fear, stoutly protected as I was. +</p> +<br> + +<h2>II.</h2> +<p> +When we reached my home, a violent gust of rain made my friend step +inside the open doorway. I asked him to come into the parlor till the +shower should lighten; and he did so. My mother sat by the fender in +her armchair, the fire burned blithely, the tea-things were on the +table. The room looked very cosy after the stormy streets. +</p> +<p> +My mother received the unexpected visitor cordially. She had heard of +his kindness to me before. Hessie came in with the bread and butter, +in her brown housefrock, with her bright curls a little tossed, and +her blue eyes wondering wide at sight of a stranger. My mother asked +him to stay for tea, and I went upstairs to take off my bonnet. +</p> +<p> +Never before had I felt so anxious to have my hair neat, and to find +an immaculate collar and cuffs. My hands trembled as I tied my apron +and drew on my slippers. This was always to me a pleasant hour, when +my return made Hessie and my mother glad, when I got refreshingly +purified from the stains and odor of paint, and when we all had tea +together. To-night a certain excitement mingled with my usual quiet +thankful satisfaction. +</p> +<p> +I hurried down to the parlor. Hessie was filling the cups, and Edward +Vance (our new friend) was talking pleasantly to my mother. He looked +up as I came in, and when I reached my seat a sensation of gladness +was tingling from my heart's core to my finger-ends. My mother took my +hand and fondled it in hers, and thanked him for his kindness to her +"good child." I felt that he could not but sympathize with my dear, +sick, uncomplaining mother, and I somehow felt it sweet that she +should give me that little word of praise while speaking to him. After +tea Hessie played us dreamy melodies from Mozart in the firelight, and +I sat by mother's side tracing pictures in the burning coals. +</p> +<p> +After that first evening Edward Vance often came to our house. At +these times our conversation was chiefly upon art-subjects. Hessie and +my mother were deeply interested in them for my sake; I, for their +own, and for <a name="316">{316}</a> the hopes which were entwined about them. +</p> +<p> +I thought him an ambitious man, one whose whole soul was bent upon +success. I liked him for it. I thought, "The noblest man is he who +concentrates all his powers upon one worthy aim, and wins a +laurel-crown from his fellow-men as the reward of his stead-fastness." +Yet he seemed often troubled when we asked him about his own works. +</p> +<p> +A remark I overheard one day in the gallery puzzled me. Some one said, +"Vance? Oh, yes! he's a clever copyist—a determined plodder; but he +originates nothing." I don't know that I had any right to be +indignant; but I was. That very evening I asked him to show us some of +his designs. His face got a dark troubled look upon it, and he evaded +the promise. +</p> +<p> +Meantime he took a keen interest in my work. He taught me how to +finish my etchings more delicately, and his remarks on my compositions +were always most useful. His suggestions were peculiarly happy. The +drawing was ever enhanced in strength or beauty by his advice. His +ideas were just and true; his taste daintily critical. This convinced +me that the remark overheard in the gallery was made either in +ignorance or ill-nature; or perhaps that there were more artists +called Vance than one. +</p> +<p> +He came often now, very often. I ceased to feel angry at myself for +starting when his knock came. Many small things, too trivial to be +mentioned, filled my life with a delicious calm, and breathed a +rose-colored atmosphere around me. Everything in my inner and outer +world had undergone a change. I grew subject to idle fits at my work; +but then the suspended energy came back with such a rush of power, +almost like inspiration, that I accomplished far more than I ever had +done in the former quiet days when there was little sunshine to be +had, and I thought I had been born to live contentedly under a cloud +all my life. Art seemed glorified a thousandfold in my eyes. The +galleries had looked to me before like dim treasuries of phantom +beauty, shadowy regions of romance and perfection, through the gates +of which I might peer, though the key was not mine. Now they teemed +with a ripe meaning; the meaning which many glorious souls that once +breathed and wrought on this earth have woven into their creations;—a +meaning which unlocked for me the world of love, and gave me long +bright visions of its beautiful vistas. +</p> +<p> +My mother looked from Edward Vance to me, and from me to him; and I +knew her thought. It sweetened yet more that food of happiness on +which I lived. Something said to me, "You may meet his eye fearlessly, +place your hand frankly in his clasp, follow his feet gladly." +</p> +<p> +One evening after he had gone my mother stroked my head lying on her +knee. +</p> +<p> +"You are very happy, Grace?" she said. +</p> +<p> +"I am, mother," I whispered. +</p> +<p> +"Ah! your life is set to music, my love," she murmured; "the old +tune." +</p> +<br> +<h2>III.</h2> +<p> +Never was one sister so proud of another as I of Hessie. She was only +seventeen, three years younger than I, and I felt almost a motherly +love for her. She was slight and fair, and childish both in face and +disposition. I gloried in her beauty; her head reminded me of +Raffaelle's angels. I thought that one day I should paint a picture +with Hessie for my model—a picture which should win the love and +admiration of all who gazed. One leisure time, in the midst of my +happiness, I suddenly resolved to commence the work. I chose a scene +from our favorite poem of <i>Enid</i>—the part where the mother goes to +her daughter's chamber, bearing Geraint's message, and finds +</p> +<a name="317">{317}</a> +<br> +<pre> + 'Half disarrayed, as to her rest, the girl, + Whom first she kissed on either cheek, and then + On either shining shoulder laid a hand, + And kept her off, and gazed into her face, + And told her all their converse in the hall, + Proving her heart. But never light and shade + Coursed one another more on open ground, + Beneath a troubled heaven, than red and pale + Across the face of Enid, hearing her; + While slowly falling, as a scale that falls + When weight is added only grain by grain, + Sank her sweet head upon her gentle breast. + Nor did she lift an eye, nor speak a word, + Rapt in the fear, and in the wonder of it." +</pre> +<p> +I made a sketch. Never had I been so happy in any attempt. My own +mother, worn, sad, dignified—I gave her face and form to the poet's +conception of Enid's mother. And Hessie made a very lovely Enid, with +the white drapery clinging to her round shoulders, and her golden head +drooped. I wrought out all the accessories with scrupulous care—the +shadowy old tower-chamber; the open window, and the dim drifts of +cloud beyond; the stirring tapestry; the lamp upon the table, flinging +its yellow light on the rich faded dress of the mother and on Enid's +glistening hair. +</p> +<p> +I toiled at the sketch almost as if I had meant to make it a finished +picture. It was large. I lavished labor upon it with a passionate +energy. I never wearied of conjuring up ideas of beauty, to lay them +in luxurious profusion under my brush. I gloried in the work of my +hands; and yet I felt impatient when others praised it. I burned to +show them what the finished picture should prove to be. This sketch, +much as I prized it as an earnest of future success, I held only as +the shadow of that which must one day live in perfection on the +canvas. So I raved in my dreams. +</p> +<p> +I had resolved not to speak of it to Edward Vance till I had completed +the sketch. I had Hessie's promise not to show it, not to tell him. I +worked at it daily, not feeling that I worked, but only that I +lived—only that my soul was accomplishing its appointed task of +creation; that it breathed in its element, revelled in its God-given +power; that it was uttering that which should stir many other souls +with a myriad blessed inspirations, long after the worn body had +refused to shelter it longer, and eternity had summoned it from the +world of endeavor to that rest which, in the fever of its earnestness, +it knew not yet how to appreciate. +</p> +<p> +And Hessie stood for me, patient day after day. +</p> +<pre> + "But never light and shade + Coursed one another more on open ground, + Beneath a troubled heaven, than red and pale + Across the face of Enid, hearing her." +</pre> +<p> +I read aloud the passage again and again, that Hessie might feel it as +well as I. And truly, as I worked, the color on Hessie's cheek changed +and changed under my eyes, till I forgot my purpose in wondering at +her. One day, while I laid down my brush questioning her, she burst +into tears, and sobbed in childish impetuous distress. She would not +answer my anxious questions; she shunned my sympathy. +</p> +<p> +But that night, before I slept, I had my little sister's secret. She +worshipped Edward Vance as simple childish natures worship heroes whom +they exalt to the rank of gods. +</p> +<br> + +<h2>IV.</h2> +<p> +I had no more joy, no more heart to work. I laid my sketch in my +portfolio, and said that it was finished, and that I should not +commence the picture at present. I could not work looking at Hessie's +changed face. +</p> +<p> +What should I do? How should I restore happiness to my little sister? +This was the question which haunted me. Night or day it would give me +no peace. I could not rest at home. I undertook a work once more at +the National Gallery, and stayed away all day. Often I sat for hours, +and did nothing, thinking with painful pertinacity of that one +question, "How should I restore happiness to my little sister?" Edward +Vance had never asked me to be his wife. Perhaps Hessie did not guess +that I had believed and hoped that he would. My mother—but then a +mother's eye will see where others are blind. +</p> +<p> +I sat in my deserted corner of the gallery, dropping tears into my +lap, <a name="318">{318}</a> and pondering my question. If my mother were dead, if I +were married, how lonely would not Hessie be in her misery! But if +Hessie were a happy wife, why, I could support myself and live in +peace and independence, blessed with congenial occupation, solaced by +the love and joy of my art. "Edward Vance must never ask me to be his +wife." I repeated the words again and again, till the resolve burnt +itself into my heart. +</p> +<p> +"I believe that he has loved me, that he loves me now; but I can so +wrap myself up in my work, so seem to forget him in my art, that I +shall cease to be loveable; and then he must, he will, perceive +Hessie's affection, and take her to his heart. He cannot help it, +beautiful and fresh and simple as she is." So I looked at her face as +she lay dreaming, sullen and grieved like a vexed child, even in +sleep; and I vowed to carry out my strange resolve—to crush my love +for Edward, to destroy his for me, to link the two dear ones together, +and go on my life alone, with no comforter but God and my toil. It was +but a short time since I had contemplated such a prospect with calm +content; and why could I not forget all that had lately been, and +return to my serene quiet? I said it should be so. +</p> +<p> +But in this I assumed a power over my own destiny and the destinies of +others which none but God had a right to sway, and he had entered it +against me in the great book of good and evil. He had planted in my +heart a natural affection, and laid at my feet a treasure of +happiness. I had stretched forth my hand to uproot that beautiful +flower which should have borne me joy. I had turned aside from the +rich gift, and thought to sweep it from my path. I had vowed to do +evil, that good might come of it; and a mighty hand was already +extended to punish my presumption. +</p> +<br> +<h2>V.</h2> +<p> +In pursuance of my resolve, I absented myself from home as much as +possible, leaving Hessie to entertain Edward Vance when he came. I did +not intend to quarrel with him—I could not have done that; but I +wanted him to see more of Hessie and less of me. I had so much faith +in her superior beauty and loveableness, that in the morbid frame of +mind into which I had fretted myself, I believed my object would soon +be accomplished. +</p> +<p> +I had succeeded in obtaining some tuitions; and between the time which +they occupied and the hours spent in the galleries, I was very little +at home. My mother looked at me uneasily; but I smiled and deceived +her with pleasant words. On coming home late, I sometimes heard that +Mr. Vance had been there; my mother always told me—Hessie never. I +longed to lay my head on my mother's knee and say, "Did he ask for +me?" but the voice never would come. +</p> +<p> +Sometimes he came, as of old, to spend the whole evening. I would not +notice how he bore my altered ways. I sat all the time apart by the +window, seemingly absorbed, puzzling out some difficult design, or +working up some careful etching. I did not ask his advice; I did not +claim his sympathy with my occupation. I sat wrapped up within myself, +grave and ungenial, while he lingered by Hessie at the piano, and +asked her to play her soft airs again. And all the time I sat staring +from my paper into the little patch of garden under the window, +twining my sorrow about the old solitary tree, building my unhealthy +purpose into the dull wall of discolored brick, which shut us and our +troubles from our neighbors. I sat listening to the plaintive tunes +with which so many associations were inwoven, hearing Hessie's musical +prattle—she was always gay while he stayed—and Edward's rich voice +and pleasant laugh, contrasting with them as a deep wave breaks in +among the echoes of a rippling creek. I sat and listened in silence, +while all my life <a name="319">{319}</a> rebelled in every vein and pulse at the false +part I acted. +</p> +<p> +But it was too late now to retract. Though every day proved to me that +the task I had undertaken was too difficult, the step had been made +and could not be retraced. I had lifted my burden, and I must bear it +even to the end. I had no doubt from Hessie's shy happy face that at +least my object must be attained, whatever it might cost myself. +</p> +<p> +I had never shown Edward Vance the dear sketch for which I had once so +keenly coveted his approval. So absorbed had I lately been in other +thoughts, that it lay by forgotten. One evening my mother desired +Hessie to bring it out and show it to him. I seldom looked at him, but +for a moment I now glanced at his face. His eyelids flickered, and a +strange expression passed over his countenance. It was admiration, +surprise, and something else—I knew not what; something strange and +unpleasant. The admiration, I jealously believed, was for Hessie's +face in its downcast beauty. He gazed at it long, but put it aside +with a few cold words of commendation. I felt, with an intolerable +pang, that even so he had put me aside, and thought no more about me. +But at different times afterward I saw him glance to where the sketch +lay. +</p> +<p> +That night my mother kept me with her after Hessie had gone to bed. +She questioned me anxiously; asked me if I had quarrelled with Edward +Vance. I said, "No, mother, why should we quarrel?" +</p> +<p> +By-and-by she said, "Grace, can it be that he has not asked you to be +his wife?" +</p> +<p> +I answered quickly, "Oh, no; it is Hessie whom he loves." +</p> +<p> +My mother looked puzzled and grieved, though I smiled in her face. +</p> +<br> +<h2>VI.</h2> +<p> +One evening I came home and found Hessie dull and out of humor. My +mother told me that Mr. Vance had called and mentioned that he was +about to leave town for some weeks. He had left his regards for me. I +knew by Hessie's face that he had said nothing to make her happy +during his absence. +</p> +<p> +Some evenings after, I found my mother sitting alone in the parlor, +and on going upstairs Hessie curled up on our bed with her face in the +pillows. I so loved this little sister, that I could not endure to see +her grieve without sharing her vexation. So I sat down by her side and +drew her head upon my shoulder. Sitting thus I coaxed her trouble from +her. She had been out walking, and had met Edward Vance in Kensington. +He had seen her. He had pretended not to see her. He had avoided her. +</p> +<p> +At first this seemed so very unlikely, I jested with her, laughed at +her, said she must have been mistaken. He had been delayed in London, +and had not recognized her. But Hessie declared vehemently that he had +purposely avoided her, and cried as though her heart would break. +</p> +<p> +Then I said: "Hessie, if he be a person to behave so, we need neither +of us trouble ourselves about him. We lived before we knew him, and I +dare say we shall get on very well now that he has gone." But Hessie +only stared and turned her face from me. She could not understand such +a view of the case. She thought I did not feel for her. +</p> +<p> +After that the weeks passed drearily. We heard no news of Edward +Vance; but he had not left London, for I saw him once in the street. I +told Hessie, for I thought it right to rouse her a little rudely from +the despondent state into which she had fallen. I tried, gently but +decidedly, to make her understand that we had looked on as a steadfast +friend one who for some reason had been tired of us, and made an +excuse to drop our acquaintance; and that she would be doing serious +injury to her self-respect did she give him one more thought. +</p> +<p> +For myself I mused much upon his <a name="320">{320}</a> strange conduct. It remained an +enigma to me. A dull listlessness hung upon me, which was more +terrible than physical pain. I spent the days at home, because I could +not leave Hessie to mope her life away, and damp my mother's spirits +with her sad face. So I had not even the obligation of going out to +daily work to stimulate me to healthful action. Now, indeed, was my +life weary and burdensome for one dark space, which, thank God and his +gift of strong energy, was not of vast compass. So long as we +sacrifice ourselves for those we love, whether in reality or in +imagination, something sublime in the idea of our purpose—whether that +purpose be mistaken or not—is yet a rock to lean on in the weakest +hour of anguish. But when our eyes are opened, and we see that we have +only dragged others as well as ourselves deeper into misery, then +indeed it is hard to "suffer and be strong." +</p> +<br> + +<h2>VII.</h2> +<p> +I had done nothing of late—nothing, although I had toiled +incessantly; for I did not dignify with the name of "work" the +soulless mechanical drudgery which had kept me from home during the +past months. My spirit had grovelled in a state of prostration, +stripped of its wings and its wand of power. I now knelt and cried: +"Give, oh, give me back my creative impulse!" +</p> +<p> +I had never since looked at the beloved sketch. I longed now to draw +it forth, and commence the picture while I stayed at home. But Hessie +shuddered when I spoke of it, and looked so terrified, pleading that +she could not stand for me, that I gave up the idea for the time. I +thought she had distressing memories connected with it, and I tried to +rid her of them by speaking cheerfully of how successful I expected +the picture to be, and what pleasure we should have in working at it. +I regretted bitterly that I had not commenced it long before, just +after I had made the sketch. I should then, perhaps, have had it +finished in time for the Exhibition drawing near. But that was +impossible now. I must wait in patience for another year. I did not at +that time even look between the leaves of the portfolio. Though I +thought it right to talk briskly and cheerily about it for both our +sakes, I had sickening associations with that work of my short, +brilliant day of happiness which Hessie, with all her childish +grieving, could hardly have comprehended. +</p> +<p> +I allowed some time to pass, and at last I thought Hessie's whim had +been indulged long enough. She must learn how to meet a shock and +outlive it. I did not like the idea of having ghosts in the house— +skeletons of unhealthy sentiment hidden away in unapproachable +chambers. The shadow should be hunted from its corner into the light. +The sketch must grow into a picture, which a new aspect of things must +despoil of all stinging associations. +</p> +<p> +I went to seek the sketch; but the sketch was gone. I sought it in +every part of the house; but to no purpose. It had quite disappeared. +I mentioned the strange circumstance to my mother in Hessie's +presence, and Hessie suddenly left the room. Then it struck me for the +first time that my sister had either destroyed it (which I could +hardly believe), or that some accident had happened to it in her +hands. I observed that she never alluded to it, never inquired if I +had found it. I did not question her about it. Indeed I felt too much +vexed to speak of it. I grieved more for its loss than I had believed +it remained in me to grieve at any fresh trial. I loved it as we do +love the creation on which we have lavished the most precious riches +of our mind, on which we have spent our toil, in which we have +conquered difficulty, striven and achieved, struggled and triumphed. I +should have loved it all my life, hanging in my own chamber, if no one +might ever see it but myself; and borne my <a name="321">{321}</a> sorrows with a better +spirit, and tasted keener joys, while thanking God that I had been +permitted to call it into existence. I gloried too much in the work of +my own hands, and I was punished. +</p> +<p> +Never since have I tasted that vivid sense of delight in any +achievement of my own. I have worked as zealously, and more +successfully, but it has been with a humbler heart. And looking +backward, I now believe that it was my inner happiness which haloed my +creation with a beauty that was half in my own glad eyes. +</p> +<br> +<h2>VIII.</h2> +<p> +The succeeding few months were quiet, in the dullest sense of the +word. Strive as I would, the sunshine had gone from our home. Hessie +was no longer the bright Hessie of old days. +</p> +<p> +I tried to forget my dear sketch of "Enid," and made several attempts +to paint some other picture; but the Exhibition drew near, and I had +nothing done. +</p> +<p> +One bright May morning I read in the newspaper an account of the +Academy Exhibition. The list of artists and their works stirred me +with a strange trouble. Tears rose in my eyes and blotted out the +words. I spread the paper on the table before me, pressed my temples +with my fingers, and travelled slowly through the criticisms and +praises which occupied some columns. Why was there no work of mine +mentioned there? Why had I lost my time so miserably during the past +months? And questioning myself thus, I was conscious of two sins upon +my own head. The first was in glorying in and worshipping the creation +of my own labor: the second, in exalting myself upon an imaginary +pinnacle of heroism by a fancied self-sacrifice, and having brought +deeper trouble upon the sister whose happiness I thought to compass. I +wept the choking tears out of my throat and read on. +</p> +<p> +Something dazzled my eyes for a moment, and brought the blood to my +forehead. A picture was mentioned with enthusiastic praise; a picture +by E. Vance. It was called "Enid," and was interpreted by a quotation +from the poem; my passage—the subject of my lost sketch! A strange +idea glanced across my mind. I half smiled at it and put it away. But +all day I was restless; and that evening I proposed to Hessie an +expedition early next morning to see the pictures. My mother longed to +go with us; but as she could not, I promised to bring home a +catalogue, and describe each painting to the best of my memory. +</p> +<p> +With a feverish haste I sought out the picture of "Enid" by E. Vance. +Was I dreaming? I passed my hand across my eyes as though some +imaginary scene had come between me and the canvas. I did not feel +Hessie's hand dropping from my arm. I stood transfixed, grasping the +catalogue, and staring at the picture before me. +</p> +<p> +It was my "Enid." My own in form, attitude, tint, and expression. It +was the "Enid" of my dreams realized; the "Enid" of my labor wrought +to completion; the "Enid" of my lost sketch ennobled, perfected, +glorified. +</p> +<p> +My work on which I had lavished my love and toil was there, and it was +not mine. +</p> +<p> +Another, a more skilled, a subtler hand, had brought out its meaning +with delicate appreciation, ripened its original purpose, enriched the +subdued depths of its coloring, etherealized the whole by the purest +finish. But that hand had robbed me, with cruel cowardly deliberation. +It had stolen my mellow fruit; taken my sweetest rose and planted it +in a strange garden. I felt the wrong heavy and sore upon me. I +resented it fiercely. I could not endure to look at the admiring faces +around me. I turned away sick and trembling, while the blood pulsed +indignantly in my throat and beat painfully at my temples. +</p> +<p> +Why should he who had already so troubled my life enjoy success and +gold which should have been mine? <a name="322">{322}</a> "O mother, mother!" I inwardly +cried, "how much would the price of this picture have done for you!" +And I thought of her yearnings for the scent of sea spray, and the +taste of sea breath, which the scanty purse forbade to be satisfied. +</p> +<p> +I sought Hessie, and found her sitting alone and very pale. I said, +"Come home, Hessie;" and she followed me, obeying like a child. +</p> +<p> +When we reached our house, I was thankful that my mother slept upon +the couch, for I needed a time to calm myself, and think and pray. I +threw away my bonnet, and sat down by our bedside. Hessie came and +crept to my feet. +</p> +<p> +"Grace," she sobbed, "can you ever forgive me? I gave him the sketch; +but I declare on my knees that I did not know why he wanted it." +</p> +<p> +For a moment I felt very harsh and stern, but my woman's nature +conquered. What were all the pictures in the world compared with my +little sister's grief? I bent over her, and wiped away the tears from +her face. +</p> +<p> +"Don't say any more about it, Hessie," I said; "I'd rather not hear +any more. I know that you meant to do me no wrong. It is with him that +the injustice lies. But, Hessie, I will only ask you one question: Can +you—do you think you ought to waste a regret on such a person?" +</p> +<p> +Hessie dried up her tears with more resolution than I had ever seen +her show before, and answered: +</p> +<p> +"No, no, Grace dear; I am cured now." +</p> +<p> +And then she put her arms about my neck, asking my pardon for all her +past wilful conduct; and in one long embrace all the estrangement was +swept away, and we two sisters were restored to one another. Hessie +went off to get tea ready with a cheerful step, and I to make the room +cosy and kiss my mother awake, when the fire glowed and the pleasant +meal was on the table. We both sat by her with bright faces, and told +her all about the pictures we could remember; all except one. +</p> +<br> + +<h2>IX.</h2> +<p class="center"> +* * * * * * +</p> +<p> +I have outlived all that trouble about the picture of "Enid," and many +troubles beside; I have kissed my mother's dear face in her coffin. I +have won success, and I have won gold; and neither seem to me quite +the boons some hold them to be. +</p> +<p> +Hessie's early grief passed away like a spring shower. She is now a +happy wife; and I have at this moment by my side a little gold-haired +fairy thing, her child. My dear sister's happiness is secured; her +boat of life is safe at anchor. Edward Vance's shadow only crossed her +path and passed away. She never met him since the old days; I but +once. His career has strangely disappointed his friends. +</p> +<p> +For me, my life is calm and contented. I think the healthy-spirited +always make for themselves happiness out of whatever materials may be +around them; and I find rich un-wrought treasure on every side, +whithersoever I turn my eyes. My sister's glad smile is a blessing on +my life; and one rare joy is the bright-faced little lisper at my +side, who peers over my shoulder with spiritual eyes, and asks +mysterious questions about my work. And, standing always by my side +like an angel, bearing the wand of power and the wings of peace, I +have my friend, my beautiful art. She fills my days with purpose and +my nights with sweet rest and dreams. She places in my hands the means +of doing good to others. While illumining my upward path, she seems to +beckon me higher and yet higher. Looking ever in her dear eyes, I +bless God for the abundance of his gifts; and I muse serenely on the +time when she, the interpreter of the ideal here on earth, will +conduct me to the gates of eternal beauty. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="323">{323}</a> +<br> +<h2>From Once a Week. +<br><br> +IMPERIAL AND ROYAL AUTHORS. +<br><br> +BY S. BARING GOULD.</h2> +<br> +<p> +Is the present Emperor of the French aware that in publishing his <i>Vie +de César</i>, he is treading a beaten path? that his predecessors on the +French throne have, from a remote age, sought to unite the fame of +authorship with the glory of regal position? and is he aware of the +fact, that their efforts in this quarter have not unfrequently been +accounted dead failures? Julius Caesar has already been handled by one +of them, and with poor success, for Louis XIV., at the age of sixteen, +produced a translation of the first book of the Commentaries of +Caesar, under the title <i>Guerre des Suisses, traduite dupremier livre +des Commentaires de Jules César, par Louis XI V., Dieu-Donné, roi de +France et de Navarre</i>. This work, consisting of eighteen pages, was +printed at the royal press in folio, 1651. +</p> +<p> +Louis XIV., however, was not the first French monarch to try his hand +upon Julius Caesar; he had been preceded by Henry IV., who translated +the whole work, and did not give it up after the first book. Will the +present <i>Vie de César</i> reach a second volume? and, if it does, will it +extend to a fourth? Those who know best the occupations of the +imperial writer, say that it might be rash to feel sure beyond the +first volume, or to calculate on more than a second. Let us see +whether there is much novelty in the circumstance of a monarch +becoming an author. We shall only look at the emperors of Rome and the +kings of France. We know well enough that our own Alfred translated +Boethius, Orosius, and Bede, and that Henry VIII. won the title of +"Defender of the Faith" by his literary tilt with Luther; and that +James I. wrote against tobacco; and we are not disposed to revive the +dispute about the Eikon Basilike. +</p> +<p> +Let us then turn to the Roman emperors after Caesar, who was an author +himself, or neither Henry IV., nor Louis XIV., nor Louis Napoleon, +would have had much to say about him. +</p> +<p> +Augustus, we are told by Suetonius, composed several works, which he +was wont to read to a circle of friends. Among these were, +"Exhortations to the Study of Philosophy," which we have no doubt the +select circle listened to with possible edification, and probable +ennui. He wrote likewise his own memoirs in thirteen books, but he +never finished them, or brought them beyond the Cantabrian war. His +epigrams were written in his bath. He commenced a tragedy upon Ajax, +but, little pleased with it, he destroyed it; and in answer to the +select circle which asked, "What had become of Ajax?" "Ah! poor +fellow!" replied the emperor, "he fell upon the sponge, and perished;" +meaning that he had washed the composition off his papyrus. +</p> +<p> +Tiberius, says the same author, composed a lyric poem on the death of +Julius Caesar, but his style was full of affectation and conceits. +</p> +<p> +Claudius suffered from the same passion for becoming an author, and +composed several books of history, as well as memoirs of his own life, +and these were read in public, for the friendly circle was too narrow +for his ambition. +</p> +<p> +He also invented three letters, which he supposed were necessary for +the perfection of the alphabet, and he wrote a pamphlet on the +subject, before assuming the purple. <a name="324">{324}</a> After having become +emperor, he enforced their use. He wrote also, in Greek, twenty books +of Tyrian, and eight of Carthaginian history, which were read publicly +every year in Alexandria. Nero composed verses, Domitian a treatise on +hair-dressing, Adrian his own life; Marcus Aurelius wrote his +commentaries, which are lost, and his moral reflections, and letters +to Fronto, which are still extant. Julian the Apostate was the author +of a curious work, the "Misopogon, or Foe to the Beard," a clever and +witty squib directed against the effeminate inhabitants of Antioch. A +few passages from this work will not be out of place. +</p> +<p> +"I begin at my face, which is wanting in all that is agreeable, noble, +and good; so I, morose and old, have tacked on to it this long beard, +to punish it for its ugliness. In this dense beard perhaps little +insects stroll, as do beasts in a forest; I leave them alone. This +beard constrains me to eat and to drink with the utmost +circumspection, or I should infallibly make a mess of it. As good luck +will have it, I am not given to kissing, or to receiving kisses, for a +beard like mine is inconvenient on that head, as it does not allow the +contact of lips. …… You say that you could twine ropes out of my +beard; try it, only take care that the roughness of the hair does not +take the skin off your soft and delicate hands." +</p> +<p> +Valentinian I. is said to have emulated Ausonius in licentious poetry. +</p> +<p> +Of the later emperors some have obtained celebrity by their writings. +</p> +<p> +Leo VI., surnamed the Wise, was the author of a very interesting and +precious treatise on the art of warfare. He also composed some +prophecies, sufficiently obscure to make the Greeks in after ages find +them apply to various events as they occurred. Constantine VI. was +also an eminent contributor to literature. This prince had been early +kept from public affairs by his uncle Alexander, and his mother Zoe, +so that he had sought pleasure and employment in study. After having +collected an enormous library, which he threw open to the public, he +employed both himself and numerous scribes in making collections of +extracts from the principal classic authors. The most important of +these, and that to which he attached his own name, consisted of a mass +of choice fragments, gathered into fifty-three books. This vast work +is lost, together with many of the books cited, except only two parts: +one treating of embassies, the other of virtues and vices. Constantine +also wrote a curious geographical account of the provinces of the +Greek empire, a treatise on the administration of government, and +another on the ceremonies observed in the Byzantine Court; a life of +the Emperor Basil, an account of the famous image of Edessa, and a few +other trifles. +</p> +<p> +Let us now turn to the French monarchs, and we shall find that they +began early to take the pen in hand; and, unfortunately, the very +first royal literary work in France was a blunder. King Chilperic +wrote a treatise on the Trinity, under the impression that he had a +gift for theological definition, and he signalized his error by +asserting that the word person should not be used in speaking of the +three members of the Trinity. Having burned his fingers by touching +theology, the semi-barbarian king attempted poetry with like success. +But his pretensions did not end there. He added the Greek letter u to +the Latin alphabet, and three characters of his own invention, so as +to introduce into that language certain Teutonic sounds. "He sent +orders," writes Gregory of Tours, "into every city of his kingdom, +that all children should be taught in this manner, and that ancient +written books should be effaced, and rewritten in the new style." +</p> +<p> +The great and wise Charlemagne, perceiving the glories of his native +tongue, and the beauties of his national poetry, carefully collected +the Teutonic national poems, and commenced a grammar of the language. +Robert II. <a name="325">{325}</a> was not only a scholar, but a musician; he composed +some of the Latin hymns still in use in the Church, with their +accompanying melodies. His queen, Constantia, seeing him engaged on +his sacred poetry, one day, in joke, asked him to write something in +memory of her. He at once composed the hymn, <i>O constantia martyrum</i>, +which the queen, not understanding Latin, but hearing her name +occurring in the first line, supposed to be a poem in her honor. +</p> +<p> +Louis XI. is supposed to have contributed to the <i>Cent Nouvelles +nouvelles</i>, which collection, however much credit it may do him in a +literary point of view, is inexcusably wanting in decency. +</p> +<p> +A volume of poems by Francis I. exists in MS. in the Imperial Library. +It contains, among other interesting matter, a prose letter, and +another in verse, written from his prison to one of his mistresses. +The king was bad in his orthography, as may be judged from the +following portion of a letter written by him to his mother at the +raising of the siege of Mézieres:— +</p> +<p> +<i>"Madame, tout asetheure (à cette heure), yn sy (ainsi) que je me +vouloys mettre o lyt (au lit), est arycé (arrivé) Laval, lequel m'a +aporté la serteneté (certitude) deu lèvemant du syège de Mésyères."</i> +</p> +<p> +I presume a schoolboy would be whipped if he wrote as bad a letter as +this king. +</p> +<p> +Louis XIII. had, says his epitaph, "a hundred virtues of a valet, not +one of a master;" but he could write sonnets, and compose the music +for them. The best, perhaps, is that composed on, or for, Madame de +Hautefort,— +</p> +<pre> + "Tu crois, bean soleil! + Qu'à ton éclat rien n'est pareil; + Mais quoi! tu pâlis + Auprès d'Amaryllis," +</pre> +<p> +—set to music which is charming. But Louis XIII. was more of a barber, +gardener, pastrycook, and farmer, than an author. +</p> +<p> +Louis XIV., beside his translation of Caesar's Commentaries, Book I., +composed <i>Memoires historiques, politiques, et militaires;</i> but his +writings were not remarkable, as his education had been so neglected +by his mother and Mazarin, that, according to La Porte, his valet, he +was not allowed to have the history of France read to him, even for +the sake of sending him to sleep. +</p> +<p> +Louis XV. wrote a little treatise on the course of the rivers of +Europe, and printed it with his own hands. It consisted of sixty-two +pages, and contained nothing which was not perfectly well known +before, as, for instance, that the Thames ran into the North Sea or +German Ocean, and that the Rhone actually fell into the Mediterranean. +In 1766 appeared a description of the forest of Compiègne, and guide +to the forest, by Louis, afterward Louis XVI., composed by the +unfortunate prince at the age of twelve. +</p> +<p> +Louis XVIII. wrote an account of a journey from Paris to Coblentz, +which was published in 1823. +</p> +<p> +This work was full of inaccuracies and mistakes, so that it became the +prey of critics. +</p> +<p> +Finally, Napoleon I. wrote much, but not in the way of bookmaking, +though he began a history of Corsica, which remained in MS. His +writings have been collected and published in five volumes, under the +title, <i>OEuvres de Napoléon Bonaparte.</i> 8vo. 1821. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="326">{326}</a> +<br> +<h2>From The Lamp. +<br><br> +HISTORY OF A BLIND DEAF-MUTE. +<br><br> +TRANSLATED FROM THE FRENCH OF M. CARTON,<br> +HEAD OF THE INSTITUTE FOR THE +DEAF AND DUMB AT BRUGES, <br> +BY CECILIA CADDELL.</h2> +<br> +<p> +Anna, the deaf, dumb, and blind girl, whose story I am about to +relate, was born at Ostend, of poor but honest parents, in the year +1818. She was blind from her birth, but during the first years of her +infancy appeared to have some sense of hearing. This, unfortunately, +soon vanished, leaving her blind, deaf, and dumb; one of the three +persons thus trebly afflicted existing at this moment in the province +of West Flanders. Losing both her parents while still an infant, she +was brought up by her grandmother, who received aid for the purpose +from the "Commission des Hospices" of the town. To the good offices of +these gentlemen she is likewise indebted for the education she has +since received; for when I first proposed taking her into my +establishment, both her aunt and her grandmother were most unwilling +to part with her, fearing, very naturally, that strangers would never +give her the affectionate care which, in her helpless condition, she +so abundantly required; they only yielded at last to the +representations and entreaties of their charitable friends. Their love +for this poor child, who could never have been anything but an anxiety +and expense to them, was indeed most touching; and they wept bitterly +when they parted from her; declaring, in their simple but expressive +language, that I was taking away from them the blessing of their +house. They were soon satisfied, however, that they had acted for the +best; and having once convinced themselves of her improvement both in +health and happiness, they never, to the day of their death, ceased to +rejoice at the decision which they had come to in her regard. When +Anna was first entrusted to my care, her relations, and every one else +who knew her, supposed her to be an idiot, and this had been their +principal reason for opposing me in my first efforts for her +instruction. Poor themselves and ignorant, and earning their bread by +the labor of their own hands, they had had neither time nor thought to +bestow on the development of this intellect, closed as it was against +all the more ordinary methods of instruction; and the child had been +left, of necessity, to her own resources for occupation and amusement. +Few, indeed, and trivial these resources were! Blind, and fearing even +to move without assistance; deaf, and incapable of hearing a syllable +of the conversation that was going on around her; dumb, and unable to +communicate her most pressing wants save by that unearthly and +unwilling cry which the deaf mutes are compelled to resort to, like +animals in the moment of their utmost need,—the child had remained day +after day seated in the same corner of the cottage. Knowing nothing of +the bright sunshine, or the green field, or the sweet smell of +flowers; nothing of the sports of childhood or its tasks; night the +same as day in her estimation, excepting for its sleep; winter only +distinguished from summer by the sharper air without, and the +increased heat of the wood-piled fire within—no wonder that she +seemed an idiot. Her only amusement—the only thing approaching to +occupation which her friends had been able to procure her—consisted, +at first, in a string of glass beads. These Anna amused herself by +taking off and <a name="327">{327}</a> putting on again at least twenty times a day; and +this and the poor meals, which she seemed to take without appetite or +pleasure, were the only breaks in the twelve long hours of her +solitary days. Some charitable person at last made her a present of a +doll; and with this doll she played, after her own fashion, until she +was twenty years of age. She never, in fact, lost her taste for it +until she had succeeded in learning to knit; then it was cast from her +with disdain, and she never afterward recurred to it for amusement. +</p> +<p> +Notwithstanding her enforced inaction, she managed to tear her clothes +continually. Perhaps, poor child, she found some relief from the +tedium of her daily life in this semblance of an occupation, for she +had an insuperable objection to changing her tattered garments; and it +was a long time before we could induce her to do so with a good grace. +Once, however, accustomed to the change, she seemed to take pleasure +in it, delighted in new clothes, and used often to come of her own +accord to beg that the old ones might be washed. There was nothing +very prepossessing in her external appearance; at first it was almost +repulsive. She was of the ordinary height of a girl of her age; but +her hands were small and thin, from want of use, as those of a little +child. When she first came to my establishment her head was bowed down +on her neck from weakness; she had sore eyes; her face was covered +with a cutaneous eruption; she walked with difficulty, and appeared to +dislike the exertion excessively. Afterward, care and good feeding +improved her very much. She acquired strength; and the skin disease +which had been her chief disfigurement entirely disappeared. I have no +intention of describing all that she did and said (by signs), or all +the pains and trouble that she cost us in the early months of her +residence among us. During that time, however, I kept a journal of her +conduct; which, as a history of her mental development, is so curious, +that I venture to lay some extracts from it before my readers, the +remainder being reserved for future publication. +</p> +<p> +I must begin by explaining my ideas as to the proper method to be +pursued in instructing these unfortunates. I try, in the first place, +to put myself in the place of a person deaf, blind, and dumb; and then +ask myself, "What do I know, what can I know, in such a state?" In my +first course of instruction, therefore, I make it a rule never to give +the word until certain that the thing which that word expresses has +been clearly understood. In the case of Anna there was an additional +difficulty. Not only had she no' preconceived idea of the use or +nature of a word, but her blindness prevented her seeing the +connection between it and the substance it was intended to represent. +Nor would it be sufficient for her full instruction that she should +learn by the touch to distinguish one word from another; she would +also require to be taught the elements of which words were themselves +composed. If I began by giving her words alone, she would never have +learned to distinguish letters. If, on the other hand, I commenced +with letters, without attaching any especial idea to them, she would +have been disgusted, and have left off at the second lesson. A letter, +in fact, would have been nothing but a letter to her; for there would +be no means of making her comprehend that it was but the first step +toward the knowledge I was desirous of imparting. I resolved, +therefore, neither to try letters by themselves nor whole words in the +first lesson which I gave her. It was in the Flemish language, of +course; but the method I pursued would be equally applicable to any +other. +</p> +<p> +In order to give, at one and the same moment, the double idea of a +letter and a word, I chose a letter which had some resemblance to the +form I intended it to express, and gave it the significance of an +entire word. For <a name="328">{328}</a> this purpose I fixed upon the letter <i>O</i>, and +made her understand that this letter signified mouth, in fact it is +one of the four letters which express the word in Flemish—<i>mond</i>, +mouth. Afterward I took a double <i>o(00)</i>, which are the first letters +in the Flemish, <i>oog</i>, eye. One O, then, signified mouth; two meant +eyes. The lesson was easy; she caught it in a moment; and thus, with +two words and two ideas attached to them, her dictionary was +commenced. It was quite possible, however, that as these letters +represented, to a certain extent, the objects of which they were the +expression, she might fall into the error of supposing that all +letters did the same; and in order to prevent this mistake, I +immediately added the letter <i>R</i> to her collection. +</p> +<p> +This not only became a new acquisition for her dictionary, but, by +forming with the two previous letters the Flemish word <i>oor</i> (ear), it +became an easy transition between the natural expression dependent on +the form, which she had already acquired, and the arbitrary, dependent +on the spelling, which it was my object she should acquire. Proceeding +on this principle, and always taking care to commence the lesson from +a point already known, we lessened the difficulties, and made rapid +progress. A cap, an apron, a ribbon, or gown, always interest the sex; +and, like any other girl, Anna valued them extremely. I took care +likewise often to choose words expressive of anything she liked, +especially to eat; and it was by the proper use of these words that +she first convinced me how completely she had seized upon the meaning +of my lessons. Whenever she was desirous of obtaining any little +dainty, she used to point to the word in her collection; and of course +it was given to her immediately. Poor child! her joy, when she found +she could really make herself understood, was very touching; and her +surprise was nearly equal to her joy. +</p> +<p> +A person born blind does not naturally make signs; for a sign +addresses itself to the sight, and of the faculty of sight they have +no conception. A sign in relief, however—a sign which they can +distinguish by the touch, and by means of which they can communicate +with their fellow-men—must come to these benighted intelligences like +a message of mercy from God himself. We always gave Anna the object, +in order to make her comprehend the word—the substance, to explain +the substantive. One day, not long after her arrival, her instructress +gave her the word <i>egg</i>, placing one at the same time before her; and +Anna immediately made signs that she wished to eat it. She offered me +at the same moment a small piece of money, which some one had given +her, as if for the purpose of buying the food. The bargain was made at +once; and she ate the egg, while I pocketed the money. I quite +expected she would try this over again, for she had some money, and +was fond of eggs. The very next day, in fact, she searched the word +out in her vocabulary, and brought it to her instructress, with an air +that quite explained her meaning. I placed an egg before her; she +touched it—touched the word; coaxed and patted the egg; and at last +burst into a fit of laughter, caused, no doubt, by pleasant +astonishment at having so easily obtained her wish. I hoped and +expected that she would propose to purchase, for I was anxious to find +out if she had any real notion of the use of money. My hopes were +fulfilled, for she offered at once her price of two centimes, with the +evident intention of making a purchase. Much to her astonishment, +however, this time I took both the money and the egg. At first she +laughed, evidently thinking that I was only joking. I gave her time to +comprehend that I was serious, and that, having taken both, I meant to +keep them. She acquiesced at last with regard to the egg; it was mine, +and I had a right to keep it if I liked; but she was indignant that I +did not return the money. She asked for it in <a name="329">{329}</a> every way she was +capable of asking, and grew at last both red and angry at the delay. I +had tried her sufficiently. It was high time to prove myself an honest +man; so I gave her back her money, and she restored me to her good +graces. I was happy indeed to find so clear a sense of justice, so +complete a knowledge of the value of "mine" and "thine," in a creature +so defective in her animal organization. +</p> +<p> +Once in possession of a little stock of words, Anna was never weary of +augmenting it, and she soon found out a way of compelling us, almost, +to satisfy her wish. She would take the hand of her mistress, and with +it imitate the action of writing, by making points upon the paper with +the finger. If her wishes were complied with, she was delighted; but +if, to try her, the mistress pretended to hesitate, then Anna took the +matter into her own hands, and positively refused to do anything else. +Every other employment suggested to her would be indignantly rejected, +and she would persist in asking over and over again for the word she +wanted, never resting or letting any one else rest until she got it. +The nuns, of course, always ended by complying with her desires; and +it would be hard to say which felt most delight,—the blind girl, who +had succeeded in adding to her small stock of knowledge, or the +religious, who by the aid of Providence had enabled her to do so. +</p> +<p> +A mother who hears for the first time the low stammering of her child +can alone form a conception of all one feels at such a moment, for God +is very good; and when he imposed upon society the task of instructing +the ignorant, he attached an ineffable delight to the accomplishment +of that duty. +</p> +<p> +When Anna knew how to read and understand about forty substantives, I +taught her the manual alphabet, and from that moment I could test her +knowledge with unfailing exactitude. She first read the word with her +fingers, and then repeated it by means of the dactology; it was a +lesson in reading and writing both. She was soon sufficiently advanced +to venture upon verbs. I began with the imperative mood; not only +because it is the simplest form of the verb, but also because I myself +would have to use it in giving her the lesson. She seized with +wonderful facility upon the relative positions of the substantive and +verb. +</p> +<p> +I always made her perform the action signified by the verb which she +had learned, and thus the lesson became quite an amusement to her. +However silly in appearance might be the association between the verb +and substantive, she never failed to apprehend it; and when told to do +anything ridiculous or out of the common way, she enjoyed the fun, and +never failed to execute the commission to the best of her ability. If +I told her to walk upon the table, she would take off her shoes, climb +up, and walk cautiously upon it; if told to eat the chair, after a +minute's hesitation as to the best manner of complying with the order, +she would take it up and pretend to devour it. One day she was +terribly embarrassed by some one writing the following phrase: "Throw +your head on the floor." She read the sentence over and over again to +make sure that she was not mistaken, laughed very much, and then +suddenly growing serious, shook her head, as much as to say, the thing +was absolutely impossible. At last, however, and as if to finish the +business, she took her head in both her hands, and made a gesture, as +if to fling it on the floor. Having done this, she evidently felt that +nothing more could be expected from her, and showed herself both +pleased and proud at having understood the phrase, and found so easy a +method of getting out of the difficulty. +</p> +<p> +She distinguished very readily between the verbs "to lay down" and "to +throw down," clearly comprehending that the one action was to be <a name="330">{330}</a> +done with vivacity, the other with caution; and it was curious to +watch her perplexity when commanded to throw down anything liable to +be broken. She knew well what would be the consequence of the command, +and you could see the questioning that went on in her own mind as to +how it could be accomplished with least damage to the article in +question. She would begin by feeling all along the ground, and trying +to form an exact idea of the distance it would have to fall; and then +at last she would throw it down with a mixture of care and yet of +caution, which showed she was perfectly aware of the mischief she was +doing. +</p> +<p> +The moment she thoroughly understood the imperative, we had only to +add her name or that of one of the sisters to produce the indicative; +and then, by changing Anna into I, she passed easily to the pronouns, +as thus: "Strike the table;" "Anna strikes the table;" "I strike the +table." I had at first omitted the article; but I soon perceived my +mistake. We have no means of teaching a deaf-mute the reason for +preceding a substantive by an article; and still more impossible would +it be to give any plausible explanation of the distinction between the +genders. Habit does this for each of us when we learn our mother +tongue; and habit and frequent repetition did it so well for Anna, +that now she rarely, if ever, makes any mistake. +</p> +<p> +When she had advanced thus far, I made her observe that by adding the +letters <i>en</i>, which constitute our Flemish plural, several of the same +sort of substantives were intended to be expressed; and passing from +this to numbers, I gave her a lesson in numeration. She readily seized +upon both ideas; and constant practice soon made her perfect in their +application. +</p> +<p> +Verbs such as <i>jeter</i>, to throw down, <i>poser</i>, to lay down, naturally +introduced the use of prepositions to express the mode in which the +verb acts upon the substantive. This enabled me to make various +combinations with words known to her already; and I found it of great +use to place the same word in such different positions in a phrase as +to alter entirely, or at least modify, the meaning. +</p> +<p> +The last lesson which she received was to make use of and understand +the meaning of the pronouns "my," "your," "our," and the conjunction +"and." We have also made her comprehend the use and meaning of +adjectives expressive of forms, as "square," "round," etc., as well as +the physical and mental state of being implied in the words "good," +"bad," "sick," "well," etc. She makes such phrases as the following, +and reads them easily when they are given to her in writing: "Give me +my knitting;" "My work is on the table;" "My apron is square." +</p> +<p> +One last observation I must make about the pronouns. The third person +singular or plural would have been difficult to Anna, since, being +blind, she could not have distinguished whether the action spoken of +had been done by one person or by several; by "him," in fact, or by +"they." The pronouns which she can most readily comprehend are the +first and second; and to these I generally confine her. For "he" or +"they" I have substituted "one:" "One strikes the table." +</p> +<p> +Anna might have been taught the others; but she would often probably +have been mistaken in their application, and would perhaps have ended +by supposing that there was no positive rule in their regard, and that +they might be used as it were at random. +</p> +<p> +People only learn willingly what they can clearly comprehend; and if +children dislike instruction, the fault is almost always with the +master. If the latter would but bring his intelligence to the level of +his pupils, he might be almost certain of their attention. +</p> +<p> +To sum up the whole, I will give the order in which I taught her the +different parts of speech necessary for the knowledge of a language. +The substantive, because, being itself an object, it falls more +immediately beneath the <a name="331">{331}</a> recognition of the senses; the verb, +because by the verb alone we speak, and without it there could be no +language; the preposition, because it indicates the nature of the +action expressed by the verb; and finally, the adjective and the +adverb. I had many reasons for keeping back these two last to the end. +Neither of them is essential to a phrase which can be complete without +them. Anna would have been much retarded in her progress if I had +stopped to teach her the attributes of words, when words themselves +were what she wanted. She could learn language only by use and habit; +and it was of the highest importance that she should acquire that +habit as speedily as possible. I threw aside, therefore, without +hesitation, all that could embarrass her progress, and confined +myself, in the first instance, to such things as it was absolutely +essential she should know, in order to be able to converse at all. It +may be asked why I taught her to make phrases by means of whole words, +instead of giving her the letters of the alphabet and teaching her to +make words themselves. The result of the mode I did adopt must be my +answer. Anna has already a clear idea of language; all her +acquisitions in the way of words are classed in her mind as in a +dictionary, and ready to come forth at a moment's notice. The reason +for this rapid progress is very plain. It is far less troublesome to +take a whole word, and put it in the grammatical order it ought to +occupy, than to be obliged to make the word itself by means of +separate letters. She had need of all her attention to learn the +elements of a phrase; and it would have been imprudent to weaken that +attention by directing it also to learn the elements of words. I +divided difficulties in order to overcome them: this was the secret of +my method, and the cause of its success. My lessons were also almost +or entirely an amusement to her; and sometimes I composed a phrase +which she first read, and acted afterward. Sometimes it was I who +performed the action, while she gave me an account of what I had done +in writing. +</p> +<p> +It was a lesson at once in reading and in writing, in hearing and in +speaking; and the moment we had got thus far, communication by means +of language was established between us. I had given my lessons at +first by words or phrases written in a book; but now, to test more +perfectly the knowledge she had acquired, and to prevent her reading +becoming a mere matter of form and guess-work, I cut all her phrases +into words, gummed them upon cardboard, and threw them pell-mell into +a box, from which she had to take out every separate word that she +required for a phrase. This new exercise vexed her very much at first; +but if it was tedious, it was also sure. By degrees she became +accustomed to it, and at last seemed to prefer it to the book, +probably because it admitted of greater facilities for varying her +phrases. Nevertheless it was troublesome work; and I was curious to +see if Anna would seek, of her own accord, to arrange her words in +such a way as to avoid the trouble of hunting through the whole mass +for every separate one she wanted. It seemed not unlikely, for she was +very ingenious; and so, in fact, it happened. +</p> +<p> +From time to time I observed that she put aside certain words, and +kept them separate from the others; and it was impossible to mistake +her exultation when these selected words were called for in her +lesson. Of course I saw them as she put them by; and, in order to +encourage her, I managed to introduce them pretty often into our +conversations. Acting also upon this hint, I had a drawer divided into +small compartments placed in the table at which she took her lessons. +Each compartment was intended for a separate class of words, but she +was permitted to arrange them according to her own ideas; and the +moment a word had been examined and understood, she placed it in the +compartment to which she imagined it belonged. Nouns, pronouns, verbs, +articles—each <a name="332">{332}</a> had their separate partition; but I observed, with +delight, that when I gave her the verb "to drink," instead of placing +it with the other verbs, she put it at once into the compartment she +had destined for liquids. Having remarked that it was always employed +with these substantives, it naturally struck her that its proper place +would be among them. To casual observers this may seem but a trifling +thing to mention, but it was an act of reasoning; and in their +half-mutilated natures the whole power of instruction hangs so +entirely on the capacity for passing by an act of reason from one fact +to another, from the known to that which is still unknown, that every +indication which a pupil gives of possessing such capacity is hailed +with delight by her teacher as an assurance of further progress. +Without it he knows that instruction would be impossible. +</p> +<br> +<p> +When Anna was first introduced into my establishment, she evidently +comprehended that she had fallen among strangers. She brought us her +poor playthings, and insisted on our examining them attentively, for +she was a baby still; a baby of twenty years of age indeed, but as +anxious to be caressed and as requiring of notice as a child of two +years old. When led in the evening to her bedside, she immediately +began to undress herself, and the next morning rose gaily, showing +herself much pleased with the good bed in which she had passed the +night. She made a little inclination of the head to the sister who +waited on her, as if to salute her. At breakfast we observed that she +ate with more cleanliness and propriety than is usual among the blind. +</p> +<p> +Her first regular lesson was to knit; and we found it far less +difficult to teach her the stitch itself than to habituate her to work +steadily for a long time together. She had evidently no idea of making +it the regular occupation of the day. She would begin by knitting a +little; then she would undo or tear up all that was already done; and +this would happen regularly over and over again at least twenty times +a day. It was weary work at first; but after a time we managed to turn +this dislike for continuous occupation into a means of teaching her +more important things. The moment she threw aside her work, we took it +up, and pretended to insist upon her continuing it; and then at last, +when we saw that she was quite vexed and wearied out by our +solicitations, we used to offer her her letters. She would take them, +and, evidently to avoid further worry, begin to study them; but the +letters, like the knitting, were soon flung aside, and then the work +once more was put into her hands. In this way, and while she fancied +she was only indulging in her own caprices, we were advancing steadily +toward our object—training her to occupation, and giving her the +means of future communication with her fellow-creatures. We also +discovered that it was quite possible to pique her out of her idle +habits; for one day in the earlier period of her education, when she +happened to be more than usually idle and inattentive, her mistress +led her toward a class of children busily employed in working, and +said to her by signs, "These little children work; and you, who are +twice their size, do you wish to sit there doing nothing?" From that +time we had less trouble with her; and once she had learned to knit +well and easily, this kind of work seemed to become a positive +necessity to her. She delighted in feeling with her fingers the +progress she was making, and the needles were scarcely ever out of her +hands. When Sunday came, she asked as usual for her knitting, and was +terribly disappointed when she found that it was withheld. I took the +opportunity to give her an idea of time— avery important point in her +future education; so I said to her, "You shall not knit <i>to-day;</i> but +after having slept once more—<i>to-morrow</i> in fact—the needles shall +be given to you again." I foresaw this to be an explanation that would +need repeating; and <a name="333">{333}</a> accordingly, the very next Sunday, she asked +again for her knitting, and was again refused. She was vexed at first, +but grew calm directly I had assured her she should have it "on the +morrow." +</p> +<p> +Many weeks afterward, and when she seemed quite to understand that +work on this day was forbidden, she came with a very serious +countenance and demanded her knitting; then bursting into a fit of +laughing, made signs that she knew she was not to knit on that day, +but that to-morrow she should have her work again. She obtained a +knowledge of the past and future much sooner than she did of the +present, using the signs expressive of the two first long before she +made an attempt even at the latter. +</p> +<p> +It was a matter of great importance that she should understand them +all; therefore I not only introduced them over and over again in our +conversations, in order to render her familiar with them, but I +watched her carefully to see that she made a right use of them in her +communications with her companions. A circumstance at last occurred +which satisfied me that she was perfect in the lesson. On the feast of +St. Aloysius Gonzaga she went with the other children to a church +where the festival was being celebrated. On her return she expressed +her gratitude for the pleasure she had received, and the next morning +I observed that she told every one she met that "yesterday she had +been to such a church;" while the day afterward I perceived that in +telling the same story she made the sign of "yesterday" twice over—a +proof how perfectly she comprehended the nature and division of time. +</p> +<p> +For a long time after she began to reside with us, she never mentioned +either her grandmother or aunt, probably because she was so completely +absorbed by the lessons of her new existence as to have no time to +think of them. Gradually, however, they came back to her recollection, +and then she spoke of them with gratitude and affection. She began +also to compare her present state with her past, evidently considering +the change for the better in her physical and mental being as due to +the care that has been bestowed on her here. She has twenty little +ways of expressing her gratitude. "My face was all over blotches," she +says by signs; "I could neither write nor walk; now I can hold myself +upright, and I can read, and know how to knit." This consciousness, +however, does not at all interfere with her affection for her +grandmother; and when the old woman died she grieved for some time +bitterly. What idea does the word "death" bring to the mind of this +child? I know not; but when we told her about her grandmother, her +mistress made her lie down on the floor, and then reminded her of a +child who had died in the establishment about a year before; after +which we explained to her that the body would be laid in the ground, +and be seen upon earth no more. She wept a great deal at first; but +suddenly drying her tears knelt down, making signs to her mistress and +companions that they should do the same; and, that there might be no +mistake about her meaning, she held up her rosary, to show them they +must pray. She did not forget her poor grandmother for a considerable +time, and every morning made it a point to inquire from her companions +if they also had remembered her that day. One of her aunts died about +the same time, leaving to Anna as a legacy a portion of her wardrobe. +Anna's attention instantly became concentrated upon this new +acquisition, and gowns and handkerchiefs underwent a minute and +searching examination. The gowns pleased her exceedingly; so also did +some woollen pelerines, which she instantly observed must be intended +for the winter. At that moment she was a complete woman, with all a +woman's innate love of dress and desire for ornamentation. "Are there +not also ear-rings?" she asked, anxiously; and being answered in the +negative, she expressed clearly, by her gestures, that it was a pity: +it was quite a pity. +</p> +<a name="334">{334}</a> +<p> +Anna soon came to understand that I was her master, and she attached +herself in consequence more strongly to me than to any one else, for +she perfectly appreciated the service she has received. One day after +a lesson, at which I had kept her until she thoroughly understood it, +she showed herself more than usually grateful. She took my hand and +kissed it repeatedly, gratitude and affection beaming in her face, and +then, drawing her mistress toward her, she made her write, "I love M. +Carton." I, on my part, was enchanted to find that she thus, of her +own accord, asked for words to express the sentiments of the heart; +and I felt not a little proud of being the object by whom this latent +feeling had first been called into expression. But if Anna loves me, +she also fears me. In the beginning of her education, I was the only +person about her who had strength enough to prevent her scratching or +kicking—exercises to which she was rather addicted when put in a +passion. She likewise knew that it was I who imposed any penance on +her, and that when she was compelled to remain without handkerchief or +cap in the schoolroom, it was to M. Carton she was indebted for the +humiliation. One day, in a fit of anger, she tore her cap; and her +mistress, as soon as she was calm enough to understand her, +remonstrated with her, telling her at the same time that I should be +informed of her misdeeds. To escape the punishment which she knew must +follow, she had recourse to the other children, acknowledged her fault +to them, and begged them to kneel down and join their hands, in order +to obtain her pardon. Not one of the children, whether among the blind +or deaf mutes, misunderstood her signs, and this was one of the +actions of Anna which astonished me the most. Some one was foolish +enough once to tell her that I was going away for some days, and she +took advantage of the chance to behave extremely bad. They made the +sign by which she understands that they mean me, and by which they +generally contrived to frighten her into submission; but it was all in +vain. She laughed in the face of her mistress, and told her she was +quite aware that I should not be back for three days. They have taken +good care ever since not to let her know when I am absent, though it +probably would make no difference now, for her character has +completely changed since those early days, and it is six months at +least since she has indulged in anything like a fit of passion. After +me, her greatest affection is reserved for my friend, M. Cauwe. She is +quite delighted when he comes, and feels his face all over to make +sure that it is he. If she has a new dress, he must feel and remark +it; if she learns a new phrase, or a new kind of work, it must be +shown to him immediately, in order that she may receive his praise; +and if by any chance his visit has been delayed, she is sure to +perceive it, and to inquire into the cause of his absence. +</p> +<p> +Anna is also very fond of all the younger deaf and dumb children. She +takes them on her knees, carries them in her arms, pets and punishes +them, and adopts a general and motherly air of kindness and protection +toward them. One of them the other day happened to be in an +exceedingly troublesome and tormenting mood. Anna could not keep her +quiet, or prevent her teasing; and at last, rather than lose her +temper, and strike her, as she would formerly have done, she left her +usual place, and went to sit at the opposite side of the room. In +fact, she never now attempts to attack any of her companions, though +she does not fail in some way or other to pay back any provocation she +has received. She takes nothing belonging to others, but attaches +herself strongly to her own possessions, and is particularly indignant +if they attempt to meddle with her objects for instruction. One of the +blind children happened to take a sheet of her writing in points, in +order to try and read it; but Anna was no <a name="335">{335}</a> sooner aware of the +theft than she angrily reclaimed it. The next day the same child +begged as a favor that she would lend her a sheet, in order to +practise her reading; but Anna curtly refused, observing, that +yesterday she had taken it without leave, and that to-day she +certainly should not have it, even for the asking. Anna's chief pet +and charge among the little children is a child, blind, and maimed of +one arm, called Eugénie. When this little thing was coming first to +the establishment Anna was told of it, and the expected day named for +her arrival. She immediately set to work and made all sorts of +arrangements in her own mind for the reception of the new child. The +mistress would, of course, teach it to read; but it would have a seat +beside Anna, and with the companion whom she already had, there would +be three to walk and amuse themselves together. It so happened that +Eugénie did not arrive on the expected day. Anna was quite downcast in +consequence; and when at last it did appear, it instantly became the +object of all her tenderest petting and endearment. She led it to its +seat, tried to make it understand all that it would have to do and +learn, and at last, when she touched its little arm, and found that it +was maimed, and incapable of being used, she burst into tears, and was +for a long time inconsolable. I tried to find out the cause of her +grief, and in what she considered the greatness of the child's +misfortune to consist, and she immediately directed my attention to +the fact that the child would never be able to learn to knit. The +power of occupation had been such an inestimable boon to herself, that +she naturally felt any inability on that score to be the most +intolerable misfortune that could befall a human being. When we +assured her that Eugénie would be able to knit as well and easily as +she did herself, she became calm. The next day, however, she was +discovered trying to knit with both hands shut, as if they had been +maimed like the blind child's, and she immediately made her mistress +observe that in such a state she could neither knit, blow her nose, +nor dress herself, ending all by expressing the immense happiness she +felt at possessing the free use of her hands. Providence has provided +an antidote to every misfortune. The blind child pities the deaf-mute, +the deaf-mute sighs over the blind, and the blind, deaf, and dumb girl +feels her heart filled with inexpressible compassion for one deprived +of the free use of her hands. Anna kept her word, and took great care +of the little Eugénie. She placed herself indeed somewhat in the +position of a mother to the child, watched over its conduct, examined +its work, and went so far as occasionally to administer a slight +correction. +</p> +<p> +If the weather was cold, she never went to bed herself without feeling +that Eugénie was well covered up, and giving her her blessing; a good +deed she always took care to make known to me in the morning. When +first the little thing came it was rather refractory and disinclined +to submit to rules, and the mistress acquainted Anna with the fact. +"Does not she like to knit?" asked Anna. "It is not with that," +answered the mistress, "but with her reading lesson, that she will not +take pains." Anna immediately went over to the child, to try and +persuade her to fulfil her duty. She took her hand, laid it on the +book, remained for at least a quarter of an hour persuading and +encouraging her; and then, perceiving that she had begun to be really +attentive, bade her get up and ask pardon of her mistress for her past +disobedience. +</p> +<p> +Another day she examined the child's knitting, and finding it badly +done, shook her head gravely, in sign of disapprobation. She then took +Eugénie's hand, made her feel with her own fingers the long loose +stitches she had made; and making her kneel down in the middle of the +room, pinned the work to her back, with threats of even more serious +punishment in the future. Just then the <a name="336">{336}</a> mistress joined the +class, and found Eugénie in tears, and on her knees, with her work +pinned behind her. "Eugénie," she asked, "what are you doing there, +and why do you cry?" "The deaf and dumb girl has punished me because +my knitting was badly done," said the child; "and she says, when M. +Carton comes in, he will throw a glass of water in my face." In order +to prevent this terrible assault, the mistress advised her to ask +pardon of Anna, which she immediately did; but the latter felt it due +to the dignity of the situation to allow herself to be entreated a +long time before she consented to grant it. +</p> +<p> +But though Anna considered it a part of her duty to punish Eugénie for +her idleness, she was always otherwise very gentle to the child. In +giving her a lesson, her mistress, with a view of testing her +knowledge of the verb in question, once bade her "strike Eugénie." +Anna behaved very prettily on this occasion. Before she would perform +the act required, she took the blind child's hand and laid it on the +letters, in order to show her that if she struck her, it was not +because she was angry with her, but simply because that phrase had +been given to her as an exercise in language. On another occasion one +of the blind children disturbed the arrangement of her words in their +separate cases, and one or two of them were lost. Anna wept bitterly; +and not content with doing everything in her own power to discover the +author of the mischief, she asked her mistress to assist in her +researches. The guilty one was found out at last, and, in the heat of +the moment, Anna demanded that she should be punished; but yielding +afterward to the natural goodness of her heart, she went herself and +interceded for the little criminal. "She is blind, like myself," she +said, by way of excuse; and then embraced her with great cordiality in +token of forgiveness. From that time, however, she became suspicious, +and scarcely dared to leave her place for fear of a similar +misfortune. Some one, seeing this, advised her to keep her letters in +her pocket. "Very pleasant indeed!" she answered, bursting into a fit +of laughter; "and a nice way, certainly, of preventing confusion! No; +I will ask M. Carton to give me a lock and key for my box, and then no +one can touch them without my knowing it." This was accordingly done; +and the key once safe in her pocket, Anna could leave her property in +perfect security that it would not be injured or stolen in her +absence. +</p> +<br> +<p> +Anna likes dainty food, and is very fond of fruit. I suspected, +however, when first she came, that she had not an idea of the way in +which it was procured. She had been so shut up in her old home, that +nature was still an unexplored page to her; and blind, deaf, and dumb +as she was, it was only through the fingers that even now this poor +child could ever be taught to read and comprehend it. It is not +difficult, therefore, to imagine her astonishment and joy at each new +discovery of this kind which she makes. One day I led her to an +apricot tree, and made her feel and examine it all over. She dislikes +trees extremely, probably because in her solitary excursions she must +have often hurt herself against them. She obeyed me, however, though +very languidly and unwillingly at first; but I never saw such +astonishment on any face before as I did on hers, when, after a short +delay, I took her hand and laid it on an apricot. She clasped her +hands delightedly together, then made me touch the fruit, as if she +expected that I also would be astonished; and then recommenced her +examination of the tree, returning over and over again, with an +expression of intense joy over all her person, to the fruit she had so +unexpectedly discovered. I permitted her at last to pull the fruit and +eat it, and she kissed my hand most affectionately, in token of +gratitude for the immense favor I had conferred upon her. After +classtime she returned alone to the garden; <a name="337">{337}</a> and as I foresaw +that the discovery of the morning would not be sterile, but that, once +put on the track, she would continue her explorations on her own +account, I watched her closely. So, in fact, it happened. +</p> +<p> +She was no sooner in the garden than she began carefully to examine +all the plants and trees around her, and it was amusing beyond +anything to watch her making her way cautiously among the cabbages, +touching the leaves and stems, and trying with great care and prudence +to discover if this plant also produced apricots. I suffered her to +continue this exercise for a little time in vain; then coming to the +rescue, after making her comprehend that cabbages, though good in +themselves to be eaten, did not bear apricots, I led her to various +kinds of fruit-trees growing in the garden. I did not name any of them +to her then, for I knew that in time she would learn to distinguish +one from the other, and she had still so much to discover of nature +and her ways, that I did not like to delay her by dwelling on +distinctions which were, comparatively speaking, of little consequence +to her in that early stage of her education. This little course of +botany we continued throughout the year. She was taught to observe the +fall of the leaf, encouraged to examine the tree when entirely bereft +of foliage, and when the spring-buds began to swell she was once more +brought to touch them, and made to understand that they were about to +burst again into leaf and flowers. The moment the leaves were visible +she inquired of one of her companions if the tree was going to bear +fruit likewise; and received for answer that it would certainly do so +whenever the weather should become sufficiently warm. Satisfied with +this information, she waited some time with patience; but a few very +warm days chancing to occur in the month of May, she reminded her +companion of what she had been told, and inquired eagerly if the fruit +was at last come. +</p> +<p> +In this way, during all that summer, she found constant amusement in +watching the progress of the different fruit-trees, and I found her +one day examining a pear with great attention. She had not met with +one before, so it was quite a discovery to her, and she begged me to +let her have it in order that she might show it to her mistress and +learn its name. With all her love of fruit, however, I must record it +to the honor of this poor child that she never attempted to touch it +without permission; and that having been guided once to a tree by one +of her deaf-mute companions, and incited to gather the fruit, she made +a very intelligible sign that it must not be done without an order +from me. On another occasion I gave her a bunch of currants and told +her to eat them, but the moment she touched them she discovered that +they were not ripe, and made signs to me that she "must wait for a few +days longer, and that then they would be good to eat." +</p> +<p> +Her delicacy of touch is in fact surprising. I have often effaced her +letters, and flattened them with my nail until it seemed impossible to +discover even a trace of them, and yet with her finger she has never +failed in following out the form. She often also finds pins and small +pieces of money, and picks them up when walking. She is very proud on +these occasions, and takes good care to inform any one who comes near +her of the fact. She is very active now, and always ready to go and +look for any thing or person that she wants; and if she does not +succeed in finding them, she engages one of her companions to aid her +in the search. She seemed indeed always to suspect that we knew better +than she did what was passing around us; though it was probably some +time before she asked herself what the nature of her own deficiency +might be. A day came, however, upon which she obtained some clearer +knowledge on the subject; and this was the way it happened. +</p> +<p> +She had dropped one of her knitting-needles, and after a vain attempt +to <a name="338">{338}</a> find it for herself, she was obliged to have recourse to her +mistress, who immediately picked it up and gave it back to her. Anna +appeared to reflect earnestly for a moment, and then drawing the +sister toward her writing-table, she wrote: "Theresa," naming one of +the pupils of the institution—"Theresa is deaf; Lucy is deaf; Jane is +blind; I am blind and deaf; you are—;" and then she presented her +tablets to the sister, in order that the latter might explain to her +the nature of that other faculty which she possessed, and which +enabled her to find so easily anything that was lost. +</p> +<p> +This was a problem which had evidently occupied her for a long time; +and with her head bent forward and fingers ready to seize the +slightest gesture, Anna waited eagerly for the answer by which she +hoped the mystery would be solved to her at last. In a second or two +the embarrassment of the mistress was nearly equal to the eagerness of +the pupil; but after a minute's hesitation she, with great tact, +resolved to repeat the action which had caused Anna's question. Making +the blind-mute walk down the room with her, she desired her once more +to drop her needle and then to pick it up again, after which she wrote +upon the board, "The needle falls; you touch the needle with your +hand; you pick it up with your fingers." Anna read these words with an +air which seemed to say, "I know all that already; but there must be +something more;" and so there was. +</p> +<p> +Her mistress made her once more drop her needle; and then, just as +Anna was stooping to pick it up, she dragged her, in spite of the poor +girl's resistance, so far from it that she could not touch it either +with her hands or feet. "It is ever so far away," Anna said, in her +mute language; and stooping down to the floor, she stretched out her +hand as far as ever it would go in a vain attempt to reach it. The +sister waited until she was a little pacified, and then wrote: "The +needle falls." Anna answered: "Yes." "The needle is far off," the +sister wrote again; and Anna replied: "Alas, it is." "Sister N. cannot +touch the needle with her hand." "Nor I either," Anna wrote in answer. +"Sister N. can touch the needle with her eyes." Then followed a mimic +scene, in which the thing expressed by words was put into action. Anna +understood at last; but, evidently in order to make certain that she +did, she desired the sister to guide her hand once more to the fallen +needle. Her mistress complied with her request, and Anna was +convinced. The experiment was repeated over and over again. Anna threw +her needle into various places, and then asked the sister if she could +touch it without stooping. "Yes," replied her mistress; "I touch the +needle with my eyes." "Can you pick it up with your eyes?" asked Anna. +The sister made her feel that her eyes were not fingers; and then once +more picking up the needle she gave it to Anna, to be satisfied that +she at last understood the nature of the faculty which her +instructress possessed and which was wanting in herself. +</p> +<p> +From that time she invariably made a distinction between the blind +children and those who were merely deaf-mutes. She had always hitherto +been ready enough to avenge herself on any of her companions who +struck her, whether accidentally or on purpose. Now if she found it +was a blind child who had done so, she would of her own accord excuse +her, saying, "She is blind; she cannot touch me with her eyes when I +am at a distance from her." In the same manner, if she lost anything, +she would ask the first deaf-mute whom she met to help her to look for +it, while she never attempted to seek a similar service from any of +the children whom she knew to be blind. She showed her knowledge of +the difference between the two classes most distinctly upon one +occasion, when her knitting having got irretrievably out of order, she +communicated her perplexity to the <a name="339">{339}</a> blind child at her side. The +latter wanted to take it from her in order to arrange it; but Anna +drew it back, and, touching first the eyes of the child and then her +own, as if she would have said, "You also are blind, and can do no +better than myself," she waited quietly until she could give it to the +mistress to disentangle for her. +</p> +<p> +Anna delights in telling her companions all her adventures, though she +takes care never to mention her faults or their punishment. She will +acknowledge the former if taxed with them, but she does not like to be +reminded either of the one or of the other. "I have done my penance," +she says: "it is past; you must not speak of it any more." With this +exception she tells all that she has done or intends to do; and she is +enchanted beyond measure when she can inform them that she has +succeeded in playing a trick on her mistress. She will tell the story +with infinite glee, and always contrives exceedingly well to put the +thing in its most ridiculous light before them. +</p> +<p> +She was fond of milk, and observed, or was told, one day that a cup of +milk had been given to a child who was sick. The next morning, while +in chapel, she burst into tears. Her mistress led her from the class, +and asked what was the matter. She coughed, showed her tongue, held +out her hand, that the mistress might feel her pulse; in fact she was +as ill as she could be, and excessively thirsty. A cup of milk was +brought; and the medicine was so good, that five minutes afterward she +managed to eat her breakfast with an excellent appetite. During the +recreation that followed, she took care to explain to her companions +the means by which she had procured herself the milk. A few days +afterward she recommenced the comedy, and played it so well, that, +thinking she really was ill, her mistress desired her to go to bed. +This was more than she wished for; but she went upstairs, trusting, no +doubt, that something would happen to extricate her from the dilemma. +Her mistress went to see her; and finding her sitting on the side of +the bed, asked why she did not get into it, as she had been desired. +"Madame," said Anna, "it is very cold, but I should get warm if you +would give me a cup of milk; that would cure me in no time; and a +little bread and butter with it would also do me good." The sister +then perceived how the case really stood, and answered promptly, "If +you will get into bed you shall have the milk, but not the bread and +butter. If, on the contrary, you prefer to go downstairs, you shall +have the bread and butter, but not the milk. Which do you choose?" +"Both," quoth Anna. But as both were not to be had, she was obliged to +content herself with the amusement of telling her intended trick to +her companions, which she did with many regrets that it had not been +successful. +</p> +<p> +But though Anna likes to tell all these little schemes and adventures +to any one who will listen to her; and though, if taxed with them by +her mistress, she is quite ready to acknowledge them with a laugh, it +is far otherwise when the action itself contains anything seriously +contrary to honesty or justice. In that case she takes good care to be +silent on the subject; and if silence is impossible, she endeavors, in +all manner of ways, to explain it away or excuse it. +</p> +<p> +One day she entered the schoolroom before any of the other pupils, and +finding that a piece of wire, belonging to the pedal of the piano, was +loose, she broke it quite off, put it into her pocket, and returned +triumphantly to her place. Her mistress, happening to be in the room +at the moment, saw the whole affair, and placed herself in her way, in +order that Anna might know she had been observed. She then asked her +what she had put in her pocket, and Anna instantly replied that it was +her beads. Her mistress gave her to understand that she was trying to +deceive her, and made her touch, as a <a name="340">{340}</a> proof, the other end of +the wire which she had broken. She was evidently confused, and became +as red as fire, but with marvellous adroitness managed to let the wire +slip out of her pocket to the ground. She had, of course, no idea that +it would make a noise in falling; and fancying that she had concealed +the theft, continued positively to deny it. In order still better to +prove her innocence, she then knelt down and began feeling all over +the floor, until she had found the wire which she had dropped, and +holding it up in triumph, said, by signs, "I will ask M. Carton to +give it to me that I may make it into a cross for my beads." +</p> +<p> +In this way she is always being ingenious in finding excuses for her +faults. Her mistress once complained of her knitting, and she +immediately held up her needles, which were bent, as if she would have +said, "How is it possible to knit with such needles as these?" Another +day, feeling more idle than usual, and wishing to remain in bed, she +made them count her pulse, and begged by signs that they would send +immediately for M. Verte, the physician of the house. We knew well it +was only a trick to stay a little longer in bed, and she was the first +to acknowledge it as soon as she had risen. +</p> +<p> +I like to watch her when she fancies herself alone, as I then often +find in her most trivial actions a something interesting or suggestive +for her future improvement. I discovered her once alone in the +class-room and busily engaged in examining every corner of the desks. +All at once she went toward the black table on which the deaf-mutes +write their exercises, and taking a piece of chalk, began to trace +lines upon it at random. I was curious to know what discovery she was +trying to make, and in a few minutes I perceived it. As soon as she +had traced her lines, she passed her hands over them to see if she +could read them. She was aware that her companions read upon this +board; and as she knew of no other method of reading than by letters +in relief, she naturally supposed that the lines she had traced would +be sufficiently raised to enable her to do so. For a few minutes she +continued thus trying to follow with her finger the chalk-lines she +had made; but finding considerable difficulty in doing so, she at last +returned to her book, compared the letters in it with the lines on the +board, and evidently pronounced a verdict in favor of the former. I +could see, in fact, that she was quite delighted with its apparent +superiority, and she never attempted to write on the black-board +again. +</p> +<p> +She often makes signs that seem to indicate an inexplicable knowledge +of things of which it is impossible she can naturally have any real +perception. She was born blind; she can look at the sun without +blinking, and the pupil of the eye is as opaque as the skin. +Nevertheless her mistress happening to ask her one night why she had +left off her work, she answered that it was too dark to work any +longer, and that she must wait for a light. [Footnote 76] In chapel, +also, she has evidently impressions which she does not receive +elsewhere. She likes to go there; often asks to be permitted to do so, +and while in it always remains in an attitude and with an expression +of face which would indicate a profound consciousness of the presence +of God. One of her companions once told her that I was ill. Anna +perceived that the child was crying: "I will not cry," she said +immediately, "but I will pray;" and she actually did go down on her +knees, and remained in that position for nearly a quarter of an hour. +She told me this herself, and I was enchanted; for who can doubt that +God held himself honored by the supplicating attitude of his poor +mutilated creature? And yet what passes in the mind of this child +during the moments which she spends in the attitude of prayer? What is +her idea of <a name="341">{341}</a> God? What is the language of her heart when she thus +places herself in solemn adoration in his presence? What is, in fact, +her prayer? I know not; it is a mystery—yet a mystery—which I trust +she will some day find words to explain to me herself. One thing alone +is certain;—there is <i>that</i> in her heart and mind which has not been +placed there by man, and which tells her there is a Father and a God +for her in heaven. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 76: She possibly may have learned the expression from some + of the deaf-mutes not blind.—TR.] +</p> +<br> +<h2>CONCLUSION.</h2> +<p> +Extract of a letter from M. Carton, announcing the death of the blind +mute, Anna Timmermans, after a residence of twenty-one years in his +establishment at Bruges: +</p> +<p class="cite"> + BRUGES, Sept. 26, 1859. +<br><br> + GENTLEMEN,—I write to you in deep affliction, for death hath this + day deprived me of my blind mute, Anna Timmermans, whom you may + remember to have seen at my establishment last year. +<br><br> + She was just forty-three years of age; and twenty-one of these had + been passed at my asylum. God has taken her from this life to bestow + upon her a better, and his holy will be done! It was a great mercy + to her, but I shall regret her all my lifetime, even while rejoicing + at her present happiness, and feeling most thankful for that love + and knowledge of Almighty God to which, through all the physical + difficulties of her position, he enabled her to attain. She loved + him indeed with all the <i>náiveté</i>, and invoked him with the simple + confidence of a child; and the last weeks of her life were almost + entirely devoted to earnest entreaties that he would call her to + himself. +<br><br> + You are the first to whom I announce my loss, because of all those + persons who have visited my house, you seem best to have + comprehended the painful position of a deaf-mute, and the exquisite + sensibility which they are capable of feeling toward any one who + shows them sympathy and affection. I have already described Anna as + she was when she came first among us—a girl twenty-one years of age, + with the stature of a woman and the habits of a child. I need not + recall her to your remembrance as she appeared to you last year, a + woman thoughtful beyond the common, and endowed with such true + knowledge of God and of religion, that you deemed it no indignity to + ask her prayers, and were pleased by her simple promise never to + forget you. +<br><br> + Thanks be to God for his great goodness toward his poor, afflicted + child! She not only learned to know him and to love him, but we were + enabled by degrees to place her in still closer communication with + him, by means of those sacraments which he has appointed to convey + grace to the soul. The last confession which she made previous to + receiving extreme unction reminds me of all the difficulty we had + long ago experienced in persuading her to make her first. +<br><br> + "It will soon be Easter," said one day to her the sister appointed + to prepare her for this duty. "It will soon be Easter, and then you + and all of us will have to go to confession." +<br><br> + "What is confession?" asked Anna. "It is to tell our sins to the + priest," explained the sister; "and to ask pardon of them from God." +<br><br> + "But why should we do that?" quoth Anna. +<br><br> + "Because," replied the sister, "God himself has commanded us to + confess our sins. You will have to do it, therefore, like the rest + of us; and when you go to confession, you must say in your heart to + God, 'I am sorry for my sins. Forgive me, O my God; and I promise I + will sin no more.'" +<br><br> + "And what are the sins I must confess?" asked Anna. She was standing + in the midst of her class, who had all assembled to receive + instruction, at the moment when she put the question. +<br><br> + "You have been in a passion," replied the sister; "you must confess + <a name="342">{342}</a> that. You have broken M. Carton's spectacles. You have torn + the cap of Sister So-and-so. You have scratched one of the blind + children;—and you must mention all these things when you go to + confession." +<br><br> + "All these things are past and gone," replied Anna, resolutely; + "when I broke M. Carton's spectacles, I was made, for my punishment, + to kneel down; and," she continued, lightly passing one hand over + the other, as if rubbing out something, "that was effaced. When I + tore Sister So-and-so's cap, I was not allowed any coffee; and," + repeating the action with her hands, "that was effaced. When I + scratched the blind child, I went to bed without supper; and that + was effaced. I will not, therefore, confess any of these things." +<br><br> + "But, Anna," replied the sister, "we are all obliged to go to + confession. I am going myself, as well as you." +<br><br> + "Oui da! Have you, then, also, been in a passion, my sister? Have + you broken M. Carton's spectacles, torn our sister's cap, and + scratched a blind child?" +<br><br> + Anna asked these questions with an immense air of triumph, and + waited the answer with a wicked smile, which seemed to say she had + put the sister in a dilemma. Not one of the class misunderstood the + little malice of her questions. Indeed, the uncharitable surmise as + to the nature of their mistress's conduct appeared so piquant to all + of them, that they unanimously insisted on its receiving a reply. It + is not difficult, indeed, to imagine their amusement, for they were + all daughters of Eve; and, beside, the best of children have an + especial delight in embarrassing their superiors. Altogether it was + a scene for a painter. +<br><br> + "I have not been in a passion; God forbid!" replied the poor sister, + gently. "And I have not scratched or done injury to any one; but I + <i>have</i> done so-and-so, and so-and-so." And here, with the greatest + <i>náiveté</i> and humility, the sister mentioned some of her own + shortcomings. "I have done so-and-so and so-and-so, and am going to + confess them; for I know I have sinned by doing these things; but I + hope God will pardon me, and give me grace not to offend him again + in like manner." +<br><br> + When the children heard this humble confession, they one by one + quietly left the class, like those in the gospel, beginning with the + eldest; but Anna, even while acknowledging herself defeated, could + not resist the small vengeance of giving the sister a lecture on her + peccadilloes. +<br><br> + "Remember, my sister, you are never again to do so-and-so and + so-and-so. You must be very sorry, and promise to be wiser another + time. And above all other things, you must go to confession to + obtain God's pardon." +<br><br> + "And you?" asked the sister, as her only answer to this grave + exhortation. +<br><br> + "And I also will go to confession," replied Anna, completely + vanquished at last by the tenderness and humility of the good + religious. +<br><br> + From that time, in fact, Anna went regularly to confession; and so + far from having any difficulty in persuading her to do so, she often + reminded us herself when the time was approaching for the + performance of that duty. +<br><br> + During the winter preceding her death she grew weaker from day to + day; and her loss of appetite, extreme emaciation, and inability to + exert herself, all convinced us that we were about to lose her. She + herself often spoke about dying, though for a long time she would + not permit any one else to address her on the subject. If any of the + sisters even hinted at her danger, she would grow quite pale, and + turn off the conversation; and even when she alluded of her own + accord to the symptoms that alarmed her, it seemed as if, like many + other invalids, she did so in order to be reassured as to her state. + She became convinced at last, however, that she could not recover, + and from that moment her life was one uninterrupted act of + resignation <a name="343">{343}</a> to the will of God, submission to his providence, + and hope and confidence in his mercy. These sentiments never forsook + her even for a moment. "I suffer," she used to say,—"I suffer a + great deal; but Jesus suffered more;" and, embracing her crucifix, + she would renew all her good resolutions to suffer patiently, and + her earnest entreaties for grace to do so. +<br><br> + Previous to receiving the last sacraments, Anna disposed of + everything belonging to her in favor of her companions, and then + causing them all to be brought to her bedside, she kissed each one + affectionately, and bade her adieu. After that she refused to see + any of them again, seeking only the company of the sisters, and of + that one in particular who best understood the silent language of + the fingers. "Let us speak a little," the poor sufferer would often + say, "of God and heaven;" and then would follow long and earnest + conversations full of faith and hope and love, confidence in the + mercies of Almighty God, and gratitude for his goodness. +<br><br> + During these communications Anna would become quite absorbed, as it + were, in the love of God; her poor face would brighten into an + expression of absolute beauty; and she seemed to lose all sense of + present suffering in her certain hope and expectation of the joy + that was about to come in on her soul. +<br><br> + "A little more," she would often say, when she fancied the + conversation was about to finish; "speak to me a little more of God. + I love him and he loves me. O my dear sister, will you not also come + soon to heaven, and love him for evermore?" +<br><br> + Her agony commenced on the morning of the 26th of September, and she + expired about noon, so quietly that we scarce perceived the moment + in which she passed away (safe and happy, as I trust) to the + presence of her God. +<br><br> + I recommend her to your good prayers; and I trust that she also will + sometimes think of us and pray for us in heaven. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="344">{344}</a> +<br> + +<h2>From Macmillan's Magazine. +<br><br> +TWILIGHT IN THE NORTH. +<br><br> +"UNTIL THE DAY BREAK, AND THE SHADOWS FLEE AWAY."</h2> +<br> +<pre> + Oh the long northern twilight between the day and the night, + When the heat and the weariness of the world are ended quite; + When the hills grow dim as dreams; and the crystal river seems + Like that River of Life from out the Throne where the blessed walk in white. + + Oh the weird northern twilight, which is neither night nor day, + When the amber wake of the long-set sun still marks his western way; + And but one great golden star in the deep blue east afar + Warns of sleep and dark and midnight—of oblivion and decay. + + Oh the calm northern twilight, when labor is all done, + And the birds in drowsy twitter have dropped silent one by one; + And nothing stirs or sighs in mountains, waters, skies— + Earth sleeps—but her heart waketh, till the rising of the sun. + + Oh the sweet, sweet twilight, just before the time of rest, + When the black clouds are driven away, and the stormy winds suppressed: + And the dead day smiles so bright, filling earth and heaven with light— + You would think 'twas dawn come back again—but the light is in the west. + + Oh the grand solemn twilight, spreading peace from pole to pole!— + Ere the rains sweep o'er the hill-sides, and the waters rise and roll, + In the lull and the calm, come, O angel with the palm— + In the still northern twilight, Azrael, take my soul. +</pre> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="345">{345}</a> +<br> +<h2>From Chambers's Journal. +<br><br> +A NIGHT IN A GLACIER.</h2> +<br> +<p> +Nothing is more common than to hear the wish expressed among ordinary +tourists "to see Switzerland in the winter;" and nothing is more +disappointing than its fulfilment. To <i>see</i> Switzerland then is just +what you cannot do; all that is visible is one vast sheet of blinding +snow, unrelieved by a particle of color; and the view is not even +grand—it is simply monotonous. However, in April, 1864, I made the +experiment of choosing that month, instead of the conventional August, +for a mountaineering ramble; and having been weather-bound at least +half a dozen times, in various places, found myself in the same +miserable predicament, at the hospice of the Great St. Bernard. It was +terribly wearisome work. We had exhausted all our small-talk, had +discussed all the celebrated passages of the Alps, from that of +Hannibal with his vinegar-cruets to that of Macdonald with his +dragoons; had worked the piano to death by playing derisive waltzes; +had elicited fearful wheezings from the harmonium, and blundered +inappropriate marches on the organ—when, early on the third morning, +two momentous events occurred. In the first place, the weather had +become suddenly fine; and in the second, the news had arrived that a +party of Italian wood-carvers had reached St. Remy, on their passage +to the Rhone valley, and that two of their number had left the main +body on the previous evening, avowing their intention of making their +way to a little stone hut, which is used in summer as a dairy for the +supply of the hospice, and passing the night there. This hut, however, +had been visited that morning, and found to be untenanted; and as the +traces of the two wanderers had been obliterated by the snow during +the night, the messenger had been sent forward to obtain assistance in +the search for them. +</p> +<p> +Though the unusually large fall of snow in the winter of 1863-64 made +mountain-climbing singularly easy in the past autumn (Mont Blanc was +ascended by more than seventy tourists in the latter year), yet in the +spring the passes were rendered more than usually difficult by the +loose snow which the sun had not yet been powerful enough to solidify +by regelation. Most travellers who cross in summer must have noticed a +line of stout posts about ten or twelve feet high, which are placed on +the most elevated points of the path, so that their summits, which the +snow rarely reaches, may serve as landmarks in the winter; but at this +time the posts were entirely covered, and it was not without great +difficulty that the man who brought the news had been able to find his +way to the Hospice. There was no time to be lost. Abandoning their +usual costume for a dress more suited to do battle with the elements, +four of the "fathers" were soon ready to start, two of them +shouldering knapsacks of provisions, one bearing a stout rope, and the +fourth carrying an axe, with which to cut steps, if necessary, in the +ice. Just as they were leaving, it was discovered that the last-named +implement had a crack in its handle, which would most probably cause +it to break short off when brought into active service; and as some +delay would be caused by fitting a fresh handle, Père Christophe, to +whose cordial politeness few travellers are not indebted, came to ask +for the loan of my axe for the day. "Perhaps, however," he said, "as +monsieur is used to glacier expeditions, he would like to accompany us +in our search, and so to carry his axe himself?"—a proposal <a name="346">{346}</a> with +which I eagerly closed, promising that my preparations should not +delay them above five minutes. +</p> +<p> +The messenger had arrived at eight in the morning; and in less than +half an hour afterward, we were making our way over the lake on the +Italian side of the pass. Two of the renowned dogs were with us; but +their proceedings did not confirm the idea which had long ago been +produced on my childish mind by the well-known print of a St. Bernard +dog, with a bottle of wine and a basket of food round its neck, +scratching away the snow under which a wayfarer was supposed to lie +buried. For finding lost travellers, indeed, they are, as I was +assured by the monks, in no-wise adapted; their function, and a most +important one it is, is to find the direct path up and down the pass, +when it is covered with snow, and in this duty they are unrivalled. +Fortunately, the frosts had been very severe, so that we were able to +tramp cheerily over the crisp snow, instead of having to undergo the +fatigue of sinking up to our knees at every step. But probably the +poor fellows down below wished that the frost had been lighter, and +our walk heavier. The scene was grand in its wildness. Huge clouds +hung along the mountain-sides at our feet, now whirling boisterously, +now creeping sullenly along; and rough gusts of wind dashed the snow +with blinding coldness into our faces, and produced on ears and nose a +tingling terribly suggestive of frost-bites. It was unusual, M. +Christophe said, for the fathers themselves to go out in search of +travellers; the latter generally waited at the house of refuge near +the Cantine, or that near St. Remy, and a servant was sent down with a +dog to lead them up; but in cases like the present, where search must +be made in different directions, it was of advantage to have three or +four people with local knowledge to join in it. Beside, the expedition +was a relief to the ordinary monotony of convent life; though the +kindness of English travellers had done much for the comfort of the +brethren, in supplying them with musical instruments, books, and +similar means of recreation. The circumstances under which the Prince +of Wales sent them their piano were curious enough. He had bought one +of the dogs, which, being quite young and very fat, was given into the +charge of a porter to carry down. The man stupidly let it fall, and it +was killed on the spot. The prince (this was some time ago) burst into +tears, and was almost inconsolable; but the monks, on hearing of the +loss, sent another dog, which the prince received while at Martigny; +and when he reached Paris, he forwarded, as a royal acknowledgment for +the gift, one of Erard's best piano-fortes, which has been the great +cheerer of their winter evenings, and on which they set no small +store. +</p> +<p> +Pleasantly chatting after this fashion, my friend beguiled the way to +the house of refuge, which we reached before ten o'clock, and where we +found collected about five-and-twenty people, waiting to be led up to +the hospice. Leaving them in charge of one of the monks, we proceeded +along the valley where the <i>vacherie</i> of the hospice is situated, +toward the Col de la Fenêtre, in search of the man and woman who were +missing. It appeared that they were natives of the Val de Lys, which +descends from Monte Rosa toward Italy, and the inhabitants of which +have, from time immemorial, held themselves aloof from all +communication with their neighbors, and have formed of their little +community a sort of nation within a nation, to which a native of +Alagna or St. Martin would have no more chance of being admitted by +marriage, than a reformer of the franchise would of being elected a +member of the Carlton Club. So we discovered that the two lost sheep, +presuming on their fortunate accident of birth, had been sneering at +the others as having been "raised" in the country of cretins and lean +pigs, and had excited such a storm of abuse about their ears, that, +finding themselves only two to twenty, they <a name="347">{347}</a> had beaten a +retreat, and decided to sleep at the cow-hut. At this we arrived in +about half an hour; but it was evident that it had not been tenanted +for some weeks by anything but marmots, of which we saw a couple +scudding along with that awkward mixture of scratch and shuffle which +is their ordinary mode of locomotion. From here we each made casts, to +use the hunting phrase, in different directions, especially trying +places which lay on the leeward side of rocks, and on which, +therefore, any tracks might not have been effaced by the night's snow. +A diabolical yell, which was the result of an attempt to imitate the +<i>jödel</i> of the Oberland guides, met with no human response, but was +taken up, as it seemed, by a chorus of imps in the depths of the +mountain; and by the multiplying echoes so common in Switzerland was +carried on from crag to crag, till it appeared to be lost only at the +top of the valley. We fixed on a point about a mile off at which to +reunite, as what was snow in the lower part of the valley would be ice +higher up, and would probably be crossed by crevasses, among which it +would be dangerous to go singly, and without the protection of the +rope. Presently there came a shout from the extreme left of our +quartett, and we saw the young <i>marronnier</i> (that is, a half-fledged +monk or deacon) standing on the top of some rocks, and indulging in +various contortions and gesticulations, which we interpreted as a +summons for our help; and when we reached him, he wanted it badly +enough, for right before him were the objects of our search; but how +to get at them was a problem which required all our skill and all our +strength for its solution. +</p> +<p> +He had come to where the glacier joined the rocks over which our +course had hitherto been, when his progress was stopped by a +<i>bergschrund</i> or deep chasm between a nearly perpendicular wall of +rock on one side, and a wall of ice on the other, inclined at an angle +of probably sixty-five degrees. On reaching this, we could see the +fugitives about fifty feet below us, and were relieved by the +assurance that they were neither of them seriously injured, except by +the cold, which had made them unable to do anything to extricate +themselves. It was evident that nothing could be done from the side of +the rocks, so we made our way as quickly-as-possible along the side of +the bergschrund, to cross on to the glacier. This involved a long +detour; but the bergschrund was too wide to be jumped, and far too +steep to be scaled, while the insecurity of the snow-bridges over it +was apparent. At last we found one that seemed solid, and M. +Christophe led the way upon it boldly, but had scarcely reached the +middle, when it suddenly broke down; and but for the rope—that great +protection of mountaineers—he would have had very little chance of +seeing the hospice again. As it was, I was the chief sufferer, for I +happened to be second in line, and had my waist (round which the rope +was tied in a slip-knot) reduced to wasp-like proportions by the jerk +of a man of fourteen stone falling in front, and the counteracting +strain which my rear-rank man forthwith put on behind. At last we +crossed, and hastily made our way to the scene of action. I have +estimated the angle of the ice-wall at sixty-five degrees, and +tremendous as that inclination is, I believe I have rather understated +it, though, as my clinometer was left behind, I could only compare it +mentally with the well-known ice-wall on the Strahleck, which seemed +about fifteen degrees less. Our rope was about ten feet too short to +reach the bottom, so the axe was brought into requisition to cut steps +for that distance, and to carve out a ledge which should give us +secure hand-hold as well. This done, we let down the rope; but the +man's fingers were so benumbed with the night's exposure, that he was +unable to tie it round his wife; and though she offered to attach it +to him first, he refused to be drawn up until after her. This +punctilio seemed rather misplaced, as it involved <a name="348">{348}</a> the descent of +one of our number; but you cannot argue with a man who has spent the +night in the heart of a glacier; so the lightest of our party lost no +time in descending, which was only difficult from the piercing cold +that was beginning to get the better of us, and which was so +benumbing, that cutting the five-and-fifty steps for the descent was a +rather formidable task. +</p> +<p> +The appearance of the girl's face—she was scarcely more than a girl— +was one to fix itself in the memory. It was white—almost as white as +the snow which had so nearly formed her cold winding-sheet; stains of +blood were on the blue lips, which she had involuntarily bitten +through in that night's agony. Her large Italian eyes seemed +fascinated by the wall of snow at which she glared; and even now, when +rescue was certain, she could only burst into a flood of tears, and +repeatedly ejaculate <i>"gerettet!"</i> (saved!) having again sunk into the +crouching position from which the question as to the rope had roused +her. The tears indeed gave relief to the heart over which a shadow of +a terrible death had for long hours been brooding. The shortness of +our rope caused the only difficulty in the ascent; but we managed to +hew out a sort of stage on the ice at which we could rest with her, +while the two younger monks carried the rope to the top, and then +completed her restoration to the upper day. The husband's ascent was +rather harder of achievement, as his chilled limbs made him as +helpless as a child in arms, without reducing his weight in the same +proportion; but after some awkward slips, it was managed; and having +refreshed the inner man, we made our way painfully toward the hospice, +obliging the husband to walk, in spite of the agony which it caused +him, as the only means of saving his limbs. We then learned that on +the previous evening they had started for the chalet, the situation of +which was well known to them, but had been completely enveloped in a +cloud of thick mist which had risen from the valley, and had obscured +their way; that after numerous turnings, they had decided, just before +darkness came on, to make their way up the St. Bernard valley, knowing +that in time they must come to the hospice, but that they had actually +mistaken for it the valley leading up to the Col de la Fenêtre, which +is nearly at right angles to the other, and had come upon the +bergschrund at a point where there was fortunately a huge cornice of +snow. On this they must have unwittingly walked, as they believed, for +many yards, when it suddenly gave way with that terrible rushing sound +at which most explorers of the great ice-world have shuddered once or +twice in their lives. Fortunately, an immense mass of snow gave way, +and its bulk broke their fall, and saved them from being dashed with +fatal violence against the rocks. They were warmly clad, and had the +courage to keep in motion during nearly the whole night, performing an +evolution corresponding to the goose-step of the volunteers, as they +dared not change their ground in the darkness. +</p> +<p> +When the gray morning showed that there was no possibility of their +extricating themselves, and the snow fell, which they knew would hide +their track, the husband sank down in despair, saying: "Nun bedeckt +mich mien Grabtuch" (Now my shroud is covering me)—and two hours of +inaction were sufficient to allow the cold to seize his hands and +feet. It was curious to observe how, as we gleaned the story from +husband and wife, each praised the other's endurance, and depreciated +his or her own. They had only been married at Gressonnay St. Giacomo +four days before, and were on their way to the celebrated wood-carving +manufactory at Freyburg. We had nearly reached the hospice, having had +hard work in helping our friend to walk, and in beating his fingers +smartly to restore circulation, when the girl, who had refused our aid +<i>en route</i>, suddenly gave a shriek and fainted away. The cause of this +had not to be sought for long. Our path had led <a name="349">{349}</a> us close by the +Morgue, in which, as is well known, the rarity of the air preserves +the corpses so thoroughly that they retain for years the appearance of +only recent death. There, placed upright against the wall, is the +ghastly row; and one figure—that of a woman with a child in her arms— +is especially noticeable for having preserved not only the features, +but even the expression which marked the last agony of despair. To see +these, you must generally wait some moments before your eyes get +accustomed to the dim light in which they are; but on this occasion, +the glare reflected from the snow threw the whole interior of the +charnel-house into full view, and the revulsion of feeling was too +much for the poor girl, who had so narrowly escaped a similar fate. +She was borne into the hospice, and soon recovered; and on the +following morning, both were able to resume their journey, though it +was feared by the monks, who had had large experience of frostbites, +that one of the man's fingers would be sacrificed. They were profuse +in their gratitude, and left, determined that the superiority of the +inhabitants of the Val de Lys over all other Piedmontese, Italians, +and Savoyards, was not best maintained by spending a night in a +bergschrund. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>From The Month. +<br><br> +CONSTANCE SHERWOOD. +<br><br> +AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY. +<br><br> +BY LADY GEORGIANA FULLERTON. +<br><br> +CHAPTER VI.</h2> +<br> +<p> +I was to travel, as had been ordered for our mutual convenience and +protection, with Mistress Ward, a gentlewoman who resided some months +in our vicinity, and had heard mass in our chapel on such rare +occasions as of late had occurred, when a priest was at our house, and +we had commodity to give notice thereof to such as were Catholic in +the adjacent villages. We had with us on the journey two serving-men +and a waiting-woman, who had been my mother's chambermaid; and so +accompanied, we set out on our way, singing as we went, for greater +safety, the litanies of our Lady; to whom we did commend ourselves, as +my father had willed us to do, with many fervent prayers. The +gentlewoman to whose charge I was committed was a lady of singular +zeal and discretion, as well as great virtue; albeit, where religion +was not concerned, of an exceeding timid disposition; which, to my no +small diversion then, and great shame since, I took particular notice +of on this journey. Much talk had been ministered in the county +touching the number of rogues and vagabonds which infested the public +roads, of which sundry had been taken up and whipped during the last +months, in Lichfield, Stafford, and other places. I did perceive that +good Mistress Ward glanced uneasily as we rode along at every +foot-passenger or horseman that came in sight. Albeit my heart was +heavy, and may be also that when the affections are inclined to tears +they be likewise prone to laughter, I scarce could restrain from +smiling at these her fears and the manner of her showing them. +</p> +<p> +"Mistress Constance," she said at last, as we came to the foot of a +steep <a name="350">{350}</a> ascent, "methinks you have a great heart concerning the +dangers which may befall us on the road, and that the sight of a +robber would move you not one whit more than that of an honest pedler +or hawker, such as I take those men to be who are mounting the hill in +advance of us. Doth it not seem to you that the box which they do +carry betokens them to be such worthy persons as I wish them to +prove?" +</p> +<p> +"Now surely," I answered, "good Mistress Ward, 'tis my opinion that +they be not such honest knaves as you do suppose. I perceive somewhat +I mislike in the shape of that box. What an if it be framed to entice +travellers to their ruin by such displays and shows of rare ribbons +and gewgaws as may prove the means of detaining them on the road, and +a-robbing of them in the end?" +</p> +<p> +Mistress Ward laughed, and commended my jesting, but was yet ill at +ease; and, as a mischievous and thoughtless creature, I did somewhat +excite and maintain her fears, in order to set her on asking questions +of our attendants touching the perils of the road, which led them to +relate such fearful stories of what they had seen of this sort as +served to increase her apprehensions, and greatly to divert me, who +had not the like fears; but rather entertained myself with hers, in a +manner such as I have been since ashamed to think of, who should have +kissed the ground on which she had trodden. +</p> +<p> +The fairness of the sky, the beauty of the fields and hedges, the +motion of the horse, stirred up my spirits; albeit my heart was at +moments so brimful of sorrow that I hated my tongue for its +wantonness, my eyes for their curious gazing, and my fancy for its +eager thoughts anent London and the new scenes I should behold there. +What mostly dwelt in them was the hope to see my Lady Surrey, of whom +I had had of late but brief and scanty tidings. The last letter I had +from her was writ at the time when the Duke of Norfolk was for the +second time thrown in the Tower, which she said was the greatest +sorrow that had befallen her since the death of my Lady Mounteagle, +which had happened at his grace's house a few months back, with all +the assistance she desired touching her religion. She had been urged, +my Lady Surrey said, by the duke some time before to do something +contrary to her faith; but though she much esteemed and respected him, +her answer was so round and resolute that he never mentioned the like +to her any more. Since then I had no more tidings of her, who was +dearer to me than our brief acquaintance and the slender tie of such +correspondence as had taken place between us might in most cases +warrant; but whether owing to some congeniality of mind, or to a +presentiment of future friendship, 'tis most certain my heart was +bound to her in an extraordinary manner; so that she was the continual +theme of my thoughts and mirror of my fancy. +</p> +<p> +The first night of our journey we lay at a small inn, which was held +by persons Mistress Ward was acquainted with, and by whom we were +entertained in a decent chamber, looking on unto a little garden, and +with as much comfort as the fashion of the place might afford, and +greater cleanliness than is often to be found in larger hostelries. +After supper, being somewhat weary with travel, but not yet inclined +for bed, and the evening fine, we sat out of doors in a bower of +eglantine near to some bee-hives, of which our hostess had a great +store; and methinks she took example from them, for we could see her +through the window as busy in the kitchen amongst her maids as the +queen-bee amidst her subjects. Mistress Ward took occasion to observe, +as we watched one of these little commonwealths of nature, that she +admired how they do live, laboring and swarming, and gathering honey +together so neat and finely, that they abhor nothing so much as +uncleanliness, drinking pure and clear water, even the dew-drops on +the leaves and flowers, <a name="351">{351}</a> and delighting in sweet music, which if +they hear but once out of tune they fly out of sight. +</p> +<p> +"They live," she said, "under a law, and use great reverence to their +elders. Every one hath his office; some trimming the honey, another +framing hives, another the combs. When they go forth to work, they +mark the wind and the clouds, and whatsoever doth threaten their ruin; +and having gathered, out of every flower, honey, they return loaded in +their mouths and on their wings, whom they that tarried at home +receive readily, easing their backs of their great burthens with as +great care as can be thought of." +</p> +<p> +"Methinks," I answered, "that if it be as you say, Mistress Ward, the +bees be wiser than men." +</p> +<p> +At the which she smiled; but withal, sighing, made reply: +</p> +<p> +"One might have wished of late years rather to be a bee than such as +we see men sometimes to be. But, Mistress Constance, if they are +indeed so wise and so happy, 'tis that they are fixed in a condition +in which they must needs do the will of him who created them; and the +like wisdom and happiness in a far higher state we may ourselves +enjoy, if we do but choose of our free will to live by the same rule." +</p> +<p> +Then, after some further discourse on the habits of these little +citizens, I inquired of Mistress Ward if she were acquainted with mine +aunt, Mistress Congleton; at the which question she seemed surprised, +and said, +</p> +<p> +"Methought, my dear, you had known my condition in your aunt's family, +having been governess for many years to her three daughters, and only +by reason of my sister's sickness having stayed away from them for +some time." +</p> +<p> +At the which intelligence I greatly rejoiced; for the few hours we had +rode together, and our discourse that evening, had wrought in me a +liking for this lady as great as could arise in so short a period. But +I minded me then of my jests at her fears anent robbers, and also of +having been less dutiful in my manners than I should have been toward +one who was like to be set over me; and I likewise bethought me this +might be the cause that she had spoken of the bees having a reverence +for their elders, and doubted if I should crave her pardon for my want +of it. But, like many good thoughts which we give not entertainment to +by reason that they be irksome, I changed that intent for one which +had in it more of pleasantness, though less of virtue. Kissing her, I +said it was the best news I had heard for a long time that I should +live in the same house with her, and, as I hoped, under her care and +good government. And she answered, that she was well pleased with it +too, and would be a good friend to me as long as she lived. Then I +asked her touching my cousins, and of their sundry looks and +qualities. She answered, that the eldest, Kate, was very fair, and +said nothing further concerning her. Polly, she told me, was +marvellous witty and very pleasant, and could give a quick answer, +full of entertaining conceits. +</p> +<p> +"And is she, then, not fair?" I asked. +</p> +<p> +"Neither fair nor foul," was her reply; "but well favored enough, and +has an excellent head." +</p> +<p> +"Then," I cried, letting my words exceed good behavior, "I shall like +her better than the pretty fool her sister." For the which speech I +received the first, but not the last, chiding I ever had from Mistress +Ward for foolish talking and pert behavior, which was what I very well +deserved. When she had done speaking, I put my arm round her neck—for +it put me in mind of my mother to be so gravely yet so sweetly +corrected—and said, "Forgive me, dear Mistress Ward, for my saucy +words, and tell me somewhat I beseech you touching my youngest cousin, +who must be nearest to mine own age." +</p> +<p> +"She is no pearl to hang at one's ear," quoth she, "yet so gifted with +a well-disposed mind that in her grace <a name="352">{352}</a> seems almost to supersede +nature. Muriel is deformed in body, and slow in speech; but in +behavior so honest, in prayer so devout, so noble in all her dealings, +that I never heard her speak anything that either concerned not good +instruction or godly mirth." +</p> +<p> +"And doth she not care to be ugly?" I asked. +</p> +<p> +"So little doth she value beauty," quoth Mistress Ward, "save in the +admiring of it in others, that I have known her to look into a glass +and smiling cry out, 'This face were fair if it were turned and every +feature the opposite to what it is;' and so jest pleasantly at her own +deformities, and would have others do so too. Oh, she is a rare +treasure of goodness and piety, and a true comfort to her friends!" +</p> +<p> +With suchlike pleasant discourse we whiled away the time until going +to rest; and next day were on horseback betimes on our way to +Coventry, where we were to lie that night at the house of Mr. Page, a +Catholic, albeit not openly, by reason of the times. This gentleman is +for his hospitality so much haunted, that no news stirs but comes to +his ears, and no gentlefolks pass his door but have a cheerful welcome +to his house; and 'tis said no music is so sweet to his ears as +deserved thanks. He vouchsafed much favor to us, and by his merry +speeches procured us much entertainment, provoking me to laughter +thereby more than I desired. He took us to see St. Mary's Hall, which +is a building which has not its equal for magnificence in any town I +have seen, no, not even in London. As we walked through the streets he +showed us a window in which was an inscription, set up in the reign of +King Richard the Second, which did run thus: +</p> +<p class="cite"> + "I, Luriche, for the love of thee<br> + Do make Coventry toll free." +</p> +<p> +And further on, the figure of Peeping Tom of Coventry, that false +knave I was so angry with when my father (ah, me! how sharp and sudden +was the pain which went through my heart as I called to mind the hours +I was wont to sit on his knee hearkening to the like tales) told me +the story of the Lady Godiva, who won mercy for her townsfolk by a +ride which none had dared to take but one so holy as herself. And, as +I said before, being then in a humor as prone to tears at one moment +as laughter at another, I fell to weeping for the noble lady who had +been in so sore a strait that she must needs have chosen between +complying with her savage lord's conditions or the misery of her poor +clients. When Mr. Page noticed my tears, which flowed partly for +myself and partly for one who had been long dead, but yet lived in the +hearts of these citizens, he sought to cheer me by the recital of the +fair and rare pageant which doth take place every year in Coventry, +and is of the most admirable beauty, and such as is not witnessed in +any other city in the world. He said I should not weep if I were to +see it, which he very much desired I should; and he hoped he might be +then alive, and ride by my side in the procession as my esquire; at +the which I smiled, for the good gentleman had a face and figure such +as would not grace a pageant, and methought I might be ashamed some +years hence to have him for my knight; and I said, "Good Mr. Page, be +the shutters closed on those days as when the Lady Godiva rode?" at +the which he laughed, and answered, +</p> +<p> +"No; and that for one Tom who then peeped, there were a thousand eyes +to gaze on the show as it passed." +</p> +<p> +"Then if it please you, sir, when the time comes," I said, "I would +like to look on and not to ride;" and he replied, it should be as I +pleased; and with such merry discourse we spent the time till supper +was ready. And afterward that good gentleman slackened not his efforts +in entertaining us; but related so many laughable stories, and took so +great notice of me, that I was moved to answer him sometimes in a +manner too forward for my years. He told us of the queen's visit to +that <a name="353">{353}</a> city, and that the mayor, who had heard her grace's majesty +considered poets, and herself wrote verses, thought to commend himself +to her favor by such rare rhymes as these, wherewith he did greet her +at her entrance into the town: +</p> +<p class="cite"> + "We, the men of Coventry,<br> + Be pleased to see your majesty,<br> + Good Lord! how fair you be!" +</p> +<p> +at the which her highness made but an instant's pause, and then +straightway replied, +<p class="cite"> + "It pleaseth well her majesty<br> + To see the men of Coventry.<br> + Good Lord! what fools you be!" +</p> +<p> +"But," quoth Mr. Page, "the good man was so well pleased that the +Queen had answered his compliment, that 'tis said he has had her +majesty's speech framed, and hung up in his parlor." +</p> +<p> +"Pity 'tis not in the town-hall," I cried; and he laughing commended +me for sharpness; but Mistress Ward said: +</p> +<p> +"A sharp tongue in a woman's head was always a stinging weapon; but in +a queen's she prayed God it might never prove a murtherous one." Which +words somewhat checked our merriment, for that they savored of rebuke +to me for forward speech, and I ween awoke in Mr. Page thoughts of a +graver sort. +</p> +<p> +When we rode through the town next day, he went with us for the space +of some miles, and then bade us farewell with singular courtesy, and +professions of good will and proffered service if we should do him the +good at any time to remember his poor house; which we told him he had +given us sufficient reason not to forget. Toward evening, when the sun +was setting, we did see the towers of Warwick Castle; and I would fain +have discerned the one which doth bear the name of the great earl who +in a poor pilgrim's garb slew the giant Colbrand, and the cave 'neath +Guy's Cliff where he spent his last years in prayer. But the light was +declining as we rode into Leamington, where we lay that night, and +darkness hid from us that fair country, which methought was a meet +abode for such as would lead a hermit's life. +</p> +<p> +The next day we had the longest ride and the hottest sun we had yet +met with; and at noon we halted to rest in a thicket on the roadside, +which we made our pavilion, and from which our eyes did feast +themselves on a delightful prospect. There were heights on one side +garnished with stately oaks, and a meadow betwixt the road and the +hill enamelled with all sorts of pleasing flowers, and stored with +sheep, which were feeding in sober security. Mistress Ward, who was +greatly tired with the journey, fell asleep with her head on her hand, +and I pulled from my pocket a volume with which Mr. Page had gifted me +at parting, and which contained sundry tales anent Amadis de Gaul, +Huon de Bordeaux, Palmerin of England, and suchlike famous knights, +which he said, as I knew how to read, for which he greatly commended +my parents' care, I should entertain myself with on the road. So, +one-half sitting, one-half lying on the grass, I reclined in an easy +posture, with my head resting against the trunk of a tree, pleasing my +fancy with the writers' conceits; but ever and anon lifting my eyes to +the blue sky above my head, seen through the green branches, or fixed +them on the quaint patterns the quivering light drew on the grass, or +else on the valley refreshed with a silver river, and the fair hills +beyond it. And as I read of knights and ladies, and the many perils +which befel them, and passages of love betwixt them, which was new to +me, and what I had not met with in any of the books I had yet read, I +fell into a fit of musing, wondering if in London the folks I should +see would discourse in the same fashion, and the gentlemen have so +much bravery and the ladies so great beauty as those my book treated +of. And as I noticed it was chiefly on the high-roads they did come +into such dangerous adventures, <a name="354">{354}</a> I gazed as far as I could +discern on the one I had in view before me with a foolish kind of +desire for some robbers to come and assail us, and then a great +nobleman or gallant esquire to ride up and fall on them, and to +deliver us from a great peril, and may be to be wounded in the +encounter, and I to bind up those wounds as from my mother's teaching +I knew how to do, and then give thanks to the noble gentleman in such +courteous and well-picked words as I could think of. But for all my +gazing I could naught perceive save a wain slowly ascending the hill +loaden with corn, midst clouds of dust, and some poorer sort of +people, who had been gleaning, and were carrying sheaves on their +heads. After an hour Mistress Ward awoke from her nap; and methinks I +had been dozing also, for when she called to me, and said it was time +to eat somewhat, and then get to horse, I cried out, "Good sir, I wait +your pleasure;" and rubbed my eyes to see her standing before me in +her riding-habit, and not the gentleman whose wounds I had been +tending. +</p> +<p> +That night we slept at Northampton, at Mistress Engerfield's house. +She was a cousin of Mr. Congleton's, and a lady whose sweet affability +and gravity would have extorted reverence from those that least loved +her. She was then very aged, and had been a nun in King Henry's reign; +and, since her convent had been despoiled, and the religious driven +out of it, having a large fortune of her own, which she inherited +about that time, she made her house a secret monastery, wherein God +was served in a religious manner by such persons as the circumstances +of the time, and not their own desires, had forced back into the +world, and who as yet had found no commodity for passing beyond seas +into countries where that manner of life is allowed. They dressed in +sober black, and kept stated hours of prayer, and went not abroad +unless necessity compelled them thereunto. When we went into the +dining-room, which I noticed Mistress Engerfield called the refectory, +grace was said in Latin; and whilst we did eat one lady read out loud +out of a book, which methinks was the life of a saint; but the fatigue +of the journey, and the darkness of the room, which was wainscotted +with oak-wood, so overpowered my senses with drowsiness, that before +the meal was ended I had fallen asleep, which was discovered, to my +great confusion, when the company rose from table. But that good lady, +in whose face was so great a kindliness that I never saw one to be +compared with it in that respect before or since, took me by the hand +and said, "Young eyes wax heavy for lack of rest, and travellers +should have repose. Come to thy chamber, sweet one, and, after +commending thyself by a brief prayer to him who sleepeth not nor +slumbereth, and to her who is the Mother of the motherless, get thee +to bed and take thy fill of the sleep thou hast so great need of, and +good angels will watch near thee." +</p> +<p> +Oh, how I did weep then, partly from fatigue, and partly from the dear +comfort her words did yield me, and, kneeling, asked her blessing, as +I had been wont to do of my dear parents. And she, whose countenance +was full of majesty, and withal of most attractive gentleness, which +made me deem her to be more than an ordinary woman, and a great +servant of God, as indeed she was, raised me from the ground, and +herself assisted to get me to bed, having first said my prayers by her +side, whose inflamed devotion, visible in her face, awakened in me a +greater fervor than I had hitherto experienced when performing this +duty. After I had slept heavily for the space of two or three hours I +awoke, as is the wont of those who be over-fatigued, and could not get +to sleep again, so that I heard the clock of a church strike twelve; +and as the last stroke fell on my ear, it was followed by a sound of +chanting, as if close unto my chamber, which resembled what on rare +occasions I had heard performed <a name="355">{355}</a> by two or three persons in our +chapel; but here, with so full a concord of voices, and so great +melody and sweetness, that methought, being at that time of night and +every one abed, it must be the angels that were singing. But the next +day, questioning Mrs. Ward thereupon as of a strange thing which had +happened to me, she said, the ladies in that house rose always at +midnight, as they had been used to do in their several convents, to +sing God's praises and give him thanks, which was what they did vow to +do when they became religious. Before we departed, Mistress Engerfield +took me into her own room, which was small and plainly furnished, with +no other furniture in it but a bed, table, and kneeling-stool, and +against the wall a large crucifix, and she bestowed upon me a small +book in French, titled "The Spiritual Combat," which she said was a +treasury of pious riches, which she counselled me by frequent study to +make my own; and with many prayers and blessings she then bade us +God-speed, and took leave of us. Our last day's lodging on the road +was at Bedford; and there being no Catholics of note in that town wont +to entertain travellers, we halted at a quiet hostelry, which was kept +by very decent people, who showed us much civility; and the landlady, +after we had supped, the evening being rainy (for else she said we +might have walked through her means into the fair grounds of the Abbey +of Woburn, which she thanked God was not now a hive for drones, as it +had once been, but the seat of a worthy nobleman; which did more +credit to the town, and drew customers to the inn), brought us for our +entertainment a huge book, which she said had as much godliness in +each of its pages as might serve to convert as many Papists—God save +the mark!—as there were leaves in the volume. My cheeks glowed like +fire when she thus spoke, and I looked at Mistress Ward, wondering +what she would say. But she only bowed her head, and made pretence to +open the book, which, when the good woman was gone, +</p> +<p> +"Mistress Constance," quoth she, "this is a book writ by Mr. Fox, the +Duke of Norfolk's old schoolmaster, touching those he doth call +martyrs, who suffered for treason and for heresy in the days of Queen +Mary,—God rest her soul!—and if it ever did convert a Papist, I do not +say on his deathbed, but at any time of his life, except it was +greatly for his own interest, I be ready …" +</p> +<p> +"To be a martyr yourself, Mistress Ward," I cried, with my ever too +great proneness to let my tongue loose from restraint. The color rose +in her cheek, which was usually pale, and she said: +</p> +<p> +"Child, I was about to say, that in the case I have named, I be ready +to forego the hope of that which I thank God I be wise enough to +desire, though unworthy to obtain; but for which I do pray each day +that I live." +</p> +<p> +"Then would you not be afraid to die on a scaffold," I asked, "or to +be hanged, Mistress Ward?" +</p> +<p> +"Not in a good cause," she said. +</p> +<p> +But before the words were out of her mouth our landlady knocked at the +door, and said a gentleman was in the house with his two sons, who +asked to pay their compliments to Mistress Ward and the young lady +under her care. The name of this gentleman was Rookwood, of Rookwood +Hall in Suffolk, and Mistress Ward desired the landlady presently to +bring them in, for she had often met them at my aunt's house, as she +afterward told me, and had great contentment we should have such good +company under the same roof with us; whom when they came in she very +pleasantly received, and informed Mr. Rookwood of my name and +relationship to Mistress Congleton; which when he heard, he asked if I +was Mr. Henry Sherwood's daughter; which being certified of, he +saluted me, and said my father was at one time, when both were at +college, the closest friend that ever he had, and his esteem for him +was so great that he would be better <a name="356">{356}</a> pleased with the news that +he should see him but once again, than if any one was to give him a +thousand pounds. I told him my father often spake of him with singular +affection, and that the letter I should write to him from London would +be more welcome than anything else could make it, by the mention of +the honor I had had of his notice. Mistress Ward then asked him what +was the news in London, from whence he had come that morning. He +answered that the news was not so good as he would wish it to be; for +that the queen's marriage with monsieur was broke off, and the King of +France greatly incensed at the favor M. de Montgomeri had experienced +at her hands; and that when he had demanded he should be given up, she +had answered that she did not see why she should be the King of +France's hangman; which was what his father had replied to her sister, +when she had made the like request anent some of her traitors who had +fled to France. +</p> +<p> +"Her majesty," he said, "was greatly incensed against the Bishop of +Ross, and had determined to put him to death; but that she was +dissuaded from it by her council; and that he prayed God Catholics +should not fare worse now that Ridolfi's plot had been discovered to +declare her highness illegitimate, and place the Queen of Scots on the +throne, which had moved her to greater anger than even the rising in +the north. +</p> +<p> +"And touching the Duke of Norfolk," Mistress Ward did ask, "what is +like to befal him?" +</p> +<p> +Mr. Rookwood said, "His grace had been removed from the Tower to his +own house on account of the plague; but it is reported the queen is +more urgent against him than ever, and will have his head in the end." +</p> +<p> +"If her majesty will not marry monsieur," Mistress Ward said, "it will +fare worse with recusants." +</p> +<p> +Upon which one of the young gentlemen cried out, "'Tis not her majesty +will not have him; but monsieur will not have her. My Lord of Oxford, +who is to marry my Lord Burleigh's daughter, said yesterday at the +tennis court, that that matter of monsieur is grieviously taken on her +grace's part; but that my lord is of opinion that where amity is so +needful, her majesty should stomach it; and so she doth pretend to +break it off herself by reason of her religious scruples." +</p> +<p> +At the which both brothers did laugh, but Mr. Rookwood bade them have +a care how they did suffer their tongues to wag anent her grace and +such matters as her grace's marriage; which although in the present +company might be without danger, was an ill habit, which in these +times was like to bring divers persons into troubles. +</p> +<p> +"Hang it!" cried the eldest of his sons, who was of a well-pleasing +favor and exceeding goodly figure; "recusants be always in trouble, +whatsoever they do; both taxed for silence and checked for speech, as +the play hath it. For good Mr. Weston was racked for silence last week +till he fainted, for that he would not reveal what he had heard in +confession from one concerned in Ridolfi's plot; and as to my Lord +Morley, he hath been examined before the council, touching his having +said he would go abroad poorly and would return in glory, which he did +speak concerning his health; but they would have it meant treason." +</p> +<p> +"Methinks, Master Basil," said his father, "thou art not like to be +taxed for silence; unless indeed on the rack, which the freedom of thy +speech may yet bring thee to, an thou hast not more care of thy words. +See now, thy brother keeps his lips closed in modest silence." +</p> +<p> +"Ay, as if butter would not melt in his mouth," cried Basil, laughing. +</p> +<p> +And I then noticed the countenance of the younger brother, who was +fairer and shorter by a head than Basil, and had the most beautiful +eyes imaginable, and a high forehead betokening thoughtfulness. Mr. +Rookwood drew his chair further from the table, and conversed in a low +voice with Mrs. Ward, <a name="357">{357}</a> touching matters which I ween were of too +great import to be lightly treated of. I heard the name of Mr. Felton +mentioned in their discourse, and somewhat about the Pope's Bull, in +the affixing of which at the Bishop of London's gate he had lent a +hand; but my ears were not free to listen to them, for the young +gentlemen began to entertain me with divers accounts of the shows in +London; which, as they were some years older than myself, who was then +no better than a child, though tall of mine age, I took as a great +favor, and answered them in the best way I could. Basil spoke mostly +of the sights he had seen, and a fight between a lion and three dogs, +in which the dogs were victorious; and Hubert of books, which he said, +for his part, he had always a care to keep handsome and well bound. +</p> +<p> +"Ay," quoth his brother, "gilding them and stringing them like the +prayer-books of girls and gallants, which are carried to church but +for their outsides. I do hate a book with clasps, 'tis a trouble to +open them." +</p> +<p> +"A trouble thou dost seldom take," quoth Hubert. "Thou art ready +enough to unclasp the book of thy inward soul to whosoever will read +in it, and thy purse to whosoever begs or borrows of thee; but with +such clasps as shut in the various stores of thought which have issued +forth from men's minds thou dost not often meddle." +</p> +<p> +"Beshrew me if I do! The best prayer-book I take to be a pair of +beads; and the most entertaining reading, the 'Rules for the Hunting +of Deer;' which, by what I have heard from Sir Roger Ashlon, my Lord +Stafford hath grievously transgressed by assaulting Lord Lyttleton's +keepers in Teddesley Haye." +</p> +<p> +"What have you here?" Hubert asked, glancing at Mr. Fox's <i>Book of +Martyrs</i>, and another which the landlady had left on the table; <i>A +profitable New Year's Gift to all England.</i> +</p> +<p> +"They are not mine," I answered, "nor such as I do care to read; but +this," I said, holding out Mr. Page's gift, which I had in my pocket, +"is a rare fund of entertainment and very full of pleasant tales." +</p> +<p> +"But," quoth he, "you should read the <i>Morte d'Arthur</i> and the <i>Seven +Champions of Christendom."</i> +</p> +<p> +Which I said I should be glad to do when I had the good chance to meet +with them. He said, "My cousin Polly had a store of such pleasant +volumes, and would, no doubt, lend them to me. She has such a sharp +wit," he added, "that she is ever exercising it on herself or on +others; on herself by the bettering of her mind through reading; and +on others by such applications, of what she thus acquires as leaves +them no chance in discoursing with her but to yield to her superior +knowledge." +</p> +<p> +"Methinks," I said, "if that be her aim in reading, may be she will +not lend to others the means of sharpening their wits to encounter +hers." +</p> +<p> +At the which both of them laughed, and Basil said he hoped I might +prove a match for Mistress Polly, who carried herself too high, and +despised such as were slower of speech and less witty than herself. +"For my part," he cried, "I am of opinion that too much reading doth +lead to too much thinking, and too much thinking doth consume the +spirits; and often it falls out that while one thinks too much of his +doing, he leaves to do the effect of his thinking." +</p> +<p> +At the which Hubert smiled, and I bethought myself that if Basil was +no book-worm neither was he a fool. With such like discourse the +evening sped away, and Mr. Rookwood and his sons took their leave with +many civilities and pleasant speeches, such as gentlemen are wont to +address to ladies, and hopes expressed to meet again in London, and +good wishes for the safe ending of our journey thither. +</p> +<p> +Ah, me! 'tis passing strange to sit here and write in this little +chamber, after so many years, of that first meeting with those +brothers, Basil and Hubert; to call to mind how they did look and +speak, and of the pretty kind <a name="358">{358}</a> of natural affection there was +betwixt them in their manner to each other. Ah, me! the old trick of +sighing is coming over me again, which I had well-nigh corrected +myself of, who have more reason to give thanks than to complain. Good +Lord, what fools you be! sighing heart and watering eyes! As great +fools, I ween, as the Mayor of Coventry, whose foolish rhymes do keep +running in my head. +</p> +<p> +The day following we came to London, which being, as it were, the +beginning of a new life to me, I will defer to speak of until I find +myself, after a night's rest and special prayers unto that end, less +heavy of heart than at present. +</p> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER VII.</h2> +<p> +Upon a sultry evening which did follow an exceeding hot day, with no +clouds in the sky, and a great store of dust on the road, we entered +London, that great fair of the whole world, as some have titled it. +When for many years we do think of a place we have not seen, a picture +forms itself in the mind as distinct as if the eye had taken +cognizance thereof, and a singular curiosity attends the actual vision +of what the imagination hath so oft portrayed. On this occasion my +eyes were slow servants to my desires, which longed to embrace in the +compass of one glance the various objects they craved to behold. +Albeit the sky was cloudless above our heads, I feared it would rain +in London, by reason of a dark vapor which did hang over it; but +Mistress Ward informed me that this appearance was owing to the smoke +of sea-coal, of which so great a store is used in the houses that the +air is filled with it. "And do those in London always live in that +smoke?" I inquired, not greatly contented to think it should be so; +but she said Mr. Congleton's house was not in the city, but in a very +pleasant suburb outside of it, close unto Holborn Hill and Ely Place, +the bishop's palace, in whose garden the roses were so plentiful that +in June the air is perfumed with their odor. I troubled her not with +further questions at that time, being soon wholly taken up with the +new sights which then did meet us at every step. So great a number of +gay horsemen, and litters carried by footmen with fine liveries, and +coaches drawn by horses richly caparisoned and men running alongside +of them, and withal so many carts, that I was constrained to give over +the guiding of mine own horse by reason of the confusion which the +noise of wheels and men's cries and the rapid motion of so many +vehicles did cause in me, who had never rode before in so great a +crowd. +</p> +<p> +At about six o'clock of the afternoon we did reach Ely Place, and +passing by the bishop's palace stopped at the gate of Mr. Congleton's +house, which doth stand somewhat retired from the high-road, and the +first sight of which did greatly content me. It is built of fair and +strong stone, not affecting fineness, but honorably representing a +firm stateliness, for it was handsome without curiosity, and homely +without negligence. At the front of it was a well-arranged ground +cunningly set with trees, through which we rode to the foot of the +stairs, where we were met by a gentleman dressed in a coat of black +satin and a quilted waistcoat, with a white beaver in his hand, whom I +guessed to be my good uncle. He shook Mistress Ward by the hand, +saluted me on both cheeks, and vowed I was the precise counterpart of +my mother, who at my age, he said, was the prettiest Lancashire witch +that ever he had looked upon. He seemed to me not so old as I did +suppose him to be, lean of body and something low of stature, with a +long visage and a little sharp beard upon the chin of a brown color; a +countenance not very grave, and, for his age, wanting the authority of +gray hairs. He conducted me to mine aunt's chamber, who was seated in +an easy-chair near unto the window, with a cat upon her knees and +<a name="359">{359}</a> a tambour-frame before her. She oped her arms and kissed me with +great affection, and I, sliding down, knelt at her feet and prayed her +to be a good mother to me, which was what my father had charged me to +do when I should come into her presence. She raised me with her hand +and made me sit on a stool beside her, and stroking my face gently, +gazed upon it, and said it put her in mind of both of my parents, for +that I had my father's brow and eyes, and my mother's mouth and +dimpling smiles. +</p> +<p> +"Mr. Congleton," she cried, "you do hear what this wench saith. I pray +you to bear it in mind, and how near in blood she is to me, so that +you may show her favor when I am gone, which may be sooner than you +think for." +</p> +<p> +I looked up into her face greatly concerned that she was like so soon +to die. Methought she had the semblance of one in good health and a +reasonable good color in her cheeks, and I perceived Mr. Congleton did +smile as he answered: +</p> +<p> +"I will show favor to thy pretty niece, good Moll, I promise thee, be +thou alive or be thou dead; but if the leeches are to be credited, who +do affirm thou hast the best strength and stomach of the twain, thou +art more like to bury me than I thee." +</p> +<p> +Upon which the good lady did sigh deeply and cast up her eyes and +lifted up her hands as one grievously injured, and he cried: +</p> +<p> +"Prithee, sweetheart, take it not amiss, for beshrew me if I be not +willing to grant thee to be as diseased as will pleasure thee, so that +thou wilt continue to eat and sleep as well as thou dost at the +present and so keep thyself from dying." +</p> +<p> +Upon which she said that she did admire how a man could have so much +cruelty as to jest and jeer at her ill-health, but that she would +spend no more of her breath upon him; and turning toward me she asked +a store of questions anent my father, whom for many years she had not +seen, and touching the manner of my mother's death, at the mention of +which my tears flowed afresh, which caused her also to weep; and +calling for her women she bade one of them bring her some hartshorn, +for that sorrow, she said, would occasion the vapors to rise in her +head, and the other she sent for to fetch her case of trinkets, for +that she would wear the ring her brother had presented her with some +years back, in which was a stone which doth cure melancholy. When the +case was brought she displayed before my eyes its rich contents, and +gifted me with a brooch set with turquoises, the wearing of which, she +said, doth often keep persons from falling into divers sorts of peril. +Then presently kissing me she said she felt fatigued, and would send +for her daughters to take charge of me; who, when they came, embraced +me with exceeding great affection, and carried me to what had been +their schoolroom and was now Mrs. Ward's chamber, who no longer was +their governess, they said, but as a friend abode in the house for to +go abroad with them, their mother being of so delicate a constitution +that she seldom left her room. Next to this chamber was a closet, +wherein Kate said I should lie, and as it is one I inhabited for a +long space of time, and the remembrance of which doth connect itself +with very many events which, as they did take place, I therein mused +on, and prayed or wept, or sometimes laughed over in solitude, I will +here set down what it was like when first I saw it. +</p> +<p> +The bed was in an alcove, closed in the day by fair curtains of +taffety; and the walls, which were in wood, had carvings above the +door and over the chimney of very dainty workmanship. The floor was +strewn with dried neatly-cut rushes, and in the projecting space where +the window was, a table was set, and two chairs with backs and seats +cunningly furnished with tapestry. In another recess betwixt the +alcove and the chimney stood a praying stool and a desk with a cushion +for a book to lie on. Ah, me! how often has my head <a name="360">{360}</a> rested on +that cushion and my knees on that stool when my heart has been too +full to utter other prayers than a "God ha' mercy on me!" which at +such times broke as a cry from an overcharged breast. But, oh! what a +vain pleasure I did take on that first day in the bravery of this +little chamber, which Kate said was to be mine own! With what great +contentment I viewed each part of it, and looked out of the window on +the beds of flowers which did form a mosaical floor in the garden +around the house, in the midst of which was a fair pond whose shaking +crystal mirrored the shrubs which grew about it, and a thicket beyond, +which did appear to me a place for pleasantness and not unfit to +flatter solitariness, albeit so close unto the city. Beyond were the +bishop's grounds, and I could smell the scent of roses coming thence +as the wind blew. I could have stood there many hours gazing on this +new scene, but that my cousins brought me down to sup with them in the +garden, which was not fairer in natural ornaments than in artificial +inventions. The table was set in a small banqueting-house among +certain pleasant trees near to a pretty water-work; and now I had +leisure to scan my cousins' faces and compare what I did notice in +them with what Mistress Ward had said the first night of our journey. +</p> +<p> +Kate, the eldest of the three, was in sooth a very fair creature, +proportioned without any fault, and by nature endowed with the most +delightful colors; but there was a made countenance about her mouth, +between simpering and smiling, and somewhat in her bowed-down head +which seemed to languish with over-much idleness, and an inviting look +in her eyes as if they would over-persuade those she spoke to, which +betokened a lack of those nobler powers of the mind which are the +highest gifts of womanhood. Polly's face fault-finding wits might +scoff at as too little for the rest of the body, her features as not +so well proportioned as Kate's, and her skin somewhat browner than +doth consist with beauty; but in her eyes there was a cheerfulness as +if nature smiled in them, in her mouth so pretty a demureness, and in +her countenance such a spark of wit that, if it struck not with +admiration, filled with delight. No indifferent soul there was which, +if it resisted making her its princess, would not long to have such a +playfellow. Muriel, the youngest of these sisters, was deformed in +shape, sallow in hue, in speech, as Mistress Ward had said, slow; but +withal in her eyes, which were deep-set, there was lacking neither the +fire which betokens intelligence, nor the sweetness which commands +affection, and somewhat in her plain face which, though it may not be +called beauty, had some of its qualities. Methought it savored more of +heaven than earth. The ill-shaped body seemed but a case for a soul +the fairness of which did shine through the foul lineaments which +enclosed it. Albeit her lips opened but seldom that evening, only +twice or thrice, and they were common words she uttered and fraught +with hesitation, my heart did more incline toward her than to the +pretty Kate or the lively Polly. +</p> +<p> +An hour before we retired to rest, Mr. Congleton came into the garden, +and brought with him Mr. Swithin Wells and Mr. Bryan Lacy, two +gentlemen who lived also in Holborn; the latter of which, Polly +whispered in mine ear, was her sister Kate's suitor. Talk was +ministered among them touching the queen's marriage with Monsieur; +which, as Mr. Rookwood had said, was broken off; but that day they had +heard that M. de la Motte had proposed to her majesty the Due +d'Alençon, who would be more complying, he promised, touching religion +than his brother. She inquired of the prince's age, and of his height; +to the which he did answer, "About your majesty's own height." But her +highness would not be so put off, and willed the ambassador to write +for the precise measurement of the prince's stature. +</p> +<p> +"She will never marry," quoth Mr. Wells, "but only amuse the French +<a name="361">{361}</a> court and her council with further negotiations touching this +new suitor, as heretofore anent the archduke and Monsieur. But I would +to God her majesty were well married, and to a Catholic prince; which +would do us more good than anything else which can be thought of." +</p> +<p> +"What news did you hear, sir, of Mr. Felton?" Mistress Ward asked. +Upon which their countenances fell; and one of them answered that that +gentleman had been racked the day before, but steadily refused, though +in the extremity of torture, to name his accomplices; and would give +her majesty no title but that of the Pretender; which they said was +greatly to be regretted, and what no other Catholic had done. But when +his sentence was read to him, for that he was to die on Friday, he +drew from his finger a ring, which had diamonds in it, and was worth +four hundred pounds, and requested the Earl of Sussex to give it to +the queen, in token that he bore her no ill-will or malice, but rather +the contrary. +</p> +<p> +Mr. Wells said he was a gentleman of very great heart and noble +disposition, but for his part he would as lief this ring had been +sold, and the money bestowed on the poorer sort of prisoners in +Newgate, than see it grace her majesty's finger; who would thus play +the hangman's part, who inherits the spoils of such as he doth put to +death. But the others affirmed it was done in a Christian manner, and +so greatly to be commended; and that Mr. Felton, albeit he was +somewhat rash in his actions, and by some titled Don Magnifico, by +reason of a certain bravery in his style of dress and fashion of +speaking, which smacked of Monsieur Traveller, was a right worthy +gentleman, and his death a blow to his friends, amongst whom there +were some, nevertheless, to be found who did blame him for the act +which had brought him into trouble. Mistress Ward cried, that such as +fell into trouble, be the cause ever so good, did always find those +who would blame them. Mr. Lacy said, one should not cast himself into +danger wilfully, but when occasion offered take it with patience. +Polly replied, that some were so prudent, occasions never came to +them. And then those two fell to disputing, in a merry but withal +sharp fashion. As he did pick his words, and used new-fangled terms, +and she spoke roundly and to the point, methinks she was the nimblest +in this encounter of wit. +</p> +<p> +Meanwhile Mr. Wells asked Mr. Congleton if he had had news from the +north, where much blood was spilt since the rising; and he apprehended +that his kinsmen in Richmondshire should suffer under the last orders +sent to Sir George Bowes by my Lord Sussex. But Mr. Congleton did +minister to him this comfort, that if they were noted wealthy, and had +freeholds, it was the queen's special commandment they should not be +executed, but two hundred of the commoner sort to lose their lives in +each town; which was about one to each five. +</p> +<p> +"But none of note?" quoth Mr. Wells. +</p> +<p> +"None which can pay the worth of their heads," Mr. Congleton replied. +</p> +<p> +"And who, then, doth price them?" asked Kate, in a languishing voice. +</p> +<p> +"Nay, sister," quoth Polly, "I warrant thee they do price themselves; +for he that will not pay well for his head must needs opine he hath a +worthless one." +</p> +<p> +Upon which Mr. Lacy said to Kate, "One hundred angels would not pay +for thine, sweet Kate." +</p> +<p> +"Then she must needs be an archangel, sir," quoth Polly, "if she be of +greater worth than one hundred angels." +</p> +<p> +"Ah, me!" cried Kate, very earnestly, "I would I had but half one +hundred gold-pieces to buy me a gown with!" +</p> +<p> +"Hast thou not gowns enough, wench?" asked her father. "Methought thou +wert indifferently well provided in that respect." +</p> +<p> +"Ah, but I would have, sir, such a <a name="362">{362}</a> velvet suit as I did see some +weeks back at the Italian house in Cheapside, where the ladies of the +court do buy their vestures. It had a border the daintiest I ever +beheld, all powdered with gold and pearls. Ruffiano said it was the +rarest suit he had ever made; and he is the Queen of France's tailor, +which Sir Nicholas Throgmorton did secretly entice away, by the +queen's desire, from that court to her own." +</p> +<p> +"And what fair nymph owns this rare suit, sweetest Kate?" Mr. Lacy +asked. "I'll warrant none so fair that it should become her, or rather +that she should become it, more than her who doth covet it." +</p> +<p> +"I know not if she be fair or foul," quoth Kate, "but she is the Lady +Mary Howard, one of the maids of honor of her majesty, and so may wear +what pleaseth her." +</p> +<p> +"By that token of the gold and pearls," cried Mr. Wells, "I doubt not +but 'tis the very suit anent which the court have been wagging their +tongues for the last week; and if it be so, indeed, Mistress Kate, you +have no need to envy the poor lady that doth own it." +</p> +<p> +Kate protested she had not envied her, and taxed Mr. Wells with +unkindness that he did charge her with it; and for all he could say +would not be pacified, but kept casting up her eyes, and the tears +streaming down her lovely cheeks. Upon which Mr. Lacy cried: +</p> +<p> +"Sweet one, thou hast indeed no cause to envy her or any one else, +howsoever rare or dainty their suits may be; for thy teeth are more +beauteous than pearls, and thine hair more bright than the purest +gold, and thine eyes more black and soft than the finest velvet, which +nature so made that we might bear their wonderful shining, which else +had dazzled us:" and so went on till her weeping was stayed, and then +Mr. Wells said: +</p> +<p> +"The lady who owned that rich suit, which I did falsely and +feloniously advance Mistress Kate did envy, had not great or long +comfort in its possession; for it is very well known at court, and +hence bruited in the city, what passed at Richmond last week +concerning this rare vesture. It pleased not the queen, who thought it +did exceed her own. And one day her majesty did send privately for it, +and put it on herself, and came forth into the chamber among the +ladies. The kirtle and border was far too short for her majesty's +height, and she asked every one how they liked her new fancied suit. +At length she asked the owner herself if it was not made too short and +ill-becoming; which the poor lady did presently consent to. Upon which +her highness cried: 'Why, then, if it become me not as being too +short, I am minded it shall never become thee as being too fine, so it +fitteth neither well.' This sharp rebuke so abashed the poor lady that +she never adorned her herewith any more." +</p> +<p> +"Ah," cried Mr. Congleton, laughing, "her majesty's bishops do come by +reproofs as well as her maids. Have you heard how one Sunday, last +April, my Lord of London preached to the queen's majesty, and seemed +to touch on the vanity of decking the body too finely. Her grace told +the ladies after the sermon, that if the bishop held more discourse on +such matters she would fit him for heaven, but he should walk thither +without a staff and leave his mantle behind him." +</p> +<p> +"Nay," quoth Mr. Wells, "but if she makes such as be Catholics taste +of the sharpness of the rack, and the edge of the axe, she doth then +treat those of her own way of thinking with the edge of her wit and +the sharpness of her tongue. 'Tis reported, Mr. Congleton, I know not +with what truth, that a near neighbor of yours has been served with a +letter, by which a new sheep is let into his pastures." +</p> +<p> +"What," cried Polly, "is Pecora Campi to roam amidst the roses, and go +in and out at his pleasure through the bishop's gate? The 'sweet lids' +have then danced away a large slice of the Church's acres. But what, I +pray you, sir, did her majesty write?" +</p> +<p> +"Even this," quoth her father, "I <a name="363">{363}</a> had it from Sir Robert +Arundell: 'Proud Prelate! you know what you were before I made you, +and what you are now. If you do not immediately comply with my +request, I will unfrock you, by God!—ELIZABETH R.'" +</p> +<p> +"Our good neighbor," saith Polly, "must show a like patience with Job, +and cry out touching his bishopric, 'The queen did give it; the queen +doth take it away; the will of the queen be done.'" +</p> +<p> +"He is like to be encroached upon yet further by yon cunning Sir +Christopher," Mr. Wells said; "I'll warrant Ely Place will soon be +Hatton Garden." +</p> +<p> +"Well, for a neighbor," answered Polly, "I'd as soon have the queen's +lids as her hedge-bishop, and her sheep as her shepherd. 'Tis not all +for love of her sweet dancer her majesty doth despoil him. She never, +'tis said, hath forgiven him that he did remonstrate with her for +keeping a crucifix and lighted tapers in her own chapel, and that her +fool, set on by such as were of the same mind with him, did one day +put them out." +</p> +<p> +In suchlike talk the time was spent; and when the gentlemen had taken +leave, we retired to rest; and being greatly tired, I slept heavily, +and had many quaint dreams, in which past scenes and present objects +were curiously blended with the tales I had read on the journey, and +the discourse I had heard that evening. When I awoke in the morning, +my thoughts first flew to my father, of whom I had a very passionate +desire to receive tidings. When my waiting-woman entered, with a +letter in her hand, I foolishly did fancy it came from him, which +could scarcely be, so soon after our coming to town; but I quickly +discerned, by the rose-colored string which it was bounden with, and +then the handwriting, that it was not from him, but from her whom, +next to him, I most desired to hear from, to wit, the Countess of +Surrey. That sweet lady wrote that she had an exceeding great desire +to see me, and would be more beholden to my aunt than she could well +express, if she would confer on her so great a benefit as to permit me +to spend the day with her at the Charter House, and she would send her +coach for to convey me there, which should never have done her so much +good pleasure before as in that service. And more to that effect, with +many kind and gracious words touching our previous meeting and +correspondence. +</p> +<p> +When I was dressed, I took her ladyship's letter to Mrs. Ward, who was +pleased to say she would herself ask permission for me to wait upon +that noble lady; but that her ladyship might not be at the charge of +sending for me, she would herself, if my aunt gave her license, carry +me to the Charter House, for that she was to spend some hours that day +with friends in the city, and "it would greatly content her," she +added, "to further the expressed wish of the young countess, whose +grandmother, Lady Mounteagle, and so many of her kinsfolk, were +Catholics, or at the least, good friends to such as were so." My aunt +did give leave for me to go, as she mostly did to whatsoever Mrs. Ward +proposed, whom she trusted entirely, with a singular great affection, +only bidding her to pray that she might not die in her absence, for +that she feared some peaches she had eaten the day before had +disordered her, and that she had heard of one who had died of the +plague some weeks before in the Tower. Mrs. Ward exhorted her to be of +good cheer, and to comfort herself both ways, for that the air of +Holborn was so good, the plague was not likely to come into it, and +that the kernels of peaches being medicinal, would rather prove an +antidote to pestilence than an occasion to it; and left her better +satisfied, insomuch that she sent for another dish of peaches for to +secure the benefit. Before I left, Kate bade me note the fashion of +the suit my Lady Surrey did wear, and if she had on her own hair, and +if she dyed it, and if she covered her bosom, or wore plaits, and if +her stomacher was straight <a name="364">{364}</a> and broad, or formed a long waist, +extending downward, and many more points touching her attire, which I +cannot now call to mind. As I went through the hall to the steps where +Mistress Ward was already standing, Muriel came hurrying toward me, +with a faint color coming and going in her sallow cheek, and twice she +tried to speak and failed. But when I kissed her she put her lips +close to my ear and whispered, +</p> +<p> +"Sweet little cousin, there be in London prisoners in a very bad +plight, in filthy dungeons, because of their religion. The noble young +Lady Surrey hath a tender heart toward such if she do but hear of +them. Prithee, sweet coz, move her to send them relief in food, money, +or clothing." +</p> +<p> +Then Mistress Ward called to me to hasten, and I ran away, but Muriel +stood at the window, and as we passed she kissed her hand, in which +was a gold angel, which my father had gifted me with at parting. +</p> +<p> +"Mrs. Ward," I said, as we went along, "my cousin Muriel is not fair, +and yet her face doth commend itself to my fancy more than many fair +ones I have seen; it is so kindly." +</p> +<p> +"I have even from her infancy loved her," she answered, "and thus much +I will say of her, that many have been titled saints who had not, +methinks, more virtue than I have noticed in Muriel." +</p> +<p> +"Doth she herself visit the prisoners she spoke of?" +</p> +<p> +"She and I do visit them and carry them relief when we can by any +means prevail with the gaolers from compassion or through bribing of +them to admit us. But it is not always convenient to let this be +known, not even at home, but I ween, Constance, as thou wilt have me +to call thee so, that Muriel saw in thee—for she has a wonderful +penetrative spirit—that thou dost know when to speak and when to keep +silence." +</p> +<p> +"And may I go with you to the prisons?" I asked with a hot feeling in +my heart, which I had not felt since I had left home. +</p> +<p> +"Thou art far too young," she answered. "But I will tell thee what +thou canst do. Thou mayst work and beg for these good men, and not be +ashamed of so doing. None may visit them who have not made up their +minds to die, if they should be denounced for their charity." +</p> +<p> +"But Muriel is young," I answered. "Hath she so resolved?" +</p> +<p> +"Muriel is young," was the reply; "but she is one in whom wisdom and +holiness have forestalled age. For two years that she hath been my +companion on such occasions, she has each day prepared for martyrdom +by such devout exercises as strengthen the soul at the approach of +death." +</p> +<p> +"And Kate and Polly," I asked, "are they privy to the dangers that you +do run, and have they no like ambition?" +</p> +<p> +"Rather the contrary," she answered; "but neither they nor any one +else in the house is fully acquainted with these secret errands save +Mr. Congleton, and he did for a long time refuse his daughter license +to go with me, until at last, by prayers and tears, she won him over +to suffer it. But he will never permit thee to do the like, for that +thy father hath intrusted thee to his care for greater safety in these +troublesome times." +</p> +<p> +"Pish!" I cried pettishly, "safety has a dull mean sound in it which I +mislike. I would I were mine own mistress." +</p> +<p> +"Wish no such thing, Constance Sherwood," was her grave answer. +"Wilfulness was never nurse to virtue, but rather her foe; nor ever +did a rebellious spirit prove the herald of true greatness. And now, +mark my words. Almighty God hath given thee a friend far above thee in +rank, and I doubt not in merit also, but whose faith, if report saith +true, doth run great dangers, and with few to advise her in these evil +days in which we live. Peradventure he hath appointed thee a work in a +palace as weighty as that of <a name="365">{365}</a> others in a dungeon. Set thyself to +it with thy whole heart, and such prayers as draw down blessings from +above. There be great need in these times to bear in remembrance what +the Lord says, that he will be ashamed in heaven before his angels of +such as be ashamed of him on earth. And many there are, I greatly +fear, who though they be Catholics, do assist the heretics by their +cowardice to suppress the true religion in this land; and I pray to +God this may never be our case. Yet I would not have thee to be rash +in speech, using harsh words, or needlessly rebuking others, which +would not become thy age, or be fitting and modest in one of inferior +rank, but only where faith and conscience be in question not to be +afraid to speak. And now God bless thee, who should be an Esther in +this house, wherein so many true confessors of Christ some years ago +surrendered their lives in great misery and torments, rather than +yield up their faith." +</p> +<p> +This she said as we stopped at the gate of the Charter House, where +one of the serving-men of the Countess of Surrey was waiting to +conduct me to her lodgings, having had orders to that effect. She left +me in his charge, and I followed him across the square, and through +the cloisters and passages which led to the gallery, where my lady's +chamber was situated. My heart fluttered like a frightened caged bird +during that walk, for there was a solemnity about the place such as I +had not been used to, and which filled me with apprehension lest I +should be wanting in due respect where so much state was carried on. +But when the door was opened at one end of the gallery, and my sweet +lady ran out to meet me with a cry of joy, the silly heart, like a +caught bird, nestled in her embrace, and my lips joined themselves to +hers in a fond manner, as if not willing to part again, but by fervent +kisses supplying the place of words, which were lacking, to express +the great mutual joy of that meeting, until at last my lady raised her +head, and still holding my hands, cried out as she gazed on my face: +</p> +<p> +"You are more welcome, sweet one, than my poor words can say. I pray +you, doff your hat and mantle, and come and sit by me, for 'tis a +weary while since we have met, and those are gone from us who loved us +then, and for their sakes we must needs love one another dearly, if +our hearts did not of themselves move us unto it, which indeed they +do, if I may judge of yours, Mistress Constance, by mine own." +</p> +<p> +Then we kissed again, and she passed her arm around my neck with so +many graceful endearments, in which were blended girlish simplicity +and a youthful yet matronly dignity, that I felt that day the love +which, methinks, up to that time had had its seat mostly in the fancy, +take such root in mine heart, that it never lost its hold on it. +</p> +<p> +At the first our tongues were somewhat tied by joy and lack of +knowledge how to begin to converse on the many subjects whereon both +desired to hear the other speak, and the disuse of such intercourse as +maketh it easy to discourse on what the heart is full of. Howsoever, +Lady Surrey questioned me touching my father, and what had befallen us +since my mother's death. I told her that he had left his home, and +sent me to London by reason of the present troubles; but without +mention of what I did apprehend to be his further intent. And she then +said that the concern she was in anent her good father the Duke of +Norfolk did cause her to pity those who were also in trouble. +</p> +<p> +"But his grace," I answered, "is, I hope, in safety at present, and in +his own house?" +</p> +<p> +"In this house, indeed," she did reply, "but a strait prisoner in Sir +Henry Neville's custody, and not suffered to see his friends without +her majesty's especial permission. He did send for his son and me last +evening, having obtained leave for to see us, which he had not done +since the day my lord and I were married again, by <a name="366">{366}</a> his order, +from the Tower, out of fear lest our first marriage, being made before +Phil was quite twelve years old, it should have been annulled by order +of the queen, or by some other means. It grieved me much to notice how +gray his hair had grown, and that his eyes lacked their wonted fire. +When we entered he was sitting in a chair, leaning backward, with his +head almost over the back of it, looking at a candle which burnt +before him, and a letter in his hand. He smiled when he saw us, and +said the greatest comfort he had in the world was that we were now so +joined together that nothing could ever part us. You see, Mistress +Constance," she said, with a pretty blush and smile, "I now do wear my +wedding-ring below the middle joint." +</p> +<p> +"And do you live alone with my lord now in these grand chambers?" I +said, looking round at the walls, which were hung with rare tapestry +and fine pictures. +</p> +<p> +"Bess is with me," she answered, "and so will remain I hope until she +is fourteen, when she will be married to my Lord William, my lord's +brother. Our Moll is likewise here, and was to have wedded my Lord +Thomas when she did grow up; but she is not like to live, the +physicians do say." +</p> +<p> +The sweet lady's eyes filled with tears, but, as if unwilling to +entertain me with her griefs, she quickly changed discourse, and spoke +of my coming unto London, and inquired if my aunt's house were a +pleasant one, and if she was like to prove a good kinswoman to me. I +told her how comfortable had been the manner of my reception, and of +my cousins' goodness to me; at the which she did express great +contentment, and would not be satisfied until I had described each of +them in turn, and what good looks or what good qualities they had; +which I could the more easily do that the first could be discerned +even at first sight, and touching the last, I had warrant from Mrs. +Ward's commendations, which had more weight than my own speerings, +even if I had been a year and not solely a day in their company. She +was vastly taken with what I related to her of Muriel, and that she +did visit and relieve poor persons and prisoners, and wished she had +liberty to do the like; and with a lovely blush and a modest +confusion, as of one who doth not willingly disclose her good deeds, +she told me all the time she could spare she did employ in making +clothes for such as she could hear of, and also salves and cordials +(such as she had learnt to compound from her dear grandmother), and +privately sent them by her waiting-maid, who was a young gentlewoman +of good family, who had lost her parents, and was most excellently +endowed with virtue and piety. +</p> +<p> +"Come to my closet, Miss Constance," she said, "and I doubt not but we +shall find Milicent at work, if so be she has not gone abroad to-day +on some such errand of charity." Upon which she led the way through a +second chamber, still more richly fitted up than the first, into a +smaller one, wherein, when she opened the door, I saw a pretty living +picture of two girls at a table, busily engaged with a store of +bottles and herbs and ointments, which were strewn upon it in great +abundance. One of them was a young maid, who was measuring drops into +a phial, with a look so attentive upon it as if that little bottle had +been the circle of her thoughts. She was very fair and slim, and had a +delicate appearance, which minded me of a snow-drop; and indeed, by +what my lady said, she was a floweret which had blossomed amidst the +frosts and cold winds of adversity. By her side was the most gleesome +wench, of not more than eight years, I ever did set eyes on; of a +fatness that at her age was comely, and a face so full of waggery and +saucy mirth, that but to look upon it drove away melancholy. She was +compounding in a cup a store of various liquids, which she said did +cure shrewishness, and said she would pour some into her nurse's +night-draught, to mend her of that disorder. +</p> +<a name="367">{367}</a> +<p> +"Ah, Nan," she cried, as we entered, "I'll help thee to a taste of +this rare medicine, for methinks thou art somewhat shrewish also and +not so conformable to thy husband's will, my lady, as a good wife +should be. By that same token that my lord willed to take me behind +him on his horse a gay ride round the square, and, forsooth, because I +had not learnt my lesson, thou didst shut me up to die of melancholy. +Ah, me! My mother had a maid called Barbara— +</p> +<pre> + 'Sing willow, willow, willow.' +</pre> +<p> +That is one of Phil's favorite songs. Milicent, methinks I will call +thee Barbara, and thou shalt sing with me— +</p> +<pre> + 'The poor soul sat sighing by a sycamore tree,— + Sing all a green willow; + Her hand on her bosom,'— +</pre> +<p> +There, put thy hand in that fashion— +</p> +<pre> + 'her head on her knee,'— +</pre> +<p> +Nay, prithee, thou must bend thy head lower— +</p> +<pre> + 'Sing willow, willow, willow.'" +</pre> +<p> +"My lady," said the gentlewoman, smiling, "I promise you I dare not +take upon me to fulfil my tasks with credit to myself or your +ladyship, if Mistress Bess hath the run of this room, and doth prepare +cordials after her fashion from your ladyship's stores." +</p> +<p> +"Ah, Bess!" quoth my lady, shaking her finger at the saucy one; "I'll +deliver thee up to Mrs. Fawcett, who will give thee a taste of the +place of correction; and Phil is not here to-day to beg thee off. And +now, good Milicent, prithee make a bundle of such clothes as we have +in hand, and such comforts as be suitable to such as are sick and in +prison, for this sweet young lady hath need of them for some who be in +that sad plight." +</p> +<p> +"And, my lady," quoth the gentlewoman, "I would fain learn how to +dress wounds when the flesh is galled; for I do sometimes meet with +poor men who do suffer in that way, and would relieve them if I +could." +</p> +<p> +"I know," I cried, "of a rare ointment my mother used to make for that +sort of hurt; and if my Lady Surrey gives me license, I will remember +you, mistress, with the receipt of it." +</p> +<p> +My lady, with a kindly smile and expressed thanks, assented; and when +we left the closet, I greatly commending the young gentlewoman's +beauty, she said that beauty in her was the worst half of her merit. +</p> +<p> +"But, Mistress Constance," she said, when we had returned to the +saloon, "I may not send her to such poor men, and above all, priests, +who be in prison for their faith, as I hear, to my great sorrow, there +be so many at this time, and who suffer great hardships, more than can +be easily believed, for she is Protestant, and not through conforming +to the times, but so settled in her way of thinking, and earnest +therein, having been brought up to it, that she would not so much as +open a Catholic book or listen to a word in defence of papists." +</p> +<p> +"But how, then, doth she serve a Catholic lady?" I asked, with a +beating heart; and oh, with what a sad one did hear her answer, for it +was as follows: +</p> +<p> +"Dear Constance, I must needs obey those who have a right to command +me, such as his grace my good father and my husband; and they are both +very urgent and resolved that by all means I shall conform to the +times. So I do go to Protestant service; but I use at home my prayers, +as my grandmother did teach me; and Phil says them too, when I can get +him to say any." +</p> +<p> +"Then you do not hear mass," I said, sorrowfully, "or confess your +sins to a priest?" +</p> +<p> +"No," she answered, in a sad manner; "I once asked my Lady Lumley, who +is a good Catholic, if she could procure I should see a priest with +that intent at Arundel House; but she turned pale as a sheet, and said +that to get any one to be reconciled who had <a name="368">{368}</a> once conformed to +the Protestant religion, was to run danger of death; and albeit for +her own part she would not refuse to die for so good a cause, she +dared not bring her father's gray hairs to the block." +</p> +<p> +As we were holding this discourse—and she so intent in speaking, and +I in listening, that we had not heard the door open—Lord Surrey +suddenly stood before us. His height made him more than a boy, and his +face would not allow him a man; for the rest, he was +well-proportioned, and did all things with so notable a grace, that +nature had stamped him with the mark of true nobility. He made a +slight obeisance to me, and I noticed that his cheek was flushed, and +that he grasped the handle of his sword with an anger which took not +away the sweetness of his countenance, but gave it an amiable sort of +fierceness. Then, as if unable to restrain himself, he burst forth, +</p> +<p> +"Nan, an order is come for his grace to be forthwith removed to the +Tower, and I'll warrant that was the cause he was suffered to see us +yesterday. God send it prove not a final parting!" +</p> +<p> +"Is his grace gone?" cried the countess, starting to her feet, and +clasping her hands with a sorrowful gesture. +</p> +<p> +"He goes even now," answered the earl; and both went to the window, +whence they could see the coach in which the duke was for the third +time carried from his home to the last lodging he was to have on this +earth. Oh, what a sorrowful sight it was for those young eyes which +gazed on the sad removal of the sole parent both had left! How her +tears did flow silently like a stream from a deep fount, and his with +wild bursts of grief, like the gushings of a torrent over rocks! His +head fell on her shoulder, and as she threw her arms round him, her +tears wetted his hair. Methought then that in the pensive tenderness +of her downcast face there was somewhat of motherly as well as of +wifely affection. She put her arm in his, and led him from the room; +and I remained alone for a short time entertaining myself with sad +thoughts anent these two young noble creatures, who at so early an age +had become acquainted with so much sorrow, and hoping that the +darkness which did beset the morning of their lives might prove but as +the clouds which at times deface the sky before a brilliant sunshine +doth take possession of it, and dislodge these deceitful harbingers, +which do but heighten in the end by contrast the resplendency they did +threaten to obscure. +</p> +<p> +[TO BE CONTINUED. <a href="#482">Page 482</a>] +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="369">{369}</a> +<br> +<h2>From Temple Bar. +<br><br> +FRENCH COCHIN CHINA.</h2> +<br> +<p> +Between India and the Chinese empire lies the peninsula of Indo-China, +jutting out far into the Indian Ocean. The south-eastern portion of +this peninsula is occupied by the empire of Anam, of which the chief +maritime province is known to Europeans as Cochin China, but to the +natives as Dang-trong, or the outer kingdom. It is in lower Cochin +China that the French have succeeded in recently establishing a +military settlement. In extent these new territorial acquisitions of +our somewhat ambitious neighbors may be compared to Brittany, though +in no other respect can any resemblance be detected. The country is, +in fact, a strictly alluvial formation. Not only is it watered by the +Dong-nai and Saigon rivers, but it also embraces the delta of the +Mekong, at the mouth of which noble stream the Portuguese poet Camoens +was ship-wrecked in the year 1556, swimming to the shore with his left +hand, while in his right he held above the waters his manuscript copy +of the <i>Lusiad</i>. It is almost needless to add that a level plain +spreads far and wide, except quite in the north, and that fevers and +dysentery prevail throughout the greater part of the year. The climate +is certainly not a healthy one for Europeans. The rainy season lasts +from April to December, during which the inhabitants live in a +vapor-bath. The consequence is, that the French soldiers die off with +such frightful rapidity that it has been urgently recommended that +every regiment should be relieved after two years' service. The +authorities, however, have lost no time in improving the sanitary +condition of the new settlement. By means of native labor large tracts +of marsh-land have been drained, and good roads made in lieu of the +shallow tidal canals which previously constituted the sole channels of +traffic and mutual intercourse. Formerly every villager owned a small +boat, in which he moved about from place to place, taking with him his +small merchandise, or conveying home to his family the proceeds of his +marketing. The town of Saigon itself is estimated to contain one +hundred thousand inhabitants. The houses are exceedingly mean, being +constructed either of wood or of palm-leaves fastened together. Though +situated seventy miles inland, Ghia-din, as it is called by the +natives, is a very flourishing port, and exhibits a very active +movement at all seasons of the year. It is frequented by a large +number of Chinese vessels, and is now rising into importance as the +head of the French possessions in the East. So far back, indeed, as +the ninth century Saigon was noted for its muslin manufactures, the +fineness of which was such that an entire dress could be drawn through +the circumference of a signet-ring. Owing to the comparative absence +of noxious insects it is regarded by Europeans as a not altogether +unpleasant residence. +</p> +<p> +The population of the empire of Anam has been estimated at thirty +millions; but on this point there are not sufficient data to form a +very accurate opinion. But whatever may be their exact number, the +inhabitants are derived from three sources. The Anamites proper—that +is, the Cochin Chinese and the Tonkinese—are of a Chinese origin; +while the people of Camboge are descended from Hindoo ancestors; and +those in the interior—such as the Lao, Moi, and others—claim to be +the sons of the soil, with Malay blood flowing in their veins. Of the +early history of the Anamites few authentic details have reached us, +nor <a name="370">{370}</a> are these of a nature to interest the general reader. +Although from an early date European missionaries appear to have +labored in their self-denying task of converting these disciples of +Buddhism to the purer tenets of Christianity, it was not until the +latter part of the eighteenth century that their influence was +sensibly appreciated. Even then they were indebted to an accident for +the increased importance they have since continued to possess. Fleeing +from a formidable and partially successful insurrection, the only +survivor of the royal family and heir to the throne—afterward the +celebrated Ghia-loung—took refuge in the house of Father Pigneau, a +French missionary of unblemished life and reputation. That worthy man +bravely afforded shelter not only to the fugitive, but also to his +wife, his sister, and his son, and even encouraged him to make a +strenuous effort to recover his rights. Foiled, however, for a time by +the superior forces of the rebels, the prince and his faithful +counsellor were compelled to flee for their lives to a small island in +the Gulf of Siam. Yielding to the advice of the missionary, Ghia-loung +now resolved to despatch an embassy to France, in the hope of +obtaining sufficient assistance to place himself on the throne of his +ancestors. Accordingly, in the year 1787, Father Pigneau, accompanied +by the youthful son of the unfortunate prince, proceeded to +Versailles, and actually prevailed upon Louis XVI. to conclude an +alliance, offensive and defensive, with his royal client. The terms of +this treaty are so far curious that they illustrate the practical and +realistic notion of an "idea" which characterized the old French +monarchy quite as much as it does the second Napoleonic empire. +Convinced of the justice of the Anamite prince's claim to the crown, +and moved by a desire to afford him a signal mark of his friendship, +as well as of his love of justice, his most Christian majesty agreed +to despatch immediately to the coasts of Cochin China a squadron +consisting of four frigates, conveying a land force of 1,200 +foot-soldiers, 200 artillerymen, and 250 Caffres, thoroughly equipped +for service, and supported by an efficient field-battery. In return +for—or rather in expectation of receiving—this succor, the king of +Cochin China surrendered the absolute ownership and sovereignty of the +islands of Hoi-nan and Pulo Condor, together with a half-share in the +port of Touron, where the French were authorized to establish whatever +works and factories they might deem requisite for their safety and +commercial advantage. They were further to enjoy the exclusive +privilege of trading with the Cochin Chinese, and of introducing their +merchandise free of all charges and imposts. Neither was any trading +vessel or ship of war to be permitted to enter any port on the Cochin +China coast save only under the French flag. And in the event of his +most Christian majesty becoming involved in hostilities with any other +power, whether Asiatic or European, his faithful ally undertook to fit +out at his own expense both naval and land forces to co-operate with +the French troops anywhere in the Indian seas, but not beyond the +Moluccas or the Straits of Malacca. In consideration of his services +in negotiating this treaty, the ratifications of which were to be +exchanged within twelve months at the latest, Father Pigneau was +raised to the dignity of Bishop of Adran, and appointed ambassador +extraordinary from the court of Versailles to that of Cochin China. +The next step was to select a commander for the projected expedition; +and on the new prelate's urgent solicitation the king consented, +though with marked reluctance, to confer that distinction upon the +Count de Conway, at that time governor of the French establishments in +India. The selection proved an unfortunate one. Bishop Pigneau had +omitted one very important element from his calculation. He had made +no allowance for the disturbing influences of an improper <a name="371">{371}</a> +connection with a "lovely woman." He may even have been ignorant of M. +de Conway's misplaced devotion to Mdme. de Vienne. Be this as it may, +on his arrival at Pondicherry he refused to wait upon that all-potent +lady, and offered her such slights that she became his avowed and +bitter enemy. It was through her, indeed, that the expedition was +never organized, and that the king of Cochin China was left to his own +resources to bring about his restoration. This he at length +accomplished, and in some small degree by the aid of a handful of +volunteers whom the Bishop of Adran had induced to accompany him to +Saigon. A sincere friendship appears to have existed between the +French prelate and the Anamite prince, which terminated only with the +death of the former in the last year of the eighteenth century. But +though Ghia-loung was fully sensible of the advantages to be derived +from maintaining a friendly intercourse with European nations, he was +not blind to the inconveniences likely to arise from allowing the +subjects of a foreign power to form independent settlements within his +dominions. Feeling that his end was at hand, the aged monarch +emphatically warned his son not to allow the French to possess a +single inch of land in his territories; but at the same time advised +him to cultivate amicable relations with that people. His successor +obeyed the paternal counsels only in part. He took care, indeed, to +prevent the French from settling permanently in his country; but he +went very much further, for he actively persecuted the Christian +converts, and exerted himself to the utmost to oppose the introduction +of western ideas and civilization. In the year 1825 Miñ-mâng—for so +was this emperor called—refused even to receive a letter and presents +forwarded by Louis XVIII., and expressed his determination to keep +aloof from all intercourse with European powers. +</p> +<p> +As Captain de Bougainville was provided neither with instructions how +to act under such circumstances, nor "with a sufficient force to +compel the acceptance of what was declined to be taken with a good +grace"—we quote from M. Leon de Rosny's <i>Tableau de Cochinchine</i>, to +which we are indebted for the matter of this article he formed the +wise resolution of withdrawing from those inhospitable shores. But +before he did so, he succeeded in landing Father Régéreau, a French +priest who had devoted himself to the work of making Christians of the +Anamites, whether they would or not. No sooner did this unwelcome news +reach the ears of the monarch, than it caused an edict to appear +enjoining the mandarins to exercise the utmost vigilance in preventing +the ingress of the teachers of "the perverse religion of the +Europeans," which is described as prejudicial to the rectitude and +right-mindedness of mankind. The doctrine of the missionaries was +further represented, in a petition said to have been inspired by the +emperor himself, as of a nature to corrupt and seduce the common +people by abusing their credulity. They employ, it was said, the fear +of hell and eternal punishment to terrify the timid; while, to attract +individuals of a different temperament, they promise the enjoyment of +heavenly bliss as the reward of virtue. By degrees the ill-feeling +entertained by the emperor toward the missionaries grew in intensity, +until they became the object of his bitter aversion; and as his +subordinates, according to custom, were anxious to recommend +themselves to favor by their demonstrative zeal, it was not long +before "the church of Cochin China was enriched by the crown of +numerous martyrs." The first of these martyrs was the Abbe Gagelin, +who was strangled on the 17th October, 1833; but then his offence was +twofold, for he had not only preached the forbidden doctrines, but, in +contravention of the king's commands, had quitted the town of Dong-nai +to do so. A very naive letter from a missionary named Jacquard +conveyed to the abbe the tidings of his forthcoming martyrdom. "Your +sentence," <a name="372">{372}</a> he wrote, "has been irrevocably pronounced. As soon +as you have undergone the punishment of the cord, your head will be +cut off and sent into the provinces in which you have preached +Christianity. Behold you, then, a martyr! How fortunate you are!" To +this pious effusion the abbe replied in a similar strain: "The news +you announce of my being irrevocably condemned to death penetrates my +very heart's core with joy. No; I do not hesitate to avow it, never +did any news give me so much pleasure." +</p> +<p> +In the following year another missionary was tortured to death, not +merely as a teacher of the new religion, but because he was found in +the company of some rebels who had seized upon a fort. No other +martyrdom occurred after this until 1837, in which year the Abbé +Cornay was beheaded and quartered, after being imprisoned for three +months; and, in 1838, M. Jacquard himself escaped by strangulation +from the insults and outrages to which he had been for some time +subjected. Nor was it the missionaries alone who shared the fate and +emulated the calm heroism of the early apostles. The native neophytes +were not a whit less zealous to suffer in their Master's cause, and to +bear witness to the truth, in death as in life. The common people +eagerly flocked to behold their execution, not indeed to taunt and +revile the patient victims, but to secure some relic, however trifling +or otherwise disgusting, and to dip their garments in the +still-flowing blood. Pagans and Christians alike yielded to this +superstition or veneration, while the soldiers on duty drove a +lucrative trade in selling to the scrambling crowd fragments of the +dress and person of the yet-quivering martyr. Even the executioners +are reported to have affirmed that at the moment the head was severed +from the body a certain perfume exhaled from the gushing blood, as if +anticipating glorification in heaven. M. de Rosny, however, frankly +admits that Miñ-mâng was chiefly moved by political considerations to +persecute the followers of the new religion, whom he believed to be in +league with his worst enemies, especially after the capture of a +missionary in one of the rebel forts. His policy, whatever may have +been its real springs, was adopted by his son Thieou-tri, one of whose +first public acts was to command the governors of provinces to track +out the Christians to their most secret asylums. These orders were +only too faithfully obeyed. The French missionaries were ferreted out +of their lurking-places, thrown into prison, and otherwise +ill-treated, throughout this reign, which did not terminate before the +end of 1847. +</p> +<p> +The new monarch, commonly known as Tu-Duk, walked in the footsteps of +his father. An edict was issued almost immediately after his accession +to the throne, commanding that every European missionary found in Anam +should be thrown into the sea with a rope round his neck. And when the +mandarins hesitated to execute such sanguinary orders, a second edict +appeared enjoining that whosoever concealed in his house a propagator +of the Christian faith should be cut in two and thrown into the river. +The fiendish work then began in earnest. The sword of the executioner +was again called into request, and several most estimable men suffered +death on the scaffold. At last even a bishop, Monseigneur Diaz, +experienced the fate of his humbler brethren, on the 20th July, 1857; +and as this prelate happened to be a Spaniard, his death was avenged +by an allied Franco-Spanish expedition, which resulted in the conquest +of Lower Cochin China, and the cession of the provinces of Saigon, +Bien-hoa, and Myt-ho to the French. Let us now see what manner of men +were these Anamites whom the French, failing to convert, were +compelled, by their sense of spiritual duty, to conquer and subjugate. +M. de Rosny shall continue to be our guide. +</p> +<p> +The people of Anam Proper are evidently of Mongol extraction. Their +complexion is of a dark sallow hue, varying from a dirty white to a +yellowish <a name="373">{373}</a> olive color. In stature they are short, but thickset, +and remarkably active. Their features are by no means beautiful +according to the European idea of beauty. They have short square +noses, prominent cheek-bones, thin lips, an small black eyes—the +eyeball being rather yellow than white. Their teeth, which are +naturally of a pure white, are stained almost black and otherwise +disfigured by the excessive use of betel-nut. Their countenances are +chiefly marked by the breadth and height of the cheek-bones, and are +nearly of the shape of a lozenge. The women are better-looking, and +decidedly more graceful, than the men, even in the lower classes, but +both sexes are particularly cheerful and vivacious. The upper classes, +however, affect the solemn air and grave deportment of the Chinese, +and are consequently much less agreeable to strangers than are the +less-dignified orders. Corpulence is considered a great beauty—a fat +face and a protuberant stomach constituting the ideal of an Adonis. +Both men and women wear their hair long, but gathered up at the back +of the head in a knot. It is never cut save in early youth, when it is +all shaved off with the exception of a small tuft on the top of the +crown. A close-cropped head of hair, indeed, is looked upon as a badge +of infamy, and is one of the distinguishing marks of a convicted +criminal. The beard is allowed to grow naturally, but consists of +little more than a few scattered hairs at the end of the chin; the +upper lip being as scantily furnished. The nails should be very long, +thin, and sharp-pointed, and by the women are usually stained of a red +color. +</p> +<p> +The Anamites dress themselves in silk or cotton according to their +means; but whatever the material, the form of their garb is always the +same. In addition to wide trousers fastened round the waist by a +silken girdle, they wear a robe descending to the knees, and +occasionally a shorter one over that; both equally opening on the +right side, but closed by five or six buttons. The men's sleeves are +very wide, and so long that they descend considerably lower than the +ends of the fingers. The women, however, who in other respects dress +precisely as do the men, have their sleeves somewhat shorter, in order +to display their metal or pearl bracelets. The under-garment is +generally made of country cotton, but the upper one, as worn by the +higher classes, is invariably of silk or flowered muslin, of Chinese +manufacture. Cotton trousers are often dyed brown, but even the +laboring population make use of silk as much as possible. For mourning +garments cotton alone is employed, white being the funereal color. +</p> +<p> +Out of doors men and women alike wear varnished straw hats, upward of +two feet in diameter, fastened under the chin, and very useful as a +protection against sun and rain, though somewhat grotesque in +appearance. Within doors the women go bareheaded, not unfrequently +allowing their fine black tresses to hang loose down their backs +almost to the ground. Ear-rings, bracelets, and rings on their fingers +are favorite objects of female vanity; but a modest demeanor is a +thing unknown; a bold, dashing manner being most admired by the men. +They are certainly not good-looking; but their natural gaiety and +liveliness amply compensate for the absence of personal charms. +</p> +<p> +Old men and persons of distinction alone wear sandals, the people +generally preferring to go barefooted. A pair of silken purses, or +bags, to carry betel, money, and tobacco, may be seen in the hand, or +hanging over the shoulder, of every man and woman not actually +employed in hard labor. They are, for the most part, of blue satin, +and sometimes richly embroidered. Like their neighbors the Chinese, +the Anamites are scrupulous observers of the distinctive insignia of +rank, but pay no regard to personal cleanliness. Notwithstanding their +frequent ablutions, their clothes, their hair, their fingers and +nails, are disgustingly filthy. Even wealthy persons wear dirty cotton +dresses within doors, over which <a name="374">{374}</a> they throw their smart silken +robes when they go out. +</p> +<p> +Taste is proverbially a matter beyond dispute; but it would be very +hard for any European to agree with an Anamite as to what constituted +a delicacy and what an abomination. A Cochin Chinese epicure delights, +for instance, in rotten eggs, and is especially fond of them after +they have been under a hen for ten or twelve days. From stale fish, +again, he extracts his choicest sauce, and feasts greedily upon meat +in a state of putrefaction. Vermin of all sorts is highly appreciated. +Crocodile's flesh is also greatly prized; though boiled rice and a +little fish fresh,—smoked, or salted—are the ordinary food of the +poor. Among delicacies may be mentioned silk-worms fried in fat, ants +and ants' eggs, bees, insects, swallows'-nests, and a large white worm +found in decayed wood; but no dainty is more dearly relished than a +still-born calf served up whole in its skin and almost raw. In the way +of pastry the women greatly affect <i>beignets</i> made of herbs, sugar, +and clay. Among the rich the dishes are placed on low tables a foot or +two in height, round which the diners seat themselves on the ground in +the attitude of tailors. Forks and spoons are equally unknown, but +chop-sticks are used after the Chinese fashion. The dinner usually +begins, instead of ending, with fruit and pastry. During the meal +nothing liquid is taken, but before sitting down it is customary to +take a gulp or two of strong spirits distilled from fermented rice, +and after dinner several small cups of tea are drunk by those who can +afford to do so. Cold or unadulterated water is thought unwholesome, +and is therefore never taken by itself. Betel-nut mixed with quicklime +is constantly chewed by both men and women, and of late years the use +of opium has partially crept in. +</p> +<p> +The houses of the Anamites are only one story high, and very low in +the roof. They are, in fact, mere halls, the roof of which is usually +supported on bamboo pillars, on which are pasted strips of +many-colored paper inscribed with Chinese proverbs. The roof slopes +rather sharply, and consists of reed or straw. Neither windows nor +chimneys are seen. The smoke escapes and the light enters by the door. +The walls are made of palm leaves, though rich people often employ +wood for that purpose. In either case they are filthily dirty and +swarm with insects. At the further end of the house is a raised +platform, which serves as a bed for the entire family. The floor is of +earth, not unfrequently traversed by channels hollowed out by the rain +which descends through the roof. In every household one member remains +awake all night, to give the alarm in case of thieves attempting to +come in. +</p> +<p> +It is usual for the men to marry as soon as they have the means to +purchase a wife. The price of such an article varies, according to +circumstances, from two to ten shillings, though rich people will give +as much as twice or three times that sum for anything out of the +common run. Polygamy is permitted by the laws; but practically it is a +luxury confined to the wealthy, and even with them the first wife +reigns supreme over the household. The privilege of divorce is +reserved exclusively for the husbands, who can put away a disagreeable +partner by breaking in twain a copper coin or a piece of wood, in the +presence of a witness. Parents cannot dispose of their daughters in +marriage without their free consent. Previous to marriage the Cochin +Chinese are perfectly unrestrained; but as chastity is nothing thought +of, this is not a matter of much moment. Infanticide is punished as a +crime, but not so abortion. Adultery is a capital offense. The guilty +woman is trampled to death under the feet of an elephant, while her +lover is strangled or beheaded; but these sentences are frequently +commuted into exile. Wives are not locked up as in Mohammedan +countries, but with that exception they are quite as badly treated, +being altogether at the mercy of their husbands. They are, in truth, +little better than slaves or <a name="375">{375}</a> beasts of burden. It is they who +build the houses, who cultivate the ground, who manufacture the +clothes, who prepare the food, who, in short, do everything. They have +nine lives, say their ungrateful husbands, and can afford to lose one +without being the worse for it. They are described as being less timid +than the men, more intelligent, more gay, and quite ready to adapt +themselves to the manners and customs of their French rulers. The men, +though by no means destitute of strength and courage, are lazy, +indolent, and averse to bodily exercise, and chiefly at home in the +petty intrigues of an almost retail commerce. +</p> +<p> +Great importance is attached to the funeral ceremonies. The dead are +interred—not burnt, according to the custom of neighboring nations— +and much taste is displayed in their burial-places. There is no more +acceptable present than a coffin, and thus it usually happens that one +is provided years before it can be turned to a proper account. The +deceased is clothed in his choicest apparel, and in his coffin is +placed an abundant supply of whatever he is likely to want in the new +life upon which he has entered through the portals of death. The +obsequies are generally deferred for six months, or for even a whole +year, in order to give more time for the necessary preparations. On +such occasions friends and relatives flock from afar to the "funeral +baked meats;" for a handsome banquet forms an essential part of the +otherwise melancholy details. From twenty to thirty bearers convey the +corpse to its last abode, amid the deafening discord of drums, +cymbals, and tom-toms. The procession moves with slow and measured +step, and on the coffin is placed a shell filled with water, which +enables the master of the ceremonies to ascertain that the coffin is +borne with becoming steadiness. Mourning is worn for twenty-seven +months for a father, mother, or husband; but only twelve months for a +wife. During this period it is forbidden to be present at any +spectacle, to attend any meeting, or to marry. At various intervals +after the interment, offerings of eatables are presented to the dead, +but which are scrupulously consumed by the offerers themselves. +Respect, bordering on reverence, is shown to old age; but then old +people are a rarity, few individuals attaining to half a century. +Sickness of all kinds is rife, including "the whole cohort of fevers." +The want of cleanliness is undoubtedly at the bottom of most of the +complaints from which the natives suffer. The system of medicine most +in vogue is borrowed from the Chinese. Every well-to-do family +maintains its own physician, who physics all its members to their +heart's content. Doctors, however, agree no more in Cochin China than +in any other region of the globe. There are two schools of +medicine—the one employing nothing but stimulants, the other adhering +solely to refrigerants, and both citing in favor of their respective +systems the most astounding and well-nigh miraculous cures. +</p> +<p> +The rules of politeness and etiquette are distinctly drawn and rigidly +observed. An inferior meeting a superior prostrates himself at full +length upon the ground, and repeats the act again and again according +to the amount of deference he wishes to exhibit. To address one by the +title of great-grand-father is to show the highest possible respect, +while grandfather, father, uncle, and elder brother mark the downward +gradations from that supreme point. There is, in truth, somewhat too +much of veneering visible in all that pertains to the private life and +character of the Anamites. Their moral code, based on the precepts of +Confucius, is irreproachable, but they seldom pause to regulate their +conduct after its wholesome doctrines. Pleasure, indeed, is more +thought of than morality, and gambling is a raging passion with all +classes. Cock-fighting, and even the combats of red-fishes, fill them +with especial delight; and when thoroughly excited they will stake on +any chance their wives and children, and even <a name="376">{376}</a> themselves. Music, +dancing, and theatrical exhibitions are likewise much to their taste, +though the dancers are invariably women hired for the purpose. +</p> +<p> +The laws and police regulations are for the most part wise and +sensible, but are more frequently neglected than observed. Here, as in +other Asiatic countries, a gift in the hand perverteth the wisdom of +the wise, and thus only the poor and the stingy need suffer for their +sins. For most offences the bastinado is inflicted, but for heinous +crimes capital punishments are enforced. There is a sufficient variety +in the modes of execution. Sometimes the criminal is sentenced to be +strangled; at other time's he is decapitated, or trampled to death by +an elephant, or even hacked to pieces if his crime has been in any way +extraordinary. For minor delinquencies recourse is had to +transportation in irons to a distant province, or to hard labor, such +as cutting grass for the emperor's elephants. +</p> +<p> +Society is divided into two classes—the people and the mandarins. +Nobility is hereditary, but the son of a mandarin of the first order +ranks only with the second until he has done something to merit +promotion to his father's rank. In like manner the son of a +second-class mandarin belongs to the third rank, and so on to the +lowest grade; and there are nine of these—the highest two sitting in +the imperial council. But the most exalted honors are open to the most +humble. No man is so low born as to despair of becoming one of the +pillars of the empire. The competition system prevails here in its +full vigor. Everything depends upon the passing certain examinations; +but for all that the mandarins are described as oppressors of the +poor, evil advisers of the sovereign, addicted to fraud, given up to +their appetites, wasting their time in sensual and frivolous pursuits, +corrupt and venal in the administration of justice. +</p> +<p> +The patrimony is distributed equally among all the sons, whether +legitimate or otherwise, except that the eldest receives one-tenth of +the entire property in addition to his own share; in return for which +he is expected to guard the interests of the family, and above all to +look after his sisters, who cannot marry without his consent. The +daughters have no part in the inheritance save in the absence of male +heirs, but in that case they are treated as if they were sons. Through +extreme poverty children are often sold as slaves by their parents. An +insolvent debtor likewise becomes the bondsman of his creditor; and as +the legal rate of interest is thirty per cent., a debt rapidly +accumulates. +</p> +<p> +An Anamite hour is twice the length of a European one, and the night +is divided into five watches. A year consists of twelve lunar months; +so that every two or three years it becomes necessary to add another +month: in nineteen years there are seventeen of these intercalated +months. The lapse of time is marked by periods of twelve years, five +of which constitute a "grand cycle;" but in historical narratives the +dates are calculated from the accession of the reigning monarch. The +year begins with the month of February. The decimal system of +enumeration is the one adopted by the Cochin Chinese. +</p> +<p> +The religion of the people is a superstitious Buddhism; that of the +lettered classes a dormant belief in the moral teachings of Confucius. +Whatever temples there are, are of a mean order, and are served by an +ignorant and ill-paid priesthood. The malignant spirits are +propitiated by offerings of burnt paper inscribed with prayers, of +bundles of sweet-scented wood, and of other articles of trifling +value; the good spirits are mostly neglected. Sincere veneration, +however, is shown to the manes of deceased ancestors. The priests take +a vow of celibacy, to which they occasionally adhere. They abstain +entirely from animal food, and affect a yellow or red hue in their +apparel. After death their bodies are burned, and not buried as is the +case with the laity. +</p> +<a name="377">{377}</a> +<p> +The inhabitants of Cochin China are naturally industrious, and possess +considerable skill as carpenters and upholsterers. They also work in +iron with some success, and display no mean taste in their pottery. +Their cotton and silk manufactures are, however, coarse and greatly +inferior to the Chinese. Their lackered boxes are famous throughout +the world, nor are their filigree ornaments unworthy of admiration. +But though skilful and intelligent as artisans, and abundantly endowed +with the faculty of imitation, they are wretchedly deficient in +imagination, and have no idea of invention. This defect is perhaps of +less consequence now that they have the benefit of receiving their +impulses from the most inventive nation in the world. Without doubt, +their material prosperity will be largely augmented by the French +domination, nor have they anything to lose in moral and social +respects. The conquest of Cochin China may therefore be regarded as an +advantage to the people themselves; but how far it is likely to yield +any profit to the French is altogether another question, and one which +at present we are not called upon to discuss. Sufficient for the day +is the evil thereof. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>From The Dublin Review. +<br><br> +CONSALVI'S MEMOIRS.</h2> +<br> +<p> +<i>Memoires du Cardinal Consalvi, Secrétaire d'État du Pape Pie VII., +avec une Introduction et des Notes.</i> Par J. CRÉTINEAU-JOLY. 2 vols. +8vo. Paris: Plon. 1864. +</p> +<p> +M. Crétineau-Joly is a Vendéan, and there seems to be in his blood +something of that pugnacious and warlike quality which so +distinguished his forefathers. Each of his former publications betrays +this combative propensity, and the introduction which accompanies +Cardinal Consalvi's Memoirs is worthy of its predecessors. M. +Crétineau-Joly is well known on the continent by his "History of the +Jesuits"—a work containing a considerable amount of valuable +information concerning that celebrated and much maligned order; but, +at the same time, it may be considered in the light of an Armstrong +gun, which batters and reduces to dust the bastions of an enemy. +Indeed, it was ushered forth at the very height of the warfare which +raged against the Church in France, a few years previous to the +downfall of Louis Philippe. In 1858 the same writer produced a +brochure bearing the following title, "The Church versus the +Revolution," another broadside fired against crowned revolutionists, +no less than against the sectarian hordes of a Mazzini and a +Garibaldi. Hardly a year had elapsed when the French emperor invaded +Lombardy, with what result the whole world is aware. So M. +Crétineau-Joly had taken time by the forelock. And now, again, he +comes forth with these highly interesting and authentic memoirs, +written by the cardinal and prime minister of Pius VII. In every +respect they may be proclaimed the most important, if not the most +voluminous, of the editor's publications. No one, at the same time, +will fail to perceive that between the actual situation of the Holy +See and that which marked its history in the eventful years between +1799 and 1811, there underlies a startling similarity. Singularly +enough, the second half of the nineteenth <a name="378">{378}</a> century begins with +the same picture of violence, the same hypocrisy, the same contempt of +right by might, that characterized the dawn of the present age. On the +one side, an all-powerful ruler, intoxicated by success, backed by a +host of servile demagogues, and hardly less servile, though royal +infidels; on the other, a weak old man, backed by a calm, deliberate, +truly Christian genius—both wielding no other weapons but faith, +hope, and charity—both torn from their home and judgment-seat by the +iron hand of revolutionary despotism—and yet both riding triumphant +over the seething waves, whilst the grim corpses of their enemies are +washed to the shore, or startle the traveller as he comes suddenly +upon them in his wanderings through Russian wilds. Ay, there she goes, +that tiny ship of Peter's, with a Pius at her helm; now, as in bygone +days, with an Antonelli as a commander—much about the same man as a +Consalvi. +</p> +<pre> + "Blow fair, thou breeze! She anchors ere the dark. + Already doubled is the cape—our bay + Receives that prow which proudly spurns the spray. + How gloriously her gallant course she goes! + Her white wings flying—never from her foes— + She walks the waters like a thing of life, + And seems to dare the elements to strife." +</pre> +<p> +Setting aside metaphors and poetry, these memoirs are certainly one of +the most remarkable instances of calm self-possession and confidence +in a just cause that are to be met with in any time or country. Here +is a man, and prime minister of a captive sovereign, himself a +prisoner, who undertakes to write the history of the important events +in which he had played a most conspicuous part. He is closely watched, +and consequently obliged to write by fits and starts; he is deprived +of every source of documentary information, and consequently must +trust to his own memory. Will these hasty yet truthful sheets escape +his jailer's eye? He cannot tell. Will he ever recover his liberty, be +restored to his dear master's bosom and confidence? He cannot tell: +but nevertheless the great cardinal—for great he was universally +acknowledged—goes on bringing forth certain facts, known to himself +alone, and which throw more light on the true character of the first +Napoleon than the ponderous and garbled evidence of a Thiers, or even +the more trustworthy pages of M. Artaud, in his "Life of Pius VII." +Indeed, there are few comparisons of higher interest than to open +those two works at the parts which refer to the events narrated in +these memoirs. A labor of this kind, first originating in a spirit of +fair play, soon becomes a labor of love, so strong is the contrast +between the worldly, scheming, truckling, infidel historian of the +first empire, and the unassuming and conscientious, though bold and +resolute cardinal. One may safely say, that M. Thiers would have never +dreamt of bearding the headstrong Bonaparte, as Consalvi did on a +memorable occasion, which reminds us of those legates of old, who +daunted by their steady looks and unruffled patience the burly +violence of a Richard, or unveiled the cunning of a Frederic +Hohenstaufen. +</p> +<p> +At the very outset of these memoirs, the cardinal gives us their true +and solemn character. His last will, which accompanies them, and may +be considered as a sort of preface, contains the following lines: +</p> +<p> +"My heir and trustee, as well as those who may hereafter take charge +of my inheritance, are bound to bestow the greatest care on my +personal writings relative to the conclave held at Venice in 1799 and +1800; to the concordat of 1801; to the marriage of the Emperor +Napoleon with the Archduchess Maria Louisa of Austria; and, lastly, to +the papers on different periods of my life and ministry. These five +papers, some of which are nearly finished, and the others in course of +preparation, are not to be published before the death of those eminent +personages who are mentioned therein. In this way many disputes may be +avoided, for, though utterly unfounded, as my own writings rest on +truth alone, still <a name="379">{379}</a> they might injure that very truth, and the +interests of the Holy See, to which I am desirous of leaving the means +of repelling any false attack published hereafter on these matters. +These memoirs on the conclave, the concordat of 1801, the marriage, +and the ministry, belonging more especially to the Holy Sec, and to +the pontifical government, my heir and trustee shall present them to +the reigning pontiff, and beseech the Holy Father to preserve them +carefully within the archives of the Vatican. They may be of use to +the Holy See on many occasions, but more particularly if any future +history be published of the events which form the object of the +present writings, or if it should become necessary to refute any false +statement. In regard to the memoirs concerning the different periods +of my own life, as the extinction of my family will leave behind me no +one directly interested in the following pages, they are to remain in +the hands of my heir and trustee, or in those of the successive +administrators of my fortune; or, again, they may be likewise handed +over to the archives of the Vatican, if they be deemed worthy of +preservation. My only desire is, that in case of the biography of the +cardinals being continued, my heir and executors shall cause these +memoirs to be known, so that nothing may be published contrary to +truth about myself; for I am ambitious of maintaining immaculate my +own reputation—a wish grounded on the prescriptions of Scripture. As +for the truth of the facts brought forward in my writings, I may make +bold to say, <i>Deus scit quia non mentior.</i>" +</p> +<p> +Cardinal Consalvi was born at Rome, of a noble family, in 1757, and +was the eldest of five children, two of whom died at an early age. His +father bore the title of marquess, and his mother, the Marchioness +Claudia Carandini, was of Modenese origin. +</p> +<p> +The family itself, on the father's side, had sprung up in Tuscany at +Pisa, though not under the same name; but emigrated about a century +and a half ago to the Roman States, where it expanded, and gradually +grew into political, or rather ecclesiastical importance. Consalvi's +forefathers still, however, held in Tuscany some property, to which he +would have been entitled had he felt disposed to dispute the equity of +certain Leopoldine laws concerning trustees. But, with characteristic +disinterestedness the future cardinal never gave the matter a second +thought. +</p> +<p> +"I never felt (says he) a passion for riches; beside, my resources, +though far from opulent, were sufficient for a modest way of living, +thanks to the income arising out of the different offices which I held +successively. And thus being lifted, by Divine Providence, above +vanity and ambition, I never was tempted to prove that I was descended +from the Brunaccis and not from the Consalvis, whenever envy or +ignorance represented me as belonging to a stock unblessed with old +nobility. It would have been an easy matter to dispel these +imputations or errors. Being fully convinced that the best nobility +springs from the heart and from good deeds; knowing, likewise, that I +was a genuine Brunacci and not a Consalvi, I despised all such rumors. +… Nor did I alter my views when the high position which I +afterward attained afforded so many opportunities for putting an end +to those idle reports." +</p> +<p> +In the above passage we have already the whole man. During his long +and chequered life he never once exposed himself to the charge of +making his own fortune out of the numerous and even honorable +occasions which would have tempted a less exalted soul. It would be +useless to follow the young Consalvi through his course of studies, +which were brilliant, and partly gone through under the eye of +Cardinal York, the last of a fated race, who entertained for the +future minister an affectionate friendship that never cooled until his +death. +</p> +<p> +Hercules Consalvi had hardly finished his academical curriculum at +<a name="380">{380}</a> Rome when he was called to the prelature, in 1783, as reporter +to the tribunal of the Curia. His talents and deep knowledge, though +so young, in canon and civil law, soon made him conspicuous among his +competitors. In 1786, the Pope Pius VI. appointed him <i>Ponente del +buono govemo</i>, a board, or congregation, charged with giving its +opinion on all municipal questions. This promotion was due to his +merit, but the cardinal himself confesses that it was a tardy one, not +on account of any neglect on the part of the pontifical government, +but merely because he did not avail himself of favorable +opportunities. "On the one hand," observes he, "my own disposition +never inclined to ask for favor, and still less to court the patronage +of those placed in high positions; whilst, on the other hand, I had +before my eyes, in such respects, the fine example of my own guardian, +the Cardinal Negroni. … He was wont to say, 'We never ought to ask +for anything; we must never flatter to obtain preferment; but manage +in such a way as to overcome every obstacle, through a most punctual +fulfilment of our duties, and the enjoyment of a sound reputation.' To +this piece of advice I strictly adhered through life." To those who +are so prone to malign the pomp and splendor of the Roman prelature, +it will be a matter of surprise to learn that at this very time the +only benefice conferred upon Consalvi amounted to the paltry stipend +of £12 a year. +</p> +<p> +The Pope, however, who seems to have been an excellent judge of true +merit, soon placed the young prelate at the head of the hospital of +San Michele, the largest and most important in Rome. The establishment +required a thorough reform; and Consalvi soon worked wonders, being +led on by his own innate ardor, and by a strong predilection for the +management of charitable institutions. But he had hardly realized his +intended labor of reformation, when he was superseded by another +prelate. Pius VI., in fact, did not wish Consalvi to wear out his +energies in the routine of administrative bureaucracy. The incident +which led to his promotion is so truly characteristic of both +personages, that we cannot refrain from a copious quotation: +</p> +<p class="cite"> + "The sudden death of one of the <i>votanti di segnatura</i>, or Supreme + Court of Cassation, made a vacancy in that court. All my friends + engaged me not to lose a moment in applying for it. I did not yield + to their entreaties, nor, indeed, did the Pope allow me time for + that purpose. The above death had taken place on Maunday Thursday. + The very next morning, though it was Good Friday, and the sacred + services of the day were about to be solemnized; though all the + public offices were closed, according to custom, the Pope sent to + the Secretary of State an order to forward my immediate appointment + as <i>votanti di segnatura</i>. As soon as it arrived, I hastened to the + Pope to thank him. His Holiness was not in the habit of receiving + any one merely for the sake of hearing expressions of gratitude; + still less did I expect to be introduced on such a day, when the + Pope, after attending at the holy function, had retired to his + apartments, with a view of coming back for <i>Tenebra</i>, and was in + the very act of reciting Complin, which was to be followed by his + dinner. +<br><br> + "On learning that I was in the antechamber, where he had previously + given orders that I should not be sent away in case I should come, + he admitted me at once. After finishing Complin in my presence, he + addressed me so kindly that I shall remember his words as long as I + live. 'My dear Monsignor,' said he, 'you are well aware that we + receive no one merely to hear thanksgivings; and yet we have gone + against our usual custom, notwithstanding this busy day, and though + our dinner has just been served up, in order that we may have the + pleasure of making you the present communication. If you were not + included in the last promotion, it was <a name="381">{381}</a> because we were obliged + to hand over to another the post really destined to yourself; and in + doing so we felt as much aggrieved as we are now delighted to offer + you immediately the vacant charge of <i>votanti di segnatura</i>. We do + it to show you the satisfaction which you afford us by your conduct, + We took you away from an administrative station merely to place you + on higher ground.' +<br><br> + "The Holy Father then added a few words concerning the opinion which + his kindness, and by no means my own merit, suggested to him + relatively to my future career. Indeed, the knowledge which I have + of myself would not allow me to transcribe those words. He then + continued as follows: 'What we now bestow upon you is really not + worth much, but I have nothing else for the present. Take it, + however, as a positive pledge of what I am disposed to do as soon as + an opportunity offers.' +<br><br> + "It is easy to understand that after such a speech, uttered in that + easy, affable, and yet majestic manner so peculiar to Pius VI., I + was at a loss for expressions to answer him. I could hardly stammer + out, that after the language he had just used about my + promotion—language showing that I had not incurred his disapproval + by my conduct at San Michele—my mind was quite at ease as to the + future. Indeed, I had no other ambition but to please him, and to + fulfil my duty in any station he might think fit to confer upon me. +<br><br> + "Here I was interrupted. 'I am satisfied—nay, highly + satisfied'—said the Pope, 'by your behavior at San Michele; but I + again say that I destine you to other purposes. What I promised + formerly was sincere, but still it was but empty words. This is + something matter of fact; not much, indeed, but yet better than + words. So don't refuse it; and now be off, for, you see, our dinner + is getting cold, and we must soon go back to chapel.'" +</p> +<p> +It would be doubtless congenial to our feelings to dwell upon these +touching details; but we are already in the year 1790, and the knell +of the old French monarchy is tolling. Let us plunge, therefore, at +once <i>in medias res</i>, and skip over the eight intervening years +between the time which saw Rome invaded by a revolutionary army, the +Pope torn from his throne, and led a prisoner, first to Florence, then +to Valence, where he was to die a martyr. On reading this part of the +memoirs, one is particularly struck with the similarity which it +presents with the history of Piedmontese invasion—the same hypocrisy, +the same attempts at provoking to insurrection the inhabitants at +Rome, and, these failing, the same recourse to violence. The +accidental death of General Duphot at last appears in its true colors, +but of course it supplied the Directory with a pretence for seizing +the Papal States, an act of spoliation it had been long preparing. +[Footnote 77] Thanks to the energy of Consalvi, to whom had been +entrusted the maintenance of public order, previous to the entry of +the French troops into the capital, no insurrection took place; but +for that very reason he was obnoxious to the government of the +invaders. After the Pope's departure he was thrown into prison, with +the prospect of being transported, together with many Roman +ecclesiastical and pontifical officers, to the fatal colony of +Cayenne. <a name="382">{382}</a> To the honor of the French commander it must be said, +that he did all in his power to defend the energetic prelate against +his contemptible enemies, and to alleviate his captivity. The Paris +Directory had first banished him to Civita Vecchia, and then altered +his destination to Naples. But the Roman demagogues were determined +upon wreaking their vengeance on Consalvi: +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 77: As a proof of this, we may produce the secret + instructions forwarded, two months and a half before the general's + death and the Roman insurrection, by the French government to Joseph + Bonaparte, their plenipotentiary at Rome: "You have two things to + bear in mind: (1) To prevent the King of Naples from coming to Rome; + (2) To help, instead of opposing, the favorable dispositions of + those who believe that it is time for the Papal dominion to come to + an end. In short, you must encourage the impulse toward freedom by + which the people of Rome seems to be animated." Instructions like + these (observes, very justly, M. Crétineau-Joly) could have no other + object but to lay a diplomatical snare, or to provoke an + insurrection. The fact is so clear that Cacault, who succeeded to + Joseph Bonaparte at Rome, wrote in 1801 to the First Consul—"You + know, quite as well as I do, the details of this melancholy event. + Nobody in Rome ordered either to fire or to kill any one. General + Duphot was imprudent; nay, more—let us out with the word—he was + guilty. There is a law of nations at Rome not a whit less than + elsewhere." The admission does credit to the honest man who + contributed so largely to bring about the concordat of 1801.] +</p> +<p> +"I had been detained (says he) about four or five and twenty days, +when I was visited in my prison by my dear brother Andrea, as well as +by my two friends, the Princes Chigi and Teano. This piece of good +fortune I owed to the kind commander of the fortress. They informed me +that they were bearers of both good and bad news. I was at last to be +transported, not, indeed, to Tuscany, but to Naples, so that I might +not join the Pope. At the same time, it had been ordained that I was +to ride through the streets of the city mounted on an ass, escorted by +policemen, and lashed all along with a horsewhip. Many a window under +which I was to pass by was already hired; and our Jacobins, as well as +the wives of our consuls, promised themselves much pleasure at the +sight of this execution. My friends were quite amazed at my +indifference on receiving this last piece of news, which, indeed, +caused me but little pain; for I really considered it rather as a +source of triumph and glory. On the contrary, I was deeply vexed at +not being able to proceed to Tuscany, where I was so desirous of +meeting the Pope." +</p> +<p> +The humanity of the French general prevented the Roman demagogues from +carrying into execution the latter part of the sentence; but he +remained inflexible as to Consalvi's removal to Naples. The latter +had, therefore, but to obey; and started for his destination, in +company with a band of eighteen convicts, and several political +prisoners like himself. After many difficulties, arising out of +Acton's tortuous policy, he succeeded at length in reaching Leghorn, +where he had to encounter obstacles of a different nature. His very +first step was to proceed to Florence, in hopes that the Duke of +Tuscany would facilitate his access to the captive Pontiff, who was +detained in a neighboring Carthusian monastery. But the jealous +watchfulness of the French plenipotentiary struck terror into the +heart of the Tuscan minister, who peremptorily refused to have +anything to do with the matter. Consalvi was not, however, to be +daunted when on the path of duty; he consequently set out on foot for +the Chartreuse, situated at about three miles from Florence, and +contrived his visit so secretly that he baffled detection. On +approaching the foot of the hill, the faithful servant could hardly +repress his emotions. But let us hear him in his own words: +</p> +<p class="cite"> + "Every step which brought me nearer to the Holy Father increased the + strong feelings that welled up from my soul. The poverty and + solitude of the place, the sight of the two or three unfortunates + who attended him, brought tears to my eyes. At last I was introduced + into his presence. O God! what were my emotions at that moment; my + heart throbbed almost to breaking! +<br><br> + "Pius VI. was seated before a table, a posture which concealed his + weakness, for he had almost lost the use of his legs, and he could + not move without the help of two strong men. The beauty and majesty + of his features were still the same as at Rome; he still inspired a + deep veneration and a most ardent attachment. I fell prostrate at + his feet, which I bathed with my tears; I told him the difficulties + I had to encounter, and how ardently I desired to remain with him, + in order to serve him, assist him—in fact, share his fate. I + promised not to spare any effort for the furtherance of this + object." +</p> +<p> +A full hour quickly fled in thus communing with each other, and +Consalvi was obliged to take his leave. The aged Pope foresaw that +this prop of <a name="383">{383}</a> his declining and martyred life would not be +allowed him; but still he clung fondly to the idea, and when his +faithful adherent, on a second and last visit, admitted that he had +failed in every endeavor to gain his end, and had even been ordered +out of the country, Pius evinced a strong feeling of regret, though no +surprise. This farewell visit is related in terms no less touching +than the former: +</p> +<p class="cite"> + "During this audience, which lasted also a full hour, he bestowed + upon me the greatest marks of kindness, exhorting me successively to + practise resignation, wisdom, and those acts of firmness of which + his own life and his whole demeanor set such a fine example. He + appeared to me quite as great, and even far greater, than when he + reigned at Rome. I besought him to give me his blessing. He laid his + hands on my head, and, like the most venerable among the patriarchs + of old, raising his eyes toward heaven, he prayed unto the Lord, and + blessed me, with an attitude so resigned, so august, so holy, so + full of real tenderness, that to the last day of my life the + remembrance will remain graven on my heart in indelible characters. +<br><br> + "When I retired, my eyes were swimming with tears; I was beside + myself with grief; and yet I felt both encouraged and re-assured by + the inexpressible calmness of my sovereign, and the sweet serenity + of his features. It was indeed the greatness of a good man + struggling against misfortune." +</p> +<p> +Four-and-twenty hours afterward, Consalvi was obliged to leave +Florence for Venice; the Pope was hurried through Alpine snows to +Valence, in Dauphine, where he died of his sufferings on the 29th of +August, 1799. +</p> +<p> +And what a time for the election of a new pope! Italy overrun by the +French revolutionary armies, Rome in their possession, and ruled by a +horde of incendiary demagogues; the Russians, headed by Suwarow, +pouring into the Peninsula to oppose the French; whilst Austria, +governed by a Thugut, was watching her opportunity to get hold of the +new Pope—if there should be a Pope—and make him the pliant tool of her +ambition. Nor let us forget that Bonaparte was on his way back from +Egypt, preparing to swoop down, eagle-like, on those very Austrian +possessions wherein the conclave was to meet. And yet the conclave <i>did</i> +meet at Venice, on an island of that famous republic, which had so +often defied the bans and interdicts of the Roman pontiffs;—the +cardinals hurried from their neighboring cities or secret abodes, +though with views and intentions not perhaps exactly in accordance +with the solemnity and urgency of the occasion. It is, indeed, a +curious picture of human passions, though blended with higher motives +and purposes,—that truthful memoir drawn up by Consalvi on the +conclave of 1800, wherein he was unanimously elected secretary to the +assembly. The election lasted more than three long months, on account +of the two contending factions, headed by Cardinal Herzan, on the part +of Austria, and by the celebrated Maury, then Bishop of Montefiascone +in the Papal States. Consalvi, notwithstanding his wonted moderation, +boldly proclaims these divisions to have been <i>scandalous</i> in such +circumstances, and animadverts severely on the intrigues of the +imperial court. And yet he cannot help observing that, on such +occasions, the Sacred College seem led on, little by little, as it +were, by some higher power, to sacrifice their own private views and +interests to the common weal of Christendom. So it was, indeed, in the +present juncture, thanks to the extraordinary ability, to the +self-renouncement, prudence, and true Catholic spirit displayed +throughout by the youthful secretary. The votes were gradually won +over to Cardinal Chiaramonti, so well known afterward by the name of +Pius VII. Consalvi had truly displayed a master-mind; and the new +pontiff immediately showed how highly he appreciated his merit, by +appointing him Secretary of State. We can easily believe the surprise +and <a name="384">{384}</a> alarm of the new minister; for doubtless his was no easy +task. The Austrians possessed nearly all the Papal States, whilst the +King of Naples held Rome itself. The court of Vienna, intent upon +keeping at least the three legations, which had recently been wrested +from the French, offered at the same time to restore to the Pope the +remaining parts of his dominions. To such a proposal the latter could +but oppose a flat denial, accompanied by a firm resolution to return +to Rome without delay. The imperial negotiator, Ghislieri, then +reduced his demands to the two legations of Bologna and Ferrara; but +he met with no better success. The spoliation of the Holy See, as the +reader may now perceive, is after all an old story. The Pope, indeed, +went so far as to write to the emperor a letter, in which he formally +demanded the restitution of all his provinces. No notice whatsoever +was taken of the Papal missive. At last, utterly worn out by Austrian +duplicity, Pius one day addressed Ghislieri in the following terms: +"Since the emperor refuses obstinately a restitution, which both +religion and equity require, I really do not see what new argument I +can produce to convince him. Let his majesty take care, however, not +to lay by in his wardrobe any clothes belonging, not to himself, but +to the Church. For not only will his majesty be unable to wear them, +but most probably they will pester with the grub his own hereditary +dominions, which may be worm-eaten in a short time." +</p> +<p> +The Marquess Ghislieri hurried out of the Papal presence in a rage, +which found vent when he met Consalvi. "The new Pope," he exclaimed, +"has hardly donned his own clothes; he is not yet accustomed to his +own craft, and he talks of the Austrian wardrobe being worm-eaten! He +knows but little of our power; it would require thousands of moths to +nibble it to dust." Two months after, the battle of Marengo had been +fought and won: the legations, Lombardy, Venetia, the hereditary +German states, the capital itself, had fallen a prey to the Corsican +conqueror! Pius VII. had scarcely set his foot on the shore of his own +dominions when the news of the famous defeat arrived: "Ah!" exclaimed +Ghislieri, a religious man, after all, "I now see fulfilled the Pope's +prediction: our wardrobe has truly been worm-eaten to tatters." +</p> +<p> +Pius VII. had but just returned to Rome, in the midst of a delighted +and grateful population, when he received the astounding news that the +conqueror of the Austrians was desirous of negotiating with the Holy +See for the restoration of religion in France. Whilst at Vercelli, +Bonaparte had met with Cardinal Martiniana, who was returning from the +conclave at Venice; and he expressed himself so clearly, so pointedly, +as to his future plans, that both Consalvi and the Pope were taken by +surprise. Their approbation was immediately given, and the Pope +himself wrote to Martiniana: "You may tell the First Consul that we +will readily enter into a negotiation tending to an object so truly +honorable, so congenial to our apostolical administration, and so +thoroughly conformable to our own views." +</p> +<p> +The history of this celebrated treaty, on which so much hangs in +France even in our own time, has been often related, and yet many a +detail of the intricate negotiations which preceded its conclusion had +remained secret until the publication of the present memoirs. Three +personages stand out in strong relief on that occasion, each with his +individual character: Cacault, the French ambassador at Rome, +Bonaparte, and Consalvi himself. Of the second, little need be said; +but M. Cacault is, we believe, hardly known in England. He was a +Breton by birth, and, as such, had imbibed those religious feelings +which stamp so strongly the most western province of France. As a +republican representative of the Directory, he did all in his power to +avert from the Papal See those evils and that invasion which <a name="385">{385}</a> +ended in the captivity of Pius VI. When Napoleon's star was in the +ascendant, M. Cacault quickly discovered the depth and extent of his +genius, and thenceforward abetted his plans. At the same time, he was +by no means a flatterer, but ever plain-spoken to bluntness. A time +came, indeed, when the greatest conqueror of modern times found the +noble-hearted Breton rather too sincere, and consigned him to the +peaceful life of a seat in his new-fangled senate. But that day was +yet to come. In 1801, M. Cacault enjoyed the whole confidence of the +First Consul. +</p> +<p> +On leaving Bonaparte, the ambassador heard him utter those famous +words, which have been so often quoted: "Mind you treat the Pope as if +he had 200,000 men at his back. Remember, also, that in October, 1796, +I wrote to you how much I wished to save the Holy See, not to +overthrow it, and that both you and I entertained the same feelings in +this respect." With credentials like these, M. Cacault should have +found it an easy matter to negotiate with Rome; but, singularly +enough, the conservative government of Austria threw many an obstacle +in the way. The very idea of a reconciliation between revolutionary +France and the Papacy seems to have disquieted M. de Thugut, and he +did all in his power to breed a feeling of distrust, on the part of +Rome at least. The court of Naples was animated by the same policy; +and even Bonaparte himself, at one time, appeared to waver between the +impulse of his own good sense and the suggestions of his infidel +advisers. In the eyes of M. Cacault, the Pope stood too much on +theological tenets and opinions, when dealing with a victorious +adventurer. At any rate, matters soon grew from bad to worse. In a fit +of impatience, the consul ordered his ambassador to leave Rome in five +days, if the concordat sent from Paris was not signed at the +expiration of that short time. +</p> +<p> +At this critical juncture, the Breton came to a determination so truly +characteristic of the man, that we must allow him to speak for +himself. We borrow the following narrative from his secretary, M. +Artaud: +</p> +<p> +"We are bound to obey our government," said he, addressing himself to +me; "but then a government must be guided by a head capable of +understanding negotiations, by ministers capable of advising him +properly, and lastly, all must agree together. Every government ought +to have a plan, a will, an aim of its own. But this is no easy matter +with a new government. Now, though in a secondary station, I am really +master of this business; but if we go on in Rome as they are going on +in Paris, nothing can come out of it but a sort of chaos. … It is +fully understood that the head of the state wished for a concordat; he +wished for it so far back as Tolentino, and even before, when he +called himself <i>the best friend of the Pope</i>.… In fact, he has sent +me here to negotiate a concordat, and for that purpose has given me in +yourself the prop I myself desired. But then his ministers probably +don't wish for a concordat, and they have constant access to his ear. +Now the character most easy to irritate and to deceive, is that of a +warrior, who as yet understands nothing about politics, and is ever +returning to military orders and to the sword.… Shall we, like two +fools, leave Rome in this way because the despatch orders us to do so, +and give up France to <i>irreligiosity</i>—a word no less barbarous than +the thing itself? Shall we leave her to a sort of spurious +Catholicism, or that hybrid system which advises the establishment of +a patriarch? God knows, then, that the future destinies of the First +Consul will probably never be fulfilled.… +</p> +<p> +"I am fond of Bonaparte, fond of the general; but this patch-work name +of a First Consul is in itself ridiculous; he borrowed it from Rome, +where he has never set his foot. But in my eyes he is still nothing +more than an <a name="386">{386}</a> Italian general. As for the fate of this terrible +general, it is now in my hands more than in his own; he is turning +into a sort of Henry the Eighth, flattering and scaring the Holy See +by turns; but how many sources of true glory will be dried up for him, +if he merely mimics Henry the Eighth! The measure is full; nations +now-a-days will not allow their rulers to dispose of them in regard to +religious matters. With concordats, on the contrary, miracles may be +wrought, more especially by him, or if not by him, supposing him to be +unwise, by France herself. Be sure, my dear sir, that great deeds +brought about at the proper moment, and bearing fruitful results, no +matter by what genius they are accomplished, are a wealthy dowry for +any country. In case of embarrassments, that country may ward off many +an attack by pointing to its history. France, with all her faults, +requires true grandeur. Our consul jeopardizes all by this pistol-shot +fired in time of peace, merely for the sake of pleasing his generals +whom he loves, but whose soldierlike jokes he fears, because he +himself now and then gives way to them. He thus breaks off a +negotiation which he wishes to succeed, and goes on casting rotten +seed. What can really be a religious concordat, that most solemn of +all human undertakings, if it is to be signed in five days? It reminds +one of the twelve hours granted by a general to a besieged town, which +can hope for no succor." +</p> +<p> +The result of the above conversation on the part of M. Cacault was a +determination to quit Rome, but to leave his secretary in that city, +whilst Consalvi himself was to set out immediately for Paris, as the +only means of preventing a positive rupture between the two courts, +for Bonaparte had already both a court and courtiers. The French +minister was by no means blind to the consequences of his boldness in +undertaking to correct the false steps of his own government; but, to +his credit be it said, the fear of those consequences did not make him +swerve one minute from his purpose. His very first step was, +therefore, to request an interview with Consalvi, and an audience from +the Pope. On meeting the cardinal, he began by reading <i>in extenso</i> +the angry despatch which he had received, not even omitting the +epithets <i>"turbulent and guilty priest"</i> which the Consul applied to +his eminence. M. Cacault then resumed as follows: +</p> +<p class="cite"> + "There must be some misunderstanding; the First Consul is + unacquainted with your person, and still more with your talents, + your ability, your precedents, your adroitness, and your anxiety to + terminate this business. So you must start for Paris." "When?" + "To-morrow: you will please him; you are fit to understand each + other; he will then learn to know a statesmanlike cardinal, and you + will draw up the concordat together. But if you don't go to Paris, I + shall be obliged to break off all intercourse with you; and there + are yonder certain ministers, who advised the Directory to transport + Pius VI. to Guyana.… +<br><br> + "I again repeat it, you must go to Paris, you will draw up the + concordat yourself—nay more, you will dictate a part of it, + obtaining at the same time far better conditions than I could ever + do, fettered as I am by so many shackles.… One word more: In a + place like this, where there is so much gossipping, I can't allow + you to bear alone the responsibility of this action. I consider it + as something truly grand; but as it may turn out a false step, + to-morrow I must see the Pope, and take the whole upon my shoulders. + I shall not bore the Pope, having but a few words to tell him, in + order to fulfil the Consul's former instructions." +</p> +<p> +Consalvi, fired at the boldness of the plan, hurried to the Pope, +rather to prepare him for this unforeseen separation than to ask for +permission. When, on the other hand, the French diplomatist was +admitted to his presence, <a name="387">{387}</a> he showed so much candor, such a true +spirit of Christian feeling, such a total forgetfulness of self, that +the pontiff could not refrain from shedding tears, and ended by +breaking out into these words: "Indeed, indeed, you are a true friend, +and we love you as we loved our own mother. At this very moment, we +will retire to our oratory, in order to implore God's blessing on this +journey, as well as for the successful issue of an undertaking, which +may afford us some consolation in the midst of so much affliction." +</p> +<p> +It was indeed a bereavement for the Pope, who, having hardly ascended +the throne, was accustomed to consider Consalvi as his main prop and +right hand in every affair of any importance. He, however, readily +consented to the separation, and on the following day the cardinal +left Rome, accompanied by M. Cacault, in an open carriage, to show the +gossipping Romans that no real coolness existed between the two +governments. This, in fact, strengthened the hands of the Papal +administration, as reports were already rife that a French army was +about to march once more into Rome, with a view of restoring the +republic. +</p> +<p> +At the distance of more than half a century Consalvi's determination +scarcely seems an act of daring; but, at that period, it was +considered in a different light. We must remember that France had been +for ten long years the scene of anarchy and bloodshed within, while +she had proved the terror of Europe on the field of battle. She was +but just emerging from that anarchy, thanks to the iron grasp of a +fortunate soldier, who might yet, for aught the world knew, turn out +to be a bloody tyrant quite as well as a sagacious ruler. For a +priest, and still more for a cardinal, to venture alone of his own +accord into the lair of those beasts of prey, as they were then +termed, certainly showed an extraordinary degree of moral courage, +however M. Thiers may taunt Consalvi with his fears. Those fears the +Papal minister <i>did</i> really entertain, as is proved by a few unwary +lines which he addressed before his departure to Acton at Naples, and +which were betrayed to Bonaparte in Paris. But then the cardinal, +prompted by a strong feeling of duty, overcame these apprehensions, +which is more perhaps than M. Thiers would vouch to have done on a +similar occasion, if we may judge from the infidel spirit and +intriguing disposition that are conspicuous alike throughout his own +career and writings. Success, not principle, ever appears to be his +leading star. +</p> +<p> +Once in Paris, Consalvi was not long in conquering that position which +the keenness of his friend Cacault foresaw that he was destined to +assume. Bonaparte approved in every respect the conduct of his +ambassador at Rome, appeared even flattered at being feared, at first +received the cardinal with affected coolness, but little by little +yielded to better feelings, and ended by turning into ridicule "that +fool Acton, who thought that he could stop the rush of a torrent with +cobwebs." To these friendly dispositions soon succeeded on both sides +a sincere confidence, and on one occasion the First Consul laughingly +inquired of Consalvi whether he was not considered as a <i>priest-eater</i> +in Italy; and then suddenly launched into one of those splendid +expositions of his future plans, by which he endeavored to fascinate +and charm those he aimed at winning over to his own views. In this +sparkling conversation the concordat held a foremost place. Napoleon +developed, just as he pleased, opinions half Protestant, half +Jansenist—in other words, exactly what he wanted the concordat to be, +and exactly what Consalvi could not allow. The contest between those +two rival spirits may well detain us a few moments longer. And why not +say at once that by degrees the master-genius of the age was obliged +to modify his own views, yielding, <i>nolens volens</i>, as he himself +admitted, to the graceful bearing and sound good sense of the man +whose countrymen had named him the Roman Syren? +</p> +<a name="388">{388}</a> +<p> +We may gather from M. Thiers' work that Consalvi had undertaken a most +arduous task. Paris itself must have offered a strange sight to a +Roman cardinal in the very first year of the present century. The +churches were still shut, and bore upon their porches such +inscriptions as savored more of heathenism than of Christianity. +Wherever the legate's eye fell he was sure to meet with a temple of +plenty, of fraternity, of liberty, of trade, of abundance, and so +forth. And then when he went to court he found a ruler disposed to +break out into the most violent fits of anger if his will was +disputed, whilst on every hand he had to encounter a host of scoffers +and infidels, belonging to every hue and grade. The army, the bench, +the schools, the <i>savants</i>, and the very clergy, all vied in showing off +Rome as the hotbed of an obsolete superstition which it was high time +to do away with altogether. And when we mention the clergy, we mean +the remains of that schismatic body which had hailed the civil +constitution so formally condemned by the Holy See in 1791. They were +active, intriguing, influential, and had the ear of Bonaparte himself. +He was intent upon distributing among them a portion of the new sees +about to be erected, and it required all the firmness of Consalvi to +ward off this impending danger. If we may believe M. Thiers, many +among them were by no means of dissolute lives; yet he cannot disguise +the fact that they were ambitious, servile, and disposed to bend to +every caprice of the ruling power. But that power was fully aware that +the French population had no confidence whatever in their +ministrations; the non-jurors, or priests who had unflinchingly +remained faithful to their duty, were, on the contrary, sought out and +held in high esteem. In this strange society the functions of +Catholicism and the rites of our religion were openly resumed by +believers, who attended them in back streets, in by-ways, in dark +warehouses, whither some aged priest repaired at dawn, after escaping +but shortly before from the dungeons of the Directory or the scaffolds +of the Revolutionary Committee. The writer of these lines has known +more than one man who was baptized at that period in a miserable +garret by some ecclesiastic disguised as a common laborer, before the +eyes of his parents, though without any sponsors, for fear of +detection. That such men should turn round in the streets of Paris and +stare with wonder at the sight of a cardinal publicly making for the +Tuileries in one of the Consul's carriages is by no means surprising; +but the fact increases our admiration for the two eminent statesmen +who both cast such a firm glance into the depths of futurity. +</p> +<p> +Consalvi had only been a few hours in Paris when he was summoned +before the First Consul, who sent him word that "he was to show off as +much of a cardinal as possible." The able diplomatist was, however, +not in the least disposed to "show off," and contented himself with +wearing the indispensable insignia of his dignity. It will be well to +remember that, at the time we are speaking of, no priest would have +ventured to put on the clerical costume in the French capital. This +first audience took place in public, in the midst of all the high +functionaries of the state. On the cardinal approaching, Bonaparte +rose and said abruptly: "I am aware of the object of your journey to +France. My will is, that the conferences shall begin immediately. I +give you five days for the purpose, and tell you beforehand that, if +on the fifth day the negotiations have not come to a conclusion, you +may return to Rome; for, within my own mind, I have come to a +determination should such an event take place." +</p> +<p> +"By sending his prime minister to Paris (replied coolly the cardinal) +His Holiness proves at any rate the interest he takes in the +conclusion of a concordat with the French government, and I fully hope +to terminate this business in the time you have marked." <a name="389">{389}</a> +Apparently satisfied with this answer, Bonaparte immediately broke +forth into one of those eloquent displays for which he was +remarkable—the concordat, the Holy See, the interests of religion, +the articles which had been rejected by the Pope, all became, on his +part, the subject of a most vehement and exhaustive speech, which was +silently listened to by the surrounding audience. +</p> +<p> +One of the most amusing and almost ludicrous instances of the Consul's +ignorance in regard to religious matters took place on this occasion. +He bore a bitter hatred to the Jesuits, and was constantly harping on +the subject. "I am quite astounded and scandalized (said he all of a +sudden) that the Pope should be allied to a non-Catholic power like +Russia, as is evident by the restoration of the Jesuits in that +country. Such a union ought surely to wound and irritate a Catholic +sovereign, since it contributes to please a schismatical monarch." +</p> +<p> +"I must answer candidly (resumed the cardinal) that your informations +are incorrect on this matter. Doubtless the Pope has deemed it +advisable not to refuse the request of the Russian emperor for the +restoration of the Jesuits in his own states, but, at the same time, +His Holiness has shown no less fatherly affection and deference for +the King of Spain, since an interval of several months has elapsed +between Paul's request and the bull, which was not sent before the +court of Spain had expressly stated that it would in no way complain +of the act." +</p> +<p> +When Bonaparte had fixed such a short term for the conclusion of the +concordat, he fully intended that not a single jot of his own plan +should be rejected by Rome. That plan, as we have already observed, +was half schismatic, and would have bound over the French Church to +the supreme will and power of the ruling government. But Consalvi +showed himself equally firm as to essentials, whilst he gracefully +yielded to every demand of minor importance. As to the wisdom of this +conduct, the present circumstances bear ample testimony; for, had the +cardinal been less firm, what might not be in 1865 the painful +situation of the French episcopacy? But the negotiations, instead of +ending in five days, were prolonged for more than three weeks, during +which the Abbé Bernier, who represented his government, was constantly +starting new difficulties, and threatening Consalvi with some new +outbreak of violence on the part of the First Consul. +</p> +<p> +At last, toward the middle of July, every difficulty being overcome, +and Bonaparte having formally promised to accept every article of the +concordat as it had been agreed to at Rome, nothing remained but to +copy and sign that famous treaty. The First Consul was to give a grand +dinner on the 14th of July to foreigners of distinction, and to men of +high standing in the country. His intention was to inform publicly his +guests of this happy event, and on the 13th the <i>Moniteur</i> published +the following laconic piece of news: "Cardinal Consalvi has succeeded +in the object which brought him to Paris." Bonaparte had selected his +brother Joseph, a councillor of state, and Bernier to sign the deed, +whilst on the other side were Consalvi, Monsignor Spina, and a +theologian named Father Caselli. But at the last moment there occurred +one of the most astounding incidents contained in the history of +diplomacy. As it has never been mentioned in any memoirs or documents +of those times, we cannot do better than let the cardinal relate it in +his own words: +</p> +<p> +"Toward four o'clock in the afternoon, Bernier arrived with a roll of +paper, which he did not unfold, but stated to be a copy of the +concordat that we were about to sign. We took our own with us, and set +out all together for the house of citizen Joseph, as was the slang of +the day, the brother to the First Consul. He received me with the +utmost politeness. Though he had been ambassador at Rome, I had not +been introduced to him, being yet but <a name="390">{390}</a> a prelate. During the few +days I passed in Paris, I had not met him on a formal visit which I +paid him, for he often resided in the country. This was, therefore, +the first time we saw each other. After the usual compliments, he bade +us to sit down round a table, adding: 'We shall have soon done, having +but to sign the compact, as all is concluded.' +</p> +<p> +"On being seated round the table, the question arose who should sign +first. Joseph Bonaparte claimed the right as brother to the head of +the government. I observed with great mildness and firmness, that both +as a cardinal and a legate of the Holy See, I could not consent to +assume the second rank in signing; beside, under the old <i>régime</i> in +France, as well as everywhere else, the cardinals enjoyed a right of +precedence, which I could not give up, not indeed from any personal +motive, but on account of the dignity with which I was invested. It is +but due to Joseph to state, that after a momentary hesitation, he +yielded with very good grace, and begged of me to sign first. He +himself was to come after, followed by the prelate Spina, Councillor +Cretet, Father Caselli, and the Abbé Bernier. +</p> +<p> +"We set to work at once, and I had taken up the pen, when to my great +surprise the Abbé Bernier presented to me his copy, with the view of +making me sign it without examining its contents. On casting my eyes +upon it in order to ascertain its identity with my own copy, I +perceived that this ecclesiastical treaty was not the one agreed to by +the respective commissioners, not the one adopted by the First Consul +himself, but another totally different! The difference existing at the +very first outset induced me to examine the whole with the most +scrupulous attention, and I soon found out that this copy contained +the draught which the Pope had refused to accept without his +correction, the very refusal that had provoked an order to the French +agent to leave Rome; nay more, that this self-same draught was +modified in many respects by the insertion of certain clauses, +previously declared to be inacceptable even before it had been sent to +Rome. +</p> +<p> +"A proceeding of this character, so truly incredible, and yet so real, +which I shall not venture to qualify—for the fact speaks sufficiently +for itself—a proceeding of this kind literally paralyzed my hand. I +expressed my astonishment, declaring positively that on no condition +could I give my approval to such a deed. The First Consul's brother +did not appear less surprised than myself, pretending not to +understand the matter. The First Consul, he added, had assured him +that, everything being agreed to, nothing remained but to sign. As for +himself, he had just come up from the country, where he was busy with +Count Cobenzel about the affairs of Austria, being called upon merely +for the formality of signing the treaty. Concerning the matter itself, +he absolutely knew nothing about it." +</p> +<p> +Cardinal Consalvi, even when writing the above lines, does not seem to +doubt Joseph's sincerity, nor that of Councillor Cretet, who affirmed +his own innocence in terms equally strong. The latter could hardly +believe his own eyes, when the legate pointed out to him the glaring +discrepancies between both copies. The Pope's minister then turning +suddenly to Bernier: "Nobody better than yourself," said he, "can +attest the truth of what I affirm; I am highly astonished at the +studied silence which you maintain, and I must therefore call upon you +positively to communicate to us what you must know so pertinently." +</p> +<p> +"Then, with an air of confusion and an embarrassed countenance, he +faltered out that doubtless my language was but too true, and that he +would not deny the difference of the documents now proposed for our +signatures. 'But the First Consul has so ordained,' continued he, +'telling me that as long as no signature has been given, one is always +at liberty to make any alteration. So he requires these alterations, +<a name="391">{391}</a> after duly considering the whole matter, he is not satisfied +with the previous stipulations.'" +</p> +<p> +The doctrine was so contrary to all precedents, that Consalvi had no +difficulty in convincing his auditors of its futility. He moreover +maintained his ground steadfastly, and refused to make any further +concession contrary to his duties. They cajoled him, they threatened +him with the violence and "fury" of the omnipotent Consul; he remained +unshaken. Joseph entreated him at least to go over the same ground +once more, following the Papal copy, and to this the cardinal +consented, firmly resolved not to give up one single point of +importance, but to modify such expressions as might induce Bonaparte +to accept the original treaty. So these six men sat down again at five +o'clock in the afternoon to discuss the whole question. The discussion +was laborious, precise, searching, and heated on both sides. It lasted +nineteen long hours, without interruption, without rest, without food, +without even sending away the servants or the carriages, as will often +happen when people hope to conclude at every minute some important +business. On one article alone they could never agree, and it was +specially reserved to the Pope's own decision. It was twelve o'clock +the next day before they came to a conclusion. But would the First +Consul adopt this plan? Would he not break all bounds, on finding his +duplicity discovered, and himself balked by the cardinal's firmness? +Joseph hurried to the Tuileries, in order to lay the whole before his +imperious brother, and in less than one hour came back, his features +evidently showing the grief of his soul. Says Consalvi: +</p> +<p> +"He told us that the First Consul had broken forth into the greatest +fury on being apprised of what had taken place. In his fit of anger he +had torn to pieces the concordat we had drawn up among us; but at +last, yielding to Joseph's entreaties and arguments, he had promised, +though with the most extreme repugnance, to accept every article we +had agreed to, except the one we had reserved, and about which he was +no less inflexible than irritated. The First Consul, added Joseph, had +closed the interview by telling him to inform me that he (Bonaparte) +was decided upon maintaining this article as it was expressed in +Bernier's copy:—consequently I had but two ways before me: either to +adopt this article just as it was in the concordat, or to give up the +negotiations. As for him, he had made up his mind to announce either +the signature or the rupture of the affair at the grand dinner he was +to give on that day. +</p> +<p> +"The reader will easily imagine our consternation at this message. We +had yet three hours until five o'clock, the time appointed for the +dinner, at which we were all to attend. I really am unable to repeat +all the Consul's brother and the two other commissioners said, to +conquer my resistance. The picture of the consequences likely to ensue +upon the rupture was indeed of the darkest color; they gave me to +understand that I alone should become responsible for those evils in +the face of France and Europe, as well as to my own sovereign and +Rome. I should be accused of an unreasonable stiffness, and of having +brought on the results of such a refusal. I felt a death-like anguish, +on conjuring up before my eyes the realization of these prophecies, +and I was—if I may be allowed such words—like unto the man of +sorrow. But my duty won the victory: thanks to heaven, I did not +betray it. I persisted in my refusal during the two hours of this +contest, and the negotiation was broken off. +</p> +<p> +"Such was the ending of this sad debate, which had lasted +four-and-twenty hours, having begun at four o'clock on the preceding +day, and closed toward the same hour of this unfortunate one. Our +bodily sufferings were doubtless very great, but they were nothing +when compared to our moral anxiety, which rose to such a pitch that +one must really have undergone <a name="392">{392}</a> such tortures to form an idea of +them. +</p> +<p> +"I was condemned—and this was indeed a most cruel circumstance at +such a moment—to appear in an hour after at the famous banquet. I was +bound to front in public the very first shock of that headstrong anger +which the General Bonaparte would feel on being apprised by his +brother of the rupture. +</p> +<p> +"We hastened back to our hotel, in order to make a few rapid +preparations, and then hurried all three to the Tuileries. We had +hardly entered the saloon where the First Consul was standing—a +saloon filled with a crowd of magistrates, officers, state grandees, +ministers, ambassadors, and illustrious foreigners, who had been +invited to the dinner—when we were greeted in a way which may easily +be imagined, as he had already seen his brother. As soon as he +perceived me, he exclaimed, his face flushed with anger, and in a loud +and indignant tone: +</p> +<p> +"'Well, Monsieur le Cardinal, you have had your fling; you have broken +off: be it so! I don't stand in need of Rome. I will act for myself. I +don't stand in need of the Pope. If Henry the Eighth, who had not +one-twentieth part of my power, was enabled to change the religion of +his country, and to succeed in his plans, far better shall I know how +to do it, and to will it. By changing the religion in France, I shall +change it throughout the best part of Europe—everywhere, in fact, +where my power is felt. Rome will soon perceive her own faults; she +will rue them, but it will then be too late. You may take your leave; +it is the best thing you can do. You have willed a rupture: be it so! +When do you intend setting out?' +</p> +<p> +"'After dinner, general,' replied I, with the greatest calmness. +</p> +<p> +"These few words acted as an electric shock on the First Consul. He +stared at me for a few minutes; and, taking advantage of his surprise, +I replied to his vehement outbreak, that I neither could nor would go +beyond my instructions on matters which were positively opposed to the +maxims of the Holy See." +</p> +<p> +Here the Consul interrupted Consalvi, though in a milder tone, to tell +him that he insisted upon having the concordat signed according to his +own views, or not at all. "Well, then," retorted the cardinal, "in +that form I neither shall nor will ever subscribe to it; no—never." +"And that is the very reason," cried out Bonaparte, "why I tell you +that you are bent upon breaking off, and why Rome will shed tears of +blood on this rupture." +</p> +<p> +What a scene! and how finely the bold, calm demeanor of the Pope's +legate shows in strong relief against that dark, passionate, and +ominous, though intelligent face of Napoleon Bonaparte! What a +splendid subject for a painter, and how it calls up at once to our +mind those barbaric chieftains of old, fit enough to wield the +sword—fit enough even to lay the snares of a savage, but unable to +cope with the spiritual strength of a Christian bishop, and utterly +cowed by the meek sedateness of some missionary monk, just wafted over +from the shores of Ireland! Write the seventh, or the thirteenth, +instead of the nineteenth century, and say if the incident would be +clothed in different colors; for, in fact, what was Bonaparte himself +but the Hohenstaufen of his age—a strange mixture of real grandeur, +of seething passions, and of mean, crafty, fox-like cunning? +</p> +<p> +The French editor of these memoirs very justly observes that some +vestige of the above scene must still exist in the documents of the +Imperial archives, and expresses the wish that the charge of duplicity +so terribly brought home to the first Bonaparte may be properly sifted +and repelled. Of the existence of such information we have scarcely +any doubt, but we hardly believe that the select committee, headed by +Prince Napoleon, who have already so unscrupulously tampered with +<a name="393">{393}</a> the correspondence of the great founder of the present dynasty, +will ever rebut the accusation, or even take notice of the narrative. +And yet it bears the stamp of truth in every line, so prone was +Napoleon to those fits of anger, which he sometimes used, Thiers +himself admits it, as tools for his policy, and to serve his end. +</p> +<p> +After all, the First Consul was glad to escape from the consequences +of his own violence, since, on the personal interference of the +Austrian ambassador, he again consented that the conferences should be +renewed. The two cardinal points on which, in the eyes of Rome, the +whole fabric of the concordat rested, were the freedom and publicity +of the Catholic worship. Without these two essential conditions, the +Pope and his ministers deemed that the Church obtained no compensation +for the numerous sacrifices which she consented to undergo in other +respects. The French government, on the contrary, admitted that +freedom and publicity, only so far as they were allowed to other forms +of worship, and saddled the article with the following rider: "The +public worship shall be free, as long as it conforms to the police +regulations." Such was the final difficulty against which Consalvi +maintained a most obstinate opposition, and it must be admitted that +his grounds were of a very serious nature. Taught by the experience of +other times and countries, he considered the obnoxious condition as a +bold attempt to enslave the Church by subjecting her to the secular +power. On the flimsy pretext of acting as the protector and defender +of the Church, a government was enabled to lord it over her, and +cripple her best endeavors for the fulfilment of her divine mission. +If such had been the case, even under the old French monarchy, +notwithstanding the strong Catholic dispositions of the Bourbon +sovereigns in general, as well as in the times of a Joseph II. and a +Leopold of Tuscany, what greater changes were to be feared on the part +of the revolutionary powers, which now swayed over France? The +cardinal readily admitted that, in the present state of the country, +it might be proper for the government to restrict on certain occasions +the publicity of the Catholic worship, for the very sake of protecting +its followers against the outbreaks of popular frenzy; but why lay +down such a sweeping and such an elastic rule? "With a clause of this +kind," said the legate, "the police, or rather the government, will be +enabled to lay their hands on everything, and may subject all to their +own will and discretion, whilst the Church, constantly fettered by the +words, 'As long as it conforms,' will have no right even to complain." +To these arguments the Consul constantly replied, "Well, if the Pope +can't accept such an indefinite and mild restriction, let him omit the +article, and give up publicity of worship altogether." As a curious +specimen of sincerity and candor, we must observe that Consalvi was +not even allowed to consult with his own court, nor to send a courier, +the French government refusing to supply him with the necessary +passports. So much for the international privileges of ambassadors. +Who can be astonished that the Papal minister should feel but little +confidence in the good faith of those he had to deal with? +</p> +<p> +Their attitude, indeed, seems to have strengthened his own unbending +firmness. In the course of these everlasting debates, he clenched the +subject in the following terms: "Either you are sincere in maintaining +that the government is obliged to impose a restriction upon the +publicity of the religious worship, being impelled thereunto by the +necessity of upholding the public peace and order, and in that case +the government cannot and ought not to hesitate as to asserting the +fact in the article itself; or the government does not wish it to be +so expressed; and in that case they show their bad faith, as also that +the only object of the aforesaid restriction is <a name="394">{394}</a> the enslavement +of the Church to their own will." +</p> +<p> +The commissioners found nothing to reply to this dilemma; for, in +fact, Consalvi only asked that the reserve itself should be laid down +as a temporary restriction. At last they yielded, despairing of ever +overcoming, on this subject, their unflinching and powerful +antagonist. The concordat, duly signed and authenticated, was sent up +for approval to the First Consul, who, after another fit of anger, +gave his consent; but, as Consalvi himself presumes, from that hour he +resolved to annul the intrinsic and most beneficial effects of the +concordat by those celebrated organic articles which are even at this +moment a bone of contention between the French clergy and the Imperial +government. +</p> +<p> +It is, indeed, a most remarkable fact that the same man who +imperiously prescribed that the concordat should be drawn up and +signed in the course of five days, allowed a full year to elapse +before he published it and sent the official ratifications to Rome. +When he did fulfil these formalities, he coupled them with the +promulgation of those famous laws which, in reality, tended to cut off +all free communication between the Holy See and the Gallican clergy, +and to spread throughout Europe the false belief that the Pope himself +had concurred in the adoption of these obnoxious measures. In vain did +Pius VII. protest against them—in vain, at a later period, was he +induced to crown the emperor in Paris, in hopes of obtaining the +fulfilment of his own promises. Napoleon turned a deaf ear to the most +touching importunities. On considering the whole of his conduct, it is +hardly possible to refrain from concluding that Bonaparte ever looked +upon the Pope's supremacy and power as an appendage and satellite of +his own paramount omnipotence. Viewed by this light, many of his acts +in latter years will appear at least consistent, though by no means +justifiable on any principle whatsoever. Is there not often a certain +consistency in madness? And if so in ordinary life, why not in the +freaks and starts of despotism? And again, is not despotism itself +madness in disguise? +</p> +<p> +But why indulge in our own speculations and surmises, when we have +before us positive evidence that in 1801, as well as ten years +afterward, Napoleon entertained and maintained a plan for arrogating +to himself both the spiritual and temporal power? The examples set by +Henry VIII., Albert of Brandenburg, and Peter I. of Russia, were ever +before his eyes, blinding his own innate good sense, and exerting a +sort of ominous fascination over his best impulses. The reader has +doubtless heard of, if not perused, those wonderful pages in which the +fallen giant whiled away his tedious hours at St. Helena, pretending +to write his own history, but in reality veiling truth under fiction, +and endeavoring to palm upon the world certain far-fetched views of +benevolence or civilization, which he never dreamt of whilst he was on +the throne. Still, that strange <i>Memorial of St. Helena</i> often +contains many a startling proof of candor, as if the mask suddenly +fell, and revealed to our astonished gaze the inner man. Among such +passages, none perhaps are so remarkable as those referring to the +concordat and to the religious difficulties of later years. One day +Napoleon dictated to General Montholon these lines, which so strongly +justify Consalvi's fears and opposition: +</p> +<p> +"When I seized the helm, I already held the most precise and definite +ideas on all those principles which cement together the social body. I +fully weighed the importance of religion—on that head I was +convinced—and had resolved to restore it. But one can hardly realize +the difficulties I had to contend with when about to bring back +Catholicism. I should have been readily supported had I unfurled the +Protestant standard. This feeling went so far that, in the <a name="395">{395}</a> +council of state, where I met with the strongest opposition against +the concordat, many a man tacitly determined to plot its destruction. +'Well,' used they to say, 'let us turn Protestants at once, and then +we may wash our hands of the business.' It is, indeed, quite true +that, in the midst of so much confusion and so many errors, I was at +liberty to choose between Catholicism and Protestantism; and still +truer that everything favored the latter. But, <i>beside</i> my own personal +bias inclining toward my national religion, I had most weighty reasons +to decide otherwise. I should thus have created in France two great +parties of equal strength, though I was determined to do away with +every party whatsoever; I should have conjured up all the frenzy of +religious warfare, whilst the enlightenment of the age and my own will +aimed at crushing it altogether. By their mutual strife these two +parties would have torn France asunder, and made her a slave to +Europe, whilst my ambition was to make her its mistress. Through +Catholicism I was far surer of attaining all my great objects. At +home, the majority absorbed the minority, which I was disposed to +treat with so much equity that any difference between both would soon +disappear; abroad, Catholicism kept me on good terms with the Pope. +Beside, thanks to my own influence and to our forces in Italy, I did +not despair, sooner or later, by some means or other, <i>to obtain the +direction and guidance of the Pope; and then what a new source of +influence! what a lever to act upon public opinion, and to govern the +world!"</i> +</p> +<p> +A few moments after the emperor resumed: +</p> +<p> +"Francis I. had a capital opportunity to embrace Protestantism, and to +become its acknowledged head throughout Europe. His rival, Charles V., +resolutely sided with Rome, because he considered this the best way to +subject Europe. This alone should have induced Francis to defend +European independence. Instead of that, he left a reality to run after +a shadow, following up his pitiful quarrels in Italy, allying himself +with the Pope, and burning the reformers in Paris. +</p> +<p> +"Had Francis I. embraced Lutheranism, which is so favorable to the +royal supremacy, he would have spared France those dreadful +convulsions which were afterward brought on by the Calvinists, whose +republican organization was so near ruining both the throne and our +fine monarchy. Unfortunately, Francis was unable to understand +anything of the kind. As to his scruples, they are quite out of the +question, since this self-same man made an alliance with the Turks, +whom he introduced among us. Oh, those stupid times! Oh, that feudal +intellect! After all, Francis I. was but a tilting king—a +drawing-room dandy—a would-be giant, but a real pigmy." +</p> +<p> +It is scarce necessary to add, that at the time Napoleon is speaking +of he was an unbeliever, though a lurking respect for his national +religion still lingered at the bottom of his heart. But then, how +fully does he admit that religion was but a tool of his ambition! How +openly does he confess his plan to get hold of the Pope <i>by some means +or other!</i> How glaringly true must now appear in our eyes that +narrative of Consalvi's in which he exposes the mean trick that +Napoleon endeavored to play upon his vigilance! Lastly, how faithfully +does the emperor adhere to the plans secretly laid within the dark +mind of the First Consul! For, as if to leave no doubt as to the +fulfilment of those plans, he related to Montholon the most minute +details of what took place during the Pope's captivity at +Fontainebleau: +</p> +<p> +"The English," said Napoleon, "plotted an escape for him from Savona; +the very thing I could have wished for. I had him brought to +Fontainebleau, where his misfortunes were to end, and his splendor to +be restored. All my grand views had been thus fulfilled under disguise +and in secrecy. I had so managed that <a name="396">{396}</a> success was infallible, +even without an effort. Indeed, the Pope adopted the famous concordat +of Fontainebleau, notwithstanding my reverses in Russia. But how far +different had I returned triumphant and victorious! So at last I had +obtained the long-wished-for separation of the spiritual and temporal +powers; whilst their confusion is so fatal to the former, by causing +trouble and disorder within society in the name of him who ought to +become a centre of union and harmony. Henceforward I intended to place +the Pope on a pinnacle; we would not even have regretted his temporal +power, for I would have made an idol of him, and he would have dwelt +close to me. Paris should have become the capital of the Christian +world, and <i>I would have governed the spiritual as well as the +political world.</i> By this means I should have been enabled to +strengthen the federative portions of the empire, and to maintain +peace in such parts as were beyond its limits. I should have had my +religious sessions, just the same as my legislative sessions: my +councils would have represented, all Christendom, and the popes would +have merely acted as their presidents. I should myself have opened +their assemblies, approved and promulgated their decrees, as was the +case under Constantine and Charlemagne. In fact, if the emperors lost +this kind of supremacy, it was because they allowed the spiritual +ruler to reside at a distance from them; and those rulers took +advantage of this act of weakness, or this result of the times, to +escape from the prince's government, and even to overrule it." +</p> +<p> +What words of ours could add to the bold significance of these? How +the proud spirit of the despot towers even within his prison! and how +little had he profited by the bitter lessons of experience! Never +before, do we believe, since the advent of Christianity, did any king +or conqueror profess such a barefaced contempt for the deepest +feelings of a Christian soul—the freedom of his spiritual being! +This pretended liberation from the court of Rome, this religious +government concentrated within the hands of the sovereign, became, +indeed, at one time, the constant object of Napoleon's thoughts and +meditations: +</p> +<p> +"England, Russia, Sweden, a large part of Germany (was he wont to +say), are in possession of it; Venice and Naples enjoyed it in former +times. Indeed, there is no doing without it, for otherwise a nation is +ever and anon wounded in its peace, in its dignity, in its +independence. But then such an undertaking is most arduous; at every +attempt I was beset with new dangers; and, once thoroughly embarked in +it, the nation would have abandoned me. More than once I tried to +awaken public opinion; but all was in vain, and I was obliged to +acknowledge that the people would not follow me." +</p> +<p> +On reading these last words, who will not remember Cacault's apothegm, +uttered in 1801: "Nations now-a-days will not allow their rulers to +dispose of them in regard to religious matters." +</p> +<p> +We hope that the reader will not accuse us of prolixity for having +related rather fully the negotiations which proceeded the concordat of +1801. Hitherto the main facts of this important event have been +gleaned from French sources of information. No voice had been raised, +we believe, on the part of Rome, and no one, it must be admitted, had +a better right to speak of that celebrated treaty than the man who +contributed so largely, so exclusively, we might almost say, to its +final adoption. And then, throughout the whole of his simple and +unpretending, yet clear and spirited memoirs, the great cardinal reads +us a grand lesson, which may be felt and understood by every human +soul. During the perusal of these two volumes, we have ever before our +eyes the struggle of right against might, of duty against tyranny, of +a true Christian soul against the truckling, shuffling, intriguing +spirit of the world. Ever <a name="397">{397}</a> and anon, this able, firm, and yet +amiable diplomatist allows some expression to escape him which shows +that his heart and soul are elsewhere, that his beacon is on high, and +that he views everything and all things in this nether world from the +light of the gospel. And this, perhaps, is the very reason why, +throughout a long career of such numerous difficulties and dangers, he +moved serene, undaunted, unblemished in his honor, proclaimed wisest +amongst the wise, until kings, princes, warriors, and statesmen, +Protestants and Catholics, counted his friendship and esteem of +priceless value. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>From Once a Week. +<br><br> +HYMN BY MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS.</h2> +<br> +<pre> + O Domine Deus, speravi in te! + O care mi Jesu, nunc libera me! + In dura catena, in misera pcena, + Desidero te; + Languendo, gemendo et genuflectendo, + Adoro, imploro, ut liberes me! + +(TRANSLATION.) + + O Lord, O my God, I have hoped but in thee; + Jesu, my dearest, now liberate me: + In hard chains, in fierce pains, + I am longing for thee: + Languishing, groaning and bending the knee, + I adore, I implore thou wouldst liberate me! + + ASTLEY H. BALDWIN. +</pre> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="398">{398}</a> +<br> +<h2>From The Lamp. +<br><br> +MANY YEARS AGO AT UPFIELD.</h2> +<br> +<p> +In the last decade of the last century, Upfield was a very healthy, +pretty, prosperous town in Suffolk. Its centre was a green; +undulating, irregular, and from four to five acres in area. Round it +were laborers' cottages, a forge, the inn, the veterinary surgeon's +house, the doctor's, the vicarage, and the Grey House, each with land +proportioned to its character. A little, very little way off, was the +church; belonging anciently to a Carthusian monastery, of which some +ruins still existed; and beyond that, but within a quarter of a mile +of Upfield, was Edward's Hall, the fine baronial residence of the +Scharderlowes, who had owned it since the reign of Henry IV., and +never forsaken the Catholic faith. Upfield was eloquent about the +past, as well as actually charming. The church, early English, was +little injured exteriorly. Inside it reminded one of a nun compelled +to wear a masquerade dress. The beautiful arches and lofty roof had +defied time and the vulgar rage of vicious fanaticism; so had the +pavement, rich in slabs imploring humbly prayers for the repose of the +dead who lay under it; but devotion and taste mourned over the changed +use of the sacred building, and the characteristics thereof; for +instance, a singing-gallery in the western end, with the royal arms +done in red and gilded plaster, fastened to it; high deal pews for the +mass of the congregation, and the squire's praying-made-comfortable +one within the carved oak screen in the south transept, where had been +the chapel of the Blessed Sacrament. +</p> +<p> +The Grey House was low, rambling, picturesque; the <i>beau-ideal</i> of a +happy, hospitable old English home. It had been built by instalments, +at distant intervals; and had derived its name from a Lord Grey, of +Codnoure, who had formerly possessed lands in the neighborhood. At the +time whence this story starts, it had been for a hundred years or more +in the family of the Wickhams, who claimed to be descended +collaterally from William of Wykeham—whether they were or not, had +never been discussed, and therefore never formally established; nor +did any one in the neighborhood, except Mr. Scharderlowe and his +family, know that a former Wickham had bartered his religion for a +wealthy Protestant wife, and allowed her to bring up their children in +her own way. In January, 1790, George Wickham, the head of the family, +died at the Grey House, of inflammation of the lungs, in his +forty-second year, and no one was ever more regretted. A +kinder-hearted man had never breathed. His attachments had been warm +and numerous; he had helped every one whom he could help, been +peculiarly gentle to the poor and his dependents, hated nothing but +wickedness, and believed in that only when it was impossible to be +blind to it. "Poor dear Mr. Wickham," said Mrs. Scharderlowe, when her +husband told her the news; "I'm heartily sorry. I always thought he +would become a Catholic—he was so liberal in all his feelings; only +the last time we met, conversation taking that turn—I forget why—he +said it was too bad that we could not worship God as we pleased, +without suffering for it; and that he was ashamed of Englishmen who +forgot that their noblest laws were made, and their most glorious +victories won, in Catholic times. What a loss he will be to Upfield +and his family!" "Yes," returned her husband, "that poor pretty little +widow is about as helpless and ignorant of the world as possible; she +never had occasion to think of anything but how to make <a name="399">{399}</a> home +happy, which I believe she did; they were a particularly united +family. I hope he made a will; but I think it is likely he did not; +his illness was short and painful, and previously to it no one ever +had a fairer prospect of long life than he had." +</p> +<p> +Mr. Wickham's funeral was talked of in Upfield and the neighborhood +many years afterward. Mr. Scharderlowe sent his carriage; the county +member, and persons of every class, attended. The clergyman from an +adjacent parish, who had been requested to perform the burial-service, +because the vicar, Mr. Wickham's nephew, felt unequal to it, burst +into tears, and had to pause some minutes to recover himself. The +widow fainted; and her eldest son Robert, a youth in his nineteenth +year, tried to jump into the vault when his father's coffin was +lowered. +</p> +<p> +There was a will, made during Mr. Wickham's last illness, and the +vicar was sole executor and trustee, with a legacy of £500. There was +ample provision for the younger children; and Robert was, when of age, +to succeed to a brewery, which his father had started many years +previously, and which was the most lucrative in the county. He was to +learn its management from James Deane, the confidential clerk, whose +salary was to be raised, and to whom £100 was left in token of Mr. +Wickham's appreciation of his services. The Grey House, and everything +in it, with £200 a year, was to be Mrs. Wickham's, and at her disposal +at death. +</p> +<p> +The brewery was half a mile from Upfield; Mr. Wickham had built it +where it would not injure the prospect, and Deane had a pretty cottage +attached to it, where he, a widower, lived with his sister and only +child, a daughter. He was a Catholic, son of a former steward of Mr. +Scharderlowe's, and extremely attached to Mr. Wickham, who had taken +him when a boy into the brewery, and advanced him steadily. He was a +well-principled, intelligent man, who had improved himself by taking +lessons in geography, grammar, and algebra, as the opportunities +offered; and he was, from his position, well-known in the +neighborhood. He told his sister that he feared that Mr. Wickham's +death was only the beginning of trouble for his family; for he +distrusted Mr. William, the vicar. "It isn't that he's a dishonorable +man, Lizzy; but it isn't likely that a crack shot, a bold rider after +the hounds, a gentleman who is as fond of a ball as anyone, and who +takes no trouble about his own affairs, will do justice to a dead +man's, though I don't doubt he means it now." +</p> +<p> +"But what harm can he do, James?" +</p> +<p> +"Why, he can ruin the younger children. Everything except the brewery +and what is left to Mrs. Wickham is as much in his power as it was in +his uncle's. I doubt if the poor dear gentleman wouldn't have arranged +differently if he'd had longer time: it's an awful lesson to be always +prepared for death; I'm sure I thought Mr. Wickham might live to be a +hundred. No doubt pain and sorrow confused his mind, and anyhow it was +natural that he should trust his own relations." +</p> +<p> +"He had better have trusted you, James." +</p> +<p> +"That was not to be expected, Lizzy, and I mightn't have been fit for +it. There's plenty on my hands. It is a large, increasing business, +and I have to teach it to Mr. Robert; and one can't tell how he'll +take to it; I've been afraid he would be unsteady, but he has taken +his father's death to heart uncommonly, and I hope he'll try to be as +good a man." +</p> +<p> +About this time people had begun to remark that Polly Deane, then in +her fifteenth year, was growing up a remarkably pretty girl; she was +an old established pet of the Wickhams; her mother had been the +daughter of a tenant, and so great a favorite that when she married +Deane, the wedding was celebrated at the Grey House. When, two years +later, she was dying of fever, Mr. and Mrs. Wickham promised to watch +over her child. All that <a name="400">{400}</a> they undertook they carried out +generously, and Polly lived as much with them as with Aunt Lizzie, who +did her part toward her well—loving her fondly, keeping her fresh, +healthy, and merry, checking her quick temper, teaching her her +prayers, and taking her often to Mr. Scharderlowe's, to get his +chaplain's—Father Armand's—blessing; and when she was old enough, +to mass and the sacraments. The fact of the Wickhams having no +daughter increased their tenderness for her, and her father was +delighted and flattered by Mrs. Wickham's watchfulness over her dress +and manner, and Mr. Wickham's care for her education; it was the best +that could be had in Upfield, and good enough to make her as charming +as she need be. She did plain sewing extremely well, and some quaint +embroidery of hideous designs in wool and floss silks; she had worked +a cat in tent-stitch, and a parrot of unknown species in cross; her +sampler was believed to be the finest in the county; she could read +aloud very pleasantly, spell wonderfully, write a clear, stiff hand, +which one might decipher without glasses at eighty; she could not have +gone up for honors in grammar, but she talked very prettily; she had +never had occasion to write a letter; as to geography, she believed +that the world was round, for her father and Mr. Wickham said so, and +she had heard that Captain Cook had been round it; but only that she +was ashamed, she would have liked to ask some one how it could be, and +how it was found out; it was such a contradiction of observation, if +only because of the sea; she had never seen the sea, but she believed +in it, and could understand water remaining on level ground; there was +the horse-pond, for instance, but that thousands of miles of roaring, +angry, deep water should hold on to a round world was too much for +her. You could not puzzle her in the multiplication table, but she did +not take kindly to weights and measures. She had learned no history, +her father could not get a Catholic to teach her, and would trust no +one else, but she had picked up a few facts and notions; for instance, +she had heard of Alfred the Great and his lanterns; of St. Edward the +Confessor, and that he made good laws; of King Charles I., and those +wicked men—she fancied Guy Fawkes was one of them—had cut his head +off; when he lived she was not sure, and she hoped Mr. Wickham would +never ask her, for she should not like to say that she did not know, +and she was sometimes afraid that he would when he talked of Carlo's +being a King Charles spaniel. It was puzzling, because she remembered +Carlo a puppy, and she was sure that the king's name had been George +ever since she was born. She had an exquisite ear for music, and a +voice of great promise. Mr. Wickham was passionately fond of music, +and therefore, appreciating peculiarly this talent of Polly's, had +engaged a good master from the county-town to teach her to play on the +piano. She had profited well by his instructions, and only a few days +before Mr. Wickham was taken ill, she had played the accompaniment +when he sang "From the white-blossomed thorn my dear Chloe requested," +"O lady fair," and "Oh life is a river, and man is the boat;" and he +had patted her head and kissed her, and asked her for the "Slow +movement in Artaxerxes" and "The harmonious Blacksmith," and—she was +so glad—she had played them without one mistake. Of course she +danced, and made cakes and pastry, beauty-washes, elder-wine, and +various preserves and salves; knitted her father's stockings and her +aunt's mittens, and read a romance whenever she could get one, but +that was very rarely. +</p> +<p> +The vicar made, at any rate, a good start, fulfilling his uncle's +instructions exactly; apprenticed his second son, Alfred, to the +College of Surgeons—that was the most liberal way in those days of +entering the medical profession—and placed him <a name="401">{401}</a> to board with an +old family friend, an opulent practitioner. The third son was articled +to an eminent attorney; the others were sent to school. The void made +by the death of those even most important and most fondly loved is +soon filled up externally; how otherwise could justice be done to the +living? The widow acquiesced in the separation from her children; it +was her husband's plan, and for their advantage. She was sure she +could not long survive him; she might even be sinful enough to wish to +die, but for her sons' sakes, she was so utterly lonely. They loved +her truly, the darlings; but they could not understand her, never +would, unless—which God in his great mercy forbid—they ever came to +suffer as she suffered. To lose such a husband! so manly, yet so +tender and thoughtful. She had always looked forward to his nursing +her in her last illness, and receiving her last breath. He would have +grieved for her truly, she was sure of that; but he could have borne +it better; he would have been of more use to the boys. Thus she mused +often, weeping plentifully; but she never denied that she had many +consolations. No one could have suited her better than Polly, and she +was never more than a day or two absent from her. They were alike in +character—simple, self-sacrificing, and affectionate in an uncommon +degree. Polly's caresses seldom failed to arouse her; the gentle girl +felt how much more she could have done had Mrs. Wickham been +accessible to the comfort in which her own, the dear old faith, +abounded; and prayed daily that it might soon be hers, and did her +best. She never attempted direct consolation, but interested the +mourner in some trifle, or coaxed her into conversation or employment. +Sometimes she really could not arrange some obstinate flowers; +sometimes her work was all wrong, and no one but Mrs. Wickham could +show her how to put it right, and Mary Hodge's baby ought to have the +garment that evening. Once, when all her ingenuity failed, she was +actually delighted by Betty's running in with her darling kitten, wet +to the skin, just saved out of the water-butt; Mrs. Wickham dried her +eyes, and pitied it, and watched Polly wiping it, and arranging a +cushion inside the fender for it; and at last smiled at the endearing +nonsense she talked, and told her she was more than a mother to it. +</p> +<p> +Robert was quite steady; regular at the brewery, pleasant at home. Of +course it would have been dull for him without Polly: her youth, +beauty, and sisterly at-homeness made a glow in the dear old house. +Did he or his mother ever calculate on what was likely to come of that +near companionship? No: their actual life engrossed them. He first +drew his mother to look on while he and Polly played cribbage or +backgammon, and then to play herself a little. He took in the +<i>Gentleman's Magazine</i>, and showed her the curious old prints, and read +the odds and ends of news aloud. Music was unendurable to her for some +months; but she conquered herself by degrees, and came to enjoy it. +Then Robert and Polly sang every evening, she playing the +accompaniments. Summer brought the boys home for holidays, and that +did good. When the anniversary of the father's death came round, its +melancholy associations pressed evidently on the widow, and she spent +the greater portion of the day in her room; but she was resigned, and +better than those who watched her lovingly expected her to be. +</p> +<p> +The great feature of those Christmas holidays was Alfred's return in +an altered character. He had left Upfield a lout—the despair of his +mother and the maids; who were the more provoked, because he was +undeniably the handsomest of the family. To keep him clean, or make +him put on his clothes properly, had been impossible. He had credit +for talent; for, when sufficiently excited, he wrote what were deemed +wonderfully pretty <a name="402">{402}</a> verses, and he was quick at repartee and +sarcasm; but he had been in perpetual disgrace at school, and silent +and awkward—sulky as a bear, his brothers called him at home. He made +a great sensation on the first evening of his return from London: he +was fluent in conversation, perfectly well dressed, and—chief +marvel—had clean, carefully-shaped nails. Polly smiled, wondered, +and said to herself that he was really very handsome, and sang +beautifully. All the Wickhams sang, but none of them, she thought, +could be compared to him. The change was not agreeable to Robert, and +he showed it; grumbled in an undertone about fops; and asked his +brother if he could play cricket or quoits, or skate, or take a +five-barred gate, or shoot snipe. +</p> +<p> +Alfred yawned, and replied: +</p> +<p> +"My dear Bob, don't you remember that I was never fond of trouble? +Those rough amusements are very well for country gentlemen and +farmers; and I give them up to them with all my heart. As to skating, +you none of you know anything about it; you should see the gentlemen, +and elegant ladies too, cutting out flowers, and other complicated +figures, on the Serpentine." +</p> +<p> +Then addressing himself to his mother and Polly—Robert's countenance +lowering as he observed the innocent girl's natural interest in +such-topics—he talked about the last drawing-room and the fashionable +plays. He had seen <i>The School for Scandal</i> and <i>The Haunted Tower,</i> +at Drury Lane; <i>Othello</i> and <i>The Conscious Lovers</i>, at Covent Garden, +and he recited—really well—some of the tender passages in <i>Othello</i>. +Next he described the lying-in-state of the Duke of Cumberland; the +trial and execution of Jobbins and Lowe for arson; the recent storms, +which had not touched Upfield, but had been terrible +elsewhere—chimneys killing people in their beds, the lightning +flowing like a stream of fluid from a glasshouse. And no one +interrupted him, till Robert said, savagely: +</p> +<p> +"That fellow will talk us all deaf." +</p> +<p> +"Not this time, Bob: you and I will sing 'Love in thine eyes' now. I +know Polly will play for us." +</p> +<p> +They did it; Alfred directing the sentiment to her, so as to make her +feel shy and uncomfortable, and his brother vowing inwardly that "he'd +give that puppy a good thrashing before he went back to London, if he +didn't mind what he was about." +</p> +<p> +Alfred had seen a good deal of what country folk call "finery" in +London; but he declared that breakfast at home was unrivalled, +particularly in winter. There was the superb fire of coal and oak +blocks, throwing a glow on the massive family plate and fine, spotless +damask: such a silver urn and teapot were not often seen. Further, the +young gentleman inherited a family predilection for an abundant show +of viands; liked to see—as was usual at an everyday breakfast +there—a ham just cut, a cold turkey, round of beef, and delicate +clear honey, with other sweet things, for which his mother's +housekeeping was famed. This was not all. The room formed one side of +a light angle in the picturesque old house, and from two sides of the +table one could see a magnificent pyrocanthus, the contrast between +its scarlet berries and the table-cloth positively delicious. +</p> +<p> +Robert and Alfred lingered one morning after the rest of the family +had left this room. Alfred was considering that it might be possible +to enjoy life in the country; Robert was watching him, half-curiously, +half-jealously: he did not believe that his brother was handsomer than +himself; but he detested the ease of manner and ready wit that gave +him ascendancy disproportioned to his years. He threw himself back in +a large armchair, stretched his legs, and said: "I'm not sure that I +don't envy you, Bob, after all." +</p> +<p> +"Your condescension is great certainly. Have you been all this time +finding out that it is a good thing to be George Wickham's eldest +son?" +</p> +<a name="403">{403}</a> +<p> +"Ah, yes!—eldest son. Well, it's a comfort for the younger ones that +there's no superior merit in being born first. But I'm not going to +philosophize; it's too much trouble, and not your line. But, really, +to breakfast here every morning in all this splendid comfort, the +prettiest and gentlest of mothers pressing you to eat and drink more +than is good for you; and that lovely fairy, Polly—that perfect Hebe +—flitting about—is more than even an eldest son ought to enjoy. How +sorry you will be next year, when you come of age, unless"—and he +looked searchingly, through half-closed eyes, at Bob. +</p> +<p> +"Why, pray? And unless what?" +</p> +<p> +"Only that I conclude you will then set up a house of your own, unless— +as it is evident my mother could not part from pretty Polly—unless you +arrange to live here, and marry our pet." +</p> +<p> +Strange flushings and palenesses passed over Robert's face, and he had +to master a choking in his throat and heaving of his chest before he +spoke. He had never had his hidden feelings put into words before—he +had not even any definite intention about the young girl whom his eye +followed stealthily every where, and whose voice, the rustling of +whose dress even, was music to him. He only knew that he should +throttle any one who laid a finger on her. He had not guessed that any +one connected him with her, even in thought; and now here was all that +was most secret and sacred in his heart dragged out, and held +mockingly before him by a boy two years younger than himself. It +seemed to him hours instead of seconds before he spoke, and his voice +had the passionate tremulousness which betrays great interior tumult; +he was sure that he should say something he would rather not say, but +conscious every moment's delay gave an advantage to his abhorred +tormentor. Without raising his eyes, he said hoarsely, "The Wickhams +are proud—they don't make low marriages." +</p> +<p> +"Upon my word, Bob," returned his brother patronizingly, "I respect +you; I did not give you credit for so much good sense. The girl's a +perfect beauty, no doubt. What a sensation she'd make in London! But, +after all, she's our servant's daughter, and old Molly Brown's +grandchild. Then, again, that unlucky religion of hers! The +Scharderlowes throw a respectability over it here, for they are +well-born and wealthy, but anywhere else it would be extremely awkward +for you. I confess I had a motive for sounding you. Farmer Briggs's +eldest son hinted to me yesterday that he should be happy to lay West +Hill at Polly's feet." +</p> +<p> +"He 's an insolent rascal!" said Robert furiously. +</p> +<p> +"My dearest Bob, why? The poor fellow has eyes, and uses them; and one +would not wish our Hebe to be an old maid." +</p> +<p> +"I say," reiterated Robert, deadly pale, and stamping, "he's an +insolent rascal; and if I catch him coming to this house I'll tell him +so. A rustic boor like that to hint at marrying a girl who has always +been my parents' pet, and is my mother's favorite companion—" +</p> +<p> +He stopped abruptly; and his brother, who was a perfect mimic, +continued in precisely his tone, "And is so dear to Robert Wickham, +that he will not hear her name coupled with another man's—" +</p> +<p> +He had gone too far; Robert's indignation boiled over—he sprang at +him—and before he had time to stir, struck him a blow between the +eyes, which brought sparks from them, and blood from his nose. A crash +and struggle followed, which Polly heard. She ran to the room, +anticipating nothing more than that some of the large dogs, privileged +to roam about the house, were quarrelling over the cold meat. Amazed, +beyond all power of words, she stood silent and very pale. Then, +feeling, young as she was, instinctive womanly power over the +disgraced young men, and holding herself <a name="404">{404}</a> so erect that she +looked a head taller than usual, she said, coldly and firmly, "I am +ashamed of you!" +</p> +<p> +By that time they were ashamed of themselves. Alfred, covering his +disfigured face with his handkerchief, left the room slowly. Robert, +who had received no visible hurt, threw up a sash, jumped out, and +when he turned to shut the window, looked earnestly and sadly at +Polly, so as to bring a strange unwelcome sensation to her heart. +</p> +<p> +There was an awkwardness at dinner that day. Polly had removed the +traces of the fray, and kept her counsel; but Alfred's features defied +concealment. He stayed in his room with raw beef on them, and +mutton-broth and barley-water for his regimen. His mother and Betty +could get nothing out of him but that Bob was a fool, and had licked +him for teasing him. He was by no means given to repentance; but his +bruises, and a message from the vicar, desiring to see him early next +morning, led him to the conclusion that he had better have "kept his +tongue within his teeth." He was sufficiently humbled to receive +silently unusually severe reproofs from his guardian, who had informed +him that he had sent for him in order to avoid the risk of paining his +excellent mother. It was not only that he knew all that Betty could +tell of "the row" between the brothers, and that he denounced the +"ruffianliness" of "brawling in a widowed mother's house," but that +Mr. Kemp, in whose house in London he lived, had inclosed bills of +disgraceful amount, in a letter complaining that Alfred's taste for +pleasure threatened to be his ruin; and regretting that justice to his +own family compelled him to decline retaining him as an inmate after +the approaching midsummer. The young man's unusual power of pleasing, +he said, made his example peculiarly dangerous. +</p> +<p> +"And now," said the vicar, "I ask you if your heart is not touched by +the thought of the pain that this letter would give your dead father, +were he living; and if you could bear your mother to know it? It is +only for her sake that I spare you. I will beg Mr. Kemp to retract his +resolution to dismiss you, if you become steadier, and I shall charge +him to let it be known that I will not pay any bills that exceed the +limit of your very handsome allowance: and I warn you that my natural +easiness and indolence shall not prevent my being severe if you +require it. As to the affair yesterday, I shall not inquire into it; +but I warn you that the recurrence of anything so disgraceful shall +prevent your spending your vacations at home; and I am sorry to say to +one of my good uncle's sons, that I am glad he must return to town the +day after to-morrow." +</p> +<p> +Alfred was surprised and alarmed, and made professions of penitence, +and promises of amendment. +</p> +<br> +<p> +There was a visible change thenceforward in Robert. He became more +manly in his bearing; and variable in his manner to Polly, saying even +at times very sharp things to her. The sweet-tempered girl gave no +provocation, and felt no resentment; but hid sometimes a tear. She did +not like to displease any one whom Mrs. Wickham loved. Robert attended +to business, took his proper place in society, and was popular; and +she felt it a relief when he was out, and she had not to play for him. +It was within three months of his twenty-first birthday, when, on +one of the frequent occasions of his dining with the vicar, that +gentleman asked him what were his plans. He replied that he hadn't +any. +</p> +<p> +"But, my dear boy, my authority over you is near its end, and so is +your enforced residence with your mother. It is time to think where +you will live." +</p> +<p> +"I don't think my mother will turn me out." +</p> +<p> +"No; but as her allowance for you ceases with your minority, you must, +in fairness to her, either contribute to <a name="405">{405}</a> the household income, +or get a home of your own." +</p> +<p> +"I don't anticipate any difficulty about it." +</p> +<p> +"Merton Paddocks is to be let," continued William. "It is a nice +little place, and suitable to you in many ways. If you let it slip, +you may regret it. Your marrying is to be calculated on, and in that +event your living with your mother might not be agreeable to all +parties." +</p> +<p> +"I don't think of marrying." +</p> +<p> +"Oh, nonsense! every man's turn comes; and why should you escape?" +</p> +<p> +"As you escaped, perhaps." + +"Me!—one old bachelor in a family is enough in two generations; and my +case may not be obstinate. I'm not actually too old." +</p> +<p> +"May I ask whom you think of elevating to the vicarage?" asked Robert, +laughing; but there was a pause which, he could not imagine why, made +him uncomfortable, before his cousin said: +</p> +<p> +"I have thought of Polly—do you forbid the banns?" +</p> +<p> +The room seemed turning round with Robert; but he swallowed a glass of +wine hastily, and said, as carelessly as he could, "That child!" +</p> +<p> +"Child! I don't know—she's seventeen, and I'm thirty-two—the +difference there was between your parents' ages when they married; and +Polly is two years older than your mother was then." +</p> +<p> +"Perhaps I'm no judge of the matter, William, but as you have broached +the subject, excuse me if I ask if you have any notion that Polly is +attached to you." +</p> +<p> +"None whatever; but any man can marry any woman provided he have a +fair field and no favor. What has really kept me doubtful has been a +distinct difficulty about pretty Polly's birth. It is awkward; and the +Wickhams have always been sensitive on such points; but I've nearly +resolved to sacrifice pride to Polly's charms. Her beauty and grace +would adorn any position; and as soon as my guardianship, and +consequent business relations with her father, ceases, I shall +probably ask my aunt's consent and blessing. It will be great +promotion for her pet, and insure her having her near her for life. +Meanwhile, Bob, I rely on your silence." +</p> +<p> +"Certainly." +</p> +<p> +Poor Robert! Here was one of his own family seeing no difficulty about +marrying the girl of whom he had spoken as beneath himself! another +man talking with assurance of being Polly's husband as soon as he +thought fit! while he, who had been domesticated with her from her +infancy—had never dared to give her a playful kiss since they had +ceased to be children—had never ventured on the least demonstration +of the fondness that tormented him for expression. He made an excuse +to go home early; walked in the shrubbery, wretched and irresolute, +till midnight; went to his room, threw himself undressed on the bed, +had some uneasy sleep, rose early, walked again, and appeared at +breakfast haggard and irritable. His mother observed it, and was +distressed. He had sat up too late, he said; and, for once, William's +wine was bad. He would not go to the brewery that day; but, if she +liked, he would drive her and Polly in the phaeton to Larchton, and +they could give Betty a treat by taking her. She was always glad to +visit her native place, and he knew she had not been there for a long +time. His mother was willing. Larchton was a two hours' drive; and +they put up the horses there. +</p> +<p> +Mrs. Wickham and Betty went to see some old people; and Robert +proposed to Polly to take a walk. She remembered afterward that she +had had an unusual feeling about that walk. They had often walked +together before, as a brother and sister might. +</p> +<p> +For the first time, however, Robert said, "Take my arm, Polly." +</p> +<p> +She took it; and they proceeded in silence in the fields for some +minutes. +</p> +<p> +Then he said abruptly, "Do you <a name="406">{406}</a> ever think of getting married, +Polly?" +</p> +<p> +"No," she replied with an innocent laugh; "what would Mrs. Wickham do +without me?" +</p> +<p> +"And do you expect never to love any one better than my mother?" +</p> +<p> +"I really don't think it would be possible." +</p> +<p> +"But, Polly, you're not a child. You know there's a different—love +the love my father had for my mother." +</p> +<p> +"I have never thought about it," she said carelessly. +</p> +<p> +Her manner gave him courage; it was so easy and unconscious. Taking +the little hand that was on his arm, and holding it so firmly that he +could not feel her effort to withdraw it, he went on: "Polly, I made +an excuse to come here that I might talk to you without interruption. +The love that my father had for my mother, I have for you. I cannot +tell when it began; but I first knew how strong it was when Alfred +came home first from London. I was madly jealous of him because he was +forward and I was bashful. Do you remember the morning you found us +fighting in the breakfast-parlor? He had provoked me so much by +something that he said about you, that I could not help striking him. +I don't know what I might have done if you hadn't come in then; and +I've never been happy since. I've been irritable, and sometimes, I +know, cross and disagreeable. Something occurred last night which I +can't tell you now—I may another time—which made me wretched; and I +made up my mind this morning to put myself out of suspense, and ask +you, Polly, to be my wife." +</p> +<p> +He had been too full of his story to look at her while he was +speaking, but he looked then eagerly for her answer. He could not read +the lovely countenance which new and various feelings made different +from anything he had ever seen. The soft eyelids down, the lashes +moist, the lips trembling, the flush so deep that it would have +spoiled a less delicate skin. She was surprised to find how much he +loved her; grateful to him; sorry she had made him unhappy, and +believed him ill-tempered. Then came a rapid thought of how handsome +he was; but, sweeping everything away, perplexity followed. What would +Mrs. Wickham and her father wish her to do? What would Father Armand +say? +</p> +<p> +Robert could not guess all this; and there was almost agony in his +voice as he said, "Oh, Polly, Polly, do speak to me!" +</p> +<p> +She made a great effort, and replied, "I don't know what to say, or +what I ought to do!" +</p> +<p> +"Say, at any rate, that you don't dislike me." +</p> +<p> +"Oh, no!" she said readily, almost laughing to think that he could +suppose that possible. +</p> +<p> +"One thing more, Polly; do you prefer any one else?" +</p> +<p> +She hesitated a minute, for her quick wit told her that the question +involved a great deal; but she answered firmly, though shyly, "No; I +do not." +</p> +<p> +Distrustful as he had been of his power to please her, this was enough +for the time to make him almost beside himself with delight. +</p> +<p> +He said "God bless you!" heartily; and was silent awhile because he +could not command his voice. He resumed, "As to your 'ought to do,' +don't say anything to any one till I've spoken to my mother. We'll go +and look for her now." He talked a great deal of nonsense on the way, +and Polly said very little then, or during the drive. She was ashamed +to look at Mrs. Wickham, and was glad that her attention was drawn +from her to Robert. He "touched up" the young horses so wildly, that +she declared he should never drive her again, if he did not behave +better. Directly they got home, he told her that he wanted to speak to +her that moment alone; and he poured out his story. Such an old, old +story! So like what her own dead and buried George had told her long, +long ago. <i>She</i> stand in the way of an innocent love, and between two +of the creatures dearest to her on earth! She would be very glad <a name="407">{407}</a> +to have Polly as a daughter—she loved her as one. As to pride and +such nonsense, people who had loved and lost, as she had, knew all its +profound folly. Polly's beauty and goodness might make any husband +proud, any home happy. As to William, there was no injustice done him. +In the first place, she was sure that Polly could never be brought to +think of him as a husband. She looked on him as quite an old man—he +<i>was</i> getting very bald; and in the next place, if he had had any real +love for her, he could not have spoken so coolly and confidently of +winning her. Robert said that the last observation was corroborated by +his own experience, and that his mother was a remarkably sensible +woman. Thereupon she smiled, and kissed and blessed him, and advised +him to go directly and tell the simple truth to the vicar. +</p> +<p> +Polly, meanwhile, sat alone in her pretty bedroom—her face buried in +her hands, her rich golden hair unbound and falling loosely over her +shoulders, dreading to go down to dinner. Not that she was ashamed of +dear, dear Mrs. Wickham. No; she could throw her arms around her neck +and hide her face there, and make her a confidante without any fear of +being repulsed; but how could she look at Robert, much less speak to +him? and of course the servant would see and understand all about it. +She wished she might stay in her room. If she had but a headache! but +she was really perfectly well; and false excuses she never dreamed of +making. Robert would be talking to her again as he had talked in the +fields. Really, really she did not know what to say to him. Indeed she +had never thought of getting married. She had looked forward to living +between the Grey House and her father's, beloved and welcome in both; +adding to his and Mrs. Wickham's happiness more and more as they grew +older and wanted greater care. Why could not this go on, with only the +difference that Robert should never be displeased with her? That <i>had</i> +made her unhappy. She did like him very much; better than any one, +next to her father and Mrs. Wickham; better than good old Aunt Lizzy. +He was very handsome, and sang well, and so attentive to his mother; +and ever since his father's death he had been quite fond of home. How +could he ever have supposed that she preferred any one else? But as to +being his wife—he was a Protestant. How she should feel his never +going to mass with her, his thinking confession useless, his not +believing in the dear Lord in the Blessed Sacrament! She had often +felt it hard that conversation about these things must be avoided in +the dear Grey House, and that her friends there, fond as they were of +her, wished her religion different. If she married Robert, it would be +worse, for she should love him better than any one on earth then; her +anxiety about his salvation would be so great as to make her quite +wretched, and he might not like her to talk to him about it. From her +earliest childhood, she prayed for the conversion of the Wickhams. She +began by saying one Hail Mary daily for the intention; and since she +had been older, she had said many novenas, and offered many communions +for it. She really did not think her father would give his consent; +and Father Armand would at any rate look grave and sad. She had heard +him tell pitiful stories of the unhappiness that had come of mixed +marriages among persons whom he knew. She did feel truly unhappy. She +walked to her window; she could see thence dear venerable Edward's +Hall, and knew exactly where the chapel was. She knelt down, fixing +her eyes there, and her heart on her divine Lord in the tabernacle, +and asked him that, for the love of his blessed mother, he would help +and direct her, and convert her friends. +</p> +<p> +Robert had not expected to feel it formidable to tell his story to his +cousin, and he was equally grieved and surprised by the way in which +he received it. He changed countenance so that he looked ten years +older; walked rapidly up and down the room; <a name="408">{408}</a> threw himself into a +great chair, and buried his face in his hands; asked Robert to ring; +ordered sherry, and drank several glasses. Robert, utterly mystified, +was trying to say something soothing, when he interrupted him. +</p> +<p> +"My dear fellow, I'm not simply love-sick; but circumstances, which I +will explain another time, do make this a terrible shock to me. I have +been such a fool! To any one but myself, your falling in love with +Polly would have seemed the most natural thing in the world; but I was +blinded, stultified, as men who have—never mind now—go away—I'm not +fit to talk—I will call or write to you tomorrow. Blame you! +Certainly not. Give my love to your mother and Polly. God bless you +all!" +</p> +<p> +Next morning early came a note stating that he was going from home for +a few days; and that if he did not return, he would explain himself +fully in the following week. +</p> +<p> +Worthy of a peerage as Polly Deane seemed to Robert, he could not be +ignorant that to marry him was great promotion for her; and though +delicacy in her regard, and real respect for her father, made him ask +his consent with the utmost deference, he felt that this was a mere +matter of good manners. +</p> +<p> +Mr. Deane was visibly gratified; said that he could never have +expected a proposal so complimentary to his child, though he might be +pardoned for saying that he thought any one might be proud of her. His +obligations to the Wickham family were of many years' standing; in +fact, he owed everything to Mr. Wickham. He could never, making all +due allowance for Polly's beauty and goodness, express how honored he +felt himself and her on that occasion; but—and he made a long pause +in evident difficulty how to express himself; and Robert was mute with +surprise and alarm. +</p> +<p> +"But is it possible, Mr. Robert, that Mrs. Wickham and you don't see +one very great objection?" +</p> +<p> +"In the name of heaven, what is it?" gasped Robert. +</p> +<p> +"Why, surely, sir, the dear child's religion." +</p> +<p> +"Now is it possible, Deane, that you think we would ever interfere +with that? Have we ever done so by word, or look, or deed, in all the +years we've known you? Have not you, ever since you came into this +business, been free to observe your holy days in your own way? Have we +not always been ready—even when my mother's spirits were at the +lowest—to spare Polly to go to mass or confession? I am really hurt, +and feel that we don't deserve this?" +</p> +<p> +"It is all true, Mr. Robert, and the Lord reward you, as he will; but +don't you see it might be different—I don't say that it would; but +I'm bound to do my best for my girl's soul no less than her body—if +she was your wife, and so completely in your power? There's no doubt +that a young man in love will promise anything, and mean to keep his +word too; but ours is a despised religion (God be praised for it!'); +it is one among many signs that it is the true one; and you might come +to be ashamed that one so near and dear to you belonged to it, and +that would breed great unhappiness. Then, again, you might have +children, and I should not dare give my consent to their being reared +Protestants. Perhaps, if some ancestor of yours had been firm in such +a case as this, you and yours might be still of the old faith." +</p> +<p> +"I'm sure, as far as I'm concerned, Deane, I wish we were. No one will +go to heaven, if Polly doesn't; and the religion that would take her +there can't be bad for any one. She might make a Catholic of me." +</p> +<p> +"God grant it, sir; but don't you see that I must not act on chance? +If the child was breaking her heart for you, and"—smiling—"it's not +come to that yet, I could not let her risk her soul, and perhaps her +children's souls." +</p> +<p> +"Look here, Mr. Deane: I'm quite ready to give you a written promise +<a name="409">{409}</a> that I will never interfere in any way with Polly's practising +her religion, and that all her children—boys as well as girls—shall +be brought up in it; and I'm sure my mother will make no difficulty." +</p> +<p> +"You cannot say more, Mr. Robert; but still, if you please, I will +take a week to think the matter over, and talk about it to Father +Armand and Polly, and for that time I think she'd better come home. +She must feel awkward in the same house with you under present +circumstances. Will you give my respects to Mrs. Wickham, and say that +I will call for the child this evening?" +</p> +<p> +Numerous, and all wide of the truth, were Mrs. Wickham's and Robert's +conjectures respecting the vicar. They began even to consider whether +he had ever shown any symptoms of insanity, and were thankful to know +that it was not hereditary in the family. +</p> +<p> +The week stipulated for by Mr. Deane passed; and after consulting +Father Armand and Mr. Scharderlowe, he agreed to give his consent to +Polly's marrying Robert at the end of a year, if he were then equally +willing to bind himself by a written promise to respect her faith, and +have his children brought up in it. They said they thought that the +kind, liberal, honorable character of the Wickhams being considered, +and having been proved in all their conduct to the Deanes, and the +difficulty of Catholic marrying Catholic (which was far, <i>far</i> greater +in England then than it is now) being weighed, the case was as hopeful +as a mixed marriage could be. +</p> +<p> +Robert grumbled about the delay, every one else approved of it. His +mother thought a man young to even at twenty-two; and the time seemed +to Polly none too long for becoming accustomed to new feelings and new +prospects. +</p> +<p> +Two days after all this was arranged came the vicar's +anxiously-expected letter, dated Scarborough. It said: +</p> +<p class="cite"> + "MY DEAR ROBERT,—The punishment of my youthful sins and + follies, which has been pursuing me for years, has at last + fallen so heavily upon me, that I feel inclined to cry + out, like Cain, that it is greater than I can bear. Try to + believe, as you read my humiliating confession, that the + bitterest portion of my suffering is the fact that I have + injured my uncle's family; and that I shall regret my + pangs less if they prove a useful warning to you and your + brothers. I can hardly remember when I was not in debt. + Before I was eight years old I owed pence continually for + fruits, sweets, toys. I suffered torture for fear of + detection while these trifles were owing, but directly + they were paid, I began a fresh score. At school I + borrowed money of every one who would lend it, and had a + bill at every shop to which a boy would be attracted. The + misery I continued to endure while I could not pay was + always forgotten directly I had paid; and I was in the + same difficulty over and over again. I must own, moreover, + that I was absolutely without excuse. I had as much money + and indulgence of every kind as any boy of my age and + position. I went to the university. My allowance was + liberal, but my debts became tremendous. I gave endless + wine-parties; drove to London frequently; entered into all + its pleasures, made expensive presents, bought horses, and + betted; and was of course done; finally, I got into the + hands of Jews. It is singular that my father never + suspected my delinquencies, and that I was wonderfully + helped by circumstances. I was young when I succeeded to + the living and a large amount of ready money. All was + swallowed up in the dreadful gulf that my unprincipled + extravagance had made. Year after year the greater portion + of my income has gone in payment of exorbitant interest. + Your dear father's legacy went that way; and my infamous + creditors, having ascertained that his will placed a great + deal in my power, threatened me with exposure—which would + have <a name="410">{410}</a> been fatal to a man in my + position—till I had pacified them with thousands not my + own—with, in fact, a considerable portion of your + brothers' inheritance. +<br><br> + "At first I stifled my conscience by representing to + myself that being released from pressure which had worried + me for years, I should have a clear head for business; and + recover, by judicious speculation, the sums that I had + appropriated—as I hoped—but for a time. I have + speculated unfortunately, and made matters infinitely + worse; for whereas my previous creditors were rapacious + rascals to whom, in justice, nothing was due, my present + ones are the helpless children of my warm-hearted, + trustful, dead uncle. +<br><br> + "By this time old Smith is, I suppose, dead, and you are + aware of his will—as singular as all we know of his + life—but he is necessary to my story. A day or two before + I told you that I thought of marrying Polly he sent for + me, said that he felt himself breaking, and wished me to + witness his will, and be aware of its purport, that it + might not be said, when he was gone, that he had acted at + the priest's instigation. He said that at that moment no + one knew he was a Catholic, that he had led a godless life + for years, but he meant to make his peace with God before + he died. He had no relations who had any claim on him; he + had left £100 to Mr. Armand for religious uses, and the + rest of his money—nearly £20,000—to Polly. I thought the + man mad, and humored him. He understood me, and said so; + told me that existence had ceased to be more than + endurable when, twenty years ago, he entered Upfield a + stranger; and that therefore he had confined himself to + the necessaries of life, and been glad to be believed + poor. That he had thought of leaving his money to a + hospital; but that Polly had become so like the only woman + he had ever loved—and whom he had lost by death—that he + had grown to feel very fatherly toward her; and his + intention to make her his heiress had been decided by a + little fact very characteristic of Polly. She was walking + with your mother one very windy day, when he was out for + nearly the last time, and his hat blew off. He was too + infirm to follow it, and every one but Polly was too lazy + or too much amused to do so. She ran for it, and brought + it to him with a kindness which seems to have thoroughly + melted him. If he be still living, this must not be + mentioned; but, as I said before, I think it is + impossible. It is an old saying that 'drowning men catch + at straws.' Oppressed as I was by hopeless remorse, I + caught at the notion that I would marry Polly. Her father, + I thought, would be pleased with her elevation. I did not + anticipate any difficulty in making such a gentle creature + love me. I intended to do my utmost to make her life + happy; and I knew that she would give up anything to do + good to your family. I calculated that, living moderately, + my income would be ample, and that I could appropriate + Polly's fortune to repaying what I had misused, and still + without wronging her—for that, as my wife, she would have + advantages far beyond her father's expectations. How all + this scheming is defeated, you know. The only reparation + now in my power, I make willingly. Deducting a curate's + stipend and eighty pounds a year for myself, I will + furnish you with full powers to receive the residue of my + income, and apply it to your brothers' use. I will appoint + Deane guardian in my stead, and furnish him with all + necessary documents. If I live—and I pray that I may live + for that object—your brothers will not suffer ultimately. + I have made my will, and left them whatever property I may + possess when I die. I have, you know, expectations from + the Heathcotes. +<br><br> + "There is, I hope, some guarantee for my reform in the + willingness with which I accept my punishment. I am glad + that, with luxurious tastes, I must exist on very narrow + means for years; <a name="411">{411}</a> that with sturdy + English prejudices I must live among foreigners. I had not + courage to make my shameful confession verbally, or to see + any of you afterward. I cross hence to Hamburg to-morrow. + My further course is undecided, but I will write to you; + and Hangham and Hunt, Fleet street, will forward letters + to me. Think of all I have lost, of all I have suffered + secretly, for years, of my dreary prospects, and try to be + merciful to your miserable cousin,—WILLIAM WICKHAM." +</p> +<p> +Polly had returned to the Grey House. Mrs. Wickham fretted, and +Robert—to be candid—was disagreeable in her absence. Shy and +conscious though she felt, she was quite willing to go back. Her +father was never at home till the evening—not always then. Aunt +Lizzie wanted no help or cheering up, and Polly's happiness depended +mainly on her being necessary to some one. There is, moreover, no +denying that, differently educated as she had been, her aunt's habits +and notions were not hers; and I could not say positively that she did +not miss Robert, and admit to herself that it was pleasant to expect +him at certain times, and to spend a good deal of time in his society. +When the vicar's letter arrived, she was at the breakfast-table, doing +the duties of president deftly and satisfactorily, as she did +everything—housewifely genius as she was. +</p> +<p> +"What a long affair!" exclaimed Robert, as he glanced at the letter. +"What can he have to say? I can't wait to read it now; I must be off +to the brewery. Here, my mother, you take it, and tell me all about it +when I come back." +</p> +<p> +She put it in her pocket, remembering that Polly was concerned in it, +and not liking to read it before her without mentioning its purport. +The thoughtful, methodical damsel soon departed for an hour's duty +among birds and flowers, and then the thunderbolt fell on poor Mrs. +Wickham. Her darling younger sons were not only fatherless, but almost +dependent on their brother. She was no woman of business; but she +guessed that there would not be more than £300 a year to come from the +vicar, when the deductions he mentioned had been made. She could of +course spare £100. What did she want with money? This would meet all +the expenses of education, supposing the vicar lived—and if he died! +In any case there was no capital to start her sons in their +professions; and, unluckily, Alfred, who would want it first, had +never been a favorite of Robert's. His assumption of superiority and +his sarcasm had nettled him extremely; and he dropped expressions +occasionally which showed he had not forgiven him. But Robert would be +very well able to help. Even supposing that—as she hoped he would— +he did marry Polly, and have a family, his brothers would be off his +hands before his children became expensive. If the story about poor +old Mr. Smith proved true, he would be a rich man. Polly would of +course do something handsome for her father and aunt, and yet have a +large fortune. That incident about the hat Mrs. Wickham remembered +perfectly; the poor old man looked enraptured when, lovelier even than +usual, glowing from her running and good-nature, she gave it to him. +It was, however, very wonderful. How much had happened in quiet +Upfield during the last two years! Then she began to pity the vicar +heartily; to make excuses for him, and forgive him. The sacrifices he +made proved the sincerity of his repentance: how miserable he would be +for years, poor and lonely in a foreign land! In those days anywhere +"abroad" seemed to simple inland folk something terrible. He might get +yellow fever, or the plague. She believed them to be imminent anywhere +out of the British Isles. She must talk to Polly, and have her for a +staunch ally before Robert came home. He had not his father's noble +impulsiveness, but he was just and honorable, and she and Polly could +do a great deal with him. Of <a name="412">{412}</a> course she should omit telling her +about the vicar's having thought of marrying her, and the story about +old Smith. One fact would be painful to her; the other might be +untrue. +</p> +<p> +The two guileless creatures agreed fully that Robert must be worked +upon to forgive his cousin, and do all that was necessary for his +brothers. They were so radiant with hope and charity that their +countenances struck Robert peculiarly when he returned, and he said he +saw plainly that they had good news to tell him. It was an awkward +beginning: his mother feared that the contrary character of her +intelligence would displease him the more, and said timidly, "You had +really better read William's letter yourself, my dear boy; he tells +his story much better than I can." +</p> +<p> +The rush of events at Upfield seemed, for a few days, overpowering to +those whom it concerned; and those whom it concerned not were very +much excited. There was the vicar gone—no one knew wherefore or +whither, or for how long; and a curate with a wife and seven children +had taken possession of his trim bachelor's hall. Then there was Mr. +Smith, not very old, probably not more than fifty, dead. And he had +turned out to be a rich man! why who could have guessed it? He had +appeared one day at the inn, as suddenly as if he had dropped from the +clouds—had evidently come a long way afoot—had no luggage but a +valise; and was altogether so equivocal-looking that Mr. Mogg, the +veterinary surgeon, would not take him as a lodger without his paying +six months' rent in advance. He had paid his way regularly, certainly; +but no one could have supposed that he had anything to spare. He would +never talk of his affairs except to say that he had out-lived all his +near relations, and been a great deal in foreign parts. People had +suggested that he might be an escaped felon, a man resuscitated after +hanging, a deserter, a Jew. On the strength of the last notion Mr. +Mogg tested him with roast pig; and he liked it. +</p> +<p> +Then he never went to church. To be sure he was not the only person in +Upfield of whom that might be said; but no one guessed that he was a +papist. They had, at last, no proof that he was; but it was +understood, though not formally acknowledged, that the librarian at +Edward's Hall was a Catholic priest, and that persons of his communion +could and did benefit by his ministrations. Such things were winked +at, in spite of penal enactments, in the case of some Catholics of +high social standing, like Mr. Scharderlowe. +</p> +<p> +Now this librarian, Mr. Armand, had been sent for by Mr. Smith when he +was taken ill, had visited him frequently, and been with him when he +died. No doubt he was a papist. That might be the reason he left his +money to Polly Deane. Well, well! what luck some people had! Upfield +wouldn't be surprised if Robert Wickham married her; and the +neighborhood supposed it must call upon her, whether he did or not. It +wondered if Mr. and Mrs. Wickham had known all along of Mr. Smith's +intention; it wouldn't be surprised; there was something odd in the +way they had educated the girl, and taken her out of her sphere. But, +after all, Mrs. Pogram said, she mightn't like Robert Wickham; and +with such a fortune as hers, she could afford to please herself. Mrs. +Pogram's own sons were decidedly finer young men, had more dash, and +were in the army—every one knew that girls liked red coats. +Lancaster would be coming home soon, on leave. She would call at once; +let others do as they pleased. Deane was a highly-respectable man, and +no one could be ashamed of his daughter. +</p> +<br> +<p> +A year later there was a large family-gathering at the Grey House at +dinner, and Mrs. Wickham presided. Her grief had settled into a +placid, subdued character, which, with the weeds, gave a kind of +moonlight tone to her appearance, and became her so <a name="413">{413}</a> well that no +one could wish to see her ever otherwise. +</p> +<p> +Robert and Polly, man and wife, had returned that day from a bridal +excursion to the English lakes. The younger brothers were assembled to +meet them. Aunt Heathcote was there with her ear-trumpet; and +queer-tempered Mrs. Trumball, all smiles. Mr. Deane, of the firm of +Wickham and Deane, urbane in shorts, black-silk stockings, and silver +knee and shoe buckles, was a father of whom the lovely bride felt +proud, as she did too of Aunt Lizzie; who looked as if she had worn +silks and laces, and kept her soft white large hands in mittens all +her life. Deep in every one's heart was the memory of warm-hearted, +generous George Wickham, gone for ever from those whose meeting there, +and in their mutual relations, he would have made more joyous; but no +one named him, for no one could have done it then and there in a voice +which would not have been thick with emotion. Tears must have followed +any mention of him; and who would have caused their flow at such a +happy gathering? Every one knew what every one was feeling and what a +long pause meant, which Robert broke by saying with a sigh, "Well, I +do wish that poor dear William were here; I am so happy that I wish +every one else was; and I hate to think of him, hospitable, +affectionate creature, dragging out his days among fat phlegmatic +Dutch boors, without a single soul to speak to." Polly, at his side, +contrived to give him, under the table, a little squeeze expressive of +the fullest approbation. +</p> +<p> +"I'm glad you have forgiven him, Bob," said his mother. +</p> +<p> +"Well, really, mother, it was but natural that I should be savage at +first. Men can't be quite as tender-hearted as women, I suppose; and +they see the consequences of pecuniary frailties more clearly, and +suffer more from them, than they do; but I must be a brute if, happy +as I am, I didn't wish well to everybody, especially to that good +fellow. Now don't cry, Polly." +</p> +<p> +Her father observed that there were great excuses for the vicar, and +that every one must admit that he had done his utmost to make +reparation. +</p> +<p> +"Yes," said Alfred, with mock gravity. It was his delight to puzzle +Aunt Lizzie; she never could make out whether he were joking or +oracular. "I have learned wisdom through the rudiments of a painful +experience; and, steady reformed man of mature years as I find myself, +I pronounce that William might have done much worse." +</p> +<p> +"Shall I write and urge him to come back?" asked Robert. +</p> +<p> +"Do! do! do!" resounded in various voices all around the table. +</p> +<p> +"Very well; I'm more than willing. Polly told me confidentially a few +days ago that she had no turn for extravagance; and I feel so domestic +and moderate, that I fancy we may manage to provide for the fine young +family that William's indiscretions have thrown on our hands, though +he will be able to give less help than if he remained at Rotterdam." +</p> +<p> +"Mr. Ridlem's stipend would be saved, you know, Bob." +</p> +<p> +"Not exactly, mother. William couldn't live at home as he lives now; +that would be painful to us and impossible for him." +</p> +<p> +"True; I forgot that." +</p> +<p> +"It is difficult for me to put in a word," said Alfred, "because I've +been a great expense to Bob, and he hasn't done with me yet; in fact +I've no right to make a suggestion; but it is my full intention to +reimburse him one of these days. I shouldn't have said so, only the +chance of helping to bring William back—" +</p> +<p> +"You're a good fellow, Alfred; I believe you; and must confess that I +have found you less trouble than I expected." +</p> +<br> +<p> +The result of the consultation was a letter to the vicar, signed by +every one present, entreating him to return forthwith; a letter over +which he cried like <a name="414">{414}</a> a girl. It brought him back speedily, a +wiser and not a sadder man. He said indeed that, though down among the +dykes, he had never been so happy as since he made all square with his +conscience. +</p> +<p> +To follow the affairs of Upfield and the Wickhams further would +involve a series of stories. It must suffice to say that Robert's +marriage turned out really well; and that from the day of her +betrothal, the dearest wish of Polly's heart was gratified; for he, +unasked, joined her and the other stragglers who—the laws +notwithstanding—made their way on Sundays and holidays to a +side-entrance in venerable old Edward's Hall, and were admitted to +mass in the little well-loved chapel; Mr. Armand the librarian, +identical with Father Armand the priest, thanking God devoutly for the +addition to the fold. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>From The Month. +<br><br> +A LOST CHAPTER OF CHURCH HISTORY RECOVERED. +<br><br> +BY JAMES SPENCER NORTHCOTE, D.D.</h2> +<br> +<p> +If we set before a skilful professor of comparative anatomy a few +bones dug out of the bowels of the earth, he will re-construct for us +the whole form of the animal to which they belonged; and it sometimes +happens that these theoretical constructions are singularly justified +by later discoveries. It is the province of an archaeologian to +attempt something of the same kind. A historian transcribes for our +use annals more or less fully composed and faithfully transmitted by +his predecessors. He may have to gather his materials from various +sources; he must distinguish the true from the false; and he gives +shape, consistency, and life to the whole; but, for the most part at +least, he has little to supply that is new from any resources of his +own. The archaeologian, on the contrary, if he be really a man of +learning and science, and not a mere collector of old curiosities, +aims at discovering and restoring annals that are lost, by means of a +careful and intelligent use of every fragment of most heterogeneous +materials that happens to come across him. And there is certainly +nobody in the present age whose talent and industry in this branch of +learning, so far at least as <i>Christian</i> archaeology is concerned, can +at all compare with that of Cavaliere G. B. de Rossi. For more than +twenty years he has devoted himself to the study of the Roman +catacombs, and at length we begin to enter upon the fruit of his +labors. He has just published (by order of the Pope, and at the +expense, we believe, of the Commission of Sacred Archaeology, +instituted by his Holiness in 1851) the first volume of <i>Roma +Sotteranea</i>; a magnificent volume, splendidly illustrated, and full of +new and varied information. An abstract of its contents would hardly +be suitable to our pages; but none, we think, can fail to be +interested in what we may venture to call <i>the first chapter</i> of the +History of the Catacombs—a chapter that had certainly never before +been written, even if it had been attempted. +</p> +<p> +All earlier authors upon subterranean Rome, so far as our experience +goes, whilst describing fully, and it may be illustrating with +considerable learning, the catacombs as they now exist, and all the +monuments they <a name="415">{415}</a> contain, have been content to pass over with a +few words of apology and conjecture the question of their origin and +early history. They have told us that the Jewish residents in Rome had +burial-places of a similar character; and they have shown how natural +and probable it was that the first Roman Christians, unwilling to burn +their dead in pagan fashion, should have imitated the practices of the +ancient people of God. When pressed to explain how so gigantic a work, +as the Roman catacombs undoubtedly are, could have been carried on by +the Christians under the very feet of their bitter persecutors, yet +without their knowledge, they have pointed to the rare instance of a +cemetery entered by a staircase hidden within the recesses of a +sand-pit; they have guessed that here or there some Christian +patrician, some senator or his wife, may have given up a garden or a +vineyard for use as a burial-ground; and then they have passed on to +the much easier task of enumerating the subterranean chapels, tracing +the intricacies of the galleries, or describing the paintings, +sculptures, and inscriptions. The work of De Rossi is of a very +different character. It begins <i>ab ovo</i>, and proceeds scientifically. +It shows not only how these wonderful cemeteries <i>may</i> have been made, +but also—as far as is practicable, and a great deal further than +nine-tenths even of the most learned archaeologians ever supposed to +be practicable—how and when each cemetery really <i>was</i> made. From the +few scattered bones, so to speak, which lay buried, and for the most +part <i>broken</i>, partly in the depths of the catacombs themselves, +partly in the Acts of the Martyrs, the Liber Pontificalis, and a few +other records of ecclesiastical history, he has reconstructed with +consummate skill the complete skeleton, if we should not rather say +has reproduced the whole body, and set it full of life and vigor +before us. Not that he has indulged in hasty conjectures, or given +unlimited scope to a lively imagination; far from it. On the contrary, +we fear many of his less learned readers will be disposed to find +fault with the slow and deliberate, almost ponderous, method of his +progress, and to grow impatient under the mass of minute criticisms +with which some of his pages are filled, and by which he insists upon +justifying each step that he takes. Indeed, we have some scruple at +presenting our readers with the sum and substance of his argument, +divested of all these <i>pièces justificatives</i>, as our neighbors would +call them, lest they should suspect us of inventing rather than +describing. However, we think it is too precious a page of Church +history to be lost, and we therefore proceed to publish it, only +premising that nobody must pretend to judge of its truth merely from +the naked abstract of it which we propose to give, but that all who +are really interested in the study should examine for themselves in +detail the whole mass of evidence by which, in De Rossi's pages, it is +supported, most of which is new, and all newly applied. +</p> +<p> +To tell our story correctly, it is necessary we should step back into +pagan times, and first take a peep at their laws and usages in the +matter of burials. No classical scholar need be told how strictly +prohibited by old Roman law was all intra-mural interment. Indeed +every traveller knows that all the great roads leading into Rome were +once lined on either side with sepulchral monuments, many of which +still remain; and the letters inscribed upon them tell us how many +feet of frontage, and how many feet at the back (into the field), +belonged to each monument, [IN. FR. P. so many. IN. AG. P. so many. +<i>In fronte, pedum—. In agro, pedum—</i>.] M. de Rossi (the brother of +our author) has published a very interesting plan of one of these +monuments with all its dependencies, as represented on an ancient +marble slab dug up on the Via Lavicana. On this slab, not only are the +usual measurements of frontage and depth carefully recorded, but also +the private or public roads which crossed the <a name="416">{416}</a> property, the +gardens and vineyards of which it consisted, the swampy land on which +grew nothing but reeds (it is called <i>Harundinetum</i>), and the ditch by +which, on one side at least, it was bounded. Unfortunately the slab is +not perfect, so that we cannot tell the exact measurement of the +whole. Enough, however, remains to show that the property altogether +was not less than twelve Roman <i>jugera</i>, or nearly 350,000 square +feet; and other inscriptions are extant, specifying an amount of +property almost equal to this as belonging to a single monument (e.g. +<i>Huic monumento cedunt agri puri jugera decem</i>). The necessity for so +large an assignment of property to a single tomb was not so much the +vastness of the mausoleum to be erected, as because certain funeral +rites were to be celebrated there year by year, on the anniversary of +the death, and at other times; sacrifices to be offered, feasts to be +given, etc.; and for these purposes <i>exedrae</i> were provided, or +semi-circular recesses, furnished with sofas and all things necessary +for the convenience of guests. A house also (<i>custodia</i>) was often +added, in which a person should always live to look after the +monument, for whose support these gardens, vineyards, or other +hereditaments were set apart as a perpetual endowment. It only remains +to add, that upon all these ancient monuments may be found these +letters, or something equivalent to them, H.M.H.EX.T.N.S. (<i>Hoc +monumentum haeredes ex testamento ne sequatur</i>); in other words, "This +tomb and all that belongs to it is sacred; henceforth it can neither +be bought nor sold; it does not descend to my heirs with the rest of +my property; but must ever be retained inviolate for the purpose to +which I have destined it, viz., as a place of sepulchre for myself and +my family," or certain specified members only of the family; or, in +some rare instances, others also external to the family. The same +sacred character which attached to the monuments themselves belonged +also to the <i>area</i> in which they stood, the <i>hypogeum</i> or subterranean +chamber, which not unfrequently was formed beneath them; but it is a +question whether it extended to the houses or other possessions +attached to them. +</p> +<p> +Nor were these monuments confined to the noblest and wealthiest +citizens. Even in the absence of all direct evidence upon the subject, +we should have found it hard to believe that any but the very meanest +of the slaves were buried (or rather were thrown without any burial at +all) into those open pits (<i>puticoli</i>) of which Horace and others have +told us. And in fact, a multitude of testimonies have come down to us +of the existence, both in republican and imperial Rome, of a number of +colleges, as they were called, or corporations (clubs or +confraternities, as we should more probably call them), whose members +were associated, partly in honor of some particular deity, but far +more with a view to mutual assistance for the performance of the just +funeral rites. Inscriptions which are still extant testify to nearly +fourscore of these <i>collegia</i>, each consisting of the members of a +different trade or profession. There are the masons and carpenters, +soldiers and sailors, bakers and cooks, corn-merchants and +wine-merchants, hunters and fishermen, goldsmiths and blacksmiths, +dealers in drugs and carders of wool, boatmen and divers, doctors and +bankers, scribes and musicians—in a word, it would be hard to say +what trade or employment is not here represented. Not, however, that +this is the only bond of fellowship upon which such confraternities +were built; sometimes, indeed generally, the members were united, as +we have already said, in the worship of some deity; they were +<i>cultores Jovis</i>, or <i>Herculis</i>, or <i>Apollinis et Diana</i>; sometimes +they merely took the title of some deceased benefactor whose memory +they desired to honor; e. g. <i>cultores statuarum et clipeorum L. +Abulli Dextri;</i> and sometimes the only bond of union seems to have +been service in the same house or family. A long <a name="417">{417}</a> and curious +inscription belonging to one of these colleges, consisting mainly of +slaves, and erected in honor of Diana and Antinous, <i>and for the +burial of the dead</i>, in the year 133 of our era, reveals a number of +most interesting particulars as to its internal organization, which +are worth repeating in this place. So much was to be paid at entrance, +and a keg of good wine beside, and then so much a month afterward; for +every member who has regularly paid up his contribution, so much to be +allowed for his funeral, of which a certain proportion to be +distributed amongst those who assist; if a member dies at a distance +of more than twenty miles from Rome, three members are to be sent to +fetch the body, and so much is to be allowed them for travelling +expenses; if the master (of the slave) will not give up the body, he +is nevertheless to receive all the funeral rites; he is to be buried +in effigy; if any of the members, being a slave, receives his freedom, +he owes the college an amphora of good wine; he who is elected +president (<i>magister</i>), must inaugurate his accession to office by +giving a supper to all the members; six times a year the members dine +together in honor of Diana, Antinous, and the patron of the college, +and the allowance of bread and of wine on these occasions is +specified; so much to every <i>mess</i> of four; no complaints or disputed +questions may be mooted at these festivals, "to the end that our +feasts may be merry and glad;" finally, whoever wishes to enter this +confraternity is requested to study all the rules first before he +enters, lest he afterward grumble or leave a dispute as a legacy to +his heir. +</p> +<p> +We are afraid we have gone into the details of this ancient burial +club more than was strictly necessary for our purpose; but we have +been insensibly drawn on by their extremely interesting character, +reminding us (as the Count de Champagny, from whom we have taken them, +most justly remarks) both of the ancient Christian <i>Agapae</i>, or +love-feasts, and (we may add) the mediaeval guilds. This, however, +suggests a train of thought which we must not be tempted to pursue. De +Rossi has been more self-denying on the subject; he confines himself +to a brief mention of the existence of the clubs, refers us to other +authors for an account of them, and then calls our attention to this +very singular, and for our purpose most important fact concerning +them: viz., that at a time when institutions of this kind had been +made a cover for political combinations and conspiracies, or at least +when the emperors suspected and feared such an abuse of them, and +therefore rigorously suppressed them, nevertheless an exception was +expressly made in favor of those which consisted of "poorer members of +society, who met together <i>every month</i> to make a small contribution +toward the expenses of their <i>funeral</i>;" and then he puts side by side +with this law the words of Tertullian in his <i>Apology</i>, written about +the very same time, where he speaks of the Christians contributing +<i>every month</i>, or when and as each can and chooses, a certain sum to +be spent on feeding and <i>burying</i> the poor. The identity of language +in the two passages, when thus brought into juxtaposition, is very +striking; and we suppose that most of our readers will now recognize +the bearing of all we have hitherto been saying upon the history of +the Christian catacombs, from which we have seemed to be wandering so, +far. +</p> +<p> +We have already said that one of the first questions which persons are +inclined to ask when they either visit, or begin to study, the +catacombs, is this: How was so vast a work ever accomplished without +the knowledge and against the will of the local authorities? And we +answer (in part at least), as the Royal Scientific Society <i>should</i> +have answered King Charles the Second's famous question about the live +fish and the dead fish in the tub of water, "Are you quite sure of +your facts? Don't call upon us to <a name="418">{418}</a> find the reason of a problem +which, after all, only exists perhaps in your own imagination." And so +in truth it is. The arguments of the Cavaliere de Rossi have satisfied +us that the Christians of the first ages were under no necessity of +having recourse to extraordinary means of secrecy with reference to +the burial of their dead; it was quite possible for them to have +cemeteries on every side of Rome, under the protection of the ordinary +laws and practices of their pagan neighbors. +</p> +<p> +But is not this to revolutionize the whole history of these wonderful +excavations? We cannot help it, if it be so; it is at least one of +those revolutions which are generally accepted as justifiable, and +certainly are approved in their consequences; for when it is complete, +everything finds its proper place; books and grave-stones, the +cemeteries and their ancient historians, every witness concerned gives +its own independent testimony, all in harmony with one another, and +with the presumed facts of the case. Let us see how the early history +of the catacombs runs, when reconstructed according to this new +theory. The first Christian cemeteries were made in ground given for +that very purpose by some wealthier member of the community, and +secured to it in perpetuity in accordance with the laws of the +country. There was nothing to prevent the erection of a public +monument in the area thus secured, and the excavation of chambers and +galleries beneath. And history tells us of several of the most ancient +catacombs that they had their origin from this very circumstance, that +some pious Christian, generally a Roman matron of noble rank, buried +the relics of some famous martyr on her own property (<i>in praedio +suo</i>.) +</p> +<p> +The oldest memorial we have about the tomb of St. Peter himself is +this, that Anacletus "<i>memoriam construxit B. Petri</i>, and places where +the bishops (of Rome) should be buried;" and this language is far more +intelligible and correct, if spoken of some public tomb, than of an +obscure subterranean grave; <i>memoria</i>, or <i>cella memoriae</i>, being the +classical designation of such tombs. How much more appropriate also +does the language of Caius the presbyter, preserved to us by Eusebius, +now appear, wherein he speaks (in the days of Zephyrinus) of the +<i>trophies</i> of the apostles being <i>to be seen</i> at the Vatican and on +the Ostian way? Tertullian, too, speaks of the bodies of the martyrs +lying in <i>mausoleums and monuments</i>, awaiting the general +resurrection. From the same writer we learn that the <i>areae</i> of the +Christian burials were known to and were sacrilegiously attacked by +the enraged heathens in the very first years of the third century; and +quite recently there has reached us from this same writer's country a +most valuable inscription, discovered among the ruins of a Roman +building, not far from the walls of the ancient Caesarea of +Mauritania, which runs in this wise: "Euelpius, a worshipper of the +word (<i>cultor Verbi</i>; mark the word, and call to mind the <i>cultores +Jovis</i>, etc.), has given this area for sepulchres, and has built a +<i>cella</i> at his own cost. He left this <i>memoria</i> to the holy church. +Hail, brethren: Euelpius, with a pure and simple heart, salutes you, +born of the Holy Spirit." It is true that this inscription, as we now +have it, is not the original stone; it is expressly added at the foot +of the tablet, that <i>Ecclesia fratrum</i> has restored this <i>titulus</i> at +a period subsequent to the persecution during which the original had +been destroyed; but both the sense and the words forbid us to suppose +that any change had been made in the language of the epitaph, to which +we cannot assign a date later than the middle of the third century. +But, finally, and above all, let us descend into the catacombs +themselves, and put them to the question. Michael Stephen de Rossi, +the constant companion of his brother's studies, having invented some +new mechanical contrivance for taking plans of subterranean +excavations, [Footnote 78] has made exact <a name="419">{419}</a> plans of several +catacombs, not only of each level (or <i>floor</i>, so to speak) within +itself, but also in its relations to the superficial soil, and in the +relations of the several floors one with another. A specimen of these +is set before us by means of different colors or tints, representing +the galleries of the different levels, in the map of the cemetery of +St. Callixtus, which accompanies this volume; and a careful study of +this map is sufficient to demonstrate that the vast net-work of paths +in this famous cemetery originally consisted of several smaller +cemeteries, confined each within strict and narrow limits, and that +they were only united at some later, though still very ancient period. +For it cannot have been without reason that the subterranean galleries +should have doubled and re-doubled upon themselves within the limits +of a certain well-defined area; that they should never have +overstepped a certain boundary-line in this or that direction, though +the nature of the soil and every other consideration would have seemed +to invite them to proceed; that they should have been suddenly +interrupted by a flight of steps, penetrating more deeply into the +bowels of the earth, and there been reproduced exactly upon the same +scale and within the same limits. These facts can only be fully +appreciated by an actual examination of the map, where they speak for +themselves; but even those who have not this advantage will scarcely +call in question the conclusion that is drawn from them, when they +call to mind how exactly it coincides with all the ancient testimonies +we have already adduced on the subject, and when they learn the +singular and most interesting fact, that the Cav. de Rossi has been +able in more than one instance, by means of the sepulchral +inscriptions, to identify the noble family by whom the site of the +cemetery was originally granted. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 78: It was highly commended and received a prize at the + International Exhibition of 1862.] +</p> +<p> +It will be of course understood that we have been speaking of the +earliest ages of the Church's history, and that we are far from +denying that there were other periods during which secrecy was an +essential condition of the Christian cemeteries; on the contrary, did +our space allow, we could show what parts of the catacombs belonged to +the one period, and what to the other, and what are the essential +characteristics of each. We might unfold also, with considerable +minuteness, the <i>economy</i> of these cemeteries, even during the ages of +persecution; under whose management they were administered, whether +they were parochial or otherwise, together with many other highly +interesting particulars. But we have already exceeded the limits +assigned us, and we hope that those of our readers who wish to know +more on the subject will take care to possess themselves of the book +from which we have drawn our information, that so funds may not be +wanting for the completion of so useful a work. Nothing but a +deficiency of funds, in the present condition of the pontifical +treasury, hinders the immediate issue of other volumes of this and its +kindred work, the <i>Inscriptiones Christianae,</i> by the same author. He +announces his intention to bring out the volumes of <i>Roma Sotterranea</i> +and of the <i>Inscriptions</i> alternately, for they mutually explain and +illustrate one another, and are in fact parts of the same whole; and +the public has been long impatient for the volume which is promised +next, viz., the ancient inscriptions which illustrate Christian dogma. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="420">{420}</a> +<br> +<h2>MISCELLANY. +<br><br> +ART.</h2> +<br> +<p> +<i>Domestic.</i>—The fortieth annual exhibition of the National Academy of +Design was opened to the public on the evening of April 27th, under +circumstances which may well mark an era in the history of that +institution. After drifting from place to place through forty long +years, now deficient in funds, and now in danger of losing public +sympathy or support, sometimes unable to carry out its specific +purposes, and almost always cramped for space, or otherwise perplexed +in the details of its public exhibitions, the Academy, like Noah's +ark, long buffetted by waves and driven by tempests, finds a resting +place, not on Mount Ararat, but at the corner of Fourth avenue and +Twenty-third street. And as the "world's gray fathers," after their +troubled voyage, regarded with infinite satisfaction <i>terra firma</i> and +the blue sky, so doubtless the older of the academicians, those who +have accompanied the institution in all its wanderings, are doubtless +both pleased and amazed to find themselves arrived at a goodly haven +with secure anchorage. To drop the figure, the Academy is now +permanently established in an attractive and convenient building, well +situated in a central locality, and bids fair to enter upon a career +of usefulness far beyond the results of its previous experience. +</p> +<p> +The new building has been for so long a time completed externally, +that its merits have been canvassed with every shade of opinion, from +enthusiastic commendation to quite as decided disapprobation. The +majority of critics, having their reputation at stake, are afraid to +hazard an opinion, and prudently remain neutral, until some +authoritative decision shall be made. As an architectural effort it +may be called an experiment, on which account it presents perhaps as +many claims to critical notice as the works of art which adorn its +walls. The style, singularly enough, is assigned to no special era or +country, but is described to be of "that revived Gothic, now the +dominant style in England, which combines those features of the +different schools of architecture of the Middle Ages which are most +appropriate to our nineteenth-century buildings," which means probably +that the building is of an eclectic Gothic pattern. All modern styles +since the renaissance may be said to be eclectic, whether founded on +antique or mediaeval models, and the building in question differs from +other Gothic edifices, of more familiar aspect to us, chiefly in form, +external decoration, and the arrangement of its component parts. In +the American mind Gothic architecture is associated chiefly with +ecclesiastical structures and is popularly supposed to be subject to +no fixed laws, beyond an adherence to the irregular and picturesque. +Given a cruciform ground-plan, a pointed spire, steep roof, narrow +arched windows, buttresses, and pinnacles <i>ad libitum</i>, and you have +as good a Gothic building as the public taste can appreciate. Here, +however, is a nearly square building, covering an area of eighty by +about a hundred feet, which is neither a church nor a college, and is +without steep roof, spire, buttresses, or pinnacles. The public +evidently do not fathom the mystery at present, and those whose praise +of the new Academy borders on the extravagant, are perhaps as much +astray in their adherence to the <i>omne ignotum pro magnifico</i> +principle as those wiseacres who tell you knowingly that the architect +has tried to palm off upon us a palpable imitation of the doge's +palace in Venice. If the latter class of critics will refresh their +memory a little, or consult any good print of Venetian architecture, +they will find about as much resemblance between the two buildings as +exists between the old Custom House in Wall street and the Parthenon. +The plain fact is that we are so unused to Gothic architecture, +applied to secular purposes, and to any other forms of it than the +ecclesiastical, as to be without sufficient data to form a correct +idea of the present edifice. And yet, such is the conceit of +criticism, that thousands of persons pronounce their judgment upon it +with as much confidence as they would upon a trivial matter perfectly +<a name="421">{421}</a> familiar to them. These may yet find that hasty opinions are +dangerous. +</p> +<p> +The Academy, as has been hinted above, is of rectangular shape, having +three stories, of which the first is devoted to the life school and +the school of design, the second to the library, reception rooms, +council room, and similar apartments, and the third to the exhibition +galleries, five in number, with which at present we have specially to +deal. The main entrance to the building is on Twenty-third street. +Passing up a double flight of marble steps and through a magnificent +Gothic portal into a vestibule, the visitor next enters the great +hall, in the centre of which commences a broad stairway, consisting at +first of a double flight of steps, and ultimately of a single flight, +leading to the level of the exhibition floor. Running all around the +open space on this story caused by the stairway is a corridor, two +sides of which, parallel with the stairway, comprise a double arcade, +supported on columns of variegated and polished marble, the capitals +of which, of white marble, are hereafter to be sculptured in delicate +leaf-and-flower work from nature. Opening from this corridor are the +exhibition rooms, which also communicate with each other, and of which +the largest is thirty by seventy-six feet, and the smallest, used as a +gallery of sculpture, is twenty-one feet square. These are all lighted +by sky-lights, and are intended for the purposes of the annual +exhibitions. In the corridor surrounding the stairway are to be hung +the works of art belonging to the Academy, although at present its +walls are covered with pictures contributed to this year's exhibition. +The several rooms described are well-lighted, and though smaller +perhaps than the large outlay upon the building might have led the +public to expect, seem excellently adapted for their purposes. The +largest of them is a model exhibition gallery in respect to +proportions and light, and all are tastefully finished and pannelled +with walnut from floor to ceiling. Throughout the building the same +costly and durable style prevails, the wood-work being of oak and +walnut, and the vestibules floored with mosaic of tiles. +</p> +<p> +So much for the interior, against which no serious complaint has been +uttered. Externally the walls of the basement story are of gray marble +relieved by bands of graywacke, those of the story above of white +marble with similar bands, while the uppermost story is of white +marble with checker-work pattern of oblong gray blocks, laid +stair-fashion. The whole is surmounted by a rich arcaded cornice of +white marble. The double flight of white marble steps on Twenty-third +street, leading to the main entrance, is, perhaps, the most marked +feature of the building, at once graceful, rich, and substantial, and +may fairly challenge comparison with any similar structure of like +pattern in the country. Under the platform is a triple arcade, +inclosing a drinking-fountain, and profusely decorated with sculpture, +and from the upper landing springs the great arched Gothic portal, +large enough almost for the entrance to a cathedral. On either side of +this are two columns of red Vermont marble with white marble capitals +and bases, on which rests a broad archivolt enriched with sculpture +and varied by voussoirs, alternately white and gray. The tympanum +above the door is to be filled with an elaborate mosaic of colored +tile work. The basement windows, on Fourth avenue, are double, with +segmental arches, each pair of which is supported in the middle on a +clustered column with rich carved capital and base. All the other +windows in the building have pointed arches, and the archivolts of +those in the first story are decorated like that of the doorway. In +the place of windows on the gallery floor are circular openings for +ventilation, filled with elaborate tracery. The building was designed +by Mr. P. B. Wight, and erected at a cost of over two hundred thousand +dollars. +</p> +<p> +Without attempting to inquire whether this or that portion of the +building is correctly designed, or even whether the whole is entirely +satisfactory, or the reverse, we may say that in the opinion of most +persons the external flight of steps and the entrance are too large +and elaborate for the building, reminding one of those remarkable +edifices for banking or other public purposes occasionally to be seen +in this city, which are all portico, as if the main structure had +walked away, or had not been considered of sufficient importance to be +added to the entrance. It is partly owing to this defect, and partly +to the insufficient area on which it is built, <a name="422">{422}</a> that the Academy +seems wanting in height and depth, and therefore devoid of just +proportions—has in fact an unmistakable <i>dumpy look</i>. Many an +architect before Mr. Wight has been prevented by want of space from +effectively developing ideas intrinsically good, and perhaps the +severest criticism that can be pronounced against him in the present +instance is that ambition has led him to attempt what his better +judgment might have taught him was impossible. "Cut your coat +according to your cloth," is a maxim of which the applicability is not +yet exhausted. Again, the obtrusive ugliness of the skylights, rising +clear above the sculptured cornices, can hardly fail to offend the +eye, and suggests the idea of an encumbered or even an overloaded +roof. If to these defects be added the curious optical delusion by +which the gray marble checker-work on the upper story appears uneven +and awry, and which denotes a radical error in design, we believe we +have mentioned the chief features of the building which even those who +profess to admire it unite in condemning. The objection that the +building is of unusual form and appearance, and out of keeping with +the styles of architecture in vogue with us, is not worthy of serious +consideration. +</p> +<p> +Having said so much in depreciation of the Academy, we must also say +that it conveys on the whole an elegant, artistic, and even cheerful +impression to the mind, relieving, with its beautiful contrasts of +white and gray and slate, the sombre blocks of red or brown buildings +which surround it, and actually lightening up the rather prosaic +quarter in which it stands. Too much praise cannot be accorded to the +architect for the combinations of color which he has infused into his +design; and, granting that in this respect he has committed some +errors of detail, they are trifling in comparison with the good +effects which will probably result from the future employment of this +means of embellishment. What if the idea, imperfectly embodied in this +experimental building, should in the end compass the overthrow of that +taste which leads us to build gloomy piles of brown houses, overlaid +with tawdry ornamentation, and pronounce them beautiful? When such an +innovation is attempted and finds even a moderate degree of favor, +there is hope that the era of architectural coldness and poverty may +yet pass away. The carving profusely distributed on both the exterior +and interior of the building, and of which, we are told, "the flowers +and leaves of our woods have furnished the models," is for the most +part exquisite in design and execution. Here, at least, is +naturalistic art, against which the sticklers for idealism can offer +no objection, so beautiful and appropriate are the designs, and so +suggestive of the necessity of going back to nature for inspiration. +If the new Academy possessed no other merit than this, it would +nevertheless subserve a useful purpose in the development of taste. +</p> +<p> +Having devoted so much space to the building, we can only allude +generally to the contents of its galleries, of which we propose to +speak more at length in a future notice. The exhibition, though +inferior to those of some years in the number, exceeds them all in the +quality of its pictures, and presents on the whole a creditable and +encouraging view of the progress of American art. If the capacity of +the galleries is not so great as was expected, there is on the other +hand less danger that the eye will be offended by a long array of +unsightly works, and we may probably bid good-bye to the monstrosities +of composition and color which the Academy was formerly compelled to +receive, in order to eke out its annual exhibitions. Such has been the +increase in the number of our resident artists of late years, that but +a limited number of pictures, and those consequently their best +efforts, can henceforth be contributed by each. This fact alone will +ensure a constantly increasing improvement to succeeding exhibitions. +As usual, landscape predominates, with every variety of treatment and +motive, from Academic generalization and pure naturalism down to +Pre-Raphaelitism and hopeful though somewhat imperfect attempts at +ideal sentiment. Portraiture and genre are also well represented, with +a fair proportion of animal, flower, and still-life pieces, and of the +numerous family of miscellaneous subjects which defy classification. +History is even less affected than usual, the dramatic episodes of the +great rebellion failing to suggest subjects to our painters other than +those of an indirect or merely probable character. So far as the +present exhibition may be supposed to afford an <a name="423">{423}</a> indication, +"high art," and particularly that branch of it which illustrates +sacred history, is defunct among us—a circumstance which those who +have witnessed previous efforts by contemporary American painters in +that department will not perhaps regret. The pictures are generally +hung with judgment, and in a spirit of fairness which ought to +satisfy, though it will not probably in every instance, the demands of +exhibitors. And it may be added that they appear to good effect, and +are daily admired, using the word in its derived as well as its more +common sense, by throngs of visitors. +</p> +<br> +<p> +Church, the landscape painter, has recently gone to the West Indies, +with the intention of passing the summer in the mountain region of +Jamaica, where he will doubtless find abundant materials for study. He +leaves behind a large unfinished work of great promise, "The Rainbow +in the Tropics," and some completed ones of less dimensions. +</p> +<p> +Augero, an Italian artist, has recently completed for a church in +Boston a picture of St. Andrew bearing the cross, of which a +contemporary says: "Mr. Augero has departed from the traditional types +that have descended to him, and has treated the picture in a manner +entirely his own. The head of the saint is finely handled, and, +without being too much spiritualized, has sufficient of the ideal to +give it value both as a church picture and a work of art. In general +arrangement and color the work is especially to be admired." This +artist is said to have received quite a number of commissions for +ecclesiastical decoration. +</p> +<p> +Palmer is completing a bust of Washington Irving, which has been +pronounced by the friends of the latter a successful likeness. +</p> +<p> +An essay on Gustave Doré, by B. P. G. Hamilton, will soon be published +by Leypoldt of Philadelphia. +</p> +<p> +The spring exhibition of the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts is now +open in Philadelphia. The collections are said to be large and to +represent all departments of painting. +</p> +<br> +<p> +<i>Foreign</i>.—The Exhibition of the Society of British Artists and the +General Exhibition of Water Color Drawings opened in London in the +latter part of April. The former contains more than a thousand +pictures, few of which, it is said, rise above the most common average +of picture-making, while the greater part fall below it. "There is +something very depressing," says the <i>Reader</i>, "about such a large +display of commonplace art. It is almost painful to have the fact +forced upon one's mind, that the thought and labor represented in all +these pictures is misapplied, if not wasted; for to this conclusion we +must come, if we bring the display in Suffolk street to the test of +comparison with any real work of art. A fine picture by Landseer or +Millais would outweigh, in intrinsic value, the whole collection. +Denude the Royal Academy exhibition of the works of Landseer, Millais, +Philip, and other of its most accomplished contributors, and subtract +from it at the same time the works of promise which lend to it so +great an interest, and we should have a second Suffolk street +exhibition, characterized by a similar dead level of mediocrity and +insipidity; for neither highly accomplished work nor sign of promise +is to be seen in this the forty-second annual exhibition of the +Society of British Artists." From which it would appear that +contemporary art in England gives no remarkable promise. +</p> +<p> +A large collection of the late John Leech's sketches, etc., was lately +sold in London. It comprised the original designs for the political +cartoons and pictures of life and character which have appeared in +Punch during the last twenty years; the designs for the "Ingoldsby +Legends," "Jorrock's Hunt," "Ask Mamma," "Mr. Facey Romford's Hounds," +and other sporting novels, and several pictures in oil. The prices ran +very high, the net result being £4,089. +</p> +<p> +The collection of paintings and water color drawings by the best +modern British artists, formed by Mr. John Knowles, of Manchester, was +recently disposed of in London at very handsome prices. The chief +attraction was Rosa Bonheur's "Muleteers Crossing the Pyrenees," which +brought 2,000 guineas. The collection realized £21,750. +</p> +<p> +Preparations are making to remove the cartoons of Raphael from Hampton +Court to the new north fire-proof gallery in the South Kensington +Museum, formerly occupied by the British pictures of the National +Gallery. +</p> +<p> +The Great Pourtalès sale has closed <a name="424">{424}</a> after lasting upward of a +month and realizing a sum total of nearly three millions of francs. A +Paris paper states that, considering the interest of the sums expended +in forming the collection as money lost, the sale will give a profit +on the outlay of a million and a half of francs, or about a hundred +per cent.—a notable illustration of the mania for picture buying now +prevailing in Europe. The owner died ten years ago, leaving directions +that the collection should not be sold until 1864, for which his heirs +and representatives are doubtless properly grateful. The following +will give an idea of the prices fetched by the best pictures: +Campagne, Ph. de: The Marriage of the Virgin, formerly the altar-piece +of the chapel of the Palais Royal, sold for 43,500f. Hals, Francis: An +unknown portrait of a man; his left hand leaning on his hip and +touching the handle of his sword, 51,000f. Rembrandt: Portrait of a +Burgomaster, 34,500f. By the same: Portrait of a veteran soldier +seated at a table, 27,000f. Murillo: The Triumph of the Eucharist; +with the words <i>"In finem dilexit eos,"</i> 67,500f.; bought for the +Louvre. By the same: The Virgin bending over the infant Christ, whom +she presses to her bosom, 18,000f. By the same: St. Joseph holding the +infant Christ by the hand, 15,000f. Velasquez: The Orlando Muerto, a +bare-headed warrior, in a black cuirass, lying dead in a grotto strewn +with human bones, his right hand on his breast, his left on the guard +of his sword; from the roof of the grotto hangs a lamp, in which the +flame is flickering, 37,000f. Albert Durer: A pen drawing, +representing Samson, of colossal size, routing the Philistines with +the jaw-bone of an ass, 4,500f. A portrait by Antonelli di Messina, +bought years ago in Florence by Pourtalès for 1,500f., and appraised +in his inventory at 20,000f., was sold to the Louvre, where it now +hangs in the <i>salon carré</i>, for 113,000f. +</p> +<p> +Gustave Doré is announced to have undertaken to illustrate Shakespeare +and the Bible. +</p> +<p> +The sale of the Due de Moray's gallery of paintings will take place in +June. It contains six Meissoniers, which cost, at the utmost, not +above 60,000 francs, but which will now probably fetch more than +double that price. +</p> +<p> +A picture by Ribera, representing St. Luke taking the likeness of the +Virgin, was sold recently in Paris for 21,000f. +</p> +<p> +French landscape art has lost one of its chief illustrators in the +person of Constant Troyon, who died in the latter part of March, aged +about fifty-two. He has been called the creator of the modern French +school of landscape, and delighted in cheerful aspects of nature, +which he rendered with masterly skill. Rural life, with its pleasing +accessories of winding streams, picturesque low banks, groups of +cattle, and shady hamlets, formed the favorite subjects of his pencil; +and though his style was not always exact, he succeeded in infusing an +unusual degree of physical life into his pictures, without ever +degenerating into mere naturalism. As a colorist he excelled all +contemporary animal and landscape painters, and used his brush with a +freedom rivalling that of Delacroix. He died insane, and is said to +have left a fortune of 1,200,000 francs. Some of his pictures are +owned in New York. +</p> +<p> +A painting by Murillo, from the collection of the late Marquis Aguado, +representing the death of Santa Clara, has been sold to the Royal +Gallery of Madrid for 75,000 francs. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="425">{425}</a> +<br> + +<h2>NEW PUBLICATIONS.</h2> +<br> +<p> +THE CORRELATION AND CONSERVATION OF FORCES: +A SERIES OF EXPOSITIONS, +by Prof. Grove, Prof. Helmholtz, Dr. Mayer, Dr. Faraday, Prof. Liebig, +and Dr. Carpenter. With an Introduction and brief Biographical Notices +of the chief Promoters of the new views. By Edward L. Youmans, M.D. +12mo., pp. xlii., 438. New York: D. Appleton & Company. +</p> +<p> +Religious writers have repeatedly deplored the materialistic tendency +of modern scientific research, and in many cases, no doubt, the +complaint is a just one. But we must not forget that the bad tendency +is in the philosophical system which is sought to be built upon the +facts of discovery, not in the facts themselves. Every development, of +truth, every fresh unveiling of the mechanism of the universe, must of +necessity redound to the greater glory of God. And it seems to us that +no scientific theory which has been broached for many years speaks +more gloriously of the disposing and over-ruling hand of an all-wise +Creator than the one to which the volume now before us is devoted. If +there could be any place for comparison in speaking of the exercise of +omnipotence, we might say that the new view of the nature and mode of +action of the physical forces represents creation as a far more +marvellous act than the old one did. +</p> +<p> +We speak of the correlation and conservation of force as a "new" +theory because it is only lately that it has attracted much attention +beyond the higher scientific circles, and indeed it would perhaps be +going too far to say that it is yet firmly established. It has been +developing however for a number of years, and the most distinguished +experts in physical science have for some time accepted it with +remarkable unanimity. In the book whose title we have given above, Dr. +Yournans has brought together eight of the most valuable essays in +which the theory has been maintained or explained by its founders and +chief supporters. He has made his selection with excellent judgment, +and prefixed to the whole a clear and well-written introduction, by +the aid of which any reader of ordinary education will be able to +appreciate what follows. The longest and most important essay is that +by Professor Grove on "The Correlation of Physical Forces." +</p> +<p> +Force is defined by Professor Grove as that active principle +inseparable from matter which induces its various changes. In other +words, it is the agent or producer of change or motion. The +modifications of this general agent—heat, light, electricity, +magnetism, chemical affinity, gravity, cohesive attraction, etc.—are +called the physical forces. In many cases, where one of these is +excited all the others are set in motion: thus when sulphuret of +antimony is <i>electrified</i>, at the moment of electrization it becomes +<i>magnetic</i>; at the same time it is <i>heated</i>; if the heat is raised to +a certain intensity, <i>light</i> is produced; the compound is decomposed, +and <i>chemical action</i> is thereby brought into play; and so on. +Moreover, we cannot magnetize a body without electrizing it, and +vice-versa. This necessary reciprocal production is what is understood +by the term "correlation of forces"—or in other words, we may say +that any one of the natural forces may be converted into another mode +of force, and may be reproduced by the same force. A striking example +of the conversion of heat into electricity is furnished by an +experiment of Seebeck's. Two dissimilar metals are brought together +and heated at the point of contact. A current of electricity flows +through the metals, having a definite direction according to the +metals employed; continues as long as an increasing temperature is +pervading the metals; ceases when the temperature is stationary; and +flows backward when the heat begins to decrease. The immediate +convertibility of heat into light is not yet established beyond +question, although these two forces exhibit many curious analogies +with each other. But heat through the medium of electricity may easily +be turned into light, chemical affinity, magnetism, etc. Electricity +directly produces heat, as in the ignited wire, the electric spark, +and the <a name="426">{426}</a> voltaic arc. The last-named phenomenon—the flame which +plays between the terminal points of a powerful voltaic battery +produces the most intense heat with which we are acquainted; so +intense, in fact, that it cannot be measured, as every sort of matter +is dissipated by it. For instance, it actually <i>distils</i> or +volatilizes iron, a metal which by ordinary means is fusible only at a +very high temperature. The voltaic arc also produces the most intense +light that we know of. Instances of the conversion of electricity into +magnetism and chemical action are familiar to everybody. The +reciprocal relations of light with other modes of force are thus far +very imperfectly known. Professor Grove however describes an +experiment by which light is made to produce simultaneously chemical +action, electricity, magnetism, heat, and motion. The conversion of +light into chemical force in photography is another exemplification of +the law of correlation, and Bunsen and Roscoe have experimentally +shown that certain rays of light are extinguished or absorbed in doing +chemical work. A familiar example of the change of light into heat is +seen in the phenomena of what is termed the absorption of light. Place +different colored pieces of cloth on snow exposed to sunshine: black +will absorb the most light, and will also develop the most heat, as +may be seen by its sinking deepest in the snow; white, which absorbs +little or no light, will not sink at all. +</p> +<p> +The evolution of one force or mode of force into another has naturally +induced many to regard all the different natural agencies as reducible +to unity, and much ingenuity has been expended on the question which +force is the efficient cause of all the others. One says electricity, +another chemical action, another gravity. Professor Grove believes +that all are wrong: each mode of force may produce the others, and +none can be produced except by some other as an anterior force. We can +no more determine which is the efficient cause than we can determine +whether the chicken is the cause of the egg, or the egg the cause of +the chicken. The tendency of recent researches however is toward the +conclusion that all the physical forces are simply modes of motion; +that as, in the case of friction, the gross or palpable motion which +is arrested by the contact of another body, is subdivided into +molecular motions or vibrations (or as Helmholtz expresses it, +peculiar shivering motions of the ultimate particles of bodies), which +motions are only heat or electricity, as the case may be; so the other +affections are only matter moved or molecularly agitated in certain +definite directions. The identity of motion with heat was established +in the last century by our countryman, Count Rumford, and has lately +been beautifully illustrated by Professor Tyndall in his charming +lectures on "Heat considered as a Mode of Motion." Dr. Mayer, of +Heilbronn, and Mr. Joule, of Manchester, independently of each other, +established the exact ratio between heat and motive power, showing +that a quantity of heat sufficient to raise one pound of water one +degree Fahrenheit in temperature is able to raise to the height of one +foot a weight of 772 pounds; and conversely, that a weight of 772 +pounds falling from a height of one foot evolves enough heat to raise +the temperature of a pound of water one degree. That is, this quantity +of force, expressed as 772 "foot-pounds," is to be regarded as the +mechanical equivalent of 1° of temperature. Professor Grove considers +at some length the identity of motion with other forms of force, +especially electricity and magnetism, and alludes briefly to the +inevitable consequence of this theory, that the different forces must +bear an exact <i>quantitative</i> relation to each other. "The great +problem which remains to be solved," he says, "in regard to the +correlation of physical forces, is this establishment of their +equivalents of power, or their measurable relation to a given +standard." +</p> +<p> +The doctrine of the conservation or persistence of force seems to flow +naturally from what has been said above. It means simply that force is +never destroyed: when it ceases to exist in one form it only passes +into another. Power or energy, like matter, is neither created nor +annihilated: "Though ever changing form, its total quantity in the +universe remains constant and unalterable. Every manifestation of +force must have come from a pre-existing equivalent force, and must +give rise to a subsequent and equal amount of some other force. When, +therefore, a force or effect appears, we are not at liberty to assume +that it was self-originated, or <a name="427">{427}</a> came from nothing; when it +disappears we are forbidden to conclude that it is annihilated: we +must search and find whence it came and whither it has gone; that is, +what produced it, and what effect it has itself produced." +(<i>Introduction</i>, p. xiii.) This branch of the subject will be found +clearly and concisely treated in Professor Faraday's paper on "The +Conservation of Force" (pp. 359-383). +</p> +<p> +Dr. Carpenter carries the new theory into the higher realms of nature, +and shows the applicability of the principle of correlation and +conservation to the vital phenomena of growth and development. "These +forces," he says, "are generated in living bodies by the +transformation of the light, heat, and chemical action supplied by the +world around, and are given back to it again, either during their +life, or after its cessation, chiefly in motion and heat, but also, to +a less degree, in light and electricity." Vital force is that power by +virtue of which a germ endowed with life is developed into an +organization of a type resembling that of its parents, and which +subsequently maintains that organism in its integrity. The prevalent +opinion until lately has been that this force is inherent in the germ, +which has been supposed to derive from its parent not merely its +material substance, but a <i>germ-force</i>, in virtue of which it develops +and maintains itself, beside imparting a fraction of the same force to +each of its descendants. In this view of the question, the aggregate +of all the germ-forces appertaining to the descendants, however +numerous, of a common parentage, must have existed in the original +progenitors. Take the case of the successive viviparous broods of +<i>Aphides</i>, which (it has been calculated) would amount in the tenth +brood to the bulk of <i>five hundred millions</i> of stout men: a +germ-force capable of organizing this vast mass of living structure +must have been shut up in the single individual, weighing perhaps the +1-1000th of a grain, from which the first brood was evolved! So, too, +in Adam must have been concentrated the germ-force of every individual +of the human race, from the creation to the end of the world. This, +says Dr. Carpenter, is a complete <i>reductio ad absurdum</i>. According to +his theory, the germ supplies not the force, but the directive agency. +The vital force of an animal or a plant is supplied by the same +physical agencies which we have considered above. +</p> +<p> +Dr. Youmans in his introduction is disposed to push this part of the +subject yet further, and to identify physical with intellectual force; +but into this dangerous region it is unnecessary to follow him. +</p> +<p> +Some of the explanations of natural phenomena which are drawn as +corollaries from the new theory of forces are in the highest degree +curious and beautiful. Many of our readers will find Dr. Mayer's paper +"On Celestial Dynamics" one of the most interesting portions of the +book. He applies the principle of the convertibility of heat and +motion to the question of the origin of the sun's heat, which he +ascribes to the fall of asteroids upon the sun's surface. That an +immense number of cosmical bodies are moving through the heavens and +streaming toward the solar surface, is well known to all physicists. +Now it is calculated that a single asteroid falling into the sun +generates from 4,600 to 9,200 times as much heat as would be generated +by the combustion of an equal mass of coal, and the mass of matter +which in the form of asteroids falls into the sun every minute is from +two to four hundred thousand billions of pounds! The enormous heat +which must be evolved by such a bombardment is almost inconceivable. +</p> +<br> +<p> +REAL AND IDEAL. By John W. Montclair. 12mo., pp. 119. Philadelphia: +Frederick Leypoldt. New York: Hurd & Houghton. +</p> +<p> +This is a dainty little volume of poems, partly translated from the +German, partly the offspring of the native muse. They are simple, +unpretending, and as a general thing melodious. The author probably +has not aspired to a very high place in the temple of fame; without +the ambition to produce anything very striking or very original, he +has been satisfied with the endeavor which he pithily expresses in his +"Prologue:" +</p> +<pre> + "Clearer to think what others thought before— + Keenly to feel th' afflictions of our race— + Better to say what others oft have said—" +</pre> +<p> +and if he does not always think clearer and speak better than those in +whose footsteps he treads, there is at all events that in his verse +which promises better <a name="428">{428}</a> things after more practice. His faults are +chiefly those of carelessness and inexperience. His metaphors are +superabundant, and sometimes incongruous. He has a good ear for +rhythm; but we often find him tripping in his prosody. Often too the +requirements of the metre lead him to eke out a line with expletives, +or weaken it with unnecessary epithets. +</p> +<p> +But we can commend the book for its healthy tone. Mr. Montclair has no +tendency toward the morbid psychological school of poetry. He delights +rather in the contemplation of nature, and in moralizing on the life +and aspirations of man. In neither does he discover much that is new; +but the natural beauties which he sings are those of which we do not +easily tire, and his moral reflections are just though they may not be +profound. For the matter of his translations he has chosen some of the +simplest and shortest of the German legendary ballads. Several of them +are rendered with considerable neatness and delicacy. The following +version of a ballad to which attention has been particularly called of +late, is a favorable specimen of Mr. Montclair's powers: +</p> +<pre> + "LENORE. + + "Above the stars are twinkling— + The moon is shining bright— + And the dead they ride by night. + + "'My love, wilt ope thy window? + I cannot long remain, + And may not come again. + + "'The cock already crows— + Tells of the dawning day, + And warns me far away. + + "'My journey distant lies; + Afar with thee, my bride, + A hundred leagues we'll ride. + + "'In Hungary's fair land + I've found a tranquil spot, + A little garden plot. + + "'And there, within the green, + A little cottage rests, + Befitting bridal guests.' + + "'Oh, thou hast lingered long; + Beloved, welcome here— + Lead on, I'll never fear.' + + "'So, wrap my mantle 'round; + The moon will be our guide, + And quick by night we'll ride.' + + "'When will our journey end? + For heavy grows my sight, + And lonely is the night.' + + "'Yon gate leads to our home: + Our bridal tour is done— + My purpose now is won. + + "'Dismount we from our steed; + Here lay thy aching head— + This tomb's our bridal bed. + + "'Now art thou truly mine: + I rode away thy breath— + Thou art the bride of death!'" +</pre> +<br> +<p> +FAITH, THE VICTORY; ON A COMPREHENSIVE VIEW OF +THE PRINCIPAL DOCTRINES OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. +By Rt. Rev. John McGill, D.D., +Bishop of Richmond. 12mo., pp. viii., +336. Richmond: J. W. Randolph. +</p> +<p> +This work is a curiosity as a specimen of the literature of the late +"Confederate States of America," and of course its typography and +general execution are plain and unpretending. The work itself is the +production of a prelate of high character and reputation for his +thorough theological erudition and ability as a writer, and as a clear +logical expounder of Catholic doctrine. It is written in a very +systematic and exact manner; the style is terse, the treatment of +topics brief but comprehensive; and yet, so lucid are the statements +and so simple the language, that it is throughout intelligible to the +ordinary reader, and in great part so to any one of good common sense +who can read English and is able to understand a plain, simple +treatise on religious doctrine. It may be characterized as an +elementary treatise on theology for the laity, and as such is adapted +to be very useful to Catholics, and also to those non-Catholics who +retain the doctrine of the old orthodox Protestant tradition. The +right reverend author is throughout careful to discriminate between +the defined doctrine of the Church and the teaching of theologians, +and is extremely cautious in expounding his opinion on those topics +which are controverted between the different schools. The authority of +the Catholic Church is established by the usual plain and irresistible +deductions from the premises admitted by those who fully accept +Christianity as a divine revelation and the Scripture as the +infallible word of God. The dogmas of the <a name="429">{429}</a> Catholic faith are +stated in the plain ordinary language of the Church, with some account +of the principal methods of explaining difficulties in vogue among +theologians, and with proofs derived from Scriptures and tradition. +The stress of the entire argument rests principally on the evidence +that the Catholic dogmas have been revealed by God and clearly deduced +by the infallible authority of the Church, consequently must be +believed as certain truths. The line of fracture, where that fragment +of Christianity called orthodox Protestantism was broken off from the +integral system of Christian doctrine at the Reformation, is +distinctly traced, and orthodox Protestants are shown that they are +logically compelled to complete their own belief by becoming +Catholics. The old Protestant tradition has a far more extensive sway +in the southern states than among ourselves, and this excellent +treatise will no doubt be the means of bringing numbers of those who +are well-disposed, and need only to be taught what the revealed +doctrines of Christianity really are, into the bosom of the Church. In +this section of the United States, the greater portion of those who +are willing to examine the evidences of the Catholic religion have +floated far away from their old land-marks. In order to reach their +minds, it is necessary to present the rational arguments which will +solve their difficulties much more fully than is done in this +treatise, and to interpret for them ecclesiastical and theological +formulas in which divine truths are embodied in language which is +intelligible to their intellect in its present state. They are either +extreme rationalists or moderate rationalists; that is, they either +reject the supernatural revelation entirely, or admit only so much of +it as can be proved to them to be true on grounds of pure reason. +Hence, we are obliged to begin with the intrinsic evidence of the +truth and reasonableness of the Catholic faith, before we can bring +the force of extrinsic revelation by the authority of the Church to +bear upon their mind. +</p> +<p> +We welcome the present of this treatise from the Bishop of Richmond +for another reason, as well as for its intrinsic value. It is a sign +of the renewal of that ecclesiastical intercourse with our brethren of +the southern states which has so long been interrupted. +</p> +<p> +And, in conclusion, we desire to call particular attention to the +ensuing extract, as an evidence of the falsehood of the charge which +our enemies are at present disposed to make against the Catholic +Church of "sanctioning some of the worst enormities of slavery:" +</p> +<p> +"And here we would take occasion to deplore the conduct of the civil +government in this country, regarding the matrimonial contract of +slaves, which, though the rulers profess Christianity, is completely +ignored even as a civil contract, and left entirely to the caprice of +owners, who frequently without scruple or hesitation, and for the sake +of interest or gain, part man and wife, separate parents from their +children, and treat the matrimonial union among them as if it were +really no more than the chance association of unreasoning animals. +Often, also, some of these marriages are indissoluble by the +sacramental bond, as well as by the original design of the Creator, +and by the action of Christian proprietors and the neglect of a +Christian government, these separated parties are subjected to the +temptation to form criminal and forbidden alliances, from which +frequency, custom, and the condition of servitude have removed, in the +public view, the shame and stigma which they possess before God, and +according to the maxims of the gospel. Christian proprietors will know +and tolerate these alliances in their slaves, even when made without +any formality, and where they are aware that one or both is under the +obligation of other ties. +</p> +<p> +"It is not certain that the present dreadful calamities which afflict +the country are not the scourge of God, chiefly for this sin, among +the many that provoke his anger, in our people. He is not likely to +leave long unpunished in a nation the palpable and flagrant contempt +of his holy laws, such as is evinced in this neglect or refusal to +respect in slaves the holiness, the unity, and the indissolubility of +marriage. It would appear that by the present convulsions his +providence is preparing for them at least a recognition of those +rights as immortal beings which are required for the observance of the +paramount laws of God. And if citizens desire to see the nation +prosper and enjoy the blessing of God, let all unite to procure from +the civil government, for the slaves, that their marriages be esteemed +as God intends, and not be dealt with in future as they have been +hitherto." +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="430">{430}</a> +<br> +<p> +MATER ADMIRABLIS; OR, FIRST FIFTEEN YEARS OF MARY IMMACULATE. +By Rev. Alfred Monnin, author of "The Life of the Curé d'Ars." +Translated from the French by the Sisters of Charity, Mount St. +Vincent, KY. 12mo., pp. 535. New York: James B. Kirker. +</p> +<p> +On the wall of a corridor in the convent of <i>Trinità del Monti</i>, at +Rome, there is a fresco representing the Blessed Virgin, <i>Mater +admirabilis</i>, at the age of fifteen. She is depicted spinning flax +within the precincts of the temple, with her work-basket and an open +book beside her. The picture was painted some twenty years ago by a +young postulant of the community of Ladies of the Sacred Heart, to +whom the <i>Trinità</i> belongs. It is not said that it is in any way +remarkable as a work of art; but it has acquired a celebrity among +pious Catholics second to that of hardly any picture in the world. +Since the year 1846, when the Holy Father gave his solemn blessing to +the picture, remarking that "it was a pious thought to represent the +most Holy Virgin at an age when she seemed to have been forgotten," +signal favors have repeatedly been bestowed upon persons who have +prayed before it. The Rev. Mr. Blampin, a missionary from Oceanica, +recovered his voice at the feet of the <i>Mater admirabilis</i>, in 1846, +after having been deprived of it for twenty-one months. In a transport +of gratitude he obtained permission to say mass before the fresco, and +from that day the corridor became a real sanctuary. A great number of +miraculous cures were reported as having been wrought there, and +multitudes of sinners who came out of mere curiosity to gaze upon a +picture of which so much had been said, were converted by an +instantaneous infusion of divine grace. In 1849 Pope Pius IX., by an +apostolic brief, granted permission for the celebration of the +festival of the <i>Mater admirabilis</i> on the 20th of October, and +enriched the sanctuary with indulgences. In 1854, by a second +rescript, he confirmed an indulgence of three hundred days, which he +had previously granted verbally to all the faithful who should recite +three Hail Maries before this holy painting, adding the invocation, +<i>Mater admirabilis, ora pro nobis;</i> and in the following year the +indulgences were extended to the entire order of the Sacred Heart. The +devotion to the "Mother most admirable" spread rapidly, and copies of +the painting at the <i>Trinità</i> were soon to be found in various parts +of Europe and America. There is one in the Convent of the Sacred Heart +at Manhattanville, N. Y., from which the frontispiece to the volume +before us has been engraved. "I admit," says Father Monnin, speaking +of the original, "that of all the different ways by which art has +represented this Virgin by excellence, there is not one which better +corresponds with the <i>beau ideal</i> which, as a priest, I had loved to +form in my mind. Like the chaste Madonnas of the most fervent +ages—those of <i>Beato</i> in particular—this Madonna of the Lily makes +one feel and understand that its designer had prayed before painting +it, and that her imagination, fed by faith and the love of God, has +delineated the most holy virgin child by interior lights derived from +her meditations. By means of a constant communion with things divine, +the disciples of Fiesole have succeeded in placing themselves as so +many mediums between the Creator and the creature, by transmitting a +ray of that eternal light amidst which they live; we may say that +<i>Mater admirabilis</i> is of the school of Fra Angelico, although several +centuries have elapsed since his time. There is, as it were, the image +of a pure soul preserved ever from all stain, sent into the world to +be joined to a perfect and immaculate body, and to become, in this +twofold perfection and purity, the ineffable instrument of our +salvation! It is thus the prophet deserved to see her, brilliantly +resplendent with grace and innocence, with the clearness of eternal +light, and the splendor of eternal or perpetual virginity. The +ineffable peace which took possession of me, made me understand that +beauty of which St. Thomas speaks, the sight whereof purifies the +senses. …… There in the wall, within a niche contiguous to the +great church of the monastery, is the most holy Virgin, painted in +fresco at full size. …… The pilgrim looks in surprise, and very +soon feels as if the air around this fair flower of the field and lily +of the valley were embalmed with the perfumes of silence and +recollection. He sees her occupied in simply spinning flax; near her, +on the right, is a distaff resting upon a slender standard, and on the +left a lily rising out of a crystal vase, and bending its flexible +stalk toward Mary. …… Absorbed in her meditation, the most holy +child has suspended her work; her shuttle, become motionless, falls +from her hand, while her left hand still holds <a name="431">{431}</a> a light thread +which remains joined to the flax in the distaff; one foot of this most +holy spinner rests upon a stool, near which lies an open book, spread +out on a work-basket, filled with shuttles and skeins. The features of +the youthful Mary express a purity in which there is nothing of earth; +her countenance is modestly tinged, the ringlets of her golden hair +are just perceptible through the wavings of a transparent veil which +covers her neck; her pure virginal brow, slender figure, and delicate +limbs give her a youthful appearance, full of grace and truthfulness. +It is truly the Virgin of virgins; it is truly Mary,—and Mary at an +age when but few works of art have sought to represent her." +</p> +<p> +The little chapel was soon decorated with votive offerings from all +parts of the world. It became a venerated shrine, and few devout +travellers now leave Rome without having prayed at it. The "archives +of <i>Mater admirabilis</i>," preserved at the <i>Trinità</i>, contain records +of the conversions, vocations, and cures effected at this consecrated +spot; and these, together with some devotional writings composed by +the pupils of the convent, form the groundwork of Father Monnin's +book. The matter is arranged in such a way that the work may be used +for the devotions of the month of May. It is divided into thirty-one +chapters, or "days," each of which contains a meditation having +special reference either to some virtue indicated by the picture, or +to Mary's childhood; this is followed by an appropriate prayer, and a +narrative taken from the archives. +</p> +<p> +Having explained the purpose of Father Monnin's book, we do not know +that we need say more by way of recommending it. Whatever tends to +foster love and veneration for the Blessed Virgin must commend itself +strongly to every pious Catholic; and in the new devotion, which is +here explained and illustrated, there is something so beautiful and +touching, that we believe it has only to be known in this country to +be embraced with the same eager affection as in Europe. +</p> +<p> +The external appearance of the volume is very attractive. We hail with +great pleasure the improvement in taste and liberality evinced by the +manufacture of such books as Kirker's "Mater Admirabilis" and O'Shea's +edition of Dr. Curnmings's "Spiritual Progress." +</p> +<p> +There is no sufficient reason why Catholics should not print and bind +books as well as other people. +</p> +<br> +<p> +THE LOVE Of RELIGIOUS PERFECTION; ON, HOW TO AWAKEN, INCREASE, +AND PRESERVE IT IN THE RELIGIOUS SOUL. +By Father Joseph Bayma, of the Society of Jesus. Translated from the +Latin by a Member of the same Society. 24mo., pp. 254. Baltimore: John +Murphy & Company. +</p> +<p> +The style and method of this little treatise are modelled upon those +of "The Imitation of Christ." The style is clear and severely simple, +not above the plainest comprehension, and not without attraction for +those who are somewhat fastidious in literary matters. Father Bayma +professes in his preface to have disregarded all ornaments of +composition, having written his little book not so much for the +edification of others as for the profit of his own soul. Our readers +can readily understand that it is for that very reason all the more +searching in its mental examinations and practical in its precepts. +Father Bayma divides his work into three books. The first treats of +the motives which should urge us toward religious perfection; the +second, of the means by which perfection is most easily obtained; and +the third, of the virtues in which it consists. The chapters are +short, and broken up into verses, and open where we will, we find +something to turn our thoughts toward God. Nor must it be supposed +that, because the book was written by a religious for his own +instruction, it contains only those more difficult counsels of +perfection which few people in the world are found strong enough to +follow. Like its prototype, "The Imitation of Christ" is a work for +all classes—for the easy-going Christian no less than for the saint. +Here is an extract from the chapter on "The Choice and Perfection of +Virtues;" we choose it because it illustrates how well even those +passages which are directly addressed to religious persons are adapted +to the use of persons in the world: +</p> +<p> +"1. So long as we are weighed down by our mortal flesh, we cannot +acquire the perfection of all virtues; and therefore, we have need of +selection that we may not labor in vain. +</p> +<p> +"Choose then a virtue to practise, until, <a name="432">{432}</a> by the assistance of +God, thou become most perfect in it. +</p> +<p> +"Some virtues are continually called for in our daily actions, and are +necessary for all; and therefore, should be acquired with particular +industry. +</p> +<p> +"The more thou shalt make progress in meekness, patience, modesty, +temperance, humility, and others, that come into more frequent use, +the sooner wilt thou become holy. +</p> +<p> +"2. Some seek after virtues which have a greater appearance of +nobility, and are reckoned amongst men to be more glorious. +</p> +<p> +"They instruct with pleasure, but it must be in famous churches, and +to a large assembly of noble and learned men. +</p> +<p> +"They visit the sick with pleasure, and hear confessions, but only of +those that are conspicuous for riches or honors. +</p> +<p> +"See that thou set not a high value upon these things: it is more +perfect and safer to imitate Christ our Lord, and to go about +villages, than to hunt for the praise of eloquence and learning in +cities. +</p> +<p> +"It is more useful to thee to visit and console the poor and the rude, +than the rich and noble, who, moreover, are less prepared to listen to +and obey thy words. +</p> +<p> +"3. Some are content with the virtues that agree with their natural +inclinations; because they seem easier, and require not any, or a less +violent struggle. +</p> +<p> +"But when they have need of self-denial and mortification, they have +not the courage to practise virtue; but they lose heart, turn +faint-hearted, and think it is best to spare themselves. +</p> +<p> +"Do thou follow them not, for they that are such make no progress, but +rather fall away from the way of perfection, because they follow not +the teaching and example of Christ. +</p> +<p> +"For it was not those who spare themselves, and fear the hardship of +the struggle, whom Christ declared blessed, but those that mourn, and +fight manfully for justice sake." +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<p> +LA MERE DE DIEU. From the Italian of Father Alphonse Capecelatro, of +the Oratory of Naples. 24mo., pp. 180. Philadelphia: Peter F. +Cunningham. New York: D. & J. Sadlier & Company. +</p> +<p> +Why not say "The Mother of God?" And why should Father Capecelatro, +being an Italian, figure with the French name of <i>Alphonse</i>? If we +cannot have the title of the book in English, at least let us have it +in Italian—the language in which it was written—not in French. +</p> +<p> +But despite the bad taste displayed on the title-page, this is a very +good little book. It exhales a genuine aroma of piety; it is written +with great simplicity; and it is devoted to a subject which is dear to +all of us. It is supposed to be addressed by a Tuscan priest to his +sister. The first part treats of the respect to which the Blessed +Virgin is entitled; the second traces her life, principally in the +pages of the Holy Scriptures; and the third is devoted to an +exhibition of the marks of veneration which she has received from the +Church since the very beginning of Christianity. "It is charmingly, +almost plaintively sweet," says Father Gratry, of the Oratory of +Paris. "It is written as a prayer, not as a book; it is learned and +affectionate, religious and instructive." +</p> +<br> +<p> +COUNT LESLIE; OR, THE TRIUMPH OF FILIAL PIETY. +A Catholic Tale. From the French. 24mo., pp. 108. +</p> +<p> +PHILIP HARTLEY; OR, A BOY'S TRIALS AND TRIUMPHS. +A Tale for Young People. By the author of "The Confessors of +Connaught." 24mo., pp. 122. +</p> +<p> +THE CHILDREN OF THE VALLEY; OR, THE GHOST OF THE RUINS. +Translated from the French. 24mo., pp. 123. +</p> +<p> +MAY CARLETON'S STORY; OR, THE CATHOLIC MAIDEN'S CROSS. +THE MILLER'S DAUGHTER. +Catholic Tales. 24mo., pp. 115. +</p> +<p> +COTTAGE EVENING TALES FOR YOUNG PEOPLE. +Compiled by the author of "Grace Morton." 24mo., pp. 126. +Philadelphia: Peter F. Cunningham. New York: D. & J. Sadlier & +Company. +</p> +<p> +The above five volumes are portions of Cunningham's "Young Catholic's +Library." They seem to have an excellent moral tendency, and as a +general thing are well written—better written, we believe, than the +majority of tales intended, as these are, for sodality and +Sunday-school libraries. The first mentioned, however, "Count Leslie," +is not rendered into irreproachable English. What respect can we +expect children to entertain for the English grammar if our school +libraries give them such cruel sentences to read as the following: "It +was this young man, and <i>him</i>, only, who knew the cause of his mother's +sadness?" With this exception we can honestly recommend so much as we +have seen of the Young Catholic's Library to public favor. Mr. +Cunningham has other volumes in preparation. + </p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="433">{433}</a> +<br> +<h1>THE CATHOLIC WORLD +<br><br> +VOL. I., NO. 4. JULY, 1865.</h1> +<br> +<h2>THE TRUTH OF SUPPOSED LEGENDS AND FABLES. + +BY H. E. CARDINAL WISEMAN. <small>[Footnote 79 ]</small></h2> +<br> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 79: From "Essays on Religion and Literature. By Various + Writers." Edited by H. E. Manning, D.D. London; Longman, Green & Co. + 1865.] +</p> +<p> +The subject of the address which I am about to deliver is as follows: +Events and things which have been considered legendary, or even +fabulous, have been proved by further research to be historical and +true. +</p> +<p> +Before coming directly to the subject upon which I wish to occupy your +attention, I will give a little account of a very extraordinary +discovery which may throw some light upon the general character and +tendency of our investigation. In the year 1775 Pius VI. laid the +foundation of the sacristy of St. Peter's. Of course, as is the case +whenever the ground is turned up in Rome, a number of inscriptions +came to light; these were carefully put aside, and formed the lining, +if I may so say, of the corridor which unites the sacristy with the +church. It was observed, however, that a great many of these +inscriptions referred to the same subject, and a subject which was +totally unknown to antiquarians: they all spoke of certain Arval +Brethren—<i>Fratres Arvales</i>. Some were mere fragments, others were +entire inscriptions. +</p> +<p> +These, to the number of sixty-seven, were carefully put together and +illustrated by the then librarian of the Vatican, Mgr. Marini. It was +an age when in Rome antiquarian learning abounded. There were many, +perhaps, who could have undertaken the task, but it naturally belonged +to him as being attached to the church near which the inscriptions +were found. He put the fragments together, collated them one with +another, and with the entire inscriptions. He procured copies at +least, when he could not examine the originals, of such other slight +fragments as seemed to have reference to the subject, the key having +now been found, and the result was two quarto volumes, [Footnote 80] +giving us the entire history, constitution, and ritual of this +singular fraternity. Before this period two brief notices in Varro, +one passage in Pliny, and allusions in two later writers, Minutius +Felix and Fulgentius, were all that was known concerning it. One +merely told the origin of it from the time of the kings, and the +others only stated that it had something to do with questions about +land; and there the matter ended. Now, out of this ignorance, out of +this darkness, there springs, through the researches of Mgr. Marini, +perhaps the most <a name="434">{434}</a> complete account or history that we have of any +institution of antiquity. So complete was the work, in fact, that only +two inscriptions relating to this subject have been found since; one +by Melchiorri, who undertook to write an appendix to the work; and the +other in 1855 in excavating the Dominican garden at Santa Sabina, +which indeed threw great light upon the subject. From these +inscriptions we learn that this was one of the most powerful bodies of +augurs or priests in Rome. Yet neither Pliny, nor Livy, nor Cicero, +when expressly enumerating all the classes of augurs, ever alludes to +them. Now, we know how they were elected. On one tablet is an order of +Claudius to elect a new member, so to fill up their number of twelve, +in consequence of the death of one. They wrote every year, and +published, at least put up in their gardens, a full and minute account +of all the sacrifices and the feasts celebrated by them. They were +allied to the imperial family, and all the great families in Rome took +part in their assemblies. They had a sacred grove, the site of which +was perfectly unknown until the last inscription, found in 1855, +revealed it. It was out of Porta Portese, on the road to the English +vineyard at La Magliana. There they had sacrifices to the <i>Dea Dia</i>, +whose name occurs nowhere else among all the writers on ancient +mythology. It is supposed to be Ceres. They had magnificent sacrifices +at the beginning of the year. There are tablets which say where the +meetings will be held, whether at the house of the rector or +pro-rector, leaving the date in blank, to be filled in the course of +the year. We are told who were at the meetings, especially who among +the youths from the first families—four of whom acted somewhat as +acolytes; and we are told how they were dressed, which of their two +dresses they wore. Then there is a most minute ritual given. We are +told how each victim was slain; how the brethren took off the toga +praetexta, their crowns and golden ears of corn, then put them on +again, and examined the entrails of the sacrifices; all as minutely +detailed as the rubrics of any office of unction and coronation could +possibly be. Then we are told how many baskets of fruit they carried +away, and what distribution there was of sweetmeats at the end, every +one taking a certain quantity. All this is recorded, and with it their +song in barbarous Oscan or early Etruscan, perfectly unintelligible, +in which their acclamations were made. So that now we know perfectly +everything about them. I may mention as an interesting fact, that +Marini's own copy of his work on the Arval Brethren, two quarto +volumes, having their margins covered with notes for a second edition, +which was never published, and filled with slips of paper with +annotations and new inscriptions of other sorts, which he subsequently +found, is now in the library at Oscott. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 80: <i>Atti e Monumenti dei Fratelli Arvali</i>. Da Mgr. + Marini. 2 tom. Roma, 1795. ] +</p> +<p> +What do I wish to draw from this account? It is that history may have +remained silent upon points which it seems impossible, in the +multiplicity of writers that have been preserved to us, should not +have cropped out, not have been mentioned in some way, not even have +been made known to us through innumerable anterior discoveries. One +fortunate circumstance brought to light the whole history of this +body. How unfair, then, is it, on the reticence of history, at once to +condemn anything, or to say, "We should have heard of it; writers who +ought to have told us would not have concealed it from us." For a +circumstance may arise which will bring out the whole history of a +thing, and make that plain and clear before us which has been scouted +completely by others, or of which we have been kept in the completest +ignorance. +</p> +<p> +I could illustrate this by several other examples which I have +collected together, but I foresee that I shall not get anything like +through the subject I propose to myself. But here is one such instance +bearing on Scripture truth. It was said by infidel writers <a name="435">{435}</a> of +the last century, "How is it that there could have been such a +remarkable occurrence as the massacre of the Innocents without a +single profane historian ever mentioning it—Josephus, if no one +else?" Of course the answer was, "We do not know why, except that we +might give plausible reasons why it should not have been noticed." +That is all we need say. It is our duty to accept the fact. We must +not reject things because we cannot find corroboration of them all at +once. We may have to wait with patience; the world has had to wait +centuries even before some doubted truth has come out clearly. +</p> +<p> +I. The subject which I wish to bring before you is one of those which, +perhaps beyond any other, may be said to be considered thoroughly +legendary, and even perhaps worse:—it is the history of St. Ursula +and her eleven thousand companions, virgins and martyrs. At first +sight it may appear bold to undertake a vindication of that narrative, +or to bring it within the compass of history by detaching from it what +has been embellishment, what has been perhaps even wilful invention, +and bringing out in its perfect completeness a history corroborated on +all sides by every variety of research. Such, however, is the object +at which I aim to-day; other instances may occupy us afterward. +</p> +<p> +It has, in fact, been treated as fabulous by Protestants, beginning +with the Centuriators of Magdeburg down to the present time. There is +hardly any story more sneered at than this, that an English lady, with +eleven thousand companions, all virgins, should have met with +martyrdom at Cologne, and should have even gone to Rome on their +journey by some route which is very difficult to comprehend; for they +are always represented in ships. Hence the whole thing has been +treated as a fable. But the more refined Germanism of later times +takes what is perhaps meant to be a mitigated view, and treats it as a +myth, that is, a sort of mythological tale. Thus the writer of a late +work, [Footnote 81] entitled the History, or fable, of St. Ursula and +the Eleven Thousand Virgins, printed in Hanover, in 1854, considers +that St. Ursula is the ancient German goddess Rehalennia, and explains +the history by the mythology of that ancient divinity. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 81: <i>Die Sage von der heilige Ursula und den, 11,000 + Jungfrauen.</i> Von Oskar Schade. Hanover, 1854. ] +</p> +<p> +But let us come to Catholics. A great number have been staggered +completely by this history, and have said, "It is incredible; it is +impossible to believe it; we must reject it: what foundation is there +for it?" Some have tried to search one out; and perhaps one of the +most ingenious explanations, though the most devoid of any foundation, +is that which Sirmondus and Valesius [Footnote 82] and several other +Catholics have brought forward—that there were only two saints, St. +Ursula and St. Undecimilla, and that this last has been turned into +the eleven thousand. This name Undecimilla has nowhere been found; +there have been some like it, but that name is not known. The +explanation is the purest conjecture, and has now been completely +rejected. But still many find it very difficult to accept the history. +If they were interrogated, and required to answer distinctly the +question, "What do you think about St. Ursula?" there are very few who +would venture to face the question and say, "I believe there is a +foundation for it in truth."—For that is all one might be expected +to say about a matter which has come down to us through ages, probably +with additions.—"I believe the substance of it; it has been so +altered by time as to reach us clogged with difficulties; still I +believe there were martyrs in great number who had come from England +that were martyred at Cologne." But there are few who like to talk +about it: most say it is a legendary story. Even Butler only gives +about two pages of history. He rejects the explanation which I have +<a name="436">{436}</a> just mentioned; but he throws the whole narrative into the +shade, and passes it over with one of those little sermons which he +gives us, to make up for not knowing much about a saint; so that his +readers are left quite in the dark. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 82: <i>Acta Sanct.</i> Bolland, Oct. tom. ix. p. 144. ] +</p> +<p> +Then unfortunately while many Catholics have been inclined to look at +it as more legendary than historical, they have been badly served by +those who have undertaken the defence or explanation of the event. +There may be many here who have gone into what is called the golden +chamber in the church of St. Ursula at Cologne, and have seen that +multitude of skulls and bones that line the walls, and have been +inclined to give an incredulous shrug and to say, "How could these +martyrs have been got together? where did they come from? how do we +know they were martyrs?" +</p> +<p> +We generally content ourselves with looking at such things through the +eyes of Mr. Murray's traveller who tells us about them. Accordingly we +look round at these startling objects, and say, "It is very singular; +it is very extraordinary." But there is very little awe, very little +devotion felt by us; while, to a good native of Cologne, it is the +most venerable, sacred, and holy place almost in Christendom. He prays +earnestly to the virgins of Cologne, and considers that they are his +powerful patrons and intercessors. +</p> +<p> +However, little has been done to help us. Works have been published in +favor of the truth of this history, but then they have run into +excess. The most celebrated of all is one by a Jesuit named Crombach, +who was led to compose it by Bebius, another learned Jesuit, whose +papers were unfortunately burned in a conflagration at the college in +Cologne. Crombach in 1647 published two large volumes entitled <i>"St. +Ursula vindicata."</i> In them he has included an immense variety of +things. He has accepted with scarce any discrimination works that are +entitled to little or no credit—contradictory works; he has mingled +them all up; and he insists upon the story or the history being true +with all details. The consequence is that the work has been very much +thrown aside, or severely attacked. +</p> +<p> +Yet it is acknowledged that it contains a great deal of valuable +information, together with an immense quantity of documents which may +be made good use of when properly examined, when the chaff is +separated from the wheat. On the whole, however, it has not been +favorable to the cause of the martyrs. +</p> +<p> +Now, however, there has appeared such a vindication, such a wonderful +re-examination of the whole history, as it is impossible to resist. It +is impossible to read the account of St. Ursula given in the 9th +volume for October of the Bollandists, published in 1858, without +being perfectly amazed at the quantity of real knowledge that has been +gained upon the subject, and still more at the powerful manner in +which this knowledge has been handled;—an erudition which, merely +glancing over the pages and notes, reminds us of the scholars of three +hundred years ago, in whom we have often wondered at the learning +which they brought to bear on any one point. +</p> +<p> +This treatise occupies from page 73 to 303, 230 pages of closely +printed folio in two columns. I acknowledge that it is not quite a +recreation to read it, but still it is very well worth reading. All +documents are printed at full length. Now, it so happened, that just +after the volume had come out, I was at Brussels, and called at the +library of the Bollandists, and had a most interesting conversation +with Father Victor de Buck, the author of this history. He gave me an +interesting outline of what he had been enabled to do. He told me that +when they came to October 21, and he had to write a life of St. Ursula +and her companions, his provincial wrote to him from Cologne and said, +"Take care what you say, for the people are tremendously alarmed lest +you should knock down all their traditions, and I <a name="437">{437}</a> do not know +what will be the case if you do." He replied, "Don't be at all afraid; +I shall confirm every point, and I am sure they will be pleased with +what I have to say." He was kind enough to put down in a letter the +chief points of his vindication for me; but I have lost it, and so +there was nothing left but to read through the whole of this great +work. But, beside, a very excellent compendium has appeared, which +takes pretty nearly the same view on every point, and approves of +everything the author has said; indeed some points are perhaps put +more popularly in it, though the history is reduced to a much smaller +compass. I have the work before me. It is entitled, "St. Ursula and +her Companions: A Critical, Historical Monograph. By John Hubert +Kessel. Cologne, 1863." It is a work which is not too long to be +translated and made known. What I have to say, after having gone +through this preliminary matter, is, that I lay claim to nothing +whatever beyond having been diligent, and having endeavored to grasp +all the points in question, and reduce them to a moderate compass. I +have changed the order altogether, taking that which seems to me most +suitable to the subject, and co-ordinating the different parts and +facts so as to make it popularly intelligible. In this I have the +satisfaction to find that in a chapter at the end of the book, in +which the history is summed up, exactly the same order is taken which +I have adopted here. It will not be necessary to give a reference for +every assertion that I shall have occasion to make; but I may say that +I have the page carefully noted where the subject is fully drawn out +and illustrated. +</p> +<p> +Now, let me first of all give, in a brief sketch, what Father de Buck +considers the real history, which has been wrapt up in such a quantity +of legendary matter—that which comes out from the different documents +laid before us, as the kernel or the nucleus of the history, as Kessel +calls it. He supposes that this army of martyrs, as we may well call +them, was composed of two different bodies: a body of virgins who +happened, under circumstances which I shall describe to you, to be at +Cologne, and a body of the inhabitants, citizens of Cologne, and +others, very probably many English and other virgins who had there +sought safety. It may be asked how came these English to be there? +About the year 446 the Britons began to be immensely annoyed by the +incursions of the Picts and Scots, which led to their calling in +(after the manner of the old fable, about the man calling in the dogs +to hunt the hare in his garden) the Anglo-Saxons, who in return took +possession of the country; and the inhabitants that they did not +exterminate they made serfs. At this period we know the English were +put to sad straits. Having so long lain quiet and undisturbed under +the Roman dominion, they had almost lost their natural valor, and were +unable to defend themselves. There was, therefore, a natural tendency +to emigrate and get away. They had already done this before; for as De +Buck shows, with extraordinary erudition, the occupation of Brittany +or Armorica was a quiet emigration from England, which sought the +continent, and also established colonies in Holland and Batavia, and +by that means obtained a peace which they could not have at home. We +have a very interesting document upon this subject. The celebrated +senator Aëtius was at that time governor of Gaul; the Britons sent to +him for help, and this is one passage of a most touching letter which +has been preserved by Gildas: "Repellunt nos barbari ad mare, repellit +nos mare ad barbaros; oriuntur duo genera funerum; aut jugulamur aut +mergimur." [Footnote 83] They were tossed backward and forward by the +sea to the barbarians, and by the barbarians to the sea; when they +fell upon the barbarians they were cut to pieces, and when they were +driven into the <a name="438">{438}</a> sea "mergimur"—we go to the bottom. It does not +mean that they ran into the sea, but that they went to their ships, +and many of them perished in the sea by shipwreck or by sinking—"aut +jugulamur aut mergimur." That shows that the English were leaving +England to go to the continent. I am only giving you the web of the +history, without its proofs; but I quote this passage to show it is +not at all unlikely that at that moment, when they were in a manner +straitened between the barbarians of the north and those coming upon +them in the south, a great many of them went out of the country, and +that especially being Christians they would wend their way to Catholic +countries. Religious and other persons of a like character, we know, +in every invasion of barbarians, were the first to suffer a double +martyrdom. This is a supposition, therefore, about which there is no +improbability, that a certain number, I do not say how many, of +Christian ladies of good family, some of them, perhaps, royal, got +over to Batavia or Holland (where there have been always traditions +and names of places in confirmation of this), and made their way to +Cologne, which was a capital and a seat of the Roman government, a +Christian city, and in every probability considered a stronghold, both +on account of its immense fortifications, and on account of the river. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 83: <i>Gildas de Excidio Britanniae</i>, pars i., cap. xvii. + Ed. Migne: <i>Patrologia</i>, tom. lxix., p. 342.] +</p> +<p> +Well, then comes the history, very difficult indeed to reconcile, of a +pilgrimage to Rome, which it is said they made; but let us suppose +that instead of the whole of them a certain number of them might go +there. It is not at all improbable that at that time, as De Buck +observes, a deputation, or a certain number of citizens and others, +did go to Rome to obtain assistance there, as their only hope against +the invasion, which I shall describe just now. There is no great +difficulty in supposing this; and assuming that some of the English +virgins also went, that would be a foundation for the great legendary +history, I might say the fabulous history, which has been built upon +it. Now, there is a strong confirmation of such a thing being done. +St. Gregory of Tours [Footnote 84] mentions that at this very time +Bishop Servatius did go to Rome to pray the Apostles Sts. Peter and +Paul to protect his country and city against the coming invasion, and +he saw no other hope of safety. He must have passed through Cologne +exactly at that time, and, therefore, there is nothing absurd or +improbable in supposing that some inhabitants of Cologne went with him +as a deputation to Rome, and that some of the English virgins may have +accompanied them. In the year following, Attila, the scourge of God, +the most cruel of all the leaders of barbaric tribes who invaded the +Roman empire, was marching along the Rhine with the known view of +invading Gaul, and not only invading it, but, as he said, of +completely conquering and destroying it; for his maxim was, "Where +Attila sets his foot no more grass shall ever grow"—nothing but +destruction and devastation. I will say a little more about the Huns +later. In the meantime we leave them, in 450, on their way to cross +the Rhine, with the intention of invading and occupying France. Attila +united great cunning with his barbarity; he pretended to the Goths +that he was coming to help them against the Romans, and to the Romans +that he was going to help them to expel the Goths. By that means he +paralyzed both for a time, until it was too well seen that he was the +enemy of all. It is most probable, knowing the character as we shall +see just now of the Huns, that the inhabitants of the neighboring +towns would seek refuge in the capital, and that all living in the +country would get within the strong walls of cities. We have important +confirmation, at this very time, in the history of St. Genevieve, +[Footnote 65] who was <a name="439">{439}</a> a virgin living out in the country, but +who, upon the approach of the Huns, hastened, we are told, immediately +to seek safety in Paris, and was there the means of saving the city, +by exhorting the inhabitants to build up walls, to close their gates, +and to fight. This they did, and so saved themselves. That is just an +example. When it is known that throughout his march Attila destroyed +every city, committing incredible barbarities (ruins of some of the +places remaining to this day), not sparing man, woman, or child, it is +more than probable that there would be a great conflux and influx to +the city of Cologne, where the Roman government still kept its seat, +and where, of course, there was something like order, although we have +unfortunate proofs, in the works of Salvianus, [Footnote 86] that the +morality of the city had become so very corrupt that it deserved great +chastisement. However, so far all is coherent. In 451, after Attila +had gone to France, and had been completely defeated, he made his way +back, greatly exasperated, burning and destroying everything in his +way, sparing no one. Then he appeared before Cologne; and this is the +invasion in which it is supposed the martyrdom took place. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 84: S. Greg. Turon., <i>Hist. Franc</i>., lib. ii., cap. v. Ed. + Migne: <i>Patrologia</i>. tom. lxviii., pp. 197, 576.] +<br><br> + [Footnote 85: Vid. Tillemont, <i>Hist. des Emp.,</i> vi. p. 151. <i>Acta + Sanct. Boll.,</i> Jan. tom. i. in vit. S. Genovevae.] +<br><br> + [Footnote 86: <i>De Gubernatione Dei</i>, Ed. Baluzii, Paris, 1864, pp. + 140, 141. ] +</p> +<p> +Having given you what the Bollandist considers the historical thread, +every part of which can be confirmed and made most probable, I will +now, before going into proofs of the narrative, direct your attention +for a few minutes to what we may call the legendary parts of the +history. When we speak of legends we must not confound them with +fables, that is, with pure inventions. We must not suppose that people +sat down to write a lie under the idea that they were edifying the +Church or anybody. There have been such cases, no doubt; for +Tertullian mentions the delinquency of a person's writing false acts +of St. Paul, and being suspended from his office of priest in +consequence. Such follies have happened in all times. We have had many +instances in our own day of attempts at forging documents, and +committing the worst of social crimes; but old legends as we have +them, and even the false acts as they were called, were no doubt +written without any intention of actually deceiving, or of passing off +what was spurious for genuine. The person who first suggested this was +a man certainly no friend of Catholics, Le Clerc, better known by his +literary name of Clericus; who observes that school exercises were +sometimes drawn from martyrdoms, as in our day from a classical +subject, as Juvenal says of Hannibal: +</p> +<pre> + "I demens et saevas curre per Alpes + Ut pueris placeas et declamatio flas." +</pre> +<p> +Not that students professed to write a real history, but they gave +wonderful descriptions of deeds of valor and marvellous events which +had never occurred, and were never intended to be believed. In the +same way, at a time when nothing but a religious subject could create +interest, that sort of composition came to be applied to acts of +saints and martyrs; so that many books and narratives which we have of +that description may be thus accounted for. It is much like our +historical novels, or the historical plays of Shakespeare, for +instance. Nobody imagines that their authors wished to pass them off +for history, but they did not contradict history; they kept to +history, so that you may find it in them; and you might almost write a +history from some of those books which are called historical works of +fiction. In early times such compositions were of a religious +character. Then came times of greater ignorance, and those works came +to be regarded as true historical accounts. But, are we to reject them +on that ground altogether? Are we to say, any more than we should with +regard to the fictitious works of which I have just spoken, that there +is no truth in them? We should proceed in the same way as people do +who seek for gold. A <a name="440">{440}</a> man goes to a gold-field, and tries to +obtain gold from auriferous sand. Now suppose he took a sieve full, +and said at once, "It's all rubbish," and threw it away; he might go +on for a long time and never get a grain of gold. But if he knows how +to set to work, if he washes what he obtains, picks out grain by +grain, and puts by, he gets a small hoard of real genuine gold; and +nobody denies that when, many such supplies are put together they make +a treasure of sterling metal. So it is with these legendary accounts. +They are never altogether falsehoods—I will not say never, but +rarely. Whenever they have an air of history about them, the chances +are that, by examining and sifting them well, we may get out a certain +amount of real and solid material for history. +</p> +<p> +The legendary works upon these virgins are numerous and begin early. +The first is one which I shall call, as all our writers do, by its +first words, "Regnante Domino." This is an account of traditions, +evidently written between the ninth and eleventh centuries. It is +impossible to determine more closely than this. But we know that it +cannot have been written earlier than the ninth century, nor later +than the eleventh. It contains a long history of these virgins while +in England, who they were, and what they were; of a certain marriage +contract that was made with the father of St. Ursula, a very powerful +king; how it was arranged that she should have eleven companions, and +each of these a thousand followers; how they should embark for three +years and amuse themselves with nautical exercises; how the ships went +to the other side of the channel. It is an absurd story and full of +fable, but there are three or four most important points in it. +Geoffrey of Monmouth comes next. He gives another history, totally +different from that of the "Regnante Domino;" but retains two or three +points of identity. His is evidently a British tradition, which, of +course, it is most important to compare with the German one; and we +shall find how singularly they agree. Then, after these, come a number +of legends called <i>Passiones</i>, long accounts filled with a variety of +incongruous particulars which may be safely put aside; but in the same +way germs or remnants of something good, which have been thus +preserved, are found in them all, and when brought together may give +us some valuable results. We next meet with what is more difficult to +explain—the supposed revelations of St. Elizabeth of Schönau, and of +Blessed Hermann of Steinfeld. It is not for us to enter into the +discussion, which is a very subtle one, of how persons who are saints +really canonized and field in immense veneration—one of them, +Hermann, singularly so—can be supposed to have been allowed to follow +their own imaginations on some points, while at the same time there +seems no doubt that they lived in an almost ecstatic state. This +question is gone into fully; and the best authorities are quoted by +the Bollandist. It would require a long discussion, and it would not +be to our purpose, to pursue it further. These supposed revelations +are rejected altogether. Now we come to positive forgeries, consisting +of inscriptions, or of engraved stones with legends carved upon them. +One of these mentions a pope who never existed, and also a bishop of +Milan who never lived, beside a number of other imaginary people. From +the texture and state of these inscriptions there can be no doubt +whatever that they are absolute forgeries, and the author of them is +pretty well discovered. He was a sacristan of the name of Theodorus. +In order to enhance the glory of these virgins, they are represented, +as you see in legendary pictures, as being in a ship accompanied by a +pope, bishops, abbots, and persons of high dignity, who are supposed +to have come from Rome with them. All this we discard, making out what +we can from the sounder traditions. +</p> +<p> +And this is the result. There are <a name="441">{441}</a> two or three points on which, +whether we take the English or the German traditions, all are agreed. +First, we have that a great many of these virgins were English: that +the Germans all agree upon; the earliest historical documents say the +same. Secondly, that they were martyred by the Huns: that we are told +both by the English and the German writers. It is singular that they +should agree on such a point as this; and you will see how—I do not +say corroborated, but absolutely proved it is. The third fact is, that +there was a tremendous slaughter at the time, a singular slaughter of +people committed at Cologne by these Huns. This comes out from all the +legendary histories, which agree upon this point, and we can hardly +know how they should do so except through separate traditions; for +they evidently have nothing else in common. Their separate narratives +we may reject as legendary. +</p> +<p> +Thus we come to an investigation of the true history, and see how it +is proved. And first I must put before you what I may call the +foundation-stone of the whole history on which it is based—the +inscription now kept in the church of St. Ursula. It had remained very +much neglected, though it had been given by different authors, until, +when the Bollandists were going to write their history, they took +three casts of it; one they gave to the archbishop of Cologne, another +they kept for themselves; the third—I cannot say what became of it, +but I think it went to Rome, having been taken by De Rossi. I could +not afford to have a cast brought here, but I have had a most accurate +tracing made of it. Those of you who are judges of graphic character +will see the nature of the letters; they are capital, or uncial +letters. First, you may ask what is the age of this inscription? It is +pretty well agreed that it cannot be later than the year 500—that +would be fifty years after that assigned to the martyrdom of the +virgins. De Buck, who is really almost hypercritical in rejecting, +says he does not see a single objection to the genuineness of this +inscription. There is not a trace of Lombard or later character about +it; it is purely Roman. The union of some of the letters is just what +we find about that time in Roman inscriptions. It is then, as nearly +as one can judge, of the age I have mentioned—about the year 500. De +Rossi, passing through Cologne three or four years ago, examined it +and pronounced it to be genuine, and said it could not be of a later +period than that. Dr. Enner, a layman of Cologne, when writing his +"History of Cologne," could not bring himself to believe that the +inscription was so old, and he sent an exact copy in plaster (perhaps +that was the third) to Professor Ritschl, the well-known editor of +Plautus, and a Protestant, at Bonn. I have a copy of the Professor's +letter here, in which he says that he has minutely examined the +inscription, and that he cannot see anything in it to make it more +modern than the date assigned to it, and that it contains +peculiarities which no forger would ever hit upon, such as the double +<i>i,</i> and other forms. He says, "I am not sufficiently acquainted with +the history of St. Ursula to connect it in any way; but I have no +hesitation in saying that the inscription cannot be later than the +beginning of the sixth century;" which, you see, takes us back very +nearly to the time when the martyrdom is supposed to have occurred. +Then I may mention that the very inscription is copied in the next +historical document that we have, as being already in the church. This +is the translation of the inscription, of which I present an exact +copy: +</p> +<p> +"Clematius came from the East; he was terrified by fiery visions, and +by the great majesty and the holiness of these virgins, and, according +to a vow that he made, he rebuilt at his own expense, on his own land, +this basilica." Then follows a commination at the end, which is not +unusual in such cases. Now, every expression here is to be found in +inscriptions of the time. +</p> +<br> +<a name="442">{442}</a> +<br> +<p class="image"> +<img alt="" src="images/i442.jpg" border=1><br> +</p> +<br> +<a name="443">{443}</a> +<br> +<p> +For instance, "de proprio;" "votum;" "loco suo" (sometimes it is "loco +empto"), meaning of course land which one made his own, or which was +his own before. There had been then a basilica—not the church that +now exists, but a basilica—at the tombs where these saints were +buried, which we shall have to describe later. He rebuilt the basilica +fifty years after the martyrdom, destroyed no doubt during the +constant incursions of barbarians. It was probably a very small one; +for we know that at Rome every entrance to the tombs of martyrs had +its basilica. De Rossi has been successful in finding one or two. One +was built by St. Damasus, who wrote: "Not daring to put my ashes among +so many martyrs, I have built this basilica for myself, my mother and +sister;" and there are three niches at the end for three sarcophagi. +It is universally allowed that there never was a catacomb without its +basilica. In fact, in that of Pope St. Alexander, and Sts. Evantius +and Theodulus, found lately, there is a basilica completely standing, +and the bodies of these saints were found—one under the altar—and +the others near it. Then from the basilica you go into the catacomb. +So that nothing is more natural than that in the place where these +martyrs were buried, Clematius should rebuild their basilica. After +this monument we proceed to the next genuine document, though one of a +later date, and by an unknown author—the "Sermo in Natali." This, +there is no doubt, was written between the years 751 and 839; and I +will give the ingenious argument by which this date is proved. But +first it quotes the inscription I have read, with the exception of the +threat at the end; in the second place it mentions that the virgins +were probably Britons—that it was not certain, but the general +opinion was that they had come from Britain; thirdly, it attributes +the martyrdom to the Huns; fourthly, it insinuates what is of great +importance in filling up the history, that it is by no means to be +supposed that they were all virgins, but that many were widows and +married people. The reason for fixing the earliest date at 751 is, +that it quotes Bede's Ecclesiastical History, which was written in +that year, giving apparently his account of the conversion of Lucius; +though one cannot say that it is certainly a copy from Bede, because +Bede himself copied from more ancient books, and both may have drawn +from the same source. Then it could not have been written after 839 +for two reasons. In 834 there was a tremendous incursion of other +barbarians—of Normans; and it is plain from our book that there had +been no such invasion when it was written; nothing was known of it, +because the writer speaks of countries, particularly Holland, as being +flourishing, which were completely destroyed by them. There is also +this singular circumstance. In speaking of the great devotion to the +virgins in Batavia, the writer states that this happened at a time +when Batavia was an island formed by the two branches of the Rhine. +Now in 839 an inundation completely destroyed it, one of the horns or +arms being entirely obliterated. Therefore that gives us a certain +compass within which the book was written. The author himself was a +native of Cologne—for in referring to the inhabitants he once or +twice speaks of "us"—and he would therefore be familiar with the +traditions of the people. He says there was no written history at that +time; he defends the traditions, and shows how natural it was that the +people should have kept them. I ought to mention that he calls the +head of the band of martyrs Pinnosa. He says, "She is called in her +own country Vinosa, in ours Pinnosa;" and there is evidence that this +was the name first given to the leader; how, by what transformation, +it came to be St. Ursula, we cannot tell; it is certain that up to +that time hers was not the name of the leader. Afterward Pinnosa +appears on the list, but not as the chief, St. Ursula being the +prominent name. +</p> +<a name="444">{444}</a> +<p> +After that period there comes a mass of historical proofs that one can +have no difficulty about. From 852 there are an immense number of +diplomas giving grants of land to the nuns of the monastery of St. +Ursula, at her place of burial. There is no doubt of the existence of +that church, from other documents. Then the martyrologies repeat the +whole tradition again and again. Thus, then, we fill up that gap of +four hundred years (from A.D. 400 to A.D. 800). There is the +inscription; there is the "Sermo in Natali," which quotes it, and +gives old traditions; and afterward there are diplomas and other +testimonies which are abundant. +</p> +<p> +We now proceed to compare the whole tradition with history, with known +history, for after all this is our chief business. When we possess a +tradition of a country and people, we ask, "What confirmation, what +corroboration, have we? what does history tell us?" Let us then see +what history does tell. It tells us, in the first place, that in the +year 450 Attila was known to be coming to invade and take possession +of Gaul, having been ejected from Italy. His army is said by +contemporary writers to have been composed of 700,000 men. It was a +hostile emigration. They brought their women and children in carts, as +the Huns always used to do, and they of course marched but slowly. +They went along both sides of the Danube, and got at length into +France. De Buck, by a most interesting series of proofs, makes it +almost as evident as anything can be that they crossed over at +Coblentz, therefore not coming near Cologne. They entered, as I have +said, into Gaul, destroying everything in their march. Some of their +barbarities and massacres are almost incredible. After devastating +nearly the whole of the country, they besieged Orleans. The +inhabitants having been encouraged to resist, at last succeeded in +obtaining certain terms; that is, Attila and his chiefs went into the +city and took what they liked, but left the city standing. After this +they were pursued by the general whom I have mentioned—Aetius, a +Gaul, but who got together all the troops he could, Goths, Visigoths, +Franks, and others, who saw what the design of these horrible +barbarians was. +</p> +<p> +A most tremendous battle was now fought, that of Catalaunia +(Châlons-sur-Marne), in which contemporary historians tell us 300,000 +men were left on the field; but that number has been reduced to +200,000. Such battles, thank God! we seldom hear of now-a-days. +Attila, routed, immediately took to flight, and got clear away from +his pursuers. He went through Belgium, destroying city after city, +leaving nothing standing, and massacring the people in the most +barbarous way. +</p> +<p> +Here comes the most difficult knot of the whole history. Authors agree +that Attila now made his way into Thuringia, that is to the heart of +Germany; he must therefore be supposed to have got clear over the +Rhine, and marched a long way through the country. On this subject De +Buck has one of the most exquisite and beautiful geographical +investigations, I should think, that have ever appeared. He proves, so +that you can no more doubt it than you can doubt my having this paper +before me, that there was Thuringia which lay on this side of the +Rhine; he proves it by a series documents taken from mediaeval +writers, and from inscriptions, that there was a Thuringia which +stretched from Louvain to the Rhine. Indeed, it is impossible to +conceive how Attila could have got, as by a leap, into the very midst +of Germany. He traces the natural course of march (which you can +follow by any map), taking the cities destroyed as landmarks, and +brings him to this province; and when there, there was no possible way +of crossing the Rhine but by Cologne; there was the only bridge, the +only military pass of any sort. So there can be no doubt that the +Huns, exasperated by their tremendous losses, and by being driven +<a name="445">{445}</a> out of Gaul, which they intended to occupy, having revenged +themselves as they went on, were obliged to go through Cologne; and if +you calculate the date of the victory, and consider the country +through which Attila passed, destroying everything as he went, you +bring him almost to a certainty to Cologne about the 21st of October, +nearly the day of the martyrdom. The "Regnante Domino," which +attributes the martyrdom to the Huns, corroborates all this account, +which is the result of a most painstaking examination, extending over +many pages. +</p> +<p> +Next we come to another important point. Why attribute this massacre +to the Huns? Because there was no other invasion and passage of +savages except that one. It accords, then, both with geographical and +chronological facts. We have the martyrs at Cologne at the very time +when these barbarians came. +</p> +<p> +But we must needs say something about the Huns. There is no question +that the Huns were the most frightful, cruel, and licentious +barbarians that ever invaded the Roman empire. They were not of a +northern race, Germans or Scandinavians; they were, no doubt, Mongols +or Tartars; they came from Tartary, from Scythia, and settled on the +Caspian sea; they then moved on to the mouths of the Danube, and again +to Hungary, and rolled on in this way toward the richer countries of +the west. There are several authors of that period—Jornandes, +Procopius, and others—who describe them to us. [Footnote 87] They +tell us that when they were infants their mothers bound down their +noses, and flattened them in such a way that they should not come +beyond the cheek-bones; that their eyes were so sunk that they looked +like two caverns; that they scarified all the lower part of the face +with hot irons when young, so that no hair could grow; that they had +no beard, and were more hideous than demons; that they wore no dress +except a shirt fabricated by the women in the carts in which they +entirely lived; it was never changed, but was worn till it dropped +off, under a mantle made entirely of wild-rat skins. Their chaussure +consisted of kid skins round their legs, with most extraordinary shoes +or sandals, which had no shape whatever, and did not adapt themselves +to the form; the consequence was that they could not walk, and they +fought entirely on their wretched horses. They had no <i>cuisine</i> except +between the saddle and the back of the horse, where they put their +steaks and softened them a little before eating; but as to drink, they +could take any amount of it. With regard to their morality it cannot +be described. The writers of that age tell us that no Roman woman +would allow herself to be seen by a Hun. They were licentious to a +degree, and they carried off all the women they could into captivity; +probably they destroyed a great many; which was their custom when they +became a burden to them. These, then, were the sort of savages that +reached Cologne. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 87: Ammianua Marcellinus, lib. xxxi., cap. ii. ] +</p> +<p> +They had another peculiarity; of all the hordes of savages that +invaded the Roman empire, they are the only ones that used the bow and +arrow. The Germans hardly made any use of the bow, except a few men +who mixed in the ranks; as a body their execution was with the sword, +the lance, and the pike. The use of the bow was distinctly Tartar, or +Scythian. Then we are told that their aim from horseback was +infallible; that when flying from a foe they could turn round and +shoot with perfect facility; that they rode equally well astride or +seated sideways like a woman; in fact that they flew and turned just +like the Parthians and Scythians from whom they were descended. In +this great battle of Catalaunia they either lost heart or steadiness, +and they could not fire upon their enemies, so that they were pursued +and tremendously routed. That their mode of fighting was by the bow +and arrow, you <a name="446">{446}</a> will see in the representations given in the +beautiful shrine at Hamelink, where the martyrs are fired into by the +barbarians with bows and arrows. Let us see what this has to do with +our question. The "Regnante Domino," which we have mentioned as +legendary, gives a most beautiful description of the mode of dealing +with the bodies. The writer says that when the inhabitants saw that +the enemy were gone they came out, and in a field they found this +great number of virgins lying on the ground. They collected their +blood, got sarcophagi, or made graves, and put them in; "and there +they lay, as they were placed," the writer says, "as any one can tell +who has seen them," evidently suggesting that he had seen them. Now, +in the year 1640, on July 2, Papebroch, an authority beyond all +question, and Crombach, whose word may be relied on as that of a most +excellent and holy man, were at the opening of the tombs. From all +tradition this was no doubt the place of the stone of Clematius; there +has always been a convent there; and you remember that part of the +inscription which threatens eternal punishment to those who should +bury any but virgins there. It is now called "St. Ursula's Acker," a +sort of sacred field where the basilica was. Here they were buried, +and so they remained undisturbed except by some translations of the +middle ages, which do not concern us. In 1640 there was a formal +exhumation, and eye-witnesses tell us what they saw. A nuncio came +afterward to verify the facts. +</p> +<p> +I will give you the account of how these bodies were found. Many of +them were in graves, in rows, but each body separate, there being a +space of a foot between them. In other places there were stone +sarcophagi in which they were laid separately. Then Crombach describes +that there were some large fosses, sixty feet long, eight feet deep, +and sixteen wide, containing a large number of bodies. They were +placed in a row with a space between them; at their feet was another +row; then a quantity of earth was thrown on, and another row was +placed, and so on, until you came to the fourth. Every skeleton in the +three rows was entire, and they all looked toward the east. They had +their arms crossed upon their bosoms, and almost every one had a +vessel containing blood, or sand tinged with blood. The fourth, or +upper stratum, consisted of disjointed bones, and with these also +there were vessels containing blood or colored sand. In this way, the +writer says, he saw a hundred bodies. Then there was this remarkable +circumstance about their clothes. Eutychianus, [Footnote 88] the +pope, had published a decree that no body of a martyr was ever to be +buried without having a dalmatic put upon it; and clothes in abundance +were found upon these bodies. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 88: <i>Acta SS.</i> Bolland. Octob., tom, ix., p. 139. + <i>Constant. Rom. Pont. Epist.</i> Paris, 1721, p. 299. ] +</p> +<p> +Another important discovery was, that immense quantities of arrows +were found mingled with the bones; some sticking in the skull, others +in the breast, others in the arms—right in the bones. So it was clear +that all these bodies had been put to death by means of arrows, and +there was no other tribe but the Huns which made use of the arrow as +its instrument of death. I may add that there were no signs of +burning, or of any heathen burial about them. This also is most +important. I have said that there had been other exhumations in the +eleventh and twelfth centuries. There are pictures of these, and there +are sarcophagi preserved in which bodies were found. These are laid in +exactly the same manner as others were found in 1640. Crombach says +the whole had been done most scientifically, that the distances were +all arranged by measure, so that there was not a quarter of a foot +difference anywhere. +</p> +<p> +Now, I ask, could these bodies have been put there in consequence of a +plague, or an earthquake, or any event of that kind? Putting aside the +arrows found in immense quantities, and the <a name="447">{447}</a> vessels containing +blood, we know that when people die in a plague to the number of +hundreds, a foss is made, and they are thrown in, and there is an end +of them. This could not have been a common cemetery. It contained +nothing but the bodies of these women (I will speak of their physical +characteristics later), all laid in studied order, with great care, +and with such peculiarities, and all evidently buried at the same +time. After reading all this, may we not exclaim with St. Ambrose, "We +have found the signs of martyrdom," and with St. Gaudentius, "What can +you desire more to show that they were all martyred?" [Footnote 89] +And who does not see here confirmed the history of Clematius? +Comparing the whole with traditions, both English and German, it seems +to me that you have as much proof as you can reasonably require. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 89: S. Ambros., class, i., epist. xxii Ed Ben., tom, iii., + p. 927. S. Gaud., <i>Serm. in Dedic. SS. XL. Martyr</i>, ap. Migne, tom, + xx., col. 963.] +</p> +<p> +Having given you concisely the facts and corroborations of history, +let me now proceed to answer objections. +</p> +<p> +And, first there is the question, Were all these martyrs? Well, if +they were to be tried by the rules established very justly in the +modern Church, it would no doubt be difficult to say; because how can +you prove that each of these women laid down her life voluntarily for +Christ? The tradition of Cologne is that they would not sacrifice +their virtue to those heathens, and that they were surrounded and +shot. But in those times a wider meaning was sometimes attached to the +word "martyr." There were what are called <i>martyres improprie dicti</i>, +where there could not be the same kind of evidence as in the case of +others; or <i>martyres latiore sensu</i>. A person was called a martyr when +he was put to death without his will being consulted, as in the case +of our own St. Edmund, and in the case of St. Wenceslaus, who was put +to death without being interrogated as to whether he would remain a +Christian or not, and many others. De Buck shows that there was +nothing more common. We have the remarkable case of the Theban +legion—another instance of a large number of men being surrounded and +cut down by soldiers without being questioned as to whether they were +in a state of grace, or whether they were prepared to die. The deed +was done <i>in odium religionis</i>, by people who merely looked to the +gratification of their own passions and their desire for revenge. In +those days the question of such persons being martyrs would be a very +simple one, if it were known that they were killed by the Huns in +hatred, as was supposed, of their virginity and because of their +resistance. We have in martyrologies the account of Nicomedia and its +twelve thousand martyrs. De Buck supposes that the number included all +the martyrs of the persecution. And the 6,700 of the Theban legion are +explained in the same way. +</p> +<p> +The next question is, Were these persons all virgins? Who can know? It +is quite certain that even married persons, when martyred, had +sometimes the title of virgins given to them. Many instances are +supplied by the martyrologies and offices. St. Sabina, [Footnote +90]for instance, is called a virgin martyr, though she was a married +person. It was considered that martyrdom raised all women to a higher +degree of excellence. There are some curious questions, too, arising, +which would not very well do for a discussion here. It is, however, +sufficiently proved that when there was a great number of virgins, and +others were mixed with them, the nobler title was given to all. Just +as, if you have a great many martyrs and some confessors united, the +title of martyrs is applied to all, as they are included in one +office, each sharing in the glory of martyrdom. The "Sermo in Natali" +expressly tells us that it was not supposed at its early period that +all were virgins, but that there were ladies of all ranks and children +amongst them. Indeed, some remains of children were found. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 90: <i>Acta SS.</i> Bolland. Octob., tom, ix., p. 143.] +</p> +<br> +<a name="448">{448}</a> +<p> +Then comes the question, Were there eleven thousand? Certainly not as +all one company. It is supposed, and there appears nothing +unreasonable in it, that when once the rage of the Huns was excited +they would give way to an indiscriminate massacre, and that the eleven +thousand most probably included persons who had sought refuge, perhaps +their own captives, and probably a great number of the inhabitants of +the city. +</p> +<p> +But does it not seem a frightful number of persons to be massacred? +Not by the Huns. In the year 436 these same Huns slaughtered at once +in Burgundy 30,000 men. They were of the same race, the same family of +men, as Tamerlane, who had 70,000 heads cut off in Ispahan. And the +Turks, when they took the island of Chios, reduced the population of +120,000 to 8,000. So that those slaughters, which to us seem so +fearful, are not to be considered in the same light when occurring in +those times. We have a frightful example in the case of Theodosius and +the inhabitants of Thessalonica. It is said that 15,000 persons were +put to death in the theatre for a simple insult. The most moderate +calculation is that by St. Ambrose, who gives the number as 7,000. +Human life, of course, was not then regarded as by us, especially by +men who devastated whole cities and burned them to the ground. Hence +the difficulty as to the number of persons, including among them not +merely the followers of St. Ursula, but the bulk of the female +inhabitants, is explained. +</p> +<p> +Another question arises, Were they English, or were there English +amongst them? That is answered unhesitatingly, Yes. All the +traditions, English and German, agree that these ladies had come from +England and sought refuge. +</p> +<p> +I have mentioned the facilities for emigration, and the way in which +many went out of the country; so that there would be nothing wonderful +in a certain number of British women being at Cologne at that time. +Now there is this curious fact illustrating the subject. Very lately +the Golden Chamber, as it is called, adjoining the church, where the +chief remains are deposited, was visited by Dr. Braubach and Dr. Gortz +of Cologne, Dr. Buschhausen of Ratingen, and others, who examined the +skulls and pronounced them to be Celtic, not German. The Celtic +characteristics, as given by Blumenbach and other writers, are quite +distinct—the chin falls back considerably, the skull is very long, +and the vertex of the head goes far behind—quite distinct from the +Romans or Germans. Moreover, with the exception of ten or fifteen out +of from eighty to a hundred, they were all the bodies of females. Now +all the writers—all that I have seen at least—say that there could +not have been an emigration of some hundreds of women without some +men, some persons to guard them, and these would be with them and +would share their martyrdom. Then, in the next place, they were all +young people, there was no sign of their having died of a plague or +any other casualty, but they appeared to be strong, healthy young +women; which of course, as far as we can judge, verifies the narrative +to the utmost. +</p> +<p> +I now leave you to judge how very different historical research has +made this legend, as it is called, appear, and how much we have a +right to regard it in a devotional spirit, as the inhabitants of +Germany certainly do. I do not say that there have not been many +exaggerations, false relics, and stories; but critical investigation +enables us to put all these aside, and to sift their evidence. But +certainly we have a strong historical verification of what has been +considered until within the last few years as legendary, not only by +real discoveries which have come to light, but also by a right use of +evidence which before had been overlooked and neglected. +</p> +<p> +The whole of what I have said relates to events. But my subject +embraces "events and things." The latter part remains untouched, and I +have <a name="449">{449}</a> yet to show how things or objects which have been looked +upon as fabulous have been proved to be real and genuine. +</p> +<p> +II. I proceed, therefore, to objects which have been, or may be, +easily misrepresented, as if asserted to be what they are not, and +involving an imputation of imposture on the part of those who propose +them to the notice or veneration of Catholics. +</p> +<p> +I will begin with a rather singular example, but one which, I trust, +will verify the assertion which I have made; and if time permits, I +will multiply the examples by giving two or three other instances. +</p> +<p> +I do not know whether any of you in your foreign travels have visited +the cathedral of Chartres; I have not seen it myself, but I believe +that it is one of the most noble, most majestic, and most inspiring of +all Gothic buildings on the continent. The French always speak of it +as combining the great effects of a mediaeval church, more perhaps +than any other in their country; and as my address will relate to that +cathedral, I think it is necessary to give a little preliminary +account of it; at the same time warning you that I do not by any means +intend to plunge into the depths of the singular mystery in which the +origin of that cathedral is involved. It takes its rise from a +Druidical cavern which was for some time the only church or cathedral. +Over that the Christians—for the town was early converted to +Christianity—built a church, of course modest, and simple, and poor, +as the early churches of the Christians were; but in this was +preserved, with the greatest jealousy, and with the deepest devotion, +what was called a Druidical image of Our Lady, which was always kept +in the crypt, for it was over the crypt that the church was built. It +was said to have existed there before the building of the church; but +into that part of the history it is not necessary to enter. In the +year 1020 this poor old church was struck by lightning, was set on +fire, and entirely consumed. The bishop at that time was one of the +most remarkable men in the French Church—Fulbert, who has left us a +full account of what was done in his time there. He immediately set to +work to build another church, proposing that it should be perfectly +magnificent according to all the ideas of the age; and to enable him +to do so, he had recourse to our modern practice of collecting money +on all sides. Among others Canute, king of England and Denmark, and +Richard, duke of Normandy, and almost all the sovereigns of the north +contributed largely. The result was the beginning of a very +magnificent church. The singularity of the building was this, that +everybody labored with his hands, not only men, but women, not only +the poor, but the noble. These furnished with their own hands +provisions or whatever was necessary for the workmen. However, after +Fulbert's death, like most undertakings of that class, the work became +more languid; and before it was completed (that was in 1094), the +building, in which there was a great quantity of wood used, was again +burnt to the ground. Well, this time it was determined that there +should be a splendid church, such as had never been seen before; and +here, again, that same plan of working with their hands was adopted to +an extent which, as stated in an account given us by Haymon and one or +two others, seems incredible. The laborers relieved one another day +and night, lighting up the whole place with torches; provisions were +abundantly furnished to all the workmen without their having to move +from their places. In fact, the writer says that you might see +noblemen, not a few, but hundreds and thousands, dragging carts or +drawing materials and provisions; in fact, not resting until, in 1160, +seventy years after the destruction, the church was consecrated; and +there it remains, the grand cathedral church of Chartres at this day. +</p> +<p> +Now, it may be asked, what was <a name="450">{450}</a> there which most particularly +made Chartres a place of such great devotion, and so attached the +inhabitants to its cathedral that they thus sacrificed their ease and +comfort so many years to build a church worthy of their object? It was +a relic—a relic which had existed for several hundred years at that +time in the church, which made it a place of pilgrimage, and which was +considered most venerable. What was this relic? The name which it has +always borne in the mouths of the simple, honest, and devoted people +of Chartres and its neighborhood, and in fact of all France, is <i>La +Chemise de la Sainte Vierge</i>—that is, a tunic which was supposed and +believed to have been worn by the Blessed Virgin, her under-clothing, +and was of course considered most venerable from having been in +contact with her pure virginal flesh. However, you may suppose that +you require strong proof of such a relic at all, and you will remember +that my object is to show how things which may have been doubtful, and +perhaps considered almost incredible, have received great proof and +elucidation by research. I do not pretend to say that in all respects +you can prove the relic: the research to which I allude is modern, but +it may guide us back, may confirm a tradition, may give us strong +reasons in its favor, showing that it has not been received without +good ground, though it may not be able to penetrate the darkness which +sometimes surrounds the beginning of anything in very remote +antiquity. I am not going, then, to prove the relic, but I am going to +show you the grounds on which it had been accepted, and then come to +the modern verification of it. +</p> +<p> +The history is this. A Byzantine writer of the fourteenth century, +Nicephorus Calixtus, [Footnote 91] tells us that this very relic was +in the possession of persons in Judaea, to whom it was left by our +Blessed Lady before her death; that it fell, in the course of time, +into the hands of a Jew in Galilee; that two patricians of +Constantinople, Galbius and Candidus, traced it, purchased it, and +took it to Constantinople, where, considering themselves in possession +of a great treasure, they concealed it, and would not let it be known +(this was in the middle of the fifth century); that the Emperor Leo, +in consequence of the miracles which were wrought, and by which this +relic was discovered, in spite of those who possessed it, immediately +entered into negotiations, obtained it, and built a splendid church in +Constantinople expressly to keep it; and that the church so built was +considered as the safety, the palladium as it were, of the city of +Constantinople. He mentions another fact which is important; that is, +that there were at that time in Constantinople three other churches, +each built expressly for the preservation of one relic of our Lady. I +mention these facts for this purpose: there is a very prevalent idea, +I believe among Catholics as well as certainly among Protestants, that +what may be called the great tide of relics came into Europe through +the crusades; that the poor ignorant crusaders, who were more able to +handle a sword than to use their discretion, were imposed upon, and +bought anything that was offered to them at any price, and so deluged +Europe with spurious and false relics. Now, you will observe, that all +that I have been relating is referred to an age quite anterior to the +crusades, or to any movement of the west into the east. It is true +that Nicephorus Calixtus is a comparatively modern writer, but he +could bear testimony to churches that were existing, and tell by whom +they were built. The mere writer of a hand-book can trace out the +history of a church or any other public monument which is before the +eyes of all: but he was not of that character: he was a historian, and +he tells us that there were [Footnote 92] three churches in +Constantinople, just as we might say that <a name="451">{451}</a> in Rome there is the +church of Santa Croce, built by Constantine to preserve the relics of +the cross. Nobody can doubt that the church was built for the relic, +that the relic was deposited there, and that earth from the Holy Land +was put into its chapel. Monuments like that preserve their own +history. Therefore, when this writer tells us that these churches +existed from that period, we can hardly doubt that he could arrive at +a knowledge of such facts; and at any rate it removes the impression +that these wonderful relics were merely the sweepings, as it were, of +Palestine during a fervent and pious but at the same time ignorant and +unenlightened age. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 91: <i>Hist. Eccles.</i>, lib. xv., cap. xxiv.] +<br><br> + [Footnote 92: <i>Hist. Eccles.</i>, lib. xv., cap. xxv., xxvi.] +</p> +<p> +Thus, we get the history so far. Now, we know that there was no one +who valued relics to such an extent as Charlemagne. We see, by +Aix-la-Chapelle and other places, what exceedingly curious relics he +collected. I am not here to defend them individually, because I do not +know their history; nor is it to our purpose. He was in close +correspondence with the east, from which he received large presents; +for it was very well known what he valued most. There was a particular +reason for this. The Empress Irene at that time (Charlemagne died in +814) wished to have his daughter Rothrude in marriage for her son +Porphyrogenitus, and later offered her own hand to himself. +</p> +<p> +Many relics existed at the time of this correspondence; and as +presents are now made of Arab horses and China services, so were they +then made of relics, which, if true, monarchs preferred to anything +else. Now, there is every reason to suppose that among the presents +sent by Irene to Charlemagne was this veil or tunic. [Footnote 93] +There is in the cathedral of Chartres a window expressly commemorating +the passage of this relic from the east to Chartres. Secondly, the +relic, as you will see later, was, up to a few years ago, wrapped in a +veil of gauze, which was entirely covered with Byzantine work in gold +and in silk, which had never been taken off; and it was wrapped up in +it till the last time it was verified. We have every reason to suppose +that it had come from Constantinople, and that it was delivered at +Chartres in that covering. In the third place, it is historical—there +is no question about it, for all chronicles and authorities agree upon +the point—that Charles the Bald, the grandson of Charlemagne, being +obliged to leave Aix-la-Chapelle, in consequence of going to settle in +France, which was the portion of the empire allotted to him, took the +relic away, and deposited it in the cathedral of Chartres. So that, as +far as we can trace a transaction of this sort, there seems to be as +much evidence as would be accepted in respect to the transmission of +any object of a profane character from one country to another. There +is the correspondence of the workmanship; there are the records of the +place; and there is the fact that the relics were brought from +Aix-la-Chapelle, where Charlemagne had collected so many relics that +he had received from Constantinople. Mabillon, who certainly is an +authority in matters of ecclesiastical history, says it would be the +greatest rashness to deny the genuineness of this relic. "Who will +presume to deny that it is real and genuine?" This is in a letter to +the bishop of Blois, in which he is expressly treating the subject of +discerning true relics. Everything so far, therefore, helps to give +authenticity to this extraordinary relic which made Chartres a place +of immense pilgrimage. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 93: See note at p. 455.] +</p> +<p> +Bringing it down so far, we may ask, what was the common, and we may +say the vulgar, opinion of the people regarding it? It had never been +opened, and was never seen until the end of the last century. The +consequence was, that it was called by the name I have mentioned. It +was represented as a sort of tunic. It was the custom to make tunics +of that form, which were laid upon the shrine and <a name="452">{452}</a> worn in +devotion; they were sent specially to ladies of great rank, and were +so held in veneration that it was the rule, that if any person going +to fight a duel had on one of these chemisettes, as they were called, +he must take it off; as it was supposed his rival had not fair play so +long as he carried it upon him. In giving an account of the building I +forgot to mention the wonderful miracles in connection with the relic +there, which are believed by everybody to have taken place. It is even +on record that the <i>Chevalier sans peur et sans reproche</i> went to +Chartres <i>pour se faire enchemiser</i> before he went to war. +</p> +<p> +In 1712, we find that the relic was in a cedar case richly ornamented +with gold and jewels—the original case in which it had arrived. The +wood being worm-eaten and crumbling, it was thought proper to remove +and clean it, and put it in some better place. The cedar case had no +opening by which it could in any way be examined, and the bishop of +the time, Mgr. de Merinville, proposed to open it. He chose a jury of +the most respectable inhabitants of the town, clergy and laity, to +assist. The box was unclosed, and the relic was found wrapped up, as I +have said, in the veil of Byzantine work. The veil was not unclosed, +so that they did not see the relic itself. The debris of the box was +swept away, and the relic, as it was, was put into a silver case that +had been prepared; this was locked up, and then deposited in a larger +shrine distinct from all the other relics. The <i>procès verbal</i> still +exists in the archives of Chartres giving an account of all that took +place, from which the account I have given you is taken. +</p> +<p> +Infidelity was then spreading in France, and, as you may know, a great +deal of ridicule was thrown on this relic. It was said that such a +garment was not worn in those days, that the system of dress was quite +different, and that it was absurd to imagine any article like this. +Now, as no one had seen the relic, there was no way of answering these +reproaches. In 1793, three commissioners came from the French +government, went into the sacristy, and imperiously desired to look at +the relic; it was very richly enshrined, and they intended to carry it +off. The shrine was brought to them, as the <i>procès verbal</i> of the +second examination relates, when they seemed to be seized with a +certain awe, and said, "We will not touch it; let it be opened by +priests." Two priests were ordered to open the box, and they did so. +These men had come prepared to have a good laugh, and scoffing at this +wonderful relic. For antiquarians had been saying that such inward +clothing was not known so early as the first century, but that instead +a long veil used to be wrapped round the body. +</p> +<p> +Well, they found a long piece of cloth four and a half ells in +length—exactly what had been said should be the proper garment. The +commissioners were startled and amazed, and said, "It is clear that +this is not the relic the people have imagined; perhaps it is all an +imposture." They then cut off a considerable piece and sent it to the +Abbé Barthélemy, author of the "Travels of Anacharsis" and member of +the Institute—a man who had made the customs and usages of antiquity +his study; they did not tell him where it came from, but desired him +to give an opinion of what it might be. He returned this answer: that +it must be about 2,000 years old, and that from the description given +him it appeared to be exactly like what the ladies in the East wear at +this day, and always have worn—that is, a veil which went over the +head, across the chest, and then involved the whole body, being the +first dress worn. I ask, could a verification be more complete than +this? And, recollect, it comes entirely from enemies. It was not the +bishop or clergy that sought it. The relic was in the hands of those +three infidel commissioners, who sent a portion to Paris without +saying or giving any hint of what it was (they <a name="453">{453}</a> wanted to make +out that the whole was an imposture), and the answer was returned +which I have mentioned, and which is contained in the <i>procès</i> in the +archives of the episcopal palace at Chartres. If any one wants to read +the whole history, I refer him to a most interesting book just +published by the curé of St. Sulpice (Abbé Hamon), entitled "Notre +Dame de France, ou Histoire du Culte de la Sainte Vierge en France." +The first volume, the only one out, contains the history of the +dioceses of the province of Paris. +</p> +<p> +I will proceed to a second popular charge, and it is one the +opportunity of easily verifying which may never occur again. It refers +to the head of St. John the Baptist, or, shall I say, to the three +heads of St. John the Baptist? Because, if you read English travellers +of the old stamp, like Forsyth, you will find that they make coarse +jokes about it. Forsyth, I think, says something about Cerberus; but +more gravely it has been said, that St. John must have had three +heads—one being at Amiens, one at Genoa, and another at Rome; that +at each place they are equally positive in their claims; and that +there is no way of explaining this but by supposing that St. John was +a triceps. +</p> +<p> +When we speak of a body you can easily imagine that one piece may be +in one place, another in another, a third elsewhere, and so on. That +is the common way in which we say that the bodies of saints are +multiplied; because the Church considers that the place which contains +the head or one of the larger limbs of a saint, or the part in which, +if a martyr, he was killed or received his death-wound, has the right +of keeping his festival and honoring him just as if it had the whole +body. Therefore, in cathedrals and places where festivals are held in +honor of a particular saint, where they have relics, which have +perhaps been sealed up for years, and never examined, they often speak +as if they have the entire body. This is a common practice, and if I +had time I might give you an interesting exemplification of it. +[Footnote 94] Suffice it to say, that according to travellers there +are three heads of St. John. Now as I have said, a body can be +divided, but you can hardly imagine this to be the case with a head. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 94: Since published in <i>The Month</i>, "Story of a French + Officer." (See CATH. WORLD, No. 1.)] +</p> +<p> +A very interesting old English traveller—Sir John Mandeville—went +into the East very early, and returned in 1366; soon after which, +almost as soon as any books were published, his travels appeared. He +is a very well-known writer. Of course you must not expect that +accuracy in his works which a person would now exhibit who has books +at his command and all the conveniences for travelling. He was not a +profound scholar: he believes almost whatever is told him, so what we +must do is to let him guide us as well as he can, and endeavor to +judge how far he is right. I will read you an extract, then, from Sir +John Mandeville: [Footnote 95] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 95: "Travels," chap, ix., p. 182. Ed. Bohn.] +</p> +<p> +"From thence we go up to Samaria, which is now called Sebaste; it is +the chief city of that country. There was wont to be the head of St. +John the Baptist inclosed in the wall; but the Emperor Theodosius had +it drawn out, and found it wrapped in a little cloth, all bloody; and +so he carried it to Constantinople; and the hinder part of the head is +still at Constantinople; and the fore part of the head to under the +chin, under the church of St. Silvester, where are nuns; and it is yet +all broiled, as though it were half burnt; for the Emperor Julian +above mentioned, of his wickedness and malice, burned that part with +the other bones, as may still be seen; and this thing hath been proved +both by popes and emperors. And the jaws beneath which hold to the +chin, and a part of the ashes, and the platter on which the head was +laid when it was smitten off, are at Genoa; and the Genoese make a +great feast in honor of it, and so do the Saracens also. And some men +say that the <a name="454">{454}</a> head of St. John is at Amiens in Picardy; and other +men say that it is the head of St. John the bishop. I know not which +is correct, but God knows; but however men worship it, the blessed St. +John is satisfied." +</p> +<p> +This is a true Catholic sentiment. Right or wrong, all mean to honor +St. John, and there is an end of it. We could not expect a traveller +going through the country like Sir John, not visiting every place, but +hearing one thing from one and another from another, to tell us the +exact full truth. But we have here two very important points gained. +First, we have the singular fact of the division of the head at all. +We occasionally hear of the head of a saint being at a particular +place, but seldom of a part of a head being in one place and a part in +another. Here we have an unprejudiced traveller going into the East; +he comes to the place where the head of St. John used to be kept, and +he finds there the tradition that it was divided into three parts, one +of which was at Constantinople, one at Genoa, and another at Rome. +Then he adds, "Other people say that the head is at Amiens." So much +Sir John Mandeville further informs us: he mentions the places where +it was reported the head was, telling us that it was divided into +three. +</p> +<p> +This is a statement worthy of being verified. It was made a long time +ago, and yet the tradition remains the same. It was as well believed +in the thirteenth century in the East, at Sebaste, as it is in Europe +at the present moment. +</p> +<p> +The church of S. Silvestro in Capite, which many of you remember, is a +small church on the east side of the Corso, entered by a sort of +vestibule: it has an atrium or court, with arches round, and dwellings +for the chaplains; the outer gates can be shut at night so as to +prevent completely any access to the church. The rest is an immense +building, belonging to the nuns, running out toward the Propaganda. +When the republicans in the late invasion got hold of Rome, the first +thing, of course, which they did was to turn out the monks and nuns +right and left, to make barracks; and the poor nuns of S. Silvestro +were ordered to move. The head of St. John is in a shrine which looks +very brilliant, but is poor in reality. I think it is exposed high +beyond the altar, and the nuns kept it in jealous custody in their +house. The republicans sent away the nuns in the middle of the night, +at ten or eleven o'clock, just as they were, with what clothes they +could get made into bundles: there were carriages at the door to send +them off to some other convent, without the slightest warning or +notice. The poor creatures were ordered to take up their abode in the +convent of St. Pudentiana. The only thing they thought of was their +relic, and that they carried with them. The good nuns received them +though late at night, and did what they could to give them good cheer; +they gave up one of their dormitories to them, putting themselves to +immense inconvenience. +</p> +<p> +When the French came to Rome, they found S. Silvestro so useful a +building for public purposes that they continued to hold it, but +permitted the nuns to occupy some rooms near the church. I was in Rome +while they were still at my titular church, and went to visit the nuns +attached to it. Their guests asked, "Would you not like to see our +relic of St. John?" I said, "Certainly I should; perhaps I shall never +have another opportunity." I do not suppose it had been out of their +house for hundreds of years. There is a chapel within the convent +which the nuns of St. Pudentiana consider a sacred oratory, having a +miraculous picture there, to which they are much attached; and in this +they kept the shrine. On examination I found that there was no part of +the head except the back. It is said in the extract I have read to you +that the front part of the head is at Rome; but it is the back of the +skull merely; the rest is filled up with some stuffing <a name="455">{455}</a> and silk +over it. The nuns have but a third of the head; and the assertion that +they pretend to possess the head, which travellers make, is clearly +false. I can say from my own ocular inspection that it is but the +third part—the back part, which is the most interesting, because +there the stroke of martyrdom fell. I was certainly glad of this +fortunate opportunity of verifying the relic. +</p> +<p> +Some time afterward I was at Amiens. I was very intimate with the late +bishop, and spent some days with him. One day he said to me, "Would +you wish to see our head of St. John?" "Yes," I replied, "I should +much desire it." "Well," he said, "we will wait till the afternoon; +then I will have the gates of the cathedral closed, that we may +examine it at leisure." +</p> +<p> +We dined early, and went into the chapel of the Blessed Sacrament, +where the relic was exposed, with candles. After saying prayers, it +was brought, and I had it in my hands; it was nothing but the mask, +the middle and back portions being totally wanting. You could almost +trace the expression and character of the countenance in the bony +structure. It was of the same size and color as the portion which I +had seen at St. Pudentiana; but the remarkable thing about it is that +there are stiletto marks in the face. We are told by Fathers, that +Herodias stabbed the head with a bodkin when she got it into her hand, +and here are the marks of such an operation visible. You could almost +say that you had seen him as he was alive. I have not seen the third +fragment, but I can hardly doubt that it is a portion of the same +head, and that it would comprise the parts, the chin and the jaw, +because there is no lower jaw in the front part, which is a mere mask. +The only other claimant is Genoa, and its relic I have not seen. But +this is exactly the portion allotted by Mandeville to that city. I +have, however, had the satisfaction of personally verifying two of the +relics, each of which comprises a third part of the head, leaving for +the other remainder exactly the place which our old traveller allots +to it. +</p> +<p class="cite"> + Mr. Cashel Hoey, one of our learned contributors, has kindly + furnished me with a most interesting corroboration of this account. + It is an extract from the <i>Revue Archéologique</i>, new series, Jan. + 1861, p. 36, in a paper by M. Louis Moland, entitled "Charlemagne à + Constantinople," etc., giving an account of a MS. in the library of + the Arsenal, anterior to the thirteenth century. +<br><br> + The following is the account of the relic which the emperor is + stated to have brought from Constantinople to Aix-la-Chapelle: +<br><br> + "Li empereres prist les saintuaires tot en disant ses orisons, si + les mist en eskerpes (<i>écharpes</i>) totes de drap de soie et si les + enporta molt saintement avoec lui trosqu Ais la Capele en l'eglise + Nostre Dame qu'il avoit ediflie. Là fu establis par l'apostolie (<i>Le + Pape</i>) et par les archevesques et les evesques as pelerins li grans + pardons, qui por Deu i venoient. Oiés une partie des reliques, que + li empereres ot aportées: il i fu la moitiés de la corone dont + Nostre Sires fu coronés des poignans espines. Et si i ot des claus + dont Nostre Sires fu atachiés en la crois al jor que li Jui le + crucifierent. Et si i ot de la vraie crois une pieche et del suaire + Nostre Segnor, <i>O le chemise Nostre Dame.</i>" +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="456">{456}</a> +<br> +<h2>From The Month. +<br><br> +MADAME SWETCHINE AND HER SALON.</h2> +<br> +<p> +The <i>salons</i> of Paris form a distinctive feature of French society. +Nowhere else is the same thing exactly to be found. Frenchwomen have a +peculiar gift for conversation, due in a great measure to their +graceful language, with its delicate shades of expression. We are +prone to smile at French sentimentality, or to apply their own word +<i>verbiage</i>, prefacing it with <i>unmeaning</i>. But when the epithet does +truly fit, it is because the real thing has been abused, not because +it does not exist. Conversation in France is cultivated as an art, +just the same as epistolary style: both form an important branch of +female education. When the soil is bad, the attempt at culture only +betrays more clearly native poverty; in other words, a mind of little +thought or taste becomes ridiculous in straining after the expression +of what it can neither conceive nor feel. But when a well-informed and +cultivated intelligence blossoms into keen appreciation of the +beautiful, no language so delicately as French conveys minute shades +of thought and feeling. 'Tis not repetition, then, but variety; and +when such an instrument is handled with feminine tact, perfection in +its kind is achieved. +</p> +<p> +No wonder that <i>salons</i> are exclusively French from the days of Julie +de Rambouillet down to Madame Récamier. No wonder at the influence +exercised by a woman who really has a <i>salon</i>. Few, very few, arrive +at this result. Thousands may receive; hundreds glitter in the gay +world of fashion, renowned for beauty, wit, good dressing, or good +parties; two or three at most in a century are the presiding spirits +of their social circles, and that is what constitutes having a +<i>salon</i>. No one quality alone will do it; a combination is required; +not always the same, but one or two together, whichsoever, attracting +sympathy and producing influence. Influence—the effect, not the +quality itself—can never be absent. +</p> +<p> +Strangers settling in Paris have had their <i>salon</i>; but we do not know +that they could transport it with them to any other atmosphere. Beside +Madame Récamier—whose rare beauty, joined to her goodness and her +tact, helped to form her <i>salon</i>—two other women in our day, or just +before it, have been the leading stars of their circles. Others, no +doubt, there are; but the names of these three have escaped beyond +Paris. Strange to say, two are foreigners, and both of these Russians. +Except, however, as regards country and influence, no comparison can +of course be established between the Princess Lieven and Madame +Swetchine. One sought and gained a political object; the other +accepted circumstances, and found them fame. +</p> +<p> +Madame Swetchine was already thirty-four years of age when she arrived +in Paris. She had no beauty, and no pretensions to wit; indeed, her +timidity was such that her expressions were always obscure when she +began to speak; and it was only by degrees, as she went on, that she +gathered confidence, and then her language flowed with ease, +betraying, rather than fully revealing, the deep current of thought +beneath. Still her advantages were many. As regards outward +circumstances, she possessed good birth and high position; her manners +were such as the early culture of a polished court bestows; she was +accustomed to wield a large fortune, and to hold a prominent place in +the social world. These were advantages that might be fairly set +against the absence of beauty, wondrous as is that charm: beside, her +person was not unpleasing. Though <a name="457">{457}</a> small, she was graceful in her +motions; despite little blue eyes, rather irregular, and a nose of +Calmuck form, her face wore a soft kindly expression that attracted +sympathy. Her complexion was remarkably fresh and clear. +</p> +<p> +But Madame Swetchine possessed innate qualities of heart and mind of +the rarest description, that only unfolded themselves gradually the +more closely she could be observed. Unlike mankind in general, the +better she was known, the more was she beloved and admired. Her +intelligence of richly-varied powers had been carefully cultivated; +what she acquired in youth, with the aid of masters, had been since +matured by her own unceasing study, and by reading of the most +widely-discursive character. Not only was she familiar with ancient +and modern literatures, perusing them in their originals, but she also +conversed fluently in all the languages of Europe. Her imagination, +enthusiastic and wild almost, as belongs to the north, successfully +sought for outpourings, both in music and painting. By a strange +combination, no natural quality of mind was more remarkable in Madame +Swetchine than her good sense: the only feature that shone above it +was her eminent gift of piety. +</p> +<p> +But virtues, and particularly religious virtues, proceed from the +heart quite as much as from the intelligence; often, indeed, far more +especially. Madame Swetchine possessed the warmest feelings, a nature +both loving and expansive. As daughter, wife, and friend she evinced +rare devotion; but the sentiment and thought that most filled heart +and mind was undoubtedly her love for God. +</p> +<p> +What a rich assemblage of qualities is here! how strange that they +should go to make up a Parisian woman of fashion! Such, however, in +its most usual acceptation, Madame Swetchine never was: she never +mingled in the light brilliant world; but she did form the centre of +attraction to a large circle she had her <i>salon</i>. +</p> +<p> +General Swetchine, deeply wounded by the emperor, who lent too ready +credence to unfounded reports whispered against so faithful a subject, +would not stoop to justify himself, but quitted Russia in disgust, +accompanied by his wife. When they reached Paris, in the spring of +1816, Louis XVIII. was on the throne of France. Madame Swetchine found +now restored to their high positions those friends of her youth whom +as exiles she had known and loved at St. Petersburg. Her place was +naturally amongst them; new intimacies were soon added to the old. The +Duchesse de Duras, authoress of <i>Ourika</i>, and friend of Madame de +Staël, gained a strong hold on her affections. Yet it did not seem at +first as if Madame Swetchine were destined to so much influence in +French society. Modesty made her reserved. Madame de Staël had been +invited to meet her at a small dinner-party; and Madame Swetchine, +though seated opposite, was intimidated, and allowed the meal to pass +over without speaking or scarcely raising her eyes. Afterward Madame +de Staël came up and said, "I had been told that you desired my +acquaintance; was I misinformed?" "By no means," was the reply; "but +it is customary for royalty to speak first." Such was the homage she +paid to genius. +</p> +<p> +At first it had seemed uncertain how long General and Madame Swetchine +might remain absent from Russia; but after the lapse of a few years +they took up their definite residence in Paris. Their hotel, Rue St. +Dominique, was hired on a long lease, and fitted up as a permanent +abode. They sent for their pictures and other articles from St. +Petersburg. The general occupied the ground-floor; Madame Swetchine +took the rooms above. Her apartments consisted of a <i>salon</i> and a +library commanding an extensive view of gardens. Here it was that her +friends used to assemble; not many at a time, but successively. She +never gave <i>soirées</i>, and her dinner-parties consisted of a few +intimates round a small table. Her hours for <a name="458">{458}</a> reception were +every day from three till six, and then from nine till midnight. +Debarred by her health from paying visits, she contented herself with +receiving in this manner; and for thirty years a continuous stream of +persons was for ever passing on through her rooms. She had not sought +to form it; but there was her <i>salon</i>, and one of a peculiar +character. +</p> +<p> +Two features distinguished it: the religious tone that prevailed, and +the absence of party spirit. Madame Swetchine herself was eminently +religious, and she had a large way of viewing all things. Her +influence, though partly moral and intellectual, was ever chiefly +religious; and she gave that presiding characteristic to the +atmosphere around. So long as faith and morality were not attacked, +all other points she considered secondary, and admitted the widest +diversity of opinion on them. Her own views on all subjects were +firmly held, and she expressed them with freedom. There could be no +mistake about it. In religion she was a strict Catholic, and in +philosophy Christian; in politics she preferred a liberal monarchy; +but far from seeking to give that color to her salon, she would not +allow any friend holding the same views to try to impose them on +others. This was equally the case in matters of art and taste; she +tolerated nothing exclusive; but the principle is much more difficult +to be followed out when applied to politics, which involve interests +of such magnitude, appealing to all the passions, and especially in +such an excitable atmosphere as that of Paris. Nothing better shows +Madame Swetchine's tact and gentleness of temper than her intimacies +with men of such different stamps, and the way in which she made them +to a certain extent amalgamate. But the above qualities would have +failed to do it, had their spring been a worldly one; hers flowed +truly from the Christian charity with which her whole soul was full. +In this she and her <i>salon</i> were unique. +</p> +<p> +She lived to see two great revolutions in France: the one of 1830, and +that which substituted the republic for Louis Philippe, ending with +the empire. Members of all these <i>régimes</i> were among her visitors. +Ministers of state under the Restoration, those who embraced the +Orleans cause, men belonging to the republican government, ambassadors +from most of the foreign courts in Europe; all these in turn enjoyed +her conversation, some her esteem or affection, according to the +degrees of intimacy and sympathy. Her own feelings, as well as +convictions, lay with legitimists; but others were no less welcomed, +and some of various parties were highly valued. True, however, to +religion, she never gave her friendship to men not devoted to the +interests of the Church. Her great object was to do good to souls, but +in a quiet, unostentatious, womanly way; gently leading to virtue, +never inculcating it. This of course became more exclusively her +province as she grew older. +</p> +<p> +She was truly liberal in all her sentiments; not assuredly from +indifference, but through a large philosophy of spirit that allowed +for diversities of opinion in all things not essential. At the same +time her own convictions were unflinchingly avowed, as well as her +ideas and tastes in smaller matters. +</p> +<p> +The men with whom she was most intimate have all more or less been +known to fame, and are eminent also for their religious spirit. We +might begin a list with Monsieur de Maistre at St. Petersburg, when +she was but twenty-five; then following her to Paris, see her make +acquaintance with his friend Monsieur de Bonald; exercise maternal +influence over MM. de Falloux, de Montalembert, and Lacordaire; and +finally wind up with Donoso Cortès, the Marquis de Valdegamas, Prince +Albert de Broglie, and Alexis de Tocqueville. +</p> +<p> +Each one of the distinguished personages above has figured prominently +on the great stage, more or less renowned in politics and letters, and +<a name="459">{459}</a> always holding a high moral character. It may seem fastidious to +recall their titles to fame. In our day, when all are acquainted with +continental literature, who is not familiar with the witty author of +the <i>Soirées de St. Pétersbourg</i>, although it be permitted somewhat to +ignore the rather dry philosophical works of his friend de Bonald? +Monsieur de Falloux, with filial love, has raised a monument to Madame +Swetchine that will endure beside his life of Pope Pius V., and +jointly with the remembrance of his political integrity. Who that has +followed the late history of Europe does not know Donoso Cortès, the +great orator, whose famous three discourses in the Spanish chambers +instantaneously reached so far and wide, whose written style is the +very music of that rich Castilian idiom, and whose liberal political +views kept pace with his large Catholic heart? Soeur Rosalie and +Madame Swetchine together soothed his dying hours. The author of <i>La +Démocratic en Amérique</i> has been indiscreetly praised, but none can +deny his ability, Prince Albert de Broglie, <i>doctrinaire</i> in his +views, still advocates with talent the cause of religion and of +constitutional monarchy. These two latter were among the latest +acquisitions to Madame Swetchine's salon. +</p> +<p> +MM. de Montalembert and de Falloux were like her sons; she knew them +from their early manhood, called them by their Christian names, loved +and counselled them as any mother might. But if her influence over +them was so salutary, we cannot help admiring most the unswerving +attachment of these young men to her; Madame Swetchine's letters show +her expostulating with Comte de Montalembert, then little past twenty, +and endeavoring to convince him he is wrong. He will not yield; but +acknowledges afterward the justness of her views, and allows now these +letters to be published. Alfred de Falloux is <i>the son</i> sent for when +danger seems impending; he tends her dying couch in that same <i>salon</i> +where he had so often and for so many years <i>walked</i> with her +conversing; to him she confides her papers and last wishes. +</p> +<p> +The celebrated Père Lacordaire was very dear to her; and she certainly +acted the part of a mother toward him. Monsieur de Montalembert +presented him to her when Abbé Lacordaire was but twenty-eight, and +quite unknown. His genius—which she immediately discerned—and his +ardent soul interested her wonderfully. Soon after he became +connected, through Abbé de Lamennais, with the journal <i>L'Avenir;</i> by +his own generous and oft-repeated avowal she kept him from any +deviation at this trying moment. "You appeared to me as the angel of +the Lord," writes he, "to a soul floating between life and death, +between earth and heaven." +</p> +<p> +Nor was this the only time. Her letters show her following him with +breathless interest through his chequered career, and assuring him of +her warm undying friendship, "so long as he remains faithful to God +and his Church." +</p> +<p> +And this was a beautiful affection, whichever side we view it. For +more than twenty years it lasted; that is, for the rest of her life. +The ardent young man is seen with the erratic impulses of his glowing +intellect, yet docile to the motherly admonitions of his old friend; +and by degrees, as time mellows him somewhat—though it never could +subdue nature altogether—he sinks into a calmer strain, still asking +advice, and taking it, with language more respectful, though not a +whit less tender. Madame Swetchine brought to bear on him a species of +idolatry; she admired his genius to excess, and loved his fine nature +as any doting parent might; but these sentiments never rendered her +blind to his faults; and she constantly blended reproof with +admiration, while strenuously endeavoring to keep him ever in the most +perfect path. She had the satisfaction of seeing him, ere she departed +this life, safely anchored in a religious order, and the Dominicans +fairly re-established in France; one of her pre-occupations on her +death-bed, after bidding him adieu, was to secure <a name="460">{460}</a> that his +letters should be one day given to the public. For thus she knew he +would be better appreciated. +</p> +<p> +Other names of men well-known in the Parisian world of letters, or for +their deeds of charity, might here be added as having adorned her +<i>salon</i>. There was the Vicomte de Melun, connected with every good +work (literary or other) in the French capital; and her two relatives, +Prince Augustin Galitzin and Prince (afterward Père) Gagarin. The +former still writes; the latter, erst a gay man of fashion and then +metamorphosed into a zealous Jesuit, is now devoting his missionary +labors to Syria. +</p> +<p> +And lastly may be named one who, though he never mingled in the world +of her <i>salon</i>, yet visited Madame Swetchine and esteemed her greatly. +Père de Ravignan presided at one time in her house over meetings of +charitable ladies, who were afterward united with the Enfants de Marie +at the convent of the Sacré Coeur. +</p> +<p> +Nor were her friendships exclusively confined to men. Madame Swetchine +had not that foible into which many superior women fall of affecting +to despise their own sex; and which always shows that they innately, +unconsciously often, separate their individual selves from all the +rest of womankind as alone superior to it. Hers was a larger view: she +loved <i>souls</i>; and "souls," says one of her aphorisms, "have neither +age nor sex." When shall we in general begin to live here as we are to +do for ever hereafter? +</p> +<p> +She had had her early friendships in Russia, and most passionate they +were; too girlish in their romantic enthusiasm, too wordily tender in +expression; but time mellowed these affections, without wearing them +out. The two principal women-friends of her youth in Russia, after her +sister, were Roxandre Stourdja, a Greek by birth, afterward Comtesse +Edlinz, and the Comtesse de Nesselrode. Both of these in later years +visited her Paris salon. But she also formed several new French +intimacies. Her grief for the loss of Madame de Duras, when death +deprived her of that friend, was a little softened by her warm +sympathy for the two daughters left, Mesdames de Rauzan and de la +Rochejacquelain. If she saw most of the former, the latter had for +Madame Swetchine a second tie through her early marriage with a +grandson of the Princesse de Tarente, whom Madame Swetchine had so +revered in her girlish days at St. Petersburg. Both the Duchesse de +Rauzan and Comtesse de la Rochejacquelain were very beautiful; and +Madame Swetchine dearly loved beauty, especially when combined, as in +them, with grace and elegance, cleverness and piety. For both the +sisters were remarkable: one had more fascinating softness united with +good sense; the other was more witty and brilliant. The last +country-house visited by Madame Swetchine shortly before her death was +the chateau de Fleury, belonging to Madame de la Rochejacquelain, +where we read that she loved to find still mementos of the Princesse +de Tarente. +</p> +<p> +Madame Swetchine was very intimate with Madame Récamier, her +fellow-star as leader of a contemporary <i>salon</i>. She greatly prized +her worth. Another friend much loved was the Comtesse de Gontant +Biron, in youth eminent for her beauty, and always for her many +virtues. Among younger women distinguished by Madame Swetchine were +Mrs. Craven, née la Ferronaye; the Princess Wittgenstein, lovely as +clever, a Russian by birth, and a convert to the Catholic Church; and +quite at the last period, the Duchess of Hamilton. +</p> +<p> +She was always partial to youth, taking a warm interest in anything +that might minister to the welfare or pleasures of that age. Thus she +liked the young women of her acquaintance to be well dressed, and +would admire their taste or try to improve it, even in that respect, +with perfectly motherly solicitude. Those going to balls frequently +stopped on their way to show their toilettes to Madame Swetchine; and +not seldom, too, they would <a name="461">{461}</a> return in the morning to ask advice +on graver matters, or to display the progress of their children. The +good Madame Swetchine did to persons of the world by quiet friendly +counsel is incalculable; she never spared the truth when she thought +it could be of use, and as she had great perspicacity, she was not +often deceived. Beside, her natural penetration became yet keener, not +only by long experience, but also by the numerous confidences she +received from the many souls in a measure laid bare before her. M. de +Falloux has well said that she "possessed the science of souls, as +<i>savants</i> do that of bodies." However one might be pained at what she +said, it was impossible to feel wounded; her manner was so kind, and +her rectitude of intention so evident. And thus did she render her +<i>salon</i> useful: living in public, as it might appear, surrounded +chiefly by the great ones of earth, her thought was yet ever with God, +and she positively worked for him day by day without even quitting +those few rooms. Nay, so completely is Madame Swetchine identified +with her <i>salon</i> for those who knew her through any part of the thirty +years spent in Paris, that it is difficult for our idea to separate +her from it. +</p> +<p> +Even materially speaking she seldom left it. With a simplicity that +seems strange indeed to our English notions, she caused her little +iron bedstead to be set up every night in one of her reception-rooms; +each morning it was doubled up again and consigned to a closet. During +her last illness it was just the same; she lay in her <i>salon</i>, the +only difference being that then the bed remained permanently. Not an +iota else was changed in the aspect of her apartment; no table was +near the sick-couch with glass or cup ready to hand; what she wanted +in this way she signed for to a deaf-and-dumb attendant, Parisse, +whose grateful eyes were ever fixed upon her benefactress, to divine +or anticipate what might be wished. And there, too, she died. +</p> +<p> +To us with our exclusive family feelings, or indeed to the general +human sentiment that courts the utmost privacy for that solemn closing +scene, there is something which jars in the account of Madame +Swetchine's last days on earth. Doubtless all the consolations of +religion were there to hallow her dying moments; she continued to the +last to devote long hours to prayer; and by an enviable privilege she +possessed a domestic chapel blessed with the perpetual presence of the +Blessed Sacrament; but what strikes us strangely is, that her <i>salon</i> +had chanced to remain open while extreme unction was being +administered; and so, as it was her usual reception hour, the few +friends in Paris at that season (September) continued to drop in one +by one, and kneeling, each new-comer behind the other, prayed with and +for her. Those last visitors were Père Chocarn, prior of the +Dominicans; Père Gagarin; Mesdames Fredro, de Meyendorf, and Craven; +Messieurs de Broglie, de Falloux, de Melun, and Zermolof. But the +<i>strange</i> feeling we cannot help experiencing must be reasoned with. +Her <i>salon</i> and her friends were to Madame Swetchine home and family. +</p> +<p> +And now it might seem that nothing more could be said of her; but, in +truth, a very small portion has yet been expressed. Beside the six +hours devoted to reception, the day counted eighteen more. There were +religious duties to be performed, and home duties no less imperative; +there were the poor to be visited, and there were the claims of study, +which Madame Swetchine never neglected up to the latest period of +existence. All these calls upon her time were recognized by +conscience, and therefore duly responded to. Madame Swetchine was, of +course, an early riser; by eight or nine o'clock she had heard mass, +visited her poor, and was ready to commence the business of the day. +</p> +<p> +After breakfast, an hour or two were devoted to General Swetchine, who +liked her to read to him. During the <a name="462">{462}</a> last fifteen years of his +life, and his death only preceded hers seven years, he had become so +deaf as to enjoy general society but little; but he would not allow +her to give up her receptions on that account, as she wished to do. +The rest of the morning was employed in study with strictly closed +doors, only opened to cases of misfortune, and these Madame Swetchine +never considered as intrusions. Her confidential servant knew it well, +and did not scruple to disturb her when real want or sorrow begged for +admittance. Her persevering love of study is well illustrated by her +own assurance, but a few months before her death, that even then she +never sat down to her writing-table without "feeling her heart beat +with joy." She advised Mrs. Craven always to reserve a few morning +hours for study, saying the quality of time was different at that +period of day. +</p> +<p> +Several hours in the evening were again spent with the general. At +midnight, when all visitors departed, Madame Swetchine retired to +rest; but her repose never lasted much beyond two in the morning. +Painful infirmities made her suffer all day long, and at night +debarred her from sleep. Motion alone brought comparative ease, and +therefore it was that, with intimate friends, she carried on +conversation walking up and down her rooms. At night, suffocation +increased, as also a nervous kind of excitement. It was at these +hours, during the intervals snatched from pain, that she mostly +composed the writings which M. de Falloux has given to the world. No +wonder that they bear the impress of the cross; nor can we marvel that +she speaks feelingly and scientifically of resignation, for good need +had she to practise that. Such were usually her twenty-four hours in +Paris. +</p> +<p> +If we look back to the past, religion had not always been the guiding +principle with Madame Swetchine. Her father, M. Soymonof, was a +disciple of Voltaire, and he brought her up without any pious +training. She never even repeated morning or evening prayers; simply +attended the imperial chapel as a matter of course. But Voltaire did +not excite her admiration; his infidelity was too cold, his immorality +too coarse; it was Rousseau who charmed her. His passionate language +pleased her imagination, and the pages of <i>La Nouvelle Héloise</i> were +almost entirely transcribed, to be again and again dwelt on. She could +not detect the sophistry beneath. But the first deep sorrow of her +youth taught her prayer, and brought her to the feet of God, never to +abandon him. M. Soymonof was suddenly snatched from his children by +death, and Madame Swetchine, the anguish of this bereavement, turned +to heaven for help and consolation. Another sorrow, the nature of +which we ignore, overtook her at this period; and, to use her own +expression, she "threw herself then into the arms of God with such +enthusiasm as naught else ever awakened." +</p> +<p> +The first effect was to render her a fervent adherent of Russian +orthodoxy; but her mind was too philosophic to rest long satisfied +with half conclusions. She was struck with the piety of French +Catholics at St. Petersburg; especially the modest merit of the +Chevalier d'Augard won her highest esteem. Finally, after much +voluminous study, and despite the resistance her rebellious spirit +loved to oppose to what she at first called M. de Maistre's "dogmatic +absolutism," she entered the Catholic Church. +</p> +<p> +The absurd idea that religion renders the heart cold has been too +often refuted to need any comment here. But it may be said that Madame +Swetchine affords another example of how much devotion, by purifying +human feeling, intensifies it also. God had given her a loving nature; +and as her piety deepens with years, so does her tender affection for +family ties, for friends, country, and finally for all the poor, +suffering, helpless ones of earth. Her first great attachment was for +her father, and so her first great sorrow was at his loss; for thus +intimately <a name="463">{463}</a> are love and pain ever conjoined in this world. +Another deep affection of childhood and early youth, extending through +life, was for her sister. Madame Swetchine was quite a mother to this +child, ten years her junior. When she married, she still kept her with +her; and when the young sister also married, becoming the wife of +Prince Gagarin, Madame Swetchine became a mother also to the five boys +who were successively brought into the world. "They are all my +nephews," would she say; "but the two eldest are especially my +children." And well did they respond to the feelings of their aunt, +scarcely separating her from their own parent. When she shut herself +up for study, it was their amusement to try and get her out to play +with them; if she remained deaf to entreaties, the little boys would +besiege her door, making deafening noises with their playthings, until +she mostly yielded and let them in. A very short time before her +death, when Madame Swetchine could hardly sit or speak, she assembled +a large family party of young nephews and nieces, with their +preceptors and governesses, to dine at her house, and was greatly +diverted with their innocent mirth. +</p> +<p> +There is something disappointing in Madame Swetchine's marriage. The +favor enjoyed by Monsieur Soymonof at court, her own position as +maid-of-honor to the Empress Marie, her birth, fortune, extreme youth, +and many individual qualifications, all alike rendered her a fitting +match for any man in the empire. She certainly could have chosen. +Several asked her hand. Amongst them was Count Strogonof, young, rich, +noble, and talented. But Monsieur Soymonof preferred his own friend +General Swetchine; and Sophie, we are told, accepted with affectionate +deference her father's choice. The general was twenty-five years her +senior, and though a fine military-looking man, with noble +soldier-like feelings, scrupulously honorable, and with much to win +esteem, yet he does not appear the sort of person suited to her ardent +enthusiastic temperament. He possessed qualities fitted to command the +respect of a young wife; but not exactly those that win her to +admiration and love. Wherever honor was not concerned, he lapsed into +his natural apathy: neither intellect nor imagination were by any +means on a par with hers. And the girl of seventeen who prematurely +linked her fate with his was full of romance: nurtured as she had been +by a fond ill-judging father, with Rousseau to guide her opening +thought, her early dreams probably had fed on some chivalrous St. +Preux with whom to course the stream of life. Perhaps she was dreaming +of wedding some stern military personification of the same. What an +awakening there must have been! Was this the second deep sorrow that +clouded her nineteenth summer? Was there a struggle then? Then did she +"fling herself into the arms of God" victorious. +</p> +<p> +There is no clue to trace aught of this save that which guides to the +usual windings of the human heart. Madame Swetchine was far too nice +in her sense of duty, and far too delicate in feeling, to allow any +such admissions to escape. +</p> +<p> +The devotion of a life-time was given unreservedly to General +Swetchine. She never knew the happiness of becoming a mother, the tie +that would of all others have been dearest to her heart. But the +general had bestowed paternal affection on a young girl called Nadine +Staeline, and Madame Swetchine also generously insisted on adopting +her. Nadine, welcomed to their roof, was treated by Madame Swetchine +like her own child. +</p> +<p> +Her attentions to the general continued unremitting. When he quitted +Russia, she accompanied him to Paris; when he was summoned to return, +though condemned to banishment from St. Petersburg and Moscow, she +profited by the respite gained to go alone in her old age and +infirmity to plead his cause herself with the emperor. Nor did she +complain of the illness in Russia that followed such fatigue, for +<a name="464">{464}</a> her suit was granted. Still less did she regret the yet more +serious malady that overtook her on returning to Paris with the glad +tidings that brought such relief to his declining years. He lived to +the age of ninety-two, and her grief at his loss was intense. Then +indeed it was the long companion of a life-time that was taken from +her; and we all know the tender attachment that strengthens with years +between two persons who pass them together, and mutually esteem each +other. +</p> +<p> +The general, on his part, always showed Madame Swetchine affection +that had gradually become mixed up with a species of veneration. +Though he never thwarted her religious views, he did not himself +embrace them; he liked to see her Catholic friends, even priests, and +especially Père de Ravignan; but remained satisfied with the Greek +Church. Beside her duties as a wife, we have seen Madame Swetchine +embrace those of a mother toward young Nadine. She never slackened in +them until Nadine by her marriage ceased to require their exercise. +Then she contrived to gratify her maternal instincts by undertaking +the charge of Helene de Nesselrode, the daughter of her friend, just +aged fourteen, and whose health demanded a warmer climate than that of +Russia. Nor did she give her up till Helene married. +</p> +<p> +Faithful to all the sentiments she experienced, and warm in her +friendships, Madame Swetchine's most enthusiastic attachment appears +to have been for Mademoiselle Stourdja. It dated from her early +married life, and continued through the whole of existence. At first +it well-nigh provokes a smile to see how, scarcely parted for a few +hours from her friend, she rushes to her pen, that it may express the +pangs of separation. But girlhood has not passed over, ere thought, +reason, duty, figure largely in the letters of Madame Swetchine. Her +correspondence was extensive, and portrays herself just as she +appeared in daily life—a wise, gentle, and affectionate friend or +counsellor, as circumstances might dictate. Nowhere does this show her +to greater advantage than in the letters—too few, unfortunately—that +we possess from Madame Swetchine to Père Lacordaire. The difference +between the two minds is striking. Her good sense and exquisite +judgment contrast with his fiery impetuosity of thought and feeling; +it is evident that her soul moves in the serene atmosphere of near +union with God; while he, the religious of already some years' +standing, is yet battling with strong human torrents. How gently she +calls him up a higher path, never forgetting her womanhood nor his +priestly character. His tone becomes much more religious; with rare +candor and simplicity he sees and owns past imperfections. +</p> +<p> +Patriotism was one of her ardent sentiments, and she considered the +feeling as a duty incumbent on women no less than men: of course, +conduct was to be in accordance. Like many Russians, love of country +centred for her in devotion to the sovereign; and of this her letters +afford curious exemplification. She calls Alexander "the hero of +humanity," and, after enumerating his many perfections, rejoices that +this young sage is our emperor! When her husband was harshly summoned +back to Russia, that the disgrace of exile from court might be +inflicted, she exclaims: "God knows that I have never uttered a word +of complaint against my sovereigns, nor so much as blamed them in +heart!" Strange loyalty this to our modern western notions! +</p> +<p> +Her tender charity toward the poor began to show itself at an early +age. At twenty-five in St. Petersburg she was already the soul of all +good works there: nor did she content herself with merely giving alms, +nor even with seeking to promote moral improvement; her ingenious +kindness displayed itself also in endeavouring to procure pleasure or +innocent amusements. She took flowers to those she visited, or tried +to adorn their rooms with pictures. The <a name="465">{465}</a> friendless deaf-and-dumb +girl whom she had adopted became her constant attendant; and Madame +Swetchine bore with her violence of temper until the defect was partly +overcome. +</p> +<p> +She undertook the charge of a poor boy at Vichy, because his many +maladies and their repulsive nature rendered him an object almost of +disgust. Each summer that she returned there, he was among the first +to greet her, sure of the kindest welcome. For years all his wants +were supplied at her expense; and when he died, she said he had now +become her benefactor. +</p> +<p> +To know Madame Swetchine thoroughly, her writings must be read. They +were never meant for publication, but are either self-communings, or +thoughts poured out before God. Some of her aphorisms are touchingly +delicate in sentiment. +</p> +<p> +"Loving hearts are like paupers; they live on what is given them." +</p> +<p> +"Our alms form our sole riches, and what we withhold constitutes our +real poverty." +</p> +<p> +Her prayers and meditations may be used with advantage for spiritual +reading. Her unfinished treatise on Old Age is very beautiful; but +more exquisite still is that more complete one on Resignation. Any +passage chosen at random would show elevated thought. +</p> +<p> +"The first degree of submission produces respectful acquiescence to +God's will; then this sentiment becomes transformed into a pious and +sincere acceptation full of confidence; until confidence itself +gradually acquires a filial character." +</p> +<p> +"Faith," she says, "makes resignation reasonable, and hope renders it +easy." +</p> +<p> +"The love of God draws us away from our long love of self." +</p> +<p> +"Patience is so near to resignation, that it often seems one and the +same thing." +</p> +<p> +She acknowledges that the hardest trials of resignation are found in +those misfortunes irreparable here on earth. Such are death, old age, +physical infirmity, loss of worldly honor, final impenitence. But the +death of those we love, she says, may be deeply mourned in the midst +of resignation; and our own certain death affords not only a +counterbalance to such affliction, but also to the other evils of +life. Old age is a halt between the world overcome, and eternity about +to begin. Physical infirmities make us live in the atmosphere of the +gospel beatitudes; we are then truly the poor ones of Christ, or +rather poverty itself. The world sometimes forgets, but never pardons; +what matters, provided virtue remain unscathed, or that it be restored +through repentance? +</p> +<p> +"Suffering teaches us how to suffer; suffering teaches us how to live; +suffering teaches us how to die." +</p> +<p> +And here we take our leave of this remarkable woman, who offers such a +bright example to our generation. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="466">{466}</a> +<br> +<h2>From The Dublin Review. +<br><br> +RECENT IRISH POETRY.</h2> +<br> +<p> +<i>Lays of the Western Gael and other Poems</i>. By SAMUEL FERGUSON. +London: Bell & Daldy. 1865. +</p> +<br> +<p> +<i>Poems</i>. By SPERANZA (LADY WILDE). Dublin: Duffy. 1864. +</p> +<br> +<p> +<i>Laurence Bloomfield in Ireland</i>. A modern Poem. By WILLIAM ALLINGHAM. +London: Macmillan & Co. 1864. +</p> +<br> +<p> +<i>Inisfail, a Lyrical Chronicle of Ireland</i>. By AUBREY DE VERE. Dublin: +Duffy. 1864. +</p> +<br> +<p> +In the palmy days of Young Ireland, its writers and speakers were +particularly prone to the quotation of that strange saying of Fletcher +of Saltoun: "If a man were permitted to make all the ballads, he need +not care who should make the laws of a country." It has been the +destiny of Young Ireland to make and to administer the laws of other +countries than that for which its hot youth hoped to legislate. But it +has certainly left Ireland a legacy of excellent ballads. A glance at +the fortunes of some of the more prominent members of this brilliant +but ill-fated party, as they present themselves to view at this +moment, suggests curious contrasts and strange reflections. Mr. Gavan +Duffy, who was assuredly the source of its noblest and wisest +inspirations, after having within ten years occupied high office in +three Victorian ministries, and laid the impress of his organizing +genius deep on the constitutional foundations of that most rising of +the Australian states, is on his way home from Melbourne for a brief +European vacation. Mr. John Mitchel, [Footnote 96] who represented +the more violent and revolutionary section of Young Ireland, was, +before the American war commenced, editor of the <i>Richmond Enquirer</i>, +one of the most extreme organs of secession, and afterward visited +Paris with the hope of inducing the Emperor Napoleon to invade +Ireland; but since the war was declared, he has resumed his post at +Richmond—sometimes writing articles that are supposed more +particularly to forecast President Davis's policy; sometimes serving +in the ranks of General Lee's army as the driver of an ambulance +wagon. His eldest son fired the first shot that struck Fort Sumter, +and afterward was himself struck at the heart in its command by a +northern bullet. Mitchel's favorite lieutenant, Devin Reilly, on the +other hand, died in office at Washington, and his illness was +attributed at the time to over-fatigue in one of the earliest of those +great electioneering contests in which the supremacy of Mr. Lincoln +finally came to be established over Mr. Stephen Douglas, "the little +giant of the west," and the only man, in Mr. Reilly's ardent +conviction, who could have saved the American Union. Mr. D'Arcy McGee, +whose character bore to that of Devin Reilly about the same relation +as Mr. Duffy's did to that of Mr. Mitchel, is at present a leading +member of the executive council of Canada, and (the Duke of Newcastle +was of opinion) the ablest statesman of British America; in proof of +which it may suffice to say, that the project of the Canadian +confederation was in a great degree originated and elaborated by him. +The handsome young orator, whose fiery eloquence surpassed in its +influence on an Irish audience in the Rotunda even the most brilliant +effects of Sheil at the old Catholic Association, is now to be +recognized in a bronzed and war-worn soldier, under <a name="467">{467}</a> the style +and title of Major-General Thomas Francis Meagher, of the United +States army, commanding a division, which, after Sherman commenced his +marvellous march on Savannah, was sent forward to hold the southern +section of Tennessee, and was last heard of in camp at Chattanooga. +One of this orator's favorite disciples, Eugene O'Reilly, holds an +equivalent rank; but his line of service has lain not in America, but +in Asia—his allegiance is not to the President Abraham Lincoln, but +to the Sultan Abdul Aziz; he is known to all true believers under the +style of O'Reilly Bey, one of the earliest of the Christian officers +who took rank under the Hatti Hamayoun; and his sword's avenging +justice was freely felt among the Mohammedan mob who horrified +Christendom five years ago by the massacres of Syria. What region of +the earth is not full of the labors of this party, sect, and school of +all the Irish talents, of whom may well be sung the antique Milesian +elegy, to which their prophet and guide gave words that complain "they +have left but few heirs of their company?" [Footnote 97] The rabid +violence and the underbred vulgarity of style which belong to so many +of the Irish Nationalist party of the present day, are all unlike even +the errors of Young Ireland. That party, though it tragically failed +in fulfilling its hopes at home, has at all events justified its +ambition abroad; and it was always and everywhere singularly true to +its ideas. Scattered as it is, broken, and often apparently divided +against itself, its members have not failed to yield loyal, valiant, +and signal service to whatever cause they espoused or country they +adopted. Its poets have had a principal hand in framing the +constitutions of states manifestly destined to future greatness. Its +orators have led forlorn hopes against fearful odds; and, whether in +the marshes of the Chickahominy or in Syrian defiles, have not known +how to show their backs to the enemy. It would be easy to trace over a +far wider range the fortunes of its members since the great emigration +that scattered them in the years that followed their catastrophe in +'48. It is possible any day to find a Young Irelander, who at a more +or less brief period after Ballingarry <i>abiit, evasit, erupit</i>, in the +red baggy breeches of the Zouave, or in judicial crimson and ermine at +the antipodes; in the black robe of a Passionist father or the silk +gown of a queen's counsel; surveying a railroad in Dakotah, or +organizing brigands in Sicily; helping in some subordinate way the +Emperor Maximilian to found the Mexican empire, or on the high road to +make himself a Yellow Button at Peking. As for American generals north +and south, and colonial law-givers east and west, their names are +legion and the legion's name very much begins with Mac or O'. May they +make war and law to good advantage! It was not given to them to make +either for Ireland; but, if Fletcher of Saltoun was a wise man in his +generation, they in theirs have left their country a far more precious +heritage. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 96: Our American readers need hardly be reminded that some + of the biographical statements which follow are very wide of the + truth.—Ed. C. W.] +<br><br> + [Footnote 97: <i>As truagh gan oidir 'n-a bh-farradk</i>—literally, + "What a pity that there is no heir of their company." See the + "Lament for the Milesians," in "The Poems of Thomas Davis." Dublin: + Duffy.] +</p> +<p> +Irish poetry certainly existed before Young Ireland, and was even +considered, like oratory, to be a quality naturally and easily +indigenous to the Irish genius. Moore had not unworthily sustained the +reputation of his country in an age of great poets; and it was Moore's +own avowed belief that his "Irish Melodies" were the very flowering of +his inspiration, and were indeed alone warranted to preserve his fame +to future ages. But neither Moore, nor any other poet of Irish birth, +had attempted to give to the Irish that poetry "racy of the soil," +wherein every image and syllable smacks of their own native +nationality, which Burns and Scott, and a host of minor poets, had +created for the Scotch. This is the work which Young Ireland +deliberately and avowedly attempted, and in which it has assuredly +succeeded. When the effort was first made, it is <a name="468">{468}</a> told that +several of the writers who afterward wrote what, in its order of +ballad poetry, is unexcelled in the language—and notably Mr. Davis +were quite unaware of any possession of the poetic faculty, and took +to the task as a boy takes to his tale of Latin spondees and dactyls +at college. But the stream was in the rock, and when the rock was +tapped the stream flowed. In the course of less than a year "The +Spirit of the <i>Nation</i>" was published, in which, with much undeniable +rubbish, there appeared a number of ballads and songs that won the +admiration of all good critics; and to which the far more important +testimony of their popular acceptance is still given in the form of +continuously recurring and increasing editions. A Scotch publisher— +Mr. Griffin, of Glasgow—ten years ago had heard such accounts of this +curious flood-tide of Irish verse, that he thought it might be a safe +speculation to try whether, despite its politics, it might not make +its way in the British market. The edition was very soon exhausted, +and the book is now, we believe, out of print. These facts are of even +more value than the high opinion which so experienced and accomplished +a critic as Lord Jeffrey expressed about the same time of the poetic +gifts of Davis and Duffy; for by universal consent the test of sale +loses all its vulgarity when applied to that most ethereal compound of +the human intellect, poetry. The poet is born, and not made, according +to Horace; but in so far as he is made anything by man, it is by +process of universal suffrage over the counter. Gradual, growing, +general recognition, testified by many editions, at last, in the +course of thirty years, establishes the irrefragable position of a +Tennyson; against which a Tupper, long struggling, in the end finds +his level, and lines trunks. +</p> +<p> +Much of the poetry of this time was, consciously or unconsciously, +mimetic—mainly of Sir Walter Scott and of Lord Macaulay, whose "Lays +of Ancient Rome" had recently been published. Scott, indeed, more +distinctly suggested the elements out of which the Young Ireland +poetry grew. Burns wrote in a peculiar provincial dialect, and with +the exception of a few glorious lyrics, which will occur to every +reader's recollection, he wrote for a district and for a class. But in +Scott's mind all the elements of the Scottish nationality were equally +confluent and homogeneous—the Highlander, the Lowlander, and the +Islander; the Celt, the Saxon, and the Dane; the laird, the presbyter, +and the peasant; and his imagination equally vivified all times—from +those of the Varangians at Constantinople to those of the Jacobites at +Culloden. But in Ireland there was no formed dialect like the Lowland +Scotch, with a settled vocabulary and a concrete form. The language of +the peasantry in many parts of the country was the same sort of base +English that a foreigner speaks—scanty in its range of words, +ill-articulated and aspirated, loose in the use of the liquid letters, +formed according to alien idioms, and flavored with alien expletives. +The language of the best of the ballads of the peasantry was that of a +period in which the people still thought in Irish, and expressed +themselves in broken English, uttered with the deep and somewhat +guttural tones of the Celt, and garnished now and then with the more +racy epithets, or endearments, or shibboleths, of their native speech. +For a time the example of Lord Macaulay's ballad poetry prevailed, +with its long rolling metre, its picturesque nomenclature, its +contrasts rather rhetorical than poetical. It was possible to describe +that decisive charge of the Irish brigade at Fontenoy, which Mr. +Carlyle treats as a mere myth, in strains which instantly suggest +those of the "Battle of Ivry." And so did Davis in a very memorable +ballad; but the likeness was mainly in the measure, and Lord Macaulay +had no copyright in lines of fourteen feet. The poem itself was Irish +to the manor born; and, it might be pleaded, was only as like the +verse of Lord Macaulay as the prose of Lord Macaulay is like the prose +of Edmund Burke. <a name="469">{469}</a> Beyond this task-work, however, which, although +very ingeniously and fluently done, was still as much task-work as +college themes, there arose a difficulty and a hope. Was it possible +to transfuse the peculiar spirit of the Irish native poetry into the +English tongue? The researches of the Archaeological Society were at +this time rapidly disentombing the long-hidden historical and poetical +treasures of the Irish language. Many of these had been translated by +Clarence Mangan, in a style which did not pretend to be literally +faithful, but which so expanded, illustrated, and harmonized the +original that the poem, while losing none of its idiosyncrasy, gained +in every quality of grace, freedom, and force. The rich, the sometimes +redundant array of epithets, the mobile, passionate transitions, the +tender and melancholy spirit of veneration for a vanishing +civilization, for perishing houses, scattering clans, and a persecuted +Church—some even of the more graceful of the idioms and more musical +of the metres—might surely be naturalized in the English language; +and so an Irish poetical dialect be absolutely invented in the middle +of the nineteenth century. It was known how an Irish peasant spoke +broken English, and put it into rhyme that did not want a strange wild +melody, that was to more finished and scholarly verse as the flavor of +<i>poteen</i> is to the flavor of Burgundy. But how would an Irish bard, +drawing his inspiration from the primeval Ossianic sources, and +thinking in the true ecstatic spirit of the Irish muse, speak, if he +were condemned to speak, in the speech of the Saxon? This was the bold +conception; and no one who is familiar with the poetry of Ireland +during the last twenty years, will deny that it has been in great part +fulfilled. +</p> +<p> +The poet to whom its execution is especially due can hardly be called +a Young Irelander in the political sense of the word. But Young +Ireland was a literary school as well as a political sect; and any one +who remembers, or may read, Mr. Ferguson's wonderful "Lament for +Thomas Davis," which it is to be greatly regretted he has not included +in the present edition of his poems, will recognize the strong +elective affinities which attached him to their action and influence. +As it is, this volume is by far the most remarkable recent +contribution of the Irish poetical genius to English literature. Mr. +Ferguson has accomplished the problem of conveying the absolute spirit +of Irish poetry into English verse, and he has done so under the most +difficult conceivable conditions—for he prefers a certain simple and +unluxuriant structure in the plan of his poems, and he uses in their +composition the most strictly Saxon words he can find. But all the +accessories and figures, and still more a certain weird melody in the +rhythm that reminds the ear of the wild grace of the native music, +indicate at every turn what Mr. Froude has half-reproachfully called +"the subtle spell of the Irish mind." It is not surprising to find +even careful and accomplished English critics unable to reach to the +essential meaning of this poetry, which, to many, evidently appears as +bald as the style of Burns first seemed to southron eyes when he +became the fashion at Edinburgh eighty years ago. And yet to master +the dialect of Burns is at least as difficult as to master the dialect +of Chaucer, while Mr. Ferguson rarely uses a word that would not be +passed by Swift or Defoe. Before one of the most beautiful, simple, +and graceful of his later poems a recent critic paused, evidently +dismayed by the introduction, of which, however, not willing to +dispute the beauty, he quoted a few lines. It was an old Irish legend, +versified with surpassing grace and spirit, of which this is the +argument. Fergus MacRoy, king of Ulster in the old pagan times, was a +very good king of his kind. He loved his people and they loved him. He +was handsome, and strong, and tall. He bore himself well in war and in +the chase. He drank with discretion. <a name="470">{470}</a> Nevertheless his life had +two troubles. He did not love the law; and he did love a widow. To +listen as chief justiciary to the causes, of which a constant crop +sprang up at Emania, tares and corn thickly set together, troubled him +sorely. To make verses to the widow, on the other hand, came as easy +as sipping usquebaugh or metheglin. He proposed, and though a king was +refused; but not discouraged, pressed his suit again and again. And at +last Nessa the fair yielded, but she made a condition that her son +Conor should sit on the judgment-seat daily by his stepfather's side.. +This easily agreed, Nessa became queen, while, as Fergus tells the +tale: +</p> +<pre> + While in council and debate + Conor daily by me sate; + Modest was his mien in sooth, + Beautiful the studious youth, + + Questioning with eager gaze, + All the reasons and the ways + In the which, and why because, + Kings administer the laws. +</pre> +<p> +In this wise a year passed, the youth diligently observant, with +faculties ripening and brightening as his majesty's grew more +consciously rusty and slow; and then a crisis came, which Mr. Ferguson +describes in verses of which it is hard to say whether they best +deserve the coif or the laurel, for in every line there is the sharp +wit of the lawyer as well as the vivid fancy of the poet: +</p> +<pre> + Till upon a day in court + Rose a plea of weightier sort, + Tangled as a briery thicket + Were the rights and wrongs intricate + + Which the litigants disputed, + Challenged, mooted, and confuted, + Till when all the plea was ended + Naught at all I comprehended. + + Scorning an affected show + Of the thing I did not know, + Yet my own defect to hide, + I said, "Boy judge, thou decide." + + Conor with unalter'd mien, + In a clear sweet voice serene, + Took in hand the tangled skein, + And began to make it plain. + + As a sheep-dog sorts his cattle, + As a king arrays his battle, + So the facts on either side + He did marshal and divide. + + Every branching side-dispute + Traced he downward to the root + Of the strife's main stem, and there + Laid the ground of difference bare. + + Then to scope of either cause, + Set the compass of the laws, + This adopting, that rejecting,— + Reasons to a head collecting,— + + As a charging cohort goes + Through and over scatter'd foes, + So, from point to point he brought + Onward still the weight of thought + + Through all error and confusion, + Till he set the clear conclusion, + Standing like a king alone, + All things adverse overthrown, + + And gave judgment clear and sound:— + Praises filled the hall around; + Yea, the man that lost the cause + Hardly could withhold applause. +</pre> +<p> +In these exquisite verses, the language is as strict to the point as +if it were taken from Mr. Smith's "Action at Law;" but the reader will +remark how every figure reminds him, and yet not in any mere mimetic +fashion, of the spirit and illustrations of the Ossianic poetry. +Nevertheless each word taken by itself is simple Saxon. Its Celtic +character only runs like a vein through the poem, but it colors and +saturates it through and through. +</p> +<p> +The greatest of Mr. Ferguson's poems, however, is undoubtedly "The +Welshmen of Tirawley," a ballad which, we do not fear to say, is +unsurpassed in the English language, or perhaps in even the Spanish. +Its epic proportion and integrity, the vivid picturesqueness of its +phraseology, its wild and original metre, its extraordinary +realization of the laws and customs of an Irish clan's daily life, the +stern brevity of its general narrative, and the richness of its +figures, though all barbaric pearl and gold, give it a pre-eminent +place among ballads. Scott would have devoted three volumes to the +story, were it not for the difficulty of telling some of its +incidents. Mr. Ferguson exhibits no little skill in the way that he +hurries his readers past what he could not altogether omit. For the +facts upon which the ballad is founded are simply horrible, and they +are historically true. +</p> +<p> +After the time of Strongbow, several Welsh families who had followed +his flag settled in Connaught. Among <a name="471">{471}</a> these "kindly Britons" of +Tirawley, were the Walshes or Wallises, the Heils (<i>a quibus</i> MacHale, +and, possibly, that most perfect instance of the <i>Hibernis ipsis +Hibemior</i>, the archbishop of Tuam); also the Lynotts and the Barretts, +with whom we are at present more particularly concerned. These last +claimed descent from the high steward of the manor of Camelot, and +their end is a story fit for the Round Table. The great toparch of the +territory was the MacWilliam Burke, as the Irish called the head of +the de Burgos, descended from William FitzAdelm de Burgo, conqueror of +Connaught, and therein commonly called William Conquer—of whom the +Marquis of Clanricarde is the present lineal representative; being to +Connaught even still somewhat as the MacCallummore is to Argyle, more +especially when he happens to be in the cabinet, and to have the +patronage of the post-office. Now the Lynotts were subject to the +Barretts, and the Barretts were subject to the Burkes. But when the +Barretts' bailiff, Scorna Boy, came to collect the Lynotts' taxes, he +so demeaned himself that the whole clan rose as one man, even as Jack +Cade, and slew him. Whereupon the vengeful Barretts gave to all +mankind among the Lynott clan a terrible choice—of which one +alternative was blindness; and the bearded men were all of their own +preference blinded, and led to the river Duvowen, and told to walk +over the stepping stones of Clochan-na-n'all; and they all stumbled +into the flood and were drowned, except old Emon Lynott, of +Garranard—whom accordingly the Barretts brought back and blinded +over again, by running needles through his eyeballs. +</p> +<pre> + But with prompt-projected footsteps, sure as ever, + Emon Lynott again crossed the river, + Though Duvowen was rising fast, + And the shaking stones o'ercast, + By cold floods boiling past; + Yet you never, + Emon Lynott, + Faltered once before your foemen of Tirawley. + + But turning on Ballintubber bank, you stood + And the Barretts thus bespoke o'er the flood— + "Oh, ye foolish sons of Wattin, + Small amends are these you've gotten, + For, while Scorna Boy lies rotten, + I am good + For vengeance!" + Sing the vengeance of the Welshmen of Tirawley. + + For 'tis neither in eye nor eyesight that a man. + Bears the fortunes of himself and his clan, + But in the manly mind + These darken'd orbs behind, + That your needles could never find, + Though they ran + Through my heartstrings. + Sing the vengeance of the Welshmen of Tirawley. + + But little your women's needles do I reck, + For the night from heaven never fell so black, + But Tirawley and abroad + From the Moy to Cuan-an-fod, + I could walk it, every sod, + Path and track, + Ford and togher, + Seeking vengeance on you, Barretts of Tirawley! +</pre> +<p> +And so leaving "loud-shriek-echoing Garranard," the Lynott, with his +wife and seven children, abandons his home, and takes refuge in Glen +Nephin, where, in the course of a year, a son is born to him, whom he +dedicates from the first breath to his vengeance. He trains this boy +with assiduous care to all the accomplishments of a Celtic cavalier; +</p> +<pre> + And, as ever the bright boy grew in strength and size, + Made him perfect in each manly exercise, + The salmon in the flood, + The dun deer in the wood, + The eagle in the cloud, + To surprise, + On Ben Nephin, + Far above the foggy fields of Tirawley. + + With the yellow-knotted spear-shaft, with the bow, + With the steel, prompt to deal shot and blow, + He taught him from year to year, + And trained him, without a peer, + For a perfect cavalier, + Hoping so— + Far his forethought— + For vengeance on the Barretts of Tirawley. + + And when mounted on his proud-bounding steed, + Emon Oge sat a cavalier indeed; + Like the ear upon the wheat, + When the winds in autumn beat + On the bending stems his seat; + And the speed + Of his courser + Was the wind from Barna-na-gee o'er Tirawley! +</pre> +<p> +Fifteen years have passed and the youth is perfected in all the +accomplishments of sport and war, and the Lynott thinks it is time to +return to the world and work out the scheme of his vengeance. So the +father and son quit their mountain solitude, and journey southward to +the bailey of Castlebar; and in a few fine touches the picture of Mac +William's grandeur, as it strikes <a name="472">{472}</a> the boy's wondering eyes, +rises before us; the stone house, strong and great, and the horse-host +at the gate and their captain in armor, and the beautiful <i>Bantierna</i> +by his side with her little pearl of a daughter. Who should this be +but the mighty MacWilliam! Into his presence ride the Lynotts; and, +after salutations, the old man declares his business. He has come to +claim, as gossip-law allows, the fosterage of MacWilliam's son. Ever +since William Conquer's time, his race were wont to place a MacWilliam +Oge in the charge of a Briton of Tirawley; and the young Lynott was a +pledge for his father's capacity in such tutelage. When MacWilliam saw +the young Lynott ride, run, and shoot, he said he would give the spoil +of a county to have his son so accomplished. When Lady MacWilliam +heard him speak, and scanned his fresh and hardy air, she said she +would give a purse of red gold that her Tibbot had such a nurse as had +reared the young Briton. The custom was allowed. The young MacWilliam +was sent under the guidance of old Lynott into Tirawley, and Emon Oge +remained as a hostage in Castlebar. So back to Garranard, no longer +the "loud-shriek-echoing," old Lynott returns— +</p> +<pre> + So back to strong-throng-gathering Garranard, + Like a lord of the country with his guard, + Came the Lynott before them all, + Once again o'er Clochan-ua-n'all, + Steady-striding, erect, and tall, + And his ward + On his shoulders; + To the wonder of the Welshmen of Tirawley. +</pre> +<p> +And then the young Tibbot was taught all manner of feats of body, to +swim, to shoot, to gallop, to wrestle, to fence, and to run, until he +grew up as deft and as tough as Emon Oge. But he was taught other +lessons as well, which were not in the bond of his foster-father. +</p> +<pre> + The lesson of hell he taught him in heart and mind; + For to what desire soever he inclined, + Of anger, lust, or pride, + He had it gratified, + Till he ranged the circle wide + Of a blind + Self-indulgence, + Ere he came to youthful manhood in Tirawley. +</pre> +<p> +Shame and rage track his passage, till one night the young Barretts of +the Bac fell upon him at Cornassack and slew him. His body was borne +to Castlebar. The Brehons were summoned to judgment; and over the bier +of MacWilliam Oge began the plea for an eric to be imposed upon the +Barretts for their crime; and the Brehons decreed the mulct, and +Lynott's share of it was nine ploughlands and nine score of cattle. +And now the ultimate hour of the blind old man's vengeance had come, +not to be sated with land and kine. "Rejoice," he cried, "in your +ploughlands and your cattle, which I renounce throughout Tirawley." +But, expert in all the rules and customs of the clans, he asks the +Brehons, Is it not the law that the foster-father may, if he please, +applot the short eric? And they say it is so. Whereupon, formally +rejecting his own share of the mulct, he makes his award—that the land +of the Barretts shall be equally divided on every side with the +Burkes, and that MacWilliam shall have a seat in every Barrett's hall, +a stall in every Barrett's stable, and needful grooming from every +hosteler for every Burke who shall ride throughout Tirawley for ever. +And then, in a speech full of barbaric sublimity and tragic +concentration of passion, he confesses "the patient search and vigil +long" of his vengeance. It is almost unjust to break the +closely-wrought chain of this speech by a single quotation, and we +have been already unduly tempted to extract from this extraordinary +poem; but, perhaps, this one verse may be separated from the rest as +containing the very culmination of the old man's hideous rage. +</p> +<pre> + I take not your eyesight from you as you took + Mine and ours: I would have you daily look + On one another's eyes, + When the strangers tyrannize + By your hearths, and blushes rise + That ye brook + Without vengeance + The insults of troops of Tibbots throughout Tirawley. +</pre> +<p> +Another moment and he has done. "Father and son," says MacWilliam, +<a name="473">{473}</a> "hang them high!" and old Lynott they hanged forthwith; but +young Lynott had eloped with MacWilliam's daughter to Scotland, and +there changed his name to Edmund Lindsay. The judgment of the short +eric was, however, held good; and the Burkes rode rough-shod over the +Barretts, until, as Mr. Ferguson, almost verbally versifying the +Chronicle of Duald Mac Firbis, says: +</p> +<pre> + Till the Saxon Oliver Cromwell, + And his valiant Bible-guided + Free heretics of Clan London + Coming in, in their succession, + Rooted out both Burke and Barrett; +</pre> +<p> +a process of eviction which Mr. Ferguson, not merely for the sake of +poetical justice, but out of the invincible ignorance of pure +puritanical Protestantism, appears on the whole very highly to +approve. +</p> +<p> +This ballad is indeed unique in its order: no Irish ballad approaches +its wild sublimity and the thoroughness of detail with which it is +conceived and executed. The only Irish narrative ballad which can bear +a general comparison with it is Mr. Florence MacCarthy's "Foray of Con +O'Donnell," a poem as perfect in its historical reality, in the +aptness of all its figures, illustrations, and feats of phrase to a +purely Celtic ideal, and which even surpasses "The Welshmen" in a +certain easy and lissome grace of melody, that falls on the ear like +the delicately drawn notes of Carolan's music. But this grace is +disdained by the grim and compressed character which animates every +line of Mr. Ferguson's ballad. His other works, fine of fancy and ripe +of phrase as they are, fall far below it, "The Tain-Quest" does not on +the whole enthral the reader, or magnetize the memory. "The Healing of +Conall Carnach," and "The Burial of King Cormac" are poems that will +hold their place in many future Books of Irish Ballads; they are +unusually spirited versifications of passages from the more heroic +period of early Irish history; but excepting occasional lines, they +only appear to be the versifications of already written legends. The +ballad of Grace O'Malley, commonly called <i>Grana Uaile</i>, may be +advantageously contrasted with these, and it contains some verses of +singular power—as, for example, where the poet denies the imputation +of piracy against this lady who loved to roam the high seas under her +own commission— +</p> +<pre> + But no: 'twas not for sordid spoil + Of barque or sea-board borough, + She plough'd with unfatiguing toil + The fluent-rolling furrow; + Delighting on the broad-back'd deep + To feel the quivering galley and sweep + Strain up the opposing hill, and sweep + Down the withdrawing valley. +</pre> +<p> +"Aideen's Grave" is a poem of a different kind, full of an exquisite +melancholy grace; and where Ossian is supposed to apostrophise his +future imitator, it is as if he thought after the manner of the +Fenians, but was withal master of every symphony of the English +tongue: +</p> +<pre> + Imperfect in an alien speech + When wandering here some child of chance, + Through pangs of keen delight shall reach. + The gift of utterance,— + To speak the air, the sky to speak, + The freshness of the hill to tell, + Who roaming bare Ben Edar's peak, + And Aideen's briery dell, + And gazing on the Cromlech vast, + And on the mountain and the sea, + Shall catch communion with the past, + And mix himself with me. +</pre> +<p> +There are lines in this poem that a little remind us of Gray, as— +</p> +<pre> + At Gavra, when by Oscar's side + She rode <i>the ridge of war;</i> +</pre> +<p> +and again in the "Farewell to Deirdre" there is something in the cast +and rhythm of the poem, rather than in any individual word or line, +that recalls Scott's "Farewell to North Maven." But to say so is not +to hit blots. Mr. Ferguson's is beyond question the most thoroughly +original vein of poetry that any Irish bard of late days has wrought +out; and in laying down this volume we can only regret that the +specimens he has thought worthy of collection are so few in comparison +not merely with what he might have done, but with what he actually has +done. For <a name="474">{474}</a> this modesty, let us hope that the prompt penance of a +second and enlarged edition may atone. +</p> +<p> +We have said that though Mr. Ferguson could hardly be called a Young +Irelander in politics, all the elective affinities of his genius +tended toward that school of thought. But Lady Wilde, then known if +she wrote prose as Mr. John Fanshawe Ellis, and if she wrote verse as +Speranza, had an extraordinary influence on all the intellectual and +political activities of Young Ireland. It was a favorite phantasy of +that time, when Lamartine's book was intoxicating all Young Europe +with the idea of a grand coming revolutionary epopoeia, and the +atrocities of socialism in France and Mazzinianism in Italy had not +yet horrified all Christendom, to find the model men for a modern +Plutarch in the ranks of the Girondists. Notably Meagher was supposed +to be gifted with all the qualities of Vergniaud, and Speranza to have +more than the genius of Madame Roland. But when we come to real +comparisons of character, the parallel easily gives way. If Smith +O'Brien was like any Frenchman of the first revolution, it was +Lafayette. Mitchel had in certain respects a suspicious resemblance to +the earlier and milder phases of Robespierre's peculiar intellectual +idiosyncrasy. The base of Carnot's character was that faculty for +organization which was the mainspring of Gavan Duffy's various and +powerful genius. The parallel was, even so far as it went, +intrinsically unjust. Lamartine's glowing imagination gave to the +Girondists a grandeur largely ideal. It is fair to say that Meagher's +oratory was on the whole of a higher order than Vergniaud's; and +certainly Madame Roland, great as may have been the influence of her +character and her conversation, has left us no example of her talent +that will bear comparison with Lady Wilde's poems or prose. +</p> +<p> +These poems, however, if full justice is to be done to them, ought to +be read from first to last with a running commentary in the memory +from the history of those few tragic years whose episodes they in a +manner mark. One poem is a mournfully passionate appeal to O'Connell +against the alliance with the Whigs, which was charged as one of the +causes of the secession. Another is a ballad of the famine, with +lights as ghastly as ever glowed in the imagination of Euripides or +Dante, and founded on horrors such as Greek or Italian never +witnessed. There is then a picture of "the young patriot leader"— +which an artist would characterize as a decidedly idealized portrait +of Meagher—that American general who has since proved his title to be +called "of the sword." Again, a gloomy series of images recalls to us +the awful state of the country—the corpses that were buried without +coffins, and the men and women that walked the roads more like corpses +than living creatures, spectres and skeletons at once; the little +children out of whose sunken eyes the very tears were dried, and over +whose bare little bones the hideous fur of famine had begun to grow; +the cholera cart, with its load of helpless huddled humanity, on its +way to the hospital; the emigrant ship sending back its woeful wail of +farewell from swarming poop to stern in the offing; and, far as the +eye could search the land, the blackened potato-fields, filling all +the air with the fetid odors of decay. Again and again such pictures +are contrasted with passionate lyrics full of rebellious fire, urging +the people to die, if die they must, by the sword rather than by +hunger—and sometimes, too, with an angry, unreasonable, +readily-forgiven reproach to the priesthood, who bore with such noble +fortitude and self-immolating charity the very cross of all the +crosses of that terrible time. +</p> +<p> +It is a curious fact, and reminds one of the myth of Achilles' heel, +that O'Connell, who marched among his myriad foes like one clad in +panoply of mail from head to foot, with a sort of inexpugnable vigor +and endurance, not to be wounded, not to be stunned, with his buckler +ready for every <a name="475">{475}</a> thrust, and a blow for every blow that rained on +his casque, was weak as a child under the influence of verse. Any one +who may count over the number of times his favorite quotations, such +as the lines beginning "Hereditary bondsmen" from "Childe Harold" for +example, crop up in the course of his speeches, will be inclined to +say that his fondness for poetry was almost preposterous. It was +always tempting him, indeed, into dangerous ways—for while his prose +preached "the ethereal principles of moral force," and the tenet that +"no political amelioration is worth the shedding of a single drop of +human blood," his favorite quotations were strictly in favor of +fighting. The "hereditary bondsmen" were to "strike the blow;" and the +Irish are a nation only too well disposed to interpret such a precept +literally. Moore's melodies were always at the tip of his tongue; and +Moore's "Slave so lowly" is indignantly urged not to pine in his +chains, but to raise the green flag forthwith, and do or die. Some +verses of O'Connell's own, of which he was at least equally fond, +began: +</p> +<pre> + Oh Erin! shall it e'er be mine + To see thy sons in battle line? +</pre> +<p> +It was not altogether politic, especially when Young Ireland was +gaining the ascendant, to use such quotations habitually; but the +temptation seems to have been irresistible. So, on the other hand, may +be conceived his excessive sensitiveness to anything sounding like a +reproach that reached him through the vehicle of verse. When Brougham +or Stanley or Peel struck their hardest, they got in return rather +more than they gave—when the whole House of Commons tried to stifle +his voice, over all the din Mr. Speaker heard himself with horror +called upon to stop this "beastly bellowing." But when Moore wrote +those lines—so cruelly touching, so terribly caustic—"The dream of +those days," which appeared in the last number of the Melodies, the +Liberator was, it is said, so deeply affected that he shed tears. So +again, these lines of Speranza, which appeared in the <i>Nation</i> at the +time of the secession, stung him to the very heart: +</p> +<pre> + Gone from us—dead to us—he whom we worshipped so! + Low lies the altar we raised to his name; + Madly his own hand hath shattered and laid it low— + Madly his own breath hath blasted his fame. + He whose proud bosom once raged with humanity. + He whose broad forehead was circled with might; + Sunk to a time-serving, driveling inanity— + God! why not spare our loved country the sight? + + Was it the gold of the stranger that tempted him? + Ah! we'd have pledged to him body and soul— + Toiled for him—fought for him—starved for him—died for him— + Smiled though our graves were the steps to hi s goal. + Breathed he one word in his deep, earnest whispering? + Wealth, crown, and kingdom were laid at his feet; + Raised he his right hand, the millions would round him cling— + Hush! 'tis the Sassenach ally you greet. +</pre> +<p> +It is a curious and, indeed, a very touching trait in O'Connell's +character that an imputation conveyed in this form had a power to +wound him which all the articles of the morning papers and all the +speeches of the evening debates had not. This redoubtable master of +every weapon of invective, whose weighty words sometimes fell on his +adversary like one of Ossian's Titans hurling boulders, or again burst +into a motley cascade of quip, and crank, and chaff, and wild, rampant +ridicule, that (sometimes rather coarse and personal) was at its best, +to other rhetoric, as the music of an Irish jig is to all other music, +nevertheless had his Achilles' tendon. The man who loved to call +himself "the best abused man in the universe" was as weak before the +enemy who attacked him according to the rules of prosody as if he +lived in the age when every Celt in Kerry piously believed that a man, +if the metre were only made sufficiently acrid, might be rhymed to +death, in the same manner <a name="476">{476}</a> as an ancestor of Lord Derby was, +according to the Four Masters. [Footnote 98] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 98: "John Stanley came to Ireland as the king of England's + viceroy—a man who gave neither toleration nor sanctuary to + ecclesiastics, laymen, or literary men; but all with whom he came in + contact he subjected to cold, hardship, and famine; and he it was + who plundered Niall, the son of Hugh O'Higgin, at Uisneach of Meath; + but Henry D'Alton plundered James Tuite and the king's people, and + gave to the O'Higgins a cow in lieu of each cow of which they had + been plundered, and afterward escorted them into Connaught. The + O'Higgins, on account of Niall, then satirized John Stanley, who + only lived live weeks after the satirizing, having died from the + venom of their satires. This was the second instance of the poetical + influence of Niall O'Higgin's satires, the first having been the + Clan Conway turning gray the night they plundered Niall at Clodoin, + and the second the death of John Stanley."—<i>Annals of the Four + Masters.</i> A.D. 1414.] +</p> +<p> +Lady Wilde's verse has not at all the same distinctively Celtic +character as Mr. Ferguson's. He aspires to be +</p> +<pre> + Kindly Irish of the Irish, + Neither Saxon nor Italian; +</pre> +<p> +and his choice inspirations come from the life of the clans. +Speranza's verse, so far as it has a specially Irish character, is of +the most ancient type of that character. It is full of oriental +figures and illustrations. It is, when it is most Irish, rather +cognate to Persian and Hebrew ways of thinking, forms of metaphor, +redundance of expression—in its tendency to adjuration, in its habit +of apostrophe, in its very peculiar and powerful but monotonous +rhythm, which seems to pulsate on the ear with the even, strident +stroke of a Hindoo drum. Where this peculiar poetry at all adapts +itself to the vogue of the modern muse, it is easy to see that Miss +Barrett had very great influence in determining the mere manner of +Lady Wilde's genius. When in the midst of one very powerful poem, "The +Voice of the Poor," these lines come in— +</p> +<pre> + When the human rests upon the human, + All grief is light; + But who lends one kind glance to illumine + Our life-long night? + The air around is ringing with their laughter— + God has only made the rich to smile, + But we—in our rags, and want, and woe—we follow after, + Weeping the while. +</pre> +<p> +—we are tempted to note an unconscious homage to the author of +"Aurora Leigh." But the character of Lady Wilde's verse is far more +colored by the range of her studies than by the influence of any +special style. The general reader, who may not breathe at ease the +political atmosphere of the earlier part of this volume, will pause +with pleasure to observe the spirit, grace, and fidelity of the +translations which succeed. They are from almost every language in +Europe, whether of Latin or Teutonic origin, French, Spanish, +Portuguese, Italian, German, Swedish, Danish, and Russian. Among these +may be mentioned in particular two hymns of Savonarola, which are +rendered so exquisitely that one is tempted to suggest that the +<i>"Carmina Sedulii,"</i> with much more of the ancient Irish hymnology, +are as yet untranslated into the tongue now used in Ireland. It is a +work peculiarly adapted to her genius. The first quality of Lady +Wilde's poetry is that lyrical power of which the hymn is the finest +development; and her most striking poems are those which assume the +character of the older and more regular form of ode. +</p> +<p> +The readers of Mr. William Allingham's early writings were in general +gratefully surprised when it was announced that he was the author of a +very remarkable poem, of the order of eclogue, which appeared by parts +in <i>Fraser's Magazine</i> in 1863. His earlier poems, chiefly songs and +verse of society, were pleasing from a certain airy grace and +lightness; but on the whole their style was thin and jejune. Of late, +his faculties have evidently mellowed very rapidly, and his language +has become more animated, more concentrated, and more sustained. +"Laurence Bloomfield in Ireland" has had, as it were, a triple +success—the success of a pamphlet, the success of a novel of Irish +life, and its own more proper and legitimate success, as a regular +pastoral, skilfully conceived, carefully executed, in which the flow +of thought is sustained at a very even, if not a very lofty level +throughout, <a name="477">{477}</a> and whose language is on the whole admirably +harmonized, full of happy allusional effects, of quaint, minute, +picturesque delineation, and of a certain graceful and easy energy. +Mr. Gladstone has quoted some of its lines in a speech on the budget +as an excuse for maintaining the duty on whisky; and he is not the +only Englishman who has derived from its perusal an unexpected insight +into some of the more perplexing problems of Irish life. Certainly, +Mr. Allingham's views of Irish society, when he touches on questions +of religion and politics, are not our views. He is an Ulster +Protestant by religion, and an advanced liberal (we take it) in +politics. But making those allowances, it must be admitted that he +shows the poet's many-sided sympathetic mind in every page of this +very remarkable poem. "It is," as he fairly says, "free from +personalities, and neither of an orange nor a green complexion; but it +is Irish in phraseology, character, and local color—with as little +use as might be of a corrupt dialect, and with no deference at all to +the stage traditions of Paddyism." It is divided into twelve chapters, +and it is written in pleasantly modulated pentameters. +</p> +<p> +The story is of the life of a young squire, who was on the point of +declaring himself a Young Irelander in his youth. His guardian, to cut +the folly short, sent him incontinently to Cambridge, thence to the +continent. He returns to Ireland in his twenty-sixth year, and finds +the population decimated by the famine, and agitated by agrarian +conspiracy. The neighboring gentry are bent, as conacre has ceased to +pay, on supplanting the population by cattle. The population +suppurates into secret societies. Laurence Bloomfield, long revolving +the difficulties of his lot, and abhorring pretty equally the crimes +of each class against the other—determined, moreover, to be neither +exterminator, demagogue, nor absentee—resolves to live among the +people of his estate like a modern patriarch, and see what patience, +kindness, a good understanding, and enlightened management may be able +to effect. He extinguishes the Ribbon lodge, fastens his tenantry by +equitable leases to the glebe, and gradually finds in the management +of his estate a career of easy, pleasant, and even prosperous power. +In the course of ten years, Lisnamoy has become an Irish Arcadia, and +Mr. Allingham's honest muse rises accordingly to sing a hero even more +memorable in his way than the Man of Ross. +</p> +<p> +Bloomfield first promulgates his peculiar views of territorial +administration at a dinner of his landlord neighbors in Lisnamoy +House, where the wholesale eviction of the tenantry of a large +neighboring district is proposed on the plea that— +</p> +<pre> + "This country sorely needs + A quicker clearance of its human weeds; + But still the proper system is begun, + And forty holdings we shall change to one." + + Bloomfield his inexperience much confessed, + Doubts if the large dispeopled farms be best,— + Best in a wide sense, best for all the world + (At this expression sundry lips were curl'd),— + "I wish but know not how each peasant's hand + Might work, nay, hope to win, a share of land; + For ownership, however small it be, + Breeds diligence, content, and loyalty, + And tirelessly compels the rudest field, + Inch after inch, its very most to yield. + Wealth might its true prerogatives retain; + And no man lose, and all men greatly gain." +</pre> +<p> +It is from the ill-concealed contempt of his class for such thoughts +as these, that Bloomfield's resolution to remain in Ireland and +administer his own estate arises. +</p> +<p> +The story, as it is evolved, presents some charming sketches of +character. Hardly even Carleton has delineated so admirably the nature +and habits of the Irish peasant family as Mr. Allingham has done in +his picture of the Dorans. How easy and natural, for example, is the +portrait of Bridget Doran: +</p> +<pre> + Mild oval face, a freckle here and there, + Clear eyes, broad forehead, dark abundant hair, + Pure placid look that show'd a gentle nature, + Firm, unperplex'd, were hers; the maiden's stature + Graceful arose, and strong, to middle height, + With fair round arms, and footstep free and light; + She was not showy, she was always neat + In every gesture, native and complete, + Disliking noise, yet neither dull nor slack, + Could throw a rustic banter briskly back, + Reserved but ready, innocently shrewd,— + In brief, a charming flower of womanhood. +</pre> +<br> +<a name="478">{478}</a> +<p> +The occasional sketches of Irish scenery are also very vividly +outlined. This of Lough Braccan is not perhaps the best, but it is the +most easily detached from the text: +</p> +<pre> + Among those mountain skirts a league away, + Lough Braccan spread, with many a silver bay + And islet green; a dark cliff, tall and bold, + Half-muffled in its cloak of ivy old, + Bastioned the southern brink, beside a glen, + Where birch and hazel hid the badger's den, + And through the moist ferns and firm hollies play'd + A rapid rivulet, from light to shade. + Above the glen, and wood, and cliff, was seen, + Majestically simple and serene, + Like some great soul above the various crowd, + A purple mountain-top, at times in cloud + Or mist, as in celestial veils of thought, + Abstracted heavenward. +</pre> +<p> +We may give another specimen of Mr. Allingham's power of delineation, +which shows that he has studied Irish country life as well as Irish +scenery and Irish physiognomy. +</p> +<pre> + Mud hovels fringe the "fair green" of this town, + A spot misnamed, at every season brown, + O'erspread with countless man and beast to-day, + Which bellow, squeak, and shout, bleat, bray, and neigh. + The "jobbers" there each more or less a rogue, + Noisy or smooth, with each his various brogue, + Cool, wiry Dublin, Connaught's golden mouth, + Blunt northern, plaintive sing-song of the south, + Feel cattle's ribs, or jaws of horses try. + For truth, since men's are very sure to lie, + And shun, with parrying blow and practised heed, + The rushing horns, the wildly prancing steed. + The moistened penny greets with sounding smack + The rugged palm, which smites the greeting back; + Oaths fly, the bargain like a quarrel burns, + And oft the buyer turns, and oft returns: + Now mingle Sassenach and Gaelic tongue; + On either side are slow concessions wrung; + An anxious audience interfere; at last + The sale is closed, and whisky binds it fast, + In case of quilting upon oziers bent, + With many an ancient patch and breezy rent. +</pre> +<p> +This is as true a picture in its way as Mdlle. Rosa Bonheur's +"Horse-fair." +</p> +<p> +Mr. Aubrey de Vere's "Inisfail" comes last on our list, but certainly +not least in our estimation. No poet of Young Ireland has like him +seized and breathed the spirit of his country's Catholic nationality, +its virginal purity of faith, its invincible patience of hope, and all +the gentle sweetness of its charity. Young Ireland rather studied the +martial muse, and that with an avowed purpose. "The Irish harp," said +Davis, "too much loves to weep. Let us, while our strength is great +and our hopes high, cultivate its bolder strains, its raging and +rejoicing; or if we weep, let it be like men whose eyes are lifted +though their tears fall." Mr. de Vere has tried every mood of the +native lyre, and proved himself master of all. His "Inisfail" is a +ballad chronicle of Ireland, such as Young Ireland would have thought +to be a worthy result of all its talents, and such as, in fact, Mr. +Duffy at one time proposed. But it must be said that its heroic +ballads are not equal to those of Young Ireland. Some one said of a +very finished, but occasionally frigid, Irish speaker, fifteen years +ago, that he spoke like "Sheil with the chill on." A few of Mr. de +Vere's ballads have the same effect of "Young Ireland with the chill +on." They want the verve, the glow, the energy, the resonance, which +belong to the best ballads of "The Spirit of the <i>Nation</i>." Of the +writers of that time, Mr. D'Arcy McGee is perhaps, on the whole, the +most kindred genius to his. Mr. de Vere has an insight into all the +periods of Irish history in their most poetical expression which Mr. +McGee alone of his comrades seems to have equally possessed. Indeed, +if Mr. Me Gee's poems were all collected and chronologically +arranged—as it is to be hoped they may be some day soon—it would be +found that he had unconsciously and desultorily traversed very nearly +the same complete extent of ground that Mr. de Vere has systematically +and deliberately gone over. But though no one has written more nobly +of the dimly glorious Celtic ages, and many of his battle-ballads are +instinct with life, and wonderfully picturesque, it is easy to see +that Mr. McGee's best desire was to follow the footsteps of the early +saints, and the <i>Via Dolorosa</i> of the period of the penal laws. These, +<a name="479">{479}</a> too, are the passages over which Mr. de Vere's genius most loves +to brood, and his prevailing view of Ireland is the supernatural view +of her destiny to carry the cross and spread the faith. Young Ireland +wrote its bold, brilliant ballads as a part of the education of the +new nationality that it believed was growing up, and destined to take +possession of the island—"a nationality that," to use Davis's words +again, "must contain and represent all the races of Ireland. It must +not be Celtic; it must not be Saxon; it must be Irish. The Brehon law +and the maxims of Westminster, the cloudy and lightning genius of the +Gael, the placid strength of the Saxon, the marshalling insight of the +Norman; a literature which shall exhibit in combination the passions +and idioms of all, and which shall equally express our mind, in its +romantic, its religious, its forensic, and its practical tendencies. +Finally, a native government, which shall know and rule by the might +and right of all, yet yield to the arrogance of none;—these are the +components of such a nationality." And such was the dream that seemed +an easy eventuality twenty years ago. But Mr. de Vere writes after the +famine and in view of the exodus. His mind goes from the present to +the past by ages of sorrow—of sorrow, nevertheless, illumined, +nurtured, and sustained by divine faith and the living presence of the +Church. So in the most beautiful poem of this volume, he sees the +whole Irish race carrying an inner spiritual life through all their +tribulation in the guise of a great religious order of which England +is the foundress, and the rules are written in the statute-book. We +cannot select a better specimen of the thorough Catholic tone of Mr. +de Vere's genius, and of the vivid power and finished grace of his +poetry, than this: +</p> +<pre> + There is an order by a northern sea + Far in the west, of rule and life more strict + Than that which Basil rear'd in Galilee, + In Egypt Paul, in Umbria Benedict. + + Discalced it walks; a stony land of tombs, + A strange Petraea of late days, it treads! + Within its court no high-tossed censer fumes; + The night-rain beats its cells, the wind its beds. + + Before its eyes no brass-bound, blazon'd tome + Reflects the splendor of a lamp high hung: + Knowledge is banish'd from her earliest home + Like wealth: it whispers psalms that once it sung. + + It is not bound by the vow celibate, + Lest, through its ceasing, anguish too might cease; + In sorrow it brings forth; and death and fate + Watch at life's gate, and tithe the unripe increase. + + It wears not the Franciscan's sheltering gown; + The cord that binds it is the strangers chain; + Scarce seen for scorn, in fields of old renown + It breaks the clod; another reaps the grain. + + Year after year it fasts; each third or fourth + So fasts that common fasts to it are feast; + Then of its brethren many in the earth + Are laid unrequiem'd like the mountain beast. + + Where are its cloisters? Where the felon sleeps! + Where its novitiate? Where the last wolf died! + From sea to sea its vigil long it keeps— + Stern foundress! is its rule not mortified? + + Thou that hast laid so many an order waste, + A nation is thine order! It was thine + Wide as a realm that order's seed to cast, + And undispensed sustain its discipline! +</pre> +<p> +It is another curious illustration of the <i>Hibernis ipsis Hibernior</i> +that a de Vere, who is, moreover, "of the caste of Vere de Vere," +should have so intimate a comprehension of the Celtic spirit as is +often shown in these poems, especially in the use of those allegories +which are so characteristic of the period of persecution, and in some +of his metres that appear to be instinct with the very melody of the +oldest Irish music. Here, indeed, we seem to taste, in a certain vague +and dreamy sensation, which the mere murmur of such verses even +without strict reference to the words produces, all the charm of which +that ancient poetry might have been capable, if it were still +cultivated in a language of living civilization. Several of these +poems, if translated into Irish verse, would probably pass back +without the change of an idiom—so completely Celtic is the whole +conception of the language. The dirges, for example, appear on a first +reading to be only English versions of Irish poems belonging to the +time of the Jacobites and the Brigade—until, as we examine more +carefully, we observe that the allegory is <a name="480">{480}</a> wrought out with all +the finish of more modern art, and that the metaphors are brought into +a more just inter-dependence than the native bard usually thought +necessary. +</p> +<p> +The tenderness that approaches to a sort of worship of Ireland under +the poetical personification of a mother wailing for her children, +again and again breaks out in Mr. de Vere's verse; and in all the +range of Irish poetry it is nowhere more exquisitely expressed. The +solemn beauty of the following verses is like that of some of those +earliest of the melodies, whose long lines, with their curious +rippling rhythm, were evidently meant for recitation as well as for +musical effect: +</p> +<pre> + In the night, in the night, O my country, the stream calls out from afar; + So swells thy voice through the ages, sonorous and vast; + In the night, in the night, O my country, clear flashes the star: + So flashes on me thy face through the gloom of the past. + + I sleep not; I watch: in blows the wind ice-wing'd and ice-fingered: + My forehead it cools and slakes the fire in my breast; + Though it sighs o'er the plains where oft thine exiles look'd back, and long lingered, + And the graves where thy famish'd lie dumb and thine outcasts find rest. +</pre> +<p> +Hardly less sad, but in so different a spirit as to afford a contrast +that brings us to a fair measure of the variety of Mr. de Vere's +powers, is a poem of the days of the brigade. The wife of one of the +soldiers who followed Sarsfield to France after the capitulation of +Limerick, and entered the Irish brigade of Louis XIV., is supposed, +sitting by the banks of the Shannon, to speak: +</p> +<pre> + River that through this purple plain + Toilest (once redder) to the main, + Go, kiss for me the banks of Seine! + + Tell him I loved, and love for aye, + That his I am though far away— + More his than on the marriage-day. + + Tell him thy flowers for him I twine + When first the slow sad mornings shine + In thy dim glass; for he is mine. + + Tell him when evening's tearful light + Bathes those dark towers on Aughrim's height, + There where he fought, in heart, I fight. + + A freeman's banner o'er him waves! + So be it! I but tend the graves + Where freemen sleep whose sons are slaves. + + Tell him I nurse his noble race, + Nor weep save o'er one sleeping face + Wherein those looks of his I trace. + + For him my beads I count when falls + Moonbeam or shower at intervals + Upon our burn'd and blacken'd walls: + + And bless him! bless the bold brigade— + May God go with them, horse and blade, + For faith's defense, and Ireland's aid! +</pre> +<p> +Here the abrupt transition of tone in the last verse from the subdued +melancholy of those which precede it is very fine and very Irish. One +can fancy the widowed wife, in all her desolation, starting, even from +her beads, as she thinks of Lord Clare's dragoons coming down on the +enemy with their "<i>Viva la</i> for Ireland's wrong!" +</p> +<p> +Twenty years have now passed since "The Spirit of the <i>Nation</i>" gave +some glimpses of the mine of poetry then latent in the Irish mind. In +1845 Mr. Gavan Duffy published his "Ballad Poetry of Ireland"—a book +which had the largest sale of any published in Ireland since the union +and probably the widest influence. Upon this common and neutral ground +Orange-man and Ribbon-man, Tory, and Nationalist, were perforce +brought into harmonious contact; and "The Boyne Water" lost half its +virus as a political psalm when it was embalmed side by side with the +"Wild Geese" or "Willy Reilly." Behind the produce of his own +immediate period, Mr. Duffy, in arranging his materials, could only +find a few ballads by Moore, a few by Gerald Griffin, a few by Banim, +Callanan, Furlong, and Drennan, that could be accounted legitimate +ballad poetry. The rest was fast cropping up while he was actually +compiling his collection, under the hot breath of the National +movement, in a lavish and luxuriant growth. This impulse seems to have +spent itself some years ago. Anything of real merit in the way of +Irish poetry does not now appear in periodical literature more than +once or twice in a year; and Mr. Thomas Irwin is the only recent +writer whose verse may fairly be named in the same breath with that +which we have now noticed. A rich grace and finish of <a name="481">{481}</a> +expression, a most quaint and delicate humor, and a fine-poised +aptness of phrase, distinguish his poetry, which is more according to +the taste that Mr. Tennyson has established in England than that of +any Irish writer of the day. +</p> +<p> +Irish poetry seems now, therefore, to have passed into a new and more +advanced stage of development. Here are four volumes, by four separate +writers, of poems, old and new—all published within a year; and all, +we believe, decidedly successful, and in satisfactory course of sale. +Mr. Florence MacCarthy's poems had previously gone through several +editions, and won enduring fame—perhaps more widely spread in America +than even at home, on account of a quality somewhat kindred to the +peculiar genius of the best American poets, and especially Longfellow, +Poe, and Irving, that the reader will readily recognize in his +finely-finished and most melodious verse. Nor should we omit to +mention, in cataloguing the library of recent Irish poets, "The Monks +of Kilcrea," a long romantic poem in the style of "The Lady of the +Lake," which contains many a passage that Scott might own, but of +which the writer remains unknown. Thus Irish national poetry is +accumulating, as it were, in strata. Mr. Duffy set on the title-page +of his "Ballad Poetry" the Irish motto, <i>Bolg an dana</i>, which not all +his readers clearly understood; but which, to all who did, seemed +extremely appropriate at the time. "This man," say the Four Masters, +speaking of a great bard of the fifteenth century, "was called the +<i>Bolg an dana</i>, which signifies that he was a common budget of poetry." +And this was all that Mr. Duffy's Ballad Poetry professed to be. But +what was only a budget of desultory jetsam and flotsam in 1845 is +taking the shape of a solid literature in 1865; and those twenty +golden years have at all events been well filled with ranks of rhyme. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="482">{482}</a> +<br> +<h2>From The Month. +<br><br> +CONSTANCE SHERWOOD. +<br><br> +AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY. +<br><br> +BY LADY GEORGIANA FULLERTON. +<br><br><br> +CHAPTER VIII.</h2> +<br> +<p> +After I had been musing a little while, Mistress Bess ran into the +room, and cried to some one behind her: +</p> +<p> +"Nan's friend is here, and she is mine too, for we all played in a +garden with her when I was little. Prithee, come and see her." Then +turning to me, but yet holding the handle of the door, she said: "Will +is so unmannerly, I be ashamed of him. He will not so much as show +himself." +</p> +<p> +"Then, prithee, come alone," I answered. Upon which she came and sat +on my knee, with her arm round my neck, and whispered in mine ear: +</p> +<p> +"Moll is very sick to-day; will you not see her, Mistress Sherwood?" +</p> +<p> +"Yea, if so be I have license," I answered; and she, taking me by the +hand, offered to lead me up the stairs to the room where she lay. I, +following her, came to the door of the chamber, but would not enter +till Bess fetched the nurse, who was the same had been at Sherwood +Hall, and who, knowing my name, was glad to see me, and with a curtsey +invited me in. White as a lily was the little face resting on a +pillow, with its blue eyes half shut, and a store of golden hair about +it, which minded me of the glories round angels' heads in my mother's +missal. +</p> +<p> +"Sweet lamb!" quoth the nurse, as I stooped to kiss the pale forehead. +"She be too good for this world. Ofttimes she doth babble in her sleep +of heaven, and angels, and saints, and a wreath of white roses +wherewith a bright lady will crown her." +</p> +<p> +"Kiss my lips," the sick child softly whispered, as I bent over her +bed. Which when I did, she asked, "What is your name? I mind your +face." When I answered, "Constance Sherwood," she smiled, as if +remembering where we had met. "I heard my grandam calling me last +night," she said; "I be going to her soon." Then a fit of pain came +on, and I had to leave her. She did go from this world a few days +after; and the nurse then told me her last words had been "Jesu! +Mary!" +</p> +<p> +That day I did converse again alone with my Lady Surrey after dinner, +and walked in the garden; and when we came in, before I left, she gave +me a purse with some gold pieces in it, which the earl her husband +willed to bestow on Catholics in prison for their faith. For she said +he had so tender and compassionate a spirit, that if he did but hear +of one in distress he would never rest until he had relieved him; and +out of the affection he had for Mr. Martin, who was one while his +tutor, he was favorably inclined toward Catholics, albeit himself +resolved to conform to the queen's religion. When Mistress Ward came +for me, the countess would have her shown into her chamber, and would +not be contented without she ordered her coach to carry us back to +Holborn, that we might take with us the clothes and cordials which she +did bestow upon us for our poor clients. She begged Mrs. Ward's +prayers for his grace, that he might soon be set at liberty; for she +said in a pretty manner, "It must needs be that Almighty God takes +most heed of the prayers of <a name="483">{483}</a> such as visit him in his affliction +in the person of poor prisoners; and she hoped one day to be free to +do so herself." Then she questioned of the wants of those Mistress +Ward had at that time knowledge of; and when she heard in what sore +plight they stood, it did move her to so great compassion, that she +declared it would be now one of her chiefest cares and pleasures in +life to provide conveniences for them. And she besought Mistress Ward +to be a good friend to her with mine aunt, and procure her to permit +of my frequent visits to Howard House, as the Charter House is now +often called: which would be the greatest good she could do her; and +that she would be most glad also if she herself would likewise favor +her sometimes with her company; which, "if it be not for mine own +sake, Mistress Ward," she sweetly said, "let it be for his sake who, +in the person of his afflicted priests, doth need assistance." +</p> +<p> +When we reached home, we hid what we had brought under our mantles, +and then in Mistress Ward's chamber, where Muriel followed us. When +the door was shut we displayed these jewelled stores before her +pleased eyes, which did beam with joy at the sight. +</p> +<p> +"Ah, Muriel," cried Mistress Ward, "we have found an Esther in a +palace; and I pray to God there may be other such in this town we ken +not of, who in secret do yet bear affection to the ancient faith." +</p> +<p> +Muriel said in her slow way: "We must needs go to the Clink to-morrow; +for there is there a priest whose flesh has fallen off his feet by +reason of his long stay in a pestered and infected dungeon. Mr. Roper +told my father of him, and he says the gaoler will let us in if he be +reasonably dealt with." +</p> +<p> +"We will essay your ointment, Mistress Sherwood," said Mistress Ward, +"if so be you can make it in time." +</p> +<p> +"I care not if I sit up all night," I cried, "if any one will buy me +the herbs I have need of for the compounding thereof." Which Muriel +said she would prevail on one of the servants to do. +</p> +<p> +The bell did then ring for supper; and when we were all seated, Kate +was urgent with me for to tell her how my Lady Surrey was dressed; +which I declared to her as follows: "She had on a brown juste au corps +embroidered, with puffed sleeves, and petticoat braided of a deeper +nuance; and on her head a lace cap, and a lace handkerchief on her +bosom." +</p> +<p> +"And, prithee, what jewels had she on, sweet coz?" +</p> +<p> +"A long double chain of gold and a brooch of pearls," I answered. +</p> +<p> +"And his grace of Norfolk is once more removed to the Tower," said Mr. +Congleton sorrowfully. "'Tis like to kill him soon, and so save her +majesty's ministers the pains to bring him to the block. His +physician, Dr. Rhuenbeck, says he is afflicted with the dropsy." +</p> +<p> +Polly said she had been to visit the Countess of Northumberland, who +was so grievously afflicted at her husband's death, that it was feared +she would fall sick of grief if she had not company to divert her from +her sad thoughts. +</p> +<p> +"Which I warrant none could effect so well as thee, wench," her father +said; "for, beshrew me, if thou wouldst not make a man laugh on his +way to the scaffold with thy mad talk. And was the poor lady of better +cheer for thy company?" +</p> +<p> +"Yea, for mine," Polly answered; "or else for M. de la Motte's, who +came in to pay his devoirs to her, for the first time, I take it, +since her lord's death. And after his first speech, which caused her +to weep a little, he did carry on so brisk a discourse as I never +noticed any but a Frenchman able to do. And she was not the worst +pleased with it that the cunning gentleman did interweave it with +anecdotes of the queen's majesty; which, albeit he related them with +gravity, did carry somewhat of ridicule in them. Such as of her +grace's dancing on Sunday before last at Lord Northampton's wedding, +and calling him to witness <a name="484">{484}</a> her paces, so that he might let +monsieur know how high and disposedly she danced; so that he would not +have had cause to complain, in case he had married her, that she was a +boiteuse, as had been maliciously reported of her by the friends of +the Queen of Scots. And also how, some days since, she had flamed out +in great choler when he went to visit her at Hampton Court; and told +him, so loud that all her ladies and officers could hear her +discourse, that Lord North had let her know the queen-mother and the +Duke of Guise had dressed up a buffoon in an English fashion, and +called him a Milor du Nord; and that two female dwarfs had been +likewise dressed up in that queen's chamber, and invited to mimic her, +the queen of England, with great derision and mockery. 'I did assure +her,' M. de la Motte said, 'with my hand on my heart, and such an +aggrieved visage, that she must needs have accepted my words as true, +that Milor North had mistaken the whole intent of what he had +witnessed, from his great ignorance of the French tongue, which did +render him a bad interpreter between princes; for that the +queen-mother did never cease to praise her English majesty's beauty to +her son, and all her good qualities, which greatly appeased her grace, +who desired to be excused if she, likewise out of ignorance of the +French language, had said aught unbecoming touching the queen-mother.' +'Tis a rare dish of fun, fit to set before a king, to hear this +Monsieur Ambassador speak of the queen when none are present but such +as make an idol of her, as some do." +</p> +<p> +"For my part," said her father, when she paused in her speech, "I +mislike men with double visages and double tongues; and methinks this +monseer hath both, and withal a rare art for what courtiers do call +diplomacy, and plain men lying. His speeches to her majesty be so +fulsome in her praise, as I have heard some say who are at court, and +his flattery so palpable, that they have been ashamed to hear it; but +behind her back he doth disclose her failings with an admirable +slyness." +</p> +<p> +"If he be sly," answered Polly, "I'll warrant he finds his match in +her majesty." +</p> +<p> +"Yea," cried Kate, "even as poor Madge Arundell experienced to her +cost." +</p> +<p> +"Ay," quoth Polly, "she catcheth many poor fish, who little know what +snare is laid for them." +</p> +<p> +"And how did her highness catch Mistress Arundell?" I asked. +</p> +<p> +"In this way, coz," quoth Polly: "she doth often ask the ladies round +her chamber, 'If they love to think of marriage?' and the wise ones do +conceal well their liking thereunto, knowing the queen's judgment in +the matter. But pretty, simple Madge Arundell, not knowing so deeply +as her fellows, was asked one day hereof, and said, 'She had thought +much about marriage, if her father did consent to the man she loved.' +'You seem honest, i' fait said the queen; 'I will sue for you your +father.' At which the dam was well pleased; and when father, Sir +Robert Arundell, came court, the queen questioned him his daughter's +marriage, and pressed him to give consent if the match were discreet. +Sir Robert, much astonished, said, 'He never had heard his daughter +had liking to any man; but he would give his free consent to what was +most pleasing to her highness's will and consent.' Then I will do the +rest,' saith the queen. Poor Madge was called in, and told by the +queen that her father had given his free consent. 'Then,' replied the +simple one, 'I shall be happy, an' it please your grace.' 'So thou +shalt; but not to be a fool and marry,' said the queen. 'I have his +consent given to me, and I vow thou shalt never get it in thy +possession. So go-to about thy business. I see thou art a bold one to +own thy foolishness so readily.'" +</p> +<p> +"Ah me!" cried Kate, "I be glad not to be a maid to her majesty; for I +would not know how to answer her <a name="485">{485}</a> grace if she should ask me a +like question; for if it be bold to say one hath a reasonable desire +to be married, I must needs be bold then, for I would not for two +thousand pounds break Mr. Lacy's heart; and he saith he will die if I +do not marry him. But, Polly, thou wouldst never be at a loss to +answer her majesty." +</p> +<p> +"No more than Pace her fool," quoth Polly, "who, when she said, as he +entered the room, 'Now we shall hear of our faults,' cried out, 'Where +is the use of speaking of what all the town doth talk of?'" +</p> +<p> +"The fool should have been whipped," Mistress Ward said. +</p> +<p> +"For his wisdom, or for his folly, good Mistress Ward?" asked Polly. +"If for wisdom, 'tis hard to beat a man for being wise. If for folly, +to whip a fool for that he doth follow his calling, and as I be the +licensed fool in this house—which I do take to be the highest +exercise of wit in these days, when all is turned upside down—I do +wish you all good-night, and to be no wiser than is good for your +healths, and no more foolish than suffices to lighten the heart;" and +so laughing she ran away, and Kate said in a lamentable voice, +</p> +<p> +"I would I were foolish, if it lightens the heart." +</p> +<p> +"Content thee, good Kate," I said; but in so low a voice none did +hear. And she went on, +</p> +<p> +"Mr. Lacy is gone to Yorkshire for three weeks, which doth make me +more sad than can be thought of." +</p> +<p> +I smiled; but Muriel, who had not yet oped her lips whilst the others +were talking, rising, kissed her sister, and said, "Thou wilt have, +sweet one, so great a contentment in his letters as will give thee +patience to bear the loss of his good company." +</p> +<p> +At the which Kate brightened a little. To live with Muriel was a +preachment, as I have often had occasion since to find. +</p> +<p> +On the first Sunday I was at London, we heard mass at the Portuguese +ambassador's house, whither many Catholics of his acquaintance +resorted for that purpose from our side of the city. In the afternoon +a gentleman, who had travelled day and night from Staffordshire on +some urgent business, brought me a letter from my father, writ only +four days before it came to hand, and about a week after my departure +from home. It was as follows: +</p> +<p class="cite"> + "MINE OWN DEAR CHILD,—The bearer of this letter hath promised to do + me the good service to deliver it to thee as soon as he shall reach + London; which, as he did intend to travel day and night, I compute + will be no later than the end of this week, or on Sunday at the + furthest. And for this his civility I do stand greatly indebted to + him; for in these straitened times 'tis no easy matter to get + letters conveyed from one part of the kingdom to another without + danger of discovering that which for the present should rather be + concealed. I received notice two days ago from Mistress Ward's + sister of your good journey and arrival at London; and I thank God, + my very good child, that he has had thee in his holy keeping and + bestowed thee under the roof of my good sister and brother; so that, + with a mind at ease in respect to thee, my dear sole earthly + treasure, I may be free to follow whatever course his providence may + appoint to me, who, albeit unworthy, do aspire to leave all things + to follow him. And indeed he hath already, at the outset of my + wanderings, sweetly disposed events in such wise that chance hath + proved, as it were, the servant of his providence; and, when I did + least look for it, by a divine ordination furnished me, who so short + a time back parted from a dear child, with the company of one who + doth stand to me in lieu of her who, by reason of her tender sex and + age, I am compelled to send from me. For being necessitated, for the + preservation of my life, to make seldom any long stay in one place, + I had need of a youth to ride with me on those frequent journeys, + and keep me company in such places <a name="486">{486}</a> as I may withdraw unto for + quietness and study. So being in Stafford some few days back, I + inquired of the master of the inn where I did lay for one night, if + it were not possible to get in that city a youth to serve me as a + page, whom I said I would maintain as a gentleman if he had + learning, nurture, and behavior becoming such a person. He said his + son, who was a schoolmaster, had a youth for a pupil who carried + virtue in his very countenance; but that he was the child of a + widow, who, he much feared, would not easily be persuaded to part + from him. Thereupon I expressed a great desire to have a sight of + this youth and charged him to deal with his master so that he should + be sent to my lodgings; which, when he came there, lo and behold, I + perceived with no small amazement that he was no other than Edmund + Genings, who straightway ran into my arms, and with much ado + restrained himself from weeping, so greatly was he moved with + conflicting passions of present joy and recollected sorrow at this + our unlooked-for meeting; and truly mine own contentment therein was + in no wise less than his. He told me that his mother's poverty + increasing, she had moved from Lichfield, where it was more bitter + to her, by reason of the affluence in which she had before lived in + that city, to Stafford, where none did know them; and she dwelt in a + mean lodging in a poor sort of manner. And whereas he had desired to + accept the offer of a stranger, with a view to relieve his mother + from the burden of his support, and maybe yield her some assistance + in her straits, he now passionately coveted to throw his fortune + with mine, and to be entered as a page in my service. But though she + had been willing before, from necessity, albeit averse by + inclination, to part with him, when she knew me it seemed awhile + impossible to gain her consent. Methinks she was privy to Edmund's + secret good opinion of Catholic religion, and feared, if he should + live with me, the effect thereof would follow. But her necessities + were so sharp, and likewise her regrets that he should lack + opportunities for his further advance in learning, which she herself + was unable to supply, that at length by long entreaty he prevailed + on her to give him license for that which his heart did prompt him + to desire for his own sake and hers. And when she had given this + consent, but not before, lest it should appear I did seek to bribe + her by such offers to so much condescension as she then evinced, I + proposed to assist her in any way she wished to the bettering of her + fortunes, and said I would do as much whether she suffered her son + to abide with me or no: which did greatly work with her to conceive + a more favorable opinion of me than she had heretofore held, and to + be contented he should remain in my service, as he himself so + greatly desired. After some further discourse, it was resolved that + I should furnish her with so much money as would pay her debts and + carry her to La Rochelle, where her youngest son was with her + brother, who albeit he had met with great losses, would + nevertheless, she felt assured, assist her in her need. Thus has + Edmund become to me less a page than a pupil, less a servant than a + son. I will keep a watchful eye over his actions, whom I already + perceive to be tractable, capable, willing to learn, and altogether + such as his early years did promise he should be. I thank God, who + has given me so great a comfort in the midst of so great trials, and + to this youth in me a father rather than a master, who will ever + deal with him in an honorable and loving manner, both in respect to + his own deserts and to her merits, whose prayers have, I doubt not, + procured this admirable result of what was in no wise designed, but + by God's providence fell out of the asking a simple question in an + inn and of a stranger. +<br><br> + "And now, mine only and very dear child, I commend thee to + God's holy keeping; and I beseech thee to be as mindful of + thy duty to him as thou <a name="487">{487}</a> hast been + (and most especially of late) of thine to me; and imprint + in thy heart those words of holy writ, 'Not to fear those + that kill the body, but cannot destroy the soul;' but + withal, in whatever is just and reasonable, and not + clearly against Catholic religion, to observe a most exact + obedience to such as stand to thee at present in place of + thy unworthy father, and who, moreover, are of such virtue + and piety as I doubt not would move them rather to give + thee an example how to suffer the loss of all things for + Christ his sake than to offend him by a contrary + disposition. I do write to my good brother by the same + convenience to yield him and my sister humble thanks for + their great kindness to me in thee, and send this written + in haste; for I fear I shall not often have means + hereafter. Therefore I desire Almighty God to protect, + bless, and establish thee. So in haste, and <i>in + visceribus Christi</i>, adieu." +</p> +<p> +The lively joy I received from this letter was greater than I can +rehearse, for I had now no longer before my eyes the sorrowful vision +of my dear father with none to tend and comfort him in his wanderings; +and no less was my contentment that Edmund, my dearly-loved playmate, +was now within reach of his good instructions, and free to follow that +which I was persuaded his conscience had been prompting him to seek +since he had attained the age of reason. +</p> +<p> +I note not down in this history the many visits I paid to the Charter +House that autumn, except to notice the growing care Lady Surrey did +take to supply the needs of prisoners and poor people, and how this +brought her into frequent occasions of discourse with Mistress Ward +and Muriel, who nevertheless, as I also had care to observe, kept +these interviews secret, which might have caused suspicion in those +who, albeit Catholic, were ill-disposed to adventure the loss of +worldly advantages by the profession of what Protestants do term +perverse and open papistry. Kate and Polly were of this way of +thinking—prudence was ever the word with them when talk of religion +was ministered in their presence; and they would not keep as much as a +prayer-book in their chambers for fear of evil results. They were +sometimes very urgent with their father for to suffer them to attend +Protestant service, which they said would not hinder them from hearing +mass at convenient times, and saying such prayers as they listed; and +Polly the more so that a young gentleman of good birth and high +breeding, who conformed to the times, had become a suitor for her +hand, and was very strenuous with her on the necessity of such +compliance, which nevertheless her father would not allow of. Much +company came to the house, both Protestant and Catholic; for my aunt, +who was sick at other times, did greatly mend toward the evening. When +I was first in London for some weeks, she kept me with her at such +times in the parlor, and encouraged me to discourse with the visitors; +for she said I had a forwardness and vivacity of speech which, if +practised in conversation, would in time obtain for me as great a +reputation of wit as Polly ever enjoyed. I was nothing loth to study +in this new school, and not slow to improve in it. At the same time I +gave myself greatly to the reading of such books as I found in my +cousins' chambers; amongst which were some M. de la Motte had lent to +Polly, marvellous witty and entertaining, such as <i>Les Nouvelles de la +Reine de Navarre</i> and the <i>Cents Histoires tragiques;</i> and others done +in English out of French by Mr. Thomas Fortescue; and a poem, writ by +one Mr. Edmund Spenser, very beautiful, and which did so much bewitch +me, that I was wont to rise in the night to read it by the light of +the moon at my casement window; and the <i>Morte d' Arthur</i>, which Mr. +Hubert Rookwood had willed me to read, whom I met at Bedford, and +which so filled my head with fantastic images and imagined scenes, +that I did, as it were, fall in love with <a name="488">{488}</a> Sir Launcelot, and +would blush if his name were but mentioned, and wax as angry if his +fame were questioned as if he had been a living man, and I in a +foolish manner fond of him. +</p> +<p> +This continued for some little time, and methinks, had it proceeded +further, I should have received much damage from a mode of life with +so little of discipline in it, and so great incitements to faults and +follies which my nature was prone to, but which my conscience secretly +reproved. And among the many reasons I have to be thankful to Mistress +"Ward, that never-to-be-forgotten friend, whose care restrained me in +these dangerous courses, partly by compulsion through means of her +influence with my aunt and her husband, and partly by such admonitions +and counsel as she favored me with, I reckon amongst the greatest +that, at an age when the will is weak, albeit the impulses be good, +she lent a helping hand to the superior part of my soul to surmount +the evil tendencies which bad example on the one hand, and weak +indulgence on the other, fostered in me, whose virtuous inclinations +had been, up to that time, hedged in by the strong safeguards of +parental watchfulness. She procured that I should not tarry, save for +brief and scanty spaces of time, in my aunt's parlor when she had +visitors, and so contrived that it should be when she herself was +present, who, by wholesome checks and studied separation from the rest +of the company, reduced my forwardness with just restraints such as +became my age. And when she discovered what books I read, oh, with +what fervent and strenuous speech she drove into my soul the edge of a +salutary remorse; with what tearful eyes and pleading voice she +brought before me the memory of my mother's care and my father's love, +which had ever kept me from drinking such empoisoned draughts from the +well-springs of corruption which in our days books of entertainment +too often prove, and if not altogether bad, yet be such as vitiate the +palate and destroy the appetite for higher and purer kinds of mental +sustenance. Sharp was her correction, but withal so seasoned with +tenderness, and a grief the keenness of which I could discern was +heightened by the thought that my two elder cousins (one time her +pupils) should be so drawn aside by the world and its pleasures as to +forget their pious habits, and minister to others the means of such +injury as their own souls had sustained, that every word she uttered +seemed to sink into my heart as if writ with a pen of fire; and mostly +when she thus concluded her discourse: +</p> +<p> +"There hath been times, Constance, when men, yea and women also, might +play the fool for a while, without so great danger as now, and dally +with idle folly like children who do sport on a smooth lawn nigh to a +running stream, under their parents' eyes, who, if their feet do but +slip, are prompt to retrieve them. But such days are gone by for the +Catholics of this land. I would have thee to bear in mind that 'tis no +common virtue—no convenient religion—faces the rack, the dungeon, and +the rope; that wanton tales and light verses are no <i>viaticum</i> for a +journey beset with such perils. And thou—thou least of all—whose +gentle mother, as thou well knowest, died of a broken heart from the +fear to betray her faith—thou, whose father doth even now gird +himself for a fight, where to win is to die on a scaffold—shouldst +scorn to omit such preparation as may befit thee to live, if it so +please God, or to die, if such be his will, a true member of his holy +Catholic Church. O Constance, it doth grieve me to the heart that thou +shouldst so much as once have risen from thy bed at night to feed thy +mind with the vain words of profane writers, in place of nurturing thy +soul by such reasonable exercises and means as God, through the +teaching of his Church, doth provide for the spiritual growth of his +children, and by prayer and penance make ready for coming conflicts. +Bethink thee of the many holy priests, yea and laymen also, who be in +uneasy <a name="489">{489}</a> dungeons at this time, lying on filthy straw, with chains +on their bruised limbs, but lately racked and tormented for their +religion, whilst thou didst offend God by such wanton conduct. Count +up the times thou hast thus offended; and so many times rise in the +night, my good child, and say the psalm 'Miserere,' through which we +do especially entreat forgiveness for our sins." +</p> +<p> +I cast myself in her arms, and with many bitter tears lamented my +folly; and did promise her then, and, I thank God, ever after did keep +that promise, whilst I abode under the same roof with her, to read no +books but such as she should warrant me to peruse. Some days after she +procured Mr. Congleton's consent, who also went with us, to carry me +to the Marshalsea, whither she had free access at that time by reason +of her acquaintanceship with the gaoler's wife, who, when a maid, had +been a servant in her family, and who, having been once Catholic, did +willingly assist such prisoners as came there for their religion. +There we saw Mr. Hart, who hath been this long while confined in a +dark cell, with nothing but boards to lie on till Mistress Ward gave +him a counterpane, which she concealed under her shawl, and the gaoler +was prevailed on by his wife not to take from him. He was cruelly +tortured some time since, and condemned to die on the same day as Mr. +Luke Kirby and some others on a like charge, that he did deny the +queen's supremacy in spiritual matters; but he was taken off the +sledge and returned to prison. He did take it very quietly and +patiently; and when Mr. Congleton expressed a hope he might soon be +released from prison, he smiled and said: +</p> +<p> +"My good friend, my crosses are light and easy; and the being deprived +of all earthly comfort affords a heavenly joy, which maketh my prison +happy, my confinement merciful, my solitude full of blessings. To God, +therefore, be all praise, honor, and glory, for so unspeakable a +benefit bestowed upon his poor, wretched, and unworthy servant." +</p> +<p> +So did he comfort those who were more grieved for him than he for +himself; and each in turn we did confess; and after I had disburdened +my conscience in such wise that he perceived the temper of my mind, +and where to apply remedies to the dangers the nature of which his +clearsightedness did foresee, he thus addressed me: +</p> +<p> +"The world, my dear daughter, soon begins to seem insipid, and all its +pleasures grow bitter as gall; all the fine shows and delights it +affords appear empty and good for nothing to such as have tasted the +happiness of conversing with Christ, though it be amidst torments and +tribulations, yea and in the near approach of death itself. This joy +so penetrates the soul, so elevates the spirit, so changes the +affections, that a prison seems not a prison but a paradise, death a +goal long time desired, and the torments which do accompany it jewels +of great price. Take with thee these words, which be the greatest +treasure and the rarest lesson for these times: 'He that loveth his +life in this world shall lose it, and he that hateth it shall find +it;' and remember the devil is always upon the watch. Be you also +watchful. Pray you for me. I have a great confidence that we shall see +one another in heaven, if you keep inviolable the word you have given +to God to be true to his Catholic Church and obedient to its precepts, +and he gives me the grace to attain unto that same blessed end." +</p> +<p> +These words, like the sower's seed, fell into a field where thorns +oftentimes threatened to choke their effect; but persecution, when it +arose, consumed the thorns as with fire, and the plant, which would +have withered in stony ground, bore fruit in a prepared soil. +</p> +<p> +As we left the prison, it did happen that, passing by the gaoler's +lodge, I saw him sitting at a table drinking ale with one whose back +was to the door. A suspicion came over me, the most unlikely in the +world, for it was against all credibility, and I had not seen so much +as that person's face; but in the shape of his head and the manner of +<a name="490">{490}</a> his sitting, but for a moment observed, there was a resemblance +to Edmund Genings, the thought of which I could not shake off. When we +were walking home, Mr. Congleton said Mr. Hart had told him that a +short time back a gentleman had been seized, and committed to close +confinement, whom he believed, though he had not attained to the +certainty thereof, to be Mr. Willisden; and if it were so, that much +trouble might ensue to many recusants, by reason of that gentleman +having dealt in matters of great importance to such persons touching +lands and other affairs whereby their fortunes and maybe their lives +might be compromised. On hearing of this, I straightway conceived a +sudden fear lest it should be my father and not Mr. Willisden was +confined in that prison; and the impression I had received touching +the youth who was at table with the gaoler grew so strong in +consequence, that all sorts of fears founded thereon ran through my +mind, for I had often heard how persons did deceive recusants by +feigning themselves to be their friends, and then did denounce them to +the council, and procured their arrest and oftentimes their +condemnation by distorting and false swearing touching the speech they +held with them. One Eliot in particular, who was a man of great +modesty and ingenuity of countenance, so as to defy suspicion (but a +very wicked man in more ways than one, as has been since proved), who +pretended to be Catholic, and when he did suspect any to be a Jesuit, +or a seminary priest, or only a recusant, he would straightway enter +into discourse with him, and in an artful manner cause him to betray +himself; whereupon he was not slow to throw off the mask, whereby +several had been already brought to the rope. And albeit I would not +credit that Edmund should be such a one, the evil of the times was so +great that my heart did misgive me concerning him, if indeed he was +the youth whom I had espied on such familiar terms with that ruffianly +gaoler. I had no rest for some days, lacking the means to discover the +truth of that suspicion; for Mrs. Ward, to whom I did impart it, dared +not adventure again that week to the Marshalsea, by reason of the +gaoler's wife having charged her not to come frequently, for that her +husband had suddenly suspected her to be a recusant, and would by no +means allow of her visits to the prisoners; but that when he was drunk +she could sometimes herself get his keys and let her in, but not too +often. Mr. Congleton would have it the prisoner must be Mr. Willisden +and no other, and took no heed of my fears, which he said had no +reasonable grounds, as I had not so much as seen the features of the +youth I took to be my father's page. But I could by no means be +satisfied, and wept very much; and I mind me how, in the midst of my +tears that evening, my eyes fell on the frontispiece of a volume of +the <i>Morte d' Arthur</i> which had been loosened when the book was in my +chamber, and in which was picture of Sir Launcelot, the present mirror +of my fancy. I had pinned it to my curtain, and jewelled it as a +treasure and fund of foolish musings, even after yielding up, with +promise to read no more therein, the book which had once held it. And +thus were kept alive the fantastic imaginings wherewith I clothed a +creature conceived in a writer's brain, whose nobility was the +offspring of his thoughts and the continual entertainment of mine own. +But, oh, how just did I now find the words of a virtuous friend, and +how childish my folly, when the true sharp edge of present fear +dispersed these vapory clouds, even as the keen blast of a north wind +doth drive away a noxious mist! The sight of the dismal dungeon that +day visited, the pallid features of that true confessor therein +immured, his soul-piercing words, and the apprehensions which were +wringing my heart—banished of a sudden an idle dream engendered by +vain readings and vainer musings, and Sir Launcelot held henceforward +no higher, or not so high, a <a name="491">{491}</a> place in my esteem as the good Sir +Guy of Warwick, or the brave Hector de Valence. +</p> +<p> +A day or two after, my Lady Surrey sent her coach for me; and I found +her in her dressing-room seated on a couch with her waiting-women and +Mistress Milicent around her, who were displaying a great store of +rich suits and jewels and such-like gear drawn from wardrobes and +closets, the doors of which were thrown open, and little Mistress Bess +was on tiptoe on a stool afore a mirror with a diamond necklace on, +ribbons flaring about her head, and a fan of ostrich-feathers in her +hand. +</p> +<p> +"Ah, sweet one," said my lady, when I came in, "thou must needs be +surprised at this show of bravery, which ill consorts with the +mourning of our present garb or the grief of our hearts; but, i' +faith, Constance, strange things do come to pass, and such as I would +fain hinder if I could." +</p> +<p> +"Make ready thine ears for great news, good Constance," cried Bess, +running toward me encumbered with her finery, and tumbling over sundry +pieces of head-gear in her way, to the waiting-woman's no small +discomfiture. "The queen's majesty doth visit upon next Sunday the +Earl and Countess of Surrey; and as her highness cannot endure the +sight of dool, they and their household must needs put it off and +array themselves in their costliest suits; and Nan is to put on her +choicest jewels, and my Lady Bess must be grand too, to salute the +queen." +</p> +<p> +"Hush, Bessy," said my lady; and leading me into the adjoining +chamber, "'tis hard," quoth she, holding my hand in hers,—"'tis hard +when his grace is in the Tower and in disgrace with her majesty, and +only six weeks since our Moll died, that she must needs visit this +house, where there be none to entertain her highness but his grace's +poor children; 'tis hard, Constance, to be constrained to kiss the +hand which threatens his life who gave my lord his, and mostly to +smile at the queen's jesting, which my Lord Arundel saith we must of +all things take heed to observe, for that she as little can endure +dool in the face as in the dress." +</p> +<p> +A few tears fell from those sweet eyes upon my hand, which she still +held, and I said, "Comfort you, my sweet lady. It must needs be that +her majesty doth intend favor to his grace through this visit. Her +highness would never be minded to do so much honor to the children if +she did not purpose mercy to the father." +</p> +<p> +"I would fain believe it were so," said the countess, thoughtfully; +"but my Lord Arundel and my Lady Lumley hold not, I fear, the same +opinion. And I do hear from them that his grace is much troubled +thereat, and hath written to the Earl of Leicester and my Lord +Burleigh to lament the queen's determination to visit his son, who is +not of age to receive her." [Footnote 99] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 99: Calendar of State Papers, Domestic Series, 1547 to + 1580: "Duke of Norfolk to the Earl of Leicester and Lord Burleigh; + laments the queen's determination to visit his son's house, who is + not of age to receive her."] +</p> +<p> +"And doth my Lord of Surrey take the matter to heart?" +</p> +<p> +"My lord's disposition doth incline him to conceive hope where others +see reason to fear," she replied. "He saith he is glad her majesty +should come to this house, and that he will take occasion to petition +her grace to release his father from the Tower; and he hath drawn up +an address to that effect, which is marvellous well expressed; and, +since 'tis written, he makes no more doubt that her majesty will +accede to it than if the upshot was not yet to come, but already past. +And he hath set himself with a skill beyond his years, and altogether +wonderful in one so young, to prepare all things for the queen's +reception; so that when his grandfather did depute my Lord Berkeley +and my Lady Lumley to assist us (he himself being too sick to go out +of his house) in the ordering of the collation in the banqueting-room, +and the music wherewith to greet her highness on her arrival, as well +as the ceremonial to be observed during her visit, they did find that +my lord had so <a name="492">{492}</a> disposedly and with so great taste ordained the +rules to be observed, and the proper setting forth of all things, that +little remained for them to do. And he will have me to be richly +dressed, and to put on the jewels which were his mother's, which, +since her death, have not been worn by the two Duchesses of Norfolk +which did succeed her. Ah me, Mistress Constance, I often wish my lord +and I had been born far from the court, in some quiet country place, +where there are no queens to entertain, and no plots which do bring +nobles into so great dangers." +</p> +<p> +"Alack," I cried, "dear lady, 'tis not the highest in the land that be +alone to suffer. Their troubles do stand forth in men's eyes; and when +a noble head is imperilled all the world doth know of it; but blood is +spilt in this land, and torments endured, which no pen doth chronicle, +and of which scant mention is made in palaces." +</p> +<p> +"There is a passion in thy speech," my lady said, "which betrayeth a +secret uneasiness of heart. Hast thou had ill news, my Constance?" +</p> +<p> +"No news," I answered, "but that which my fears do invent and +whisper;" and then I related to her the cause of my disturbance, which +she sought to allay by kind words, which nevertheless failed to +comfort me. +</p> +<p> +Before I left she did propose I should come to the Charter House on +the morning of the queen's visit, and bring Mistress Ward and my +cousins also, as it would pleasure them to stand in the gallery and +witness the entertainment, and albeit my heart was heavy, methought it +was an occasion not to be overpast to feast my eyes with the sight of +majesty, and to behold that great queen who doth hold in her hands her +subjects' lives, and who, if she do but nod, like the god of the +heathen which books do speak of, such terrible effects ensue, greater +than can be thought of; and so I gave my lady mine humble thanks, and +also for that she did gift me with a dainty hat and a well-embroidered +suit to wear on that day; which, when Kate saw, she fell into a +wonderful admiration of the pattern, and did set about to get it +copied afore the day of the royal visit to Howard House. As I returned +to Holborn in my lady's coach there was a great crowd in the Cornhill, +and the passage for a while arrested by the number of persons on their +way to what is now called the Royal Exchange, which her majesty was to +visit in the evening. I sat very quietly with mine eyes fixed on the +foot-passengers, not so much looking at their faces as watching their +passage, which, like the running of a river, did seem endless. But at +last it somewhat slackened, and the coach moved on, when, at the +corner of a street, nigh unto a lamp over a shop, which did throw a +light on his face, I beheld Edmund Genings. Oh, how my heart did beat, +and with what a loud cry I did call to the running footmen to stop! +But the noise of the street was so great they did not hear me, and I +saw him turn and pursue his way down another street toward the river. +My good uncle, when he heard I had verily seen my father's new page in +the city, gave more heed to my suspicions, and did promise to go +himself unto the Marshalsea on the next day, and seek to verify the +name of the prisoner Mr. Hart had made mention of. +</p> +<p> +[TO BE CONTINUED. <a href="#600">Page 600</a>] +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="493">{493}</a> +<br> +<h2>From The Cornhill Magazine. +<br><br> +MODERN FALCONRY.</h2> +<br> +<p> +Hunting and hawking were, as every one knows, the great sports of our +forefathers. Angling was but little understood before the time of +Walton and Cotton, and not thoroughly even by those great masters +themselves. In the olden time, the bow and arrow, being scarcely +adapted for fowling, were used almost exclusively against large game, +such as deer; the crossbow was perhaps not a very efficient weapon; +and the art of shooting flying with a fowling-piece may be said to be +of recent invention. It is true that, a couple of hundred years ago, +men (the sportsmen of those days) might have been seen, armed with a +match-lock, or some such wonderful contrivance, crawling toward a +covey of basking partridges, with the intention of shooting them on +the ground; and Dame Juliana Berners, who wrote upon falconry in the +middle of the fifteenth century, invented a fly-rod of such excessive +weight that the strongest salmon-fisher in these days would be +unwilling to wield it. But this was sorry work, and we can well +understand that, of itself, it was very far from satisfying a +sport-loving people. They still held by the old sports. Hunting and +hawking were in their glory when what we now call "shooting" and +"fishing" were scarcely understood at all. Deer were in abundance, and +so was other game, especially if we consider the few people privileged +to kill it. In those days, though not in these, the most sportsmanlike +way was the most profitable; and more quarry could be taken with dogs +and hawks than in any other, and perhaps less legitimate, manner. +</p> +<p> +Hunting we retain, as our great and national sport, though +circumstances, rather than choice, have led to our exchanging the stag +for the fox. But falconry, the great sport of chivalry, once the +national sport of these islands, has been permitted so nearly to die +out that but few people are aware of its existence amongst us. That it +does still live, however, though under a cloud,—to what extent and in +what manner it is carried out,—it is the purport of this paper to +show. +</p> +<p> +The causes of the decrease, and almost the loss, of this sport are +obvious enough. Amongst the chief are, the present enclosed state of +the country; the perfection—or what is almost perfection—of modern +gunnery, and of the marksman's skill, and the desire to make large +bags. Add to these, perhaps, the trouble and expense attendant upon +keeping hawks. But the links have at no time absolutely been broken +which, in England, unite falconry in the time of Ethelbert to falconry +of the present day. Lord Orford and Colonel Thornton took them up and +strengthened them at the end of the last, and the beginning of the +present, century. Later still, the Loo Club in Holland saved falconry +from extinction in England, because its English members brought their +falcons to this country, and flew them here. The Barrs, first-rate +Scotch falconers, and John Pells, of Norfolk, helped the course by +training and selling hawks; and a work entitled "Falconry in the +British Isles," published in 1855, together with some chapters which +appeared rather later in one of the leading sporting newspapers (and +were afterward collected in a volume), served to create or encourage a +love for falconry. +</p> +<p> +It was said that the present Duke of St. Albans, the grand falconer, +would take to the sport <i>con amore</i>, and not as a mere form; but this +is very far indeed from being the case. <a name="494">{494}</a> The Maharajah Dhuleep +Singh was perhaps the most considerable falconer of the present day; +and last season but one he killed 119 grouse with his young hawks; but +he has lately given up the greater part of his hawking establishment. +In Ireland there are some good falcons, flown occasionally at herons, +and frequently, and with great success, at other quarry; many officers +in the army are falconers; and, in the wilds of Cheshire, there lives +a poor gentleman who has flown hawks for fifteen years, and contrives, +through the courtesy of his friends, to make a bag on the moors with +his famous grouse-hawk "The Princess," and one or two others. +</p> +<p> +Those who have been accustomed to regard falconry as entirely a thing +of the past, and the secret of hawk-training as utterly lost as that +of Stonehenge or the Pyramids, will be surprised to hear that there +are, at the present time, hawks in England of such proved excellence, +that it is impossible to conceive even princes in the olden time, +notwithstanding the monstrous prices they are said to have paid for +some falcons, ever possessing better. When a peregrine falcon will +"wait on," as it is called, at the height of a hundred or a hundred +and fifty yards above her master, as he beats the moors for her, and, +when the birds rise, chase them with almost the speed of an arrow; +when she is sure to kill, unless the grouse escapes in cover; when she +will not attempt to "carry" her game, even should a dog run by her, +and when she is ready to fly two or three times in one morning—it can +easily be imagined, even by those who know nothing of falconry, that +she has reached excellence. +</p> +<p> +And so, in heron-hawking. If a cast of falcons, unhooded at a quarter +of a mile from a passing heron (especially a "light" heron, i. e., a +heron <i>going</i> to feed, and therefore not weighted), capture him in a +wind, and after a two-mile flight, it is difficult to suppose, +<i>caeteris paribus</i>, that any hawks could possibly be superior to them. +And, as such hawks as we have described exist, the inevitable +conclusion is, that where falconry is really understood, it is +understood as well as it ever was; or, in other words, that modern +falconry, as far as the perfection of individual hawks is concerned, +is equal to ancient. +</p> +<p> +Our forefathers, excellent falconers as they were, chose to make a +wonderful mystery of their craft; and when they did publish a book on +the subject of their great sport, its directions could only avail the +gentry of those exclusive times. In examining these books, one is +sometimes almost tempted to doubt whether the writers really offered +the whole of their contents in a spirit of good faith; at any rate, +some of the advice is very startling to modern ears; and no sane man +of the present day would dream of following it. Perhaps the reader +would like an extract. Here, then, is a recipe for a sick hawk, +extracted from <i>The Gentleman's Recreation</i>, published 1677: "Take +germander, pelamountain, basil, grummel-seed, and broom-flowers, of +each half an ounce; hyssop, sassafras, polypodium, and horse-mints, of +each a quarter of an ounce, and the like of nutmegs; cubebs, borage, +mummy, mugwort, sage, and the four kinds of mirobolans, of each half +an ounce; of aloes soccotrine the fifth part of an ounce, and of +saffron one whole ounce. To be put into a hen's gut, tied at both +ends." What was supposed to be the effect of this marvellous mixture, +it is somewhat hard to divine; but our modern pharmacopoeia would be +content with a little rhubarb and a few peppercorns. With regard to +food, we are told, in the same work, that cock's flesh is proper for +falcons that are "melancholick;" and that "phlegmatick" birds are to +be treated in a different way—possibly fed on pullets. Were this paper +intended as a notice of ancient, instead of modern falconry, we might +multiply instances to show the extreme <i>faddiness</i> of the old +falconers. +</p> +<a name="495">{495}</a> +<p> +Simply to <i>tame</i> a hawk is excessively easy. To train it, up to +a certain point, is not at all difficult. But it requires an old and +practised hand to produce a bird of first-rate excellence. +</p> +<p> +The modern routine of training the peregrine falcon is shortly as +follows: Young birds are procured, generally from Scotland, either +just before they can fly, or just after. They are placed in some +straw, on a platform, in an outhouse, which ought to open to the +southeast. They are furnished each with a large bell (the size of a +very small walnut) for the leg; and each with a couple of jessies +(short straps of leather) for both legs. If they are unable to fly, +the door of the coach-house (or whatever the outhouse may be) should +be left open; but if they have tolerable use of their wings, it will +be necessary to close it for the first few days. They are fed twice a +day with beefsteak—changed, occasionally, for rabbit, rook, or +pigeon; and, if the birds are very young, the food must be cut up +small; but it is improper to take them from the nest until the +feathers have shown themselves thoroughly through the white down. A +lure is then used. This instrument need be nothing more than a forked +and somewhat heavy piece of wood (sometimes covered with leather), to +which is fastened a strap and a couple of pigeons' wings. To this meat +is tied; and the young hawks are encouraged to fly down from their +platform, at the stated feeding times, to take their meals from it, +the falconer either loudly whistling or shouting to them the while. +Presently, and as they become acquainted with the lures, they are +permitted to fly at large for a fortnight or three weeks; and, if the +feeding-times be kept, the lures well furnished with food, and the +shout or whistle employed, the hawks will certainly return when they +are due; unless, indeed, they have been injured or destroyed when from +home, by accident or malice. This flying at liberty is termed "flying +at hack." When the young hawks show any disposition to prey for +themselves (though the heavy bells are intended slightly to delay +this), they are taken up from "hack," either with a small net, or with +the hand. They are then taught to wear the hood, and are carried on +the fist. In a few days they are sufficiently tame to be trusted at +large, and may be flown at young grouse or pigeons, the heavy bells +having been changed for the lightest procurable. At this period great +pains are taken by the falconer to prevent his bird "carrying" her +game; for it is obvious that, were the hawk to move when he approached +her, he would be subject constantly to the greatest trouble and +disappointment. The tales told in books about hawks <i>bringing</i> quarry to +their master are absurd; the falconer must go to his hawk. Such is a +sketch of the training in modern times of the eyas or young bird. +Wild-caught hawks, however, called "haggards," are occasionally used. +These, though excellent for herons and rooks, are not good for +game-hawking, as it is difficult to make them "wait on" about the +falconer, and all game must be flown from the air, and not from the +hood; <i>i.e.</i>, by a hawk from her pitch, and not from the fist of her +master. Haggards, of course, are never flown at "hack." The tiercel, +or male peregrine, is excellent for partridges and pigeons; but the +female bird only can have a chance with herons, and is to be preferred +also for grouse and rooks. +</p> +<p> +We have in this country several trained goshawks, which are flown at +rabbits; also sometimes at hares and pheasants. The merlin, too, is +occasionally trained: the present writer flew these beautiful little +birds at larks for years; but gave them up in 1857, and confined +himself entirely to peregrines and goshawks. The sparrow-hawk, the +wildest of hawks, is sometimes used for small birds. The hobby is +hardly to be procured. The Iceland and Greenland falcons are prized, +but are rarely met with. +</p> +<p> +These large birds are called gerfalcons; and, when very white, and +good in the field, fetched extravagant prices in the old times. They +may now sometimes be procured untrained for £5 or £6 each; but the +peregrine is large enough for the game of this country. +</p> +<a name="496">{496}</a> +<p> +It may be interesting to know, in something like detail, what a flight +at game, rooks, pigeons, or magpies is like how it is conducted, and +to what extent the sagacity of hawks may be developed. To this end, we +will give a sketch or two of what is being done now, and what will be +done in the game season. +</p> +<p> +At this season of the year, and in this country, falconers are obliged +to be content with rook, pigeon, or magpie flying. Such quarry is +flown "out of the hood," and not from the air; <i>i.e.</i> the hawk, +instead of "waiting on" over the falconer in expectation of quarry +being sprung, is unhooded as it rises, and is cast off from the fist. +At least the only exception to this is when pigeons are thrown from +the hand in order to teach a hawk to "wait on." +</p> +<p> +It will be understood that, in the following description, the +peregrine is supposed to be used, for a long-winged hawk is necessary +for the flights about to be described, and the merlin is too small to +be depended upon for anything larger than a black-bird, or a young +partridge; though the best females are good for pigeons. +</p> +<p> +Let us go out to-day, then, and try to kill a rook or two on the +neighboring common. The hawks are in good condition; not indeed as fat +as though they were put up to moult, but with plenty of flesh and +muscle, and wind kept good by almost daily exercise. We have a haggard +tiercel and a haggard falcon; also two eyas falcons; all are up to +their work and have been well entered to rooks. We shall not trouble +ourselves to take out the cadge to-day, for our party is quite strong +enough to carry the hawks on the fist. Only two of us are mounted, a +lady and a gentleman; the rest will run. The lady would carry the +little tiercel, but she is afraid lest she should make a blunder in +unhooding him, as her mare is rather fresh this morning; but her +companion, who has flown many a hawk, willingly takes charge of him. +</p> +<p> +We are well on the common now; and lo! a black mass on the ground +there, with a few black spots floating over. Hark to the distant +"caw!" A clerical meeting. "Let us give them a bishop, then," says the +bearer of the tiercel, which is called by that name. The wind is from +them to us. The horseman and his companion canter onward; we follow at +a slow run. The horses approach the flock; the black mass becomes +disturbed and rises; the "bishop" is thrown off with a shout of "Hoo, +ha! ha!" and rushes amongst his clergy with even more than episcopal +energy. There is full enough wind; the rooks are soon into it, and +ringing up in a compact body with a pace which, for them, is very +good. His lordship, too, is mounting: he rose in a straight line the +moment he left the fist, but he is now making a large circle to get +above his quarry. He has reached them, but he does not grapple with +the first bird he comes near, though he seems exceedingly close to it. +But there is something so thoroughly systematic in his movements, +something which so suggests a long and deadly experience, that even +the uninitiated of the party feel certain that he is doing the right +thing. He is nearly above them. A rook has left the flock—the very +worst thing he could possibly do for his own sake: he has saved the +bishop the trouble of selection. He makes for some trees in the +distance, but it is inconceivable that he can reach them. There! and +there! Now again! He is clutched at the third stoop, and both birds, +in a deadly embrace, flap and twist to the ground together. The rest +are high in the air, and a long way off. +</p> +<p> +It must not be considered that this tiercel did not dash at once into +the whole flock because he was afraid to do so. He had no fear +whatever; but nature or experience taught him that a stoop from above +was worth half-a-dozen attempts to fly level and grapple. +</p> +<p> +"It's poor work after all," said one of the party, who had run for it +notwithstanding; "these brutes can't fly, <a name="497">{497}</a> and it's almost an +insult to a first-rate hawk to unhood him at such quarry. Even the +hawks don't fly with the same dash that one sees when a strong pigeon +is on the wing. Beside, it's spoiling the eyases for game-hawking; +when they ought to be 'waiting on' over grouse, they will be starting +after the first rook that passes." +</p> +<p> +"My good fellow," answered another, "you <i>must</i> hawk rooks now, or be +content with pigeons, unless you can find magpies (we will try that +presently): there are no herons anywhere near (and I don't know that +the eyases would fly them if there were); and, as for flying a +house-pigeon, which has been brought to the field in a basket, though +I grant the goodness of the flight, I don't see the sport. If we could +find wood-pigeons far enough from trees, I should like that. As for +the game next season, there are not many rooks on the <i>moors</i>; and, as +these falcons would fly rooks even if they had not seen them for a +year, I don't think we are losing much by what we are doing. It is +exercise at any rate; and, beside, I assure you that I have seen an +old cock-rook, in a wind like this, live for a mile, before one of the +best falcons in the world, where there was not a single tree to +shelter him." +</p> +<p> +We are compelled to go some distance before we can see a black +feather; for rooks, once frightened, are very careful; or rather, we +should have been so compelled had it not happened that an old +carrion-crow, perhaps led near the spot by curiosity, is seen passing +at the distance of about two hundred yards. The passage-falcon is +instantly unhooded and cast off; and, as we are now in the +neighborhood of a few scattered trees, it takes ten minutes to kill +him; and a short time, too, for he has "treed" himself some eight or +ten times in spite of our efforts to make him take the open. +</p> +<p> +Our time is short to-day; but let us get a magpie, if possible, before +we go home. Our fair companion is fully as anxious for the sport as we +are. Only a mile off there is a nice country; large grass fields, +small fences, with a bush here and there. We have reached it. A magpie +has flown from the top of that single tree in the hedgerow, and is +skimming down the field. Off with the young falcons: wait till the +first sees him; now unhood the second. Ah! he sees <i>them</i>, and flies +along the side of the hedge. Let us ride and run! Get him out of cover +as fast as possible, while the hawks "wait on" above. Pray, sir, jump +the fence a little lower down, and help to get him out from the other +side. Hoo-ha-ha! there he goes. Well stooped, "Vengeance," and nearly +clutched, "Guinevere," but he has reached the tree in the hedgerow, +and is moving his long tail about in the most absurd manner. A good +smack of the whip, and he is off again. And so we go on for a quarter +of an hour, riding, running, shouting, till "Guinevere" clutches him +just as he is about to enter a clump of trees. Who-whoop! +</p> +<p> +Such is rook-hawking and magpie-hawking. In an open plain, and on a +tolerably still day, a great number of rooks may be killed with good +hawks. Either eyas or passage-falcons may be used. Last year, one +hundred and fifty-two rooks and two carrion-crows were killed by some +officers, on the finest place for rook-flying in England, with some +passage-hawks and two eyases. In 1863, ninety rooks were killed, near +the same spot, with eyases. Tiercels are better than falcons for +magpie-hawking, as they are unquestionably quicker amongst hedgerows, +and can turn in a smaller compass. One tiercel has been known to kill +eight magpies in a day; but this is extraordinary work. +</p> +<p> +To prevent confusion, it may be as well to mention here that the term +"haggard" and "passage-hawk" both mean a wild-caught hawk; while +"eyas" signifies a bird taken from the nest or eyrie. +</p> +<p> +Heron-hawking requires an open country, with a heronry in the +neighborhood. The quarry is flown at generally by passage-hawks; but a +few <a name="498">{498}</a> very good eyases have been found equal to the flight. +</p> +<p> +Game-hawking is conducted in the following manner: Let us suppose, in +the first instance, that the falconer is living in the immediate +neighborhood of grouse-moors, and that he wishes, on some fine morning +at the end of October or the beginning of November, to show his friend +a flight or two at grouse, without going very far for the sport. The +old pointer is summoned; "The Princess," an eyas falcon in the second +plumage, is hooded; and the walk is commenced. +</p> +<p> +Now, very early in the season on the moors, and through the whole of +September with partridges, it is better to wait for a point before the +hawk is cast oft, for this saves time, and you know that you have game +under you; but at that period of the season which we have named, +grouse rise the moment man or dog is seen, and you would have a bad +chance indeed were you to fly your hawk out of the hood (<i>i.e.</i>, from +the fist) at them. The best way is to keep your dog to heel, not to +talk, and, just before you show yourself in some likely place, to +throw up the falcon. When she has reached her pitch, which she will +soon do, hurry the dog on, run, clap your hands, and get the birds up +as soon as may be. +</p> +<p> +The hill is ascended, "The Princess" is at her pitch—where she would +remain, following her master and "Shot" the pointer, for ten minutes +if necessary. Some minutes pass: an old cock-grouse, put up by a +shepherd-dog, rises a couple of hundred yards off. Hoo-ha-ha-ha! "The +Princess" vanishes from her post, more rapidly than the knights in +"Ivanhoe" left theirs. She does not droop or fly near the ground (she +has had too much experience for that), but almost rises as she shoots +off after him. Had he risen under her, she would have cut him over; +but this is a different affair. They are soon out of sight down the +hill; but a marker has been placed that way. "I think she has killed +him, sir," he shouts presently; "but it's a long way. No, she's coming +back; she must have put him into cover." Up and down hill, it would +take us twenty minutes to get there; and see! she is over our heads, +"waiting on" again, and telling us, as well as she can, to spring +another. A point! how is that?—only that there are some more which +dare not rise because they have seen <i>her</i>. "Hi in, 'Shot!'" Again the +falconer's shout startles his friend; again "The Princess" passes +through the air like an arrow. "All right this time, sir," cries the +marker; "I see her with it under yon wall." She has scarcely begun to +eat the head as we reach her. One more flight. She is lifted on the +grouse; the leash is passed through the jesses, and then she is +hooded. Let us rest for ten minutes. Again, she is "waiting on," again +she flies; but this time, though we see the flight for three-quarters +of a mile, the birds top a hill, and we are an hour in finding them. +The grouse, however, is fit for cooking even then; only the head, +neck, and some of the back have vanished: it is plucked nearly as well +as though it had been in the hands of a cook. That will do, and very +good sport, too, considering we had but one hawk. Let us now feed her +up on beef, and hood her. +</p> +<p> +In the very early part of the season, with grouse, and commonly with +partridges, it is usual (as we have hinted) to wait for a point; the +hawk is then cast off, and the birds are sprung when she has reached +her pitch. +</p> +<p> +Goshawks, which may be occasionally procured from the Regent's Park +Zoological Gardens, or directly from Sweden or Germany, are considered +by some falconers to be difficult birds to manage. That they are +sulkily disposed is certain; but in hands <i>accustomed to them</i>, and +when they are constantly at work, they are exceedingly trustworthy, +even affectionate, and will take as many as eight or ten rabbits in a +day. They are short-winged hawks, and have no chance with anything +faster than a rising pheasant; they are <a name="499">{499}</a> excellent for rabbits, +and a few large ones will sometimes hold a hare. In modern practice +they are never hooded, except in travelling, and are always flown from +the fist, or from some tree in which they may have perched after an +unsuccessful flight. +</p> +<p> +There are probably, in these islands, about fifteen practical +falconers, three or four of whom are professional; of the latter, John +Pells and the Barrs are well worthy of mention. +</p> +<p> +John Pells was born at Lowestoft in 1815, and went, when he was +thirteen, with his father to Valkneswaard to take passage-hawks for +the Didlington Subscription Club; so that he was very soon in harness. +The elder Pells commenced his career at the age of eleven, and was in +every respect a perfect falconer; he was presented by Napoleon I. with +a falconer's bag, which is now in possession of the Duke of Leeds. He +died in 1838. The present John Pells has had all possible advantages +in his calling, and has made every use of them. He was falconer to the +Duke of Leeds, to Mr. O'Keeffe, to Mr. E. C. Newcome, to the late Duke +of St. Albans, and now attends to the hawks which the present duke is +bound, either by etiquette or necessity, to maintain. Pells also sells +trained hawks, and gives lessons in the art of falconry. He was at one +time an exceedingly active man, and spent six months in Iceland, +catching Iceland falcons. After enduring a good deal of cold and +fatigue, he brought fifteen of these birds to Brandon, in Norfolk, in +November, 1845. He is now too stout and too gouty for strong exercise, +but his experience is very valuable. +</p> +<p> +Too much can hardly be said in raise of John and Robert Barr +(brothers). Their father, a gamekeeper in Scotland, taught them, in a +rough way, the rudiments of falconry, They are now, and have been for +a long time, most accomplished falconers, When in the employment of +the Indian prince Dhuleep Singh, John Barr was sent to India to learn +the Indian system of falconry. There is some notion now of his being +placed at the head of a hawking club about to be established in Paris; +and English falconry might well be proud of such a representative. +Beside the Pells and the Barrs, we have Paul Möllen, Gibbs, and +Bots—and one or two more—all good. +</p> +<p> +In consequence of the great rage for game-preserving which obtains in +the present day, it does not seem unlikely that the peregrine falcon +may, in time, be as thoroughly exterminated in Scotland and Ireland as +the goshawk has already been. At present, however, falconers find no +difficulty in procuring these birds, if they are willing to pay for +them. In a selfish point of view, therefore, they have nothing of +which to complain. But it might become a question, at least of +conscience, whether mankind have the right, though they possibly may +have the power, of blotting out from the face of creation—so long as +there is no danger to human life and limb—any conspicuous type of +strength or of beauty. The kingfisher is sought to be exterminated on +our rivers, the eagle and the falcon on our hills; and it is brought +forward in justification of this slaughter—at least it is brought +forward in effect—that the sportsman's bag and the angler's creel are +of much more importance than the wonderful works of God. To all that +is selfish in these strict preservers of fish and of game it may be +opposed that part of the food of the kingfisher consists in minnows; +that the fry of trout and salmon, when not confined in breeding-boxes, +are rarely procured by this bird, which constantly feeds upon the +larvae of the <i>Dytiscce</i> and <i>Libelluae</i>, the real foes of the fry; +that the peregrine falcon, though she undoubtedly kills very many +healthy grouse, purges the moors of diseased ones, and drives away the +egg-stealing birds. And to all that is generous in these martinets of +preservation it may be submitted that true sport has other elements +than those of acquisition and slaughter; that the pleasure of a ramble +on the hills <a name="500">{500}</a> or by the river is sadly dashed if you have struck +out some of the beauty of the landscape; and that the incident of a +flight made by a wild hawk, or the flash of a kingfisher near the +angler's rod, is as lively and as well worth relating as the fall of +an extra grouse to the gun, or the addition of another trout to the +basket. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>From The Lamp. +<br><br> +ALL-HALLOW EVE; OR, THE TEST OF FUTURITY. +<br><br> +BY ROBERT CURTIS. +<br><br><br> +CHAPTER I.</h2> +<br> +<p> +I could have wished that the incidents which I am about to describe in +the following tale had taken place in some locality with a less +Celtic, and to English tongues a more pronounceable, name than +<i>Boher-na-Milthiogue.</i> I had at first commenced the tale with the word +itself, thus: "Boher-na-Milthiogue, though in a wild and remote part +of Ireland," etc. But I was afraid that, should an English reader take +up and open the book, he would at the very first word slap it together +again between the palms of his hands, saying, "Oh, that is quite +enough for me!" Now, as my English readers have done me vastly good +service on former occasions, I should be sorry to frighten them at the +outset of this new tale; and I have therefore endeavored to lead them +quietly into it. With my Irish friends no such circumlocution would +have been necessary. Perhaps, if I dissever and explain the word, it +may enable even my English readers in some degree to approach a +successful attempt at its pronunciation. I am aware, however, of the +difficulty they experience in this respect, and that their attempts at +some of our easiest names of Irish places are really +laughable—laughable, at least, to our Celtic familiarity with the +correct sound. +</p> +<p> +<i>Boher</i> is the Irish for "bridge," and <i>milthiogue</i> for a "midge;" +Boher-na-Milthiogue, "the midge's bridge." +</p> +<p> +There now, if my English friends cannot yet pronounce the word +properly, which I still doubt, they can at least understand what it +means. It were idle, I fear to hope, that they can see any <i>beauty</i> in +it; and yet that it is beautiful there can be no Celtic doubt +whatever. +</p> +<p> +Perhaps it might have been well to have written thus far in the shape +of a preface; but as nobody nowadays reads prefaces, the matter would +have been as bad as ever. I shall therefore continue now as I had +intended to have commenced at first. +</p> +<p> +Boher-na-Milthiogue, though in a wild and remote part of Ireland, is +not without a certain degree of natural and romantic beauty, suiting +well the features of the scene in which it lies. +</p> +<p> +Towering above a fertile and well-cultivated plain frown and smile the +brother and sister mountains of Slieve-dhu and Slieve-bawn, the solid +masonry of whose massive and perpendicular precipices was built by no +human architect. The ponderous and scowling rocks of Slieve-dhu, the +brother, are dark and indistinct; while, separated from it by a narrow +and abrupt ravine, those of Slieve-bawn, the sister, are of a whitish +spotted gray, contrasting cheerfully with those of her gloomy brother. +</p> +<a name="501">{501}</a> +<p> +There is generally a story in Ireland about mountains or rivers or old +ruins which present any peculiarity of shape or feature. Now it is an +undoubted fact, which any tourist can satisfy himself of, that +although from sixty to a hundred yards asunder, there are huge bumps +upon the side of Slieve-bawn, corresponding to which in every respect +as to size and shape are cavities precisely opposite them in the side +of Slieve-dhu. The story in this case is, that although formerly the +mountains were, like a loving brother and sister, clasped in each +other's arms, they quarrelled one dark night (I believe about the +cause of thunder), when Slieve-dhu in a passion struck his sister a +blow in the face, and staggered her back to where she now stands, too +far for the possibility of reconciliation; and that she, knowing the +superiority of her personal appearance, stands her ground, as a proud +contrast to her savage and unfeeling relative. +</p> +<p> +Deep straight gullies, worn by the winter floods, mark the sides of +both mountains into compartments, the proportion and regularity of +which might almost be a matter of surprise, looking like huge stripes +down the white dress of Slieve-bawn, while down that of Slieve-dhu +they might be compared to black and purple plaid. +</p> +<p> +"Far to the north," in the bosom of the minor hills, lies a glittering +lake—glittering when the sun shines; dark, sombre, and almost +imperceptible when the clouds prevail. +</p> +<p> +The origin of the beautiful name in which the spot itself rejoices I +believe to be this; but why do I say "believe?" It is a self-evident +and well-known fact. +</p> +<p> +Along the base of Slieve-bawn there runs a narrow <i>roadeen</i>, turning +almost at right angles through the ravine already mentioned, and +leading to the flat and populous portion of the country on the other +side of the mountains, and cutting the journey, for any person +requiring to go there, into the sixteenth of the distance by the main +road. In this instance the proverb would not be fulfilled, that "the +longest way round was the shortest way home." Across one of the +winter-torrent beds which runs down the mountain side, almost at the +entrance of the ravine, is a rough-built rustic bridge, at a +considerable elevation from the road below. To those approaching it +from the lower level, it forms a conspicuous and exceedingly +picturesque object, looking not unlike a sort of castellated defence +to the mouth of the narrow pass between the mountains. +</p> +<p> +This bridge, toward sunset upon a summer's evening, presents a very +curious and (except in that spot) an unusual sight. Whether it arises +from any peculiarity of the herbage in the vicinity, or the fissures +in the mountains, or the crevices in the bridge itself, as calculated +to engender them, it would be hard to say; but it would be impossible +for any arithmetician to compute at the roughest guess the millions, +the billions of small midges which dance in the sunbeams immediately +above and around the bridge, but in no other spot for miles within +view. The singularity of their movements, and the peculiarity of their +distribution in the air, cannot fail to attract the observation of the +most careless beholder. In separate and distinct batches of some +hundreds of millions each, they rise in almost solid masses until they +are lost sight of, as they attain the level of the heathered brow of +the mountain behind them, becoming visible again as they descend into +the bright sunshine that lies upon the white rocks of Slieve-bawn. In +no instance can you perceive individual or scattered midges; each +batch is connected and distinct in itself, sometimes oval, sometimes +almost square, but most frequently in a perfectly round ball. No two +of these batches rise or fall at the same moment. I was fortunate +enough to see them myself upon more than one occasion in high +perfection. They reminded me of large balls thrown up and caught +successively by some distinguished <a name="502">{502}</a> acrobat. During the +performance, a tiny little sharp whir of music fills the atmosphere, +which would almost set you to sleep as you sit on the battlement of +the bridge watching and wondering. +</p> +<p> +By what law of creation, or what instinct of nature, or, if by +neither, by what union of sympathy the movements of these milthiogues +are governed—for I am certain there are millions of them at the same +work in the same spot this fine summer's evening—would be a curious +and proper study for an entomologist; but I have no time here to do +more than describe the facts, were I even competent to enter into the +inquiry. Fancy say fifty millions of midges in a round ball, so +arranged that, under no suddenness or intricacy of movement, any one +touches another. There is no saying amongst them, "Keep out of my way, +and don't be <i>pushin'</i> me," as Larry Doolan says. +</p> +<p> +So far, the thing in itself appears miraculous; but when we come to +consider that their motions, upward to a certain point, and downward +to another, are simultaneous, that the slightest turn of their wings +is collectively instantaneous, rendering them at one moment like a +black target, and another turn rendering them almost invisible, all +their movements being as if guided by a single will—we are not only +lost in wonder, but we are perfectly unable to account for or +comprehend it. I have often been surprised, and so, no doubt, may many +of my readers have been, at the regularity of the evolutions of a +flock of stares in the air, where every twist and turn of a few +thousand pairs of wings seemed as if moved by some connecting wire; +but even this fact, surprising as it is, sinks into insignificance +when compared with the movements of these milthiogues. +</p> +<p> +But putting all these inquiries and considerations aside, the simple +facts recorded have been the origin of the name with which this tale +commences. +</p> +<br> + +<h2>CHAPTER II.</h2> +<p> +Winifred Cavana was an only daughter, indeed an only child. Her +father, old Ned Cavana of Rathcash, had been always a thrifty and +industrious man. During the many years he had been able to attend to +business—and he was an experienced farmer—he had realized a sum of +money, which, in his rank of life and by his less prosperous +neighbors, would be called "unbounded wealth," but which, divested of +that envious exaggeration, was really a comfortable independence for +his declining years, and would one of those days be a handsome +inheritance for his handsome daughter. Not that Ned Cavana intended to +huxter the whole of it up, so that she should not enjoy any of it +until its possession might serve to lighten her grief for his +death—no; should Winny marry some "likely boy," of whom her father +could in every respect approve, she should have six hundred pounds, +R.M.D.; and at his death by which time Ned hoped some of his +grandchildren would make the residue more necessary—she should have +all that he was able to demise, which was no paltry matter. In the +meantime they would live happily and comfortable, not niggardly. +</p> +<p> +With this view—a distant one, he still hoped—before him, and knowing +that he had already sown a good crop, and reaped a sufficient harvest +to live liberally, die peacefully, and be <i>berrid dacently</i>, he had +set a great portion of his land upon a lease during his own life, at +the termination of which it was to revert to his son-in-law, of whose +existence, long before that time, he could have no doubt, and for +whose name a blank had been left in his will, to be filled up in due +time before he died, or, failing that event—not his death, but a +son-in-law—it was left solely to his daughter Winifred. +</p> +<p> +Winny Cavana was, beyond doubt or question, a very handsome girl—and +she knew it. She knew, too, <a name="503">{503}</a> that she was "a catch;" the only one +in that side of the country; and no person wondered at the many +admirers she could boast of, though it was a thing she was never known +to do; nor did she wonder at it herself. Without her six hundred +pounds, Winny could have had scores of "bachelors;" and it was not +very surprising if she was hard to be pleased. Indeed, had Winny +Cavana been penniless, it is possible she would have had a greater +number of open admirers, for her reputed wealth kept many a faint +heart at a distance. It was not to be wondered at either, if a wealthy +country beauty had the name of a coquette, whether she deserved it or +not; nor was it to be expected that she could give unmixed +satisfaction to each of her admirers; and we all know what +censoriousness unsuccessful admiration is likely to cause in a +disappointed heart. +</p> +<p> +Amongst all those who were said to have entered for the prize of +Winny's heart, Thomas Murdock was the favorite—not with herself, but +the neighbors. At all events he was the "likely boy" whom Winny's +father had in his eye as a husband for his daughter; and in writing +his will, he had lifted his pen from the paper at the blank already +mentioned, and written the name Thomas Murdock in the air, so that, in +case matters turned out as he wished and anticipated, it would fit in +to a nicety. +</p> +<p> +The townlands of Rathcash and Rathcashmore, upon which the Cavanas and +Murdocks lived, was rather a thickly populated district, and they had +some well-to-do neighbors, beside many who were not quite so +well-to-do, but were yet decent and respectable. There were the Boyds, +the Beattys, and the Brennans, with the Cahils, the Cartys, and the +Clearys beyond them; the Doyles, the Dempseys, and the Dolans not far +off; with the Mulveys, the Mooneys, and the Morans quite close. The +people seemed to live in alphabetical batches in that district, as if +for the convenience of the county cess-collector and his book. Many +others lived still further off, but not so far (in Ireland) as not to +be called neighbors. +</p> +<p> +Kate Mulvey, one of the nearest neighbors, was a great friend and +companion of Winny's. If Kate had six hundred pounds she could easily +have rivalled Winny's good looks, but she had not six hundred pence; +and notwithstanding her magnificent eyes, her white teeth, and her +glossy brown hair, she could not look within miles as high into the +clouds as Winny could. Still Kate had her admirers, some of whom even +Winny's fondest glance, with all her money, could not betray into +treachery. But it so happened that the person at whom she had thrown +her cap had not (as yet, at least) picked it up. +</p> +<br> + +<h2>CHAPTER III.</h2> +<p> +It was toward the end of October, 1826. There had been an early +spring, and the crops had been got in favorably, and in good time. +There had been "a wet and a windy May;" a warm, bright summer had +succeeded it; and the harvest had been now all gathered in, except the +potatoes, which were in rapid progress of being dug and pitted. It was +a great day for Ireland, let the advocates for "breadstuffs" say what +they will, before the blight and yellow meal had either of them become +familiar with the poor. There were the Cork reds and the cups, the +benefits and the Brown's fancies, for half nothing in every direction, +beside many other sorts of potatoes, bulging up the surface of the +ridges—there were no drills in those days; <i>mehils</i> in almost every +field, with their coats off at the digging-in. +</p> +<p> +"Bill, don't lane on that boy on the ridge wid you; he's not much more +nor a <i>gossoon</i>; give him a start of you." +</p> +<p> +"<i>Gossoon aniow</i>; be gorra, he's as smart a chap on the face of a +ridge as the best of us, Tom." +</p> +<a name="504">{504}</a> +<p> +"Ay; but don't take it out of him too soon, Bill." +</p> +<p> +"Work away, boys," said the <i>gossoon</i> in question; "I'll engage I'll +shoulder my loy at the end of the ridge as soon as some of ye that's +spaking." +</p> +<p> +"It was wan word for the <i>gossoon</i>, as he calls him, an' two for +himself, Bill," chimed in the man on the next ridge. "Don't hurry Tom +Nolan; his feet's sore afther all he danced with Nelly Gaffeny last +night." +</p> +<p> +Here there was a loud and general laugh at poor Tom Nolan's expense, +and the <i>pickers</i>—women and girls, with handkerchiefs tied over their +heads looked up with one accord, annoyed that they were too far off to +hear the joke. It was well for one of them that they had not heard it, +for Nelly Gaffeny was amongst them. +</p> +<p> +"It's many a day, Pat, since you seen the likes of them turned out of +a ridge." +</p> +<p> +"They bate the world." +</p> +<p> +"They bang Banagher; and Banagher, they say—" +</p> +<p> +"Whist, Larry; don't be dhrawing that chap down at all." +</p> +<p> +"I seen but wan betther the year," said Tim Meaney. +</p> +<p> +"I say you didn't, nor the sorra take the betther, nor so good." +</p> +<p> +"Arra, didn't I? I say I did though." +</p> +<p> +"Where, <i>avic ma cree?</i>" +</p> +<p> +"Beyant at Tony Kilroy's." +</p> +<p> +"Ay, ay; Tony always had a pet acre on the side of the hill toward the +sun. He has the best bit of land in the parish." +</p> +<p> +"You may say that, Micky, with your own purty mouth. I led his +<i>mehil</i>, come this hollintide will be three years; an' there wasn't a +man of forty of us but turned out eight stone of cup off every ten +yards a a' four-split ridge. Devil a the like of them I ever seen +afore or since." +</p> +<p> +"Lumpers you mane, Andy; wasn't I there?" +</p> +<p> +"Is it you, Darby? no, nor the sorra take the foot; we all know where +you were that same year." +</p> +<p> +"Down in the lower part of Cavan, Phil. In throth, it wasn't cup +potatoes was throublin' him that time; but cups and saucers. He dhrank +a power of tay that harvest, boys." +</p> +<p> +Here there was another loud laugh, and the women with the +handkerchiefs upon their heads looked up again. +</p> +<p> +"Well, I brought her home dacent, boys; an' what can ye say to her?" +</p> +<p> +"Be gor, nothing, Darby avic, but that she's an iligant purty crathur, +and a credit to them that owns her, an' them that reared her." +</p> +<p> +"The sorra word of lie in that," echoed every man in the <i>mehil</i>. +</p> +<p> +Thus the merry chat and laugh went on in every potato-field. The +women, finding that they had too much to do to enable them to keep +close to the men, and that they were losing the fun, of course got up +a chat for themselves, and took good care to have some loud and hearty +laughs, which made the men in their turn look up, and lean upon their +loys. +</p> +<p> +Everything about Rathcash and Rathcashmore was prosperous and happy, +and the farmers were cheerful and open-hearted. +</p> +<p> +"That's grand weather, glory be to God, Ned, for the time of year," +said Mick Murdock to his neighbor Cavana, who was leaning, with his +arms folded, on a field-gate near the mearing of their two farms. The +farms lay alongside of each other—one in the town-land of Rathcash, +and the other in Rathcashmore. +</p> +<p> +"Couldn't be bet, Mick. I'm upward of forty years stannin' in this +spot, an' I never seen the batin' of it." +</p> +<p> +"Be gorra, you have a right to be tired, Ned; that's a long stannin'." +</p> +<p> +"The sorra tired, Mick a <i>wochal</i>. You know very well what I mane, an' +you needn't be so sharp. I'd never be tired of the same spot." +</p> +<p> +"Them's a good score of calves, Ned; God bless you an' them!" said +Mick, making up for his sharpness. +</p> +<p> +"An' you too, Mick. They are a fine lot of calves, an' all reared +since Candlemas." +</p> +<a name="505">{505}</a> +<p> +"There's no denying, Ned, but you med the most of that bit of land of +yours." +</p> +<p> +"'Tis about the same as your own, Mick; an' I think you med as good a +fist of yours." +</p> +<p> +"Well, maybe so, indeed; but I doubt it is going into worse hands than +what yours will, Ned." +</p> +<p> +"Why that, Mick?" +</p> +<p> +"Ah, that Tom of mine is a wild extravagant hero. He doesn't know much +about the value of money, and never paid any attention to farming +business, only what he was obliged to pick up from being with me. He +thinks he'll be rich enough when I'm in my clay, without much work. +An' so he will, Ned, so far as that goes; but it's only of +book-larnin' an' horse-racin' an' coorsin' he's thinkin', by way of +being a sort of gentleman one of those days; but he'll find to his +cost, in the lather end, that there's more wantin' to grow good crops +than 'The Farmer's Calendar of Operations.'" +</p> +<p> +"He's young, Mick, an' no doubt he'll mend. I hope you don't +discourage him." +</p> +<p> +"Not at all, Ned. The book-larnin 's all well enough, as far as it +goes, if he'd put the practice along with it, an' be studdy." +</p> +<p> +"So he will, Mick. His wild-oats will soon be all sown, an' then +you'll see what a chap he'll be." +</p> +<p> +"Faix, I'd rather see him sowing a crop of yallow Aberdeens, Ned, next +June; an' maybe it's what it's at the Curragh of Kildare he'll be, as +I can hear. My advice to him is to get married to some dacent nice +girl, that id take the wildness out of him, and lay himself down to +business. You know, Ned, he'll have every penny and stick I have in +the world; and the lease of my houlding in Rathcashmore is as good as +an estate at the rent I pay. If he'd give up his meandherin', and take +a dacent liking to them that's fit for him, I'd set him up all at +wanst, an' not be keeping him out of it until I was dead an' berrid." +</p> +<p> +The above was not a bad feeler, nor was it badly put by old Mick +Murdock to his neighbor. "Them that's fit for him" could hardly be +mistaken; yet there was a certain degree of disparagement of his own +son calculated to conceal his object. It elicited nothing, however, +but a long thoughtful silence upon old Ned Cavana's part, which Mick +was not slow to interpret, and did not wish to interrupt. At last Ned +stood up from the gate, and smoothing down the sleeves of his coat, as +if he supposed they had contracted some dust, he observed, "I'm +afear'd, Mick, you're puttin' the cart before the horse; come until I +show you a few ridges of red apples I'm diggin' out to-day. You'd +think I actially got them carted in, an' threune them upon the ridges: +the like of them I never seen." +</p> +<p> +And the two old men walked down the lane together. +</p> +<p> +But Mick Murdock's feeler was not forgotten by either of them. Mick +was as well pleased—perhaps better—that no further discussion took +place upon the subject at the time. He knew Ned Cavana was not a man +to commit himself to a hasty opinion upon any matter, much less upon +one of such importance as was so plainly suggested by his +observations. +</p> +<p> +Ned Cavana, too, brooded over the conversation in silence, determined +to throw out a feeler of his own to his daughter. +</p> +<p> +Ned had himself more than once contemplated the possibility as well as +the prudence of a match between Tom Murdock and his daughter. The +union, not of themselves alone, but of the two farms, would almost +make a gentleman of the person holding them. Both farms were held upon +unusually long leases, and at less than one-third of their value. If +joined, there could be no doubt but, with the careful and industrious +management of an experienced man, they would turn in a clear income of +between five and six hundred a year; quite sufficient in that part of +the world to entitle <a name="506">{506}</a> a person of even tolerably good education +to look up to the grand-jury list and a "justice of the pace." +</p> +<p> +The only question with Ned Cavana was, Did Tom Murdock possess the +attributes required for success in all or any of the above respects? +Ned, although he had taken his part with his father, feared <i>not</i>. Ay, +there was another question, Was Winny inclined for him? He feared not +also. +</p> +<p> +The other old man had not forgotten the feeler he had thrown out +either, nor the thoughtful silence with which it had been received; +for Mick Murdock could not believe that a man of Ned Cavana's +penetration had misunderstood him. Indeed, he was inclined to think +that the same matter might have originated in Ned's own mind, from +some words he had once or twice dropped about poor Winny's prospects +when he was gone, and the suspense it would be to him if she were not +settled in life before that day; "snaffled perhaps by some +good-for-nothing, extravagant fortune-hunter, with a handsome face, +when she had no one to look after her." +</p> +<p> +There was but one word in the above which Mick thought could be justly +applied to Tom; "extravagant" he undoubtedly was, but he was neither +handsome—at least not handsome enough to be called so as a matter of +course—nor was he good-for-nothing. He was a well-educated sharp +fellow, if he would only lay himself down to business. He was not a +fortune-hunter, for he did not require it; but idleness and +extravagance might make him one in the end. Yet old Mick was by no +means certain that the propriety of a match between these only and +rich children had not suggested itself to his neighbor Ned as well as +to himself. He hoped that if Tom had a "dacent hankerrin' afther" any +one, it was for Winny Cavana; but, like her father, he doubted if the +girl herself was inclined for him. He knew that she was proud and +self-willed. He was determined, however, to follow the matter up, and +throw out another feeler upon the subject to his son. +</p> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER IV.</h2> +<p> +It was now the 25th of October, just six days from All-Hallow Eve. +Mick would ask a few of the neighbors to burn nuts and eat apples, and +then, perhaps, he might find out how the wind blew. +</p> +<p> +"Tom," said he to his son, "I believe this is a good year for nuts." +</p> +<p> +"Well, father, I met a couple of chaps ere yesterday with their +pockets full of fine brown shellers, coming from Clonard Wood." +</p> +<p> +"I dare say they are not all gone yet, Tom; an' I wish you would set +them to get us a few pockets full, and we would ask a few of the +neighbors here to burn them on All-Hallow Eve." +</p> +<p> +"That's easy done, father; I can get three or four quarts by to-morrow +night. Those two very chaps would be glad to earn a few pence for +them; they wanted me to buy what they had; and if I knew your +intentions at the time, I should have done so; but it's not too late. +Who do you intend to ask, father?" +</p> +<p> +"Why, old Cavana and his daughter, of course, and the Mulveys; in +short, you know, all the neighbors. I won't leave any of them out, +Tom. The Cavanas, you know, are all as wan as ourselves, livin' at the +doore with us; and they're much like us too, Tom, in many respects. +Old Ned is rich, an' has but one child—a very fine girl. I'm old, an' +as rich as what Ned is, and I have but one child; I'll say though +you're to the fore, Tom—a very fine young man." +</p> +<p> +Old Mick paused. He wanted to see if his son's intelligence was on the +alert. It must have been very dull indeed had it failed to perceive +what his father was driving at; but he was silent. +</p> +<p> +"That Winny Cavana is a very fine girl, Tom," he continued; "and I +often wonder that a handsome young fellow like you doesn't make more +of her. She'll have six hundred pounds fortune, as round as a hoop; +beside, whoever gets her will fall in for that farm at her <a name="507">{507}</a> +father's death. There's ninety-nine years of it, Tom, just like our +own." +</p> +<p> +"She's a conceited proud piece of goods, father; and I suspect she +would rather give her six hundred pounds to some <i>skauhawn</i> than to a +man of substance like me." +</p> +<p> +"Maybe not now. Did you ever thry?" +</p> +<p> +"No, father, I never did. People don't often hold their face up to the +hail." +</p> +<p> +"<i>Na-bockleish</i>, Tom, she'd do a grate dale for her father, for you +know she must owe everything to him; an' if she vexes him he can cut +her out of her six hundred pounds, and lave the interest in his farm +to any one he likes; and I know what he thinks about you, Tom." +</p> +<p> +"Ay, and he's so fond of that one that she can twist him round her +finger. Wait now, father, until you see if I'm not up to every twist +and turn of the pair of them." +</p> +<p> +"But you never seem to spake to her or mind her at all, Tom; and I +know, when I was your age, I always found that the girls liked the man +best that looked afther them most. I'm purty sure too, Tom, that +there's no one afore you there." +</p> +<p> +"I'm not so sure of that, father. But I'll tell you what it is: I have +not been either blind or idle on what you are talking about; but up to +this moment she seems to scorn me, father; there's the truth for you. +And as for there being no one before me, all I can say is that she +manages, somehow or other, to come out of the chapel-door every Sunday +at the same moment with that whelp, Edward Lennon, from the mountain; +<i>Emon-a-knock</i>, as they call him, and as I have heard her call him +herself. Rathcash chapel is not in his parish at all, and I don't know +what brings him there." +</p> +<p> +"Is it that poor penniless pauper, depending on his day's labor? Ah, +Tom, she's too proud for that." +</p> +<p> +"Yes, that very fellow; and there's no getting a word with her where +he is." +</p> +<p> +"Well, Tom, all I can say is this, an' it's to my own son I'm sayin' +it—that if you let that fellow pick up that fine girl with her six +hundred pounds and fall into that rich farm, an' you livin' at the +doore with her, you're not worth staggering-bob broth, with all your +book-larnin' an' good looks, to say nothin' of your manners, Tom +avic." And he left him, saying to himself, "He may put that in his +pocket to balance his knife." +</p> +<p> +Thus ended what old Murdock commenced as a feeler, but which became +very plain speaking in the end. But the All-Hallow Eve party was to +come off all the same. +</p> +<p> +A word or two now of comparison, or perhaps, more properly speaking, +of contrast, between these two aspirants to Winny Cavana's favor, +though young Lennon was still more hopeless than the other, from his +position. +</p> +<p> +Thomas Murdock was more conspicuous for the manliness of his person +than for the beauties of his mind or the amiability of his +disposition. Although manifestly well-looking in a group, take him +singly, and he could not be called very handsome. There was a +suspicious fidgetiness about his green-spotted eyes, as if he feared +you could read his thoughts; and at times, if vexed or opposed, a dark +scowl upon his heavy brow indicated that these thoughts were not +always amiable. This unpleasing peculiarity of expression marred the +good looks which the shape of his face and the fit of his curly black +whiskers unquestionably gave him. In form he was fully six feet high, +and beautifully made. At nineteen years of age he had mastered not +only all the learning which could be attained at a neighboring +national school, but had actually mastered the master himself in more +ways than one, and was considered by the eighty-four youngsters whom +he had outstripped as a prodigy of valor as well as learning. But Tom +turned his schooling to a bad account; it was too superficial, and +served more to set his head astray than to correct his heart; and +there were some respectable <a name="508">{508}</a> persons in the neighborhood who were +not free from doubts that he had already become a parish-patriot, and +joined the Ribbon Society. He was high and overbearing toward his +equals, harsh and unkind to his inferiors, while he was cringing and +sycophantic toward his superiors. There was nothing manly or +straightforward, nothing ingenuous or affectionate, about him. In +fact, if ever a man's temper and disposition justified the opinion +that he had "the two ways" in him, they were those of Thomas Murdock. +His father was a rich farmer, whose land joined that of old Ned +Cavana, of whom he was a contemporary in years, and with whom he had +kept pace in industry and wealth. +</p> +<p> +Thomas Murdock was an only son, as Winny Cavana was an only daughter, +and the two old men were of the same mind now as regarded the future +lot of their children. +</p> +<p> +A few words now of Edward Lennon, and we can get on. +</p> +<p> +He was the eldest of five in the family. They lived upon the +mountain-side in the parish of Shanvilla, about two "<i>short</i> miles" from +the Cavanas and Murdocks. His father and mother were both alive. They +were respectable so far as character and conduct can make people +respectable who are unquestionably poor. Their marriage was what has +been sarcastically, but perhaps not inaptly, called by an English +newspaper a "<i>potato marriage;</i>" that is—but no, it will not bear +explanation. The result, however, after many years' struggling, may be +stated. The Lennons had lived, and were still living, in a small +thatched house upon the side of a mountain, with about four acres of +reclaimed ground. It had been reclaimed gradually by the father and +his two sons—for Emon had a younger brother—and they paid little or +no rent for it. The second son and eldest daughter were now at +service, "doin' for theirselves;" and those at home consisted of the +father, the mother, the eldest son, and two younger daughters, mere +children. For the house and garden they paid a small rent, which "a +slip of a pig" was always ready to realize in sufficient time; while a +couple of goats, staggering through the furze, yoked together by the +necks, gave milk to the family. +</p> +<p> +Edward, though not so well-looking as to the actual cut of his +features, nor so tall by an inch and a half, as our friend Murdock, +was far more agreeable to look upon. There was a confident good-nature +in his countenance which assured you of its reality, and the honesty +of his heart. His figure, from his well-shaped head, which was +beautifully set upon his shoulders, to his small, well-turned feet, +was faultless. In disposition and character young Lennon was a full +distance before the man to whom he was a secret rival, while in talent +and learning he had nothing to fear by a comparison. He had commenced +his education when a mere gossoon at a poor-school with "his turf an' +his read-a-ma-daisy," and as he progressed from A-b-e-l, bel, a man's +name; A-b-l-e, ble, Able, powerful, strong, until finally he could +spell Antitrinitarian pat, he then cut the concern, and was promoted +by his parish-priest—"of whom more anon," as they say—to Rathcash +national school, where he soon stood in the class beside Tom Murdock, +and ere a week had passed he "took him down a peg." This, added to his +supposed presumptuous thoughts in the quarter which Tom had considered +almost his exclusive right, sowed the seed of hatred in Murdock's +heart against Lennon, which one day might bear a heavy crop. +</p> +<p> +That young Lennon was devotedly but secretly attached to Winny Cavana +there was no doubt whatever in his own mind, and there were few who +did not agree with him, although he had "never told his love;" and as +we Irish have leave to say, there was still less that his love was +more disinterested than that of his richer rival. There was another +point upon which there was still less doubt than either, and that was +that Winny Cavana's heart secretly leaned to <i>"Emon-a-knock,"</i> as +<a name="509">{509}</a> young Lennon was familiarly called by all those who knew and +loved him. One exception existed to this cordial recognition of Emon's +good qualities, and that was, as may be anticipated, by Thomas +Murdock, who always called him "<i>that</i> Lennon," and on one occasion, +as we have seen, substituted the word "whelp." +</p> +<p> +Winny, however, kept her secret in this matter to herself. She knew +her father would go "tanterin' tearin' mad, if he suspected such a +thing." She conscientiously endeavored to hide her preference from +young Lennon himself, knowing that it would only get them both into +trouble. Beside, he had never (yet) shown a decided preference for her +above Kate Mulvey. Whether she succeeded in her endeavors is another +question; women seldom fail where they are in earnest. +</p> +<p> +It is not considered amongst the class of Irish to which our <i>dramatis +persona</i> belong as any undue familiarity, upon even a very short +acquaintance, for the young persons of both the sexes to call each +other by their Christian names. It is the admitted custom of the +country, and Winny Cavana, rich and proud as she was, made no +exception to the general rule. She even went further, and sometimes +called young Lennon by his pet name. As regarded Tom Murdock, although +she could have wished it otherwise, she would not make herself +particular by acting differently. The first three letters of his name, +coupled with the scowl she had more than once detected on his +countenance, sounded unpleasantly upon her ear, Mur-dock. She always +thought people were going to say murder before the "dock" was out. She +never could think well of him; and although she called him Tom, it was +more to be in keeping with the habit of the country, and as a refuge +from the other name, than from a friendly feeling. +</p> +<p> +These were the materials upon which the two old men had to work, to +bring about a union of their landed interests and their only children. +</p> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER V.</h2> +<p> +The invitations for All-Hallow Eve were forthwith issued in person by +old Murdock, who went from house to house in his Sunday clothes, and +asked all the respectable neighbors in the politest manner. Edward +Lennon, although he could scarcely be called a neighbor, and moreover +was not considered as "belonging to their set," was nevertheless asked +to be of the party. Old Murdock had his reasons for asking him; +although, to tell the truth, he and his son had a difference of +opinion upon the subject. Tom thought to "put a spoke in his wheel," +but was overruled by the old man, who said it would look as if they +were afraid to bring him and Winny Cavana together; that it was much +better to let the young fellow see at once that he had no chance, +which would no doubt be an easy matter on that night: "it was betther +to <i>humiliate</i> him at wanst." +</p> +<p> +Tom was ashamed not to acquiesce, but wished nevertheless that he +might have had his own way. Edward Lennon lived too far from the +Murdocks for the old man to go there specifically upon the mission of +invitation; and the moment this difficulty was hinted by his father, +Tom, who was not in the habit of making such offers, was ready at once +to "go over to Shanvilla, and save his father the walk: he would +deliver the message." +</p> +<p> +There was an anxiety in Tom's manner which betrayed itself; and old +Mick was not the man to <i>miss</i> a thing of the kind. +</p> +<p> +"No, Tom <i>a wochal</i>" he observed, "I won't put such a thramp upon you. +Sure I'll see him a Sunda'; he always comes to our chapel." +</p> +<p> +"Fitter for him stick to his own," said Tom. +</p> +<p> +"It answers well this turn, at all events," replied the old man. +</p> +<p> +Upon the following Sunday he was as good as his word. He watched young +Lennon coming out of the chapel, and asked him, with more cordiality +than Tom, who happened to be by, approved of. +</p> +<a name="510">{510}</a> +<p> +Had nothing else been necessary to secure an acceptance, the fact of +Tom Murdock being present would have been sufficient. The look which +he caught from under the rim of Tom's hat roused Lennon's pride, and +he accepted the old man's invitation with unhesitating civility. +Lennon on this, as on all Sunday occasions, "was dressed in all his +best;" and that look seemed to say, "I wonder where that fellow got +them clothes, and if they're paid for:" he understood the look very +well. But the clothed were paid for,—perhaps, too, more promptly +than Tom's own; and a better fitting suit, from top to toe, was not to +be met with in the whole parish. A "Caroline hat," smooth and new, set +a wee taste jauntily upon his well-shaped head; a shirt like the +drifted snow, loose at the throat, but buttoned down the breast with +tiny blue buttons round as sweet-pea seeds; a bright plaid waistcoat, +with ditto buttons to match, but a size larger; a pair of +"spic-an'-span" knee-breeches of fine kersey-mere, with +unexceptionable steel buttons and blue silk-ribbon strings, tied to +perfection at the knee; while closely-fitting lamb's-wool long +stockings showed off the shape of a pair of legs which, for symmetry, +looked as if they had been turned in a lathe. Of his feet I have +already spoken; and on this occasion they did not belie what I said. +</p> +<p> +Old Mick desired Edward Lennon "to bring Phil M'Dermot the smith's son +with him. He was a fine young man, a good dancer, and had mended a +couple of ploughs for him in first-rate style, an' very raisonable, +for the winther plowing." +</p> +<p> +Tom Murdock did not want for fine clothes, of course. Two or three +suits were at his command; and as this was Sunday, he had one of his +best on. It was "given up to him" by most of the girls that he was the +handsomest and best-dressed man in the parish of Rathcash, and some +would have added Shanvilla; yet he now felt, as he stole envious +glances at young Lennon, that his case with Winny Cavana might not be +altogether a "walk over." All Tom's comparisons and metaphors had +reference to horse-racing. +</p> +<p> +This little incident, however, cut young Lennon out of his usual few +words with Winny; for, as a girl with a well-regulated mind, she could +not venture to dawdle on the road until old Murdock had done speaking +to Emon: she knew that would be remarked. She had never happened to +see old Murdock speaking to Emon before, and her secret wonder now was— +"Could it be possible that he was asking Edward Lennon for All-Hallow +Eve?" +</p> +<p> +Quite possible, Winny; but you scarcely have time to find out before +you meet him there, for another Sunday will not intervene before the +party. +</p> +<br> + +<h2>CHAPTER VI.</h2> +<p> +The last day of October came round apace, and about six o'clock in the +evening the company began to arrive at old Mick Murdock's. Winny +Cavana and her father took their time. They were near enough to make +their entree at any moment; and Winny had some idea, like her betters, +that it was not genteel to be the first. She now delayed, however, to +the other extreme, and kept her father waiting, under the pretence +that she was finishing her toilet, until, on their arrival, they found +all the guests assembled. Winny flaunted in, leaning upon her father's +arm, "the admired of all admirers." Not being very learned in the +mysteries of the toilet, I shall not attempt to describe the dresses +of the girls upon this occasion, nor the elaborate manner in which +their heads were set out, oiled, and bedizened to an amazing extent, +while the roses above their left ears seemed to have been all culled +from the same tree. +</p> +<a name="511">{511}</a> +<p> +Altogether there were about sixteen young persons, pretty equally +divided as to boys and girls, beside some—and some only—of their +fathers and mothers. Soon after the arrival of Ned Cavana and his +daughter, who were the guests of the evening, supper was announced, +and there was a general move into the "large parlor," where a long +table was set out with a snow-white cloth, where plates (if not +covers) were laid for at least twenty-four. In the middle of the table +stood a smoking dish of <i>calcannon</i>, which appeared to defy them, and +as many more; while at either end was a <i>raking</i> pot of tea, surrounded +with cups and saucers innumerable, with pyramids of cut +bread-and-butter nearly an inch thick. +</p> +<p> +The company having taken their seats, it was announced by the host +that there were "two goold weddin'-rings in the <i>calcannon;</i>" but +whereabouts, of course, no one could tell. He had borrowed them from +two of the married women present, and was bound to restore them; so he +begged of his young friends, for his sake as well as their own, to be +careful not to swallow them. It was too well known what was to be the +lot of the happy finders before that day twelvemonth for him to say +anything upon that part of the subject. He would request of Mrs. +Moran, who had seen more All-Hallow Eves than any woman there +present—he meant no offence—to help the calcannon. +</p> +<p> +After this little introduction, Mrs. Moran, who by previous +arrangement was sitting opposite the savory volcano, distributed it +with unquestionable impartiality. It was a well-known rule on all such +occasions that no one commenced until all were helped, when a signal +was given, and a simultaneous plunge of spoons took place. +</p> +<p> +Another rule was that all the married persons should content +themselves with tea and bread-and-butter, in order that none of them +might possibly rob the youngsters of their chance of the ring. Upon +this occasion, however, this restriction had been neatly obviated by +Mrs. Moran's experience in such matters; and there was a <i>knock-oge</i> +of the same delicious food without any ring, which she called "the +married dish." The tea was handed up and down from each end of the +table until it met in the middle, and for some time there was a silent +onslaught on the calcannon, washed down now and then by a copious +draught of tea. +</p> +<p> +"I have it! I have it!" shouted Phil M'Dermott, taking it from between +his teeth and holding it up, while his cheeks deepened three shades +nearer to the color of the rose in Kate Mulvey's hair, nearly +opposite. +</p> +<p> +"A lucky man," observed Mrs. Moran, methodically, who seemed to be +mistress of the mysteries. "Now for the lucky girl; and lucky +everybody will say she must be." +</p> +<p> +The words were scarcely finished when Kate Mulvey coughed as if she +were choking; but pulling the other ring from her mouth, she soon +recovered herself, declaring that she had nearly swallowed it. +</p> +<p> +Matters, as Mrs. Moran thought, had so far gone quite right, and a +hearty quizzing the young couple got; but, to tell the truth, one of +them did not seem to be particularly satisfied with the result. The +attack upon the calcannon from this point waxed very weak, for the +charm was broken, and the tea and bread-and-butter came into play. +Apples and nuts were now laid down in abundance, and the young girls +might be seen picking a couple of pairs of nice nuts out of those on +the plate, as nearly as fancy might suggest, to match the figures of +those whom they were intended to represent upon the bar of the grate. +Almost as if by magic a regiment of nuts in pairs were seen smoking, +and some of them stirring and purring on the flat bar at the bottom of +the grate, which had been swept, and the fire brightened up, for the +purpose. Of course Mrs. Moran insisted upon openly putting down Phil +M'Dermott and Kate Mulvey of the rings; for in general there is a +secrecy observed as to <i>who</i> the <i>nuts</i> are, in order to save <a name="512">{512}</a> the +constant girl from a laugh at the fickleness of her bachelor, should +he go off in a shot from her side, and <i>vice versâ</i>. And here the +mistress of the mysteries was not at fault. Kate Mulvey, without +either smoking or getting red at one end (which was a good sign), went +off like the report of a pistol, and was actually heard striking +against the door as if to get out. There was a general laugh at Mrs. +Moran's expense, who was told that it was a strong proof in favor of +putting the pairs down secretly. +</p> +<p> +But Mrs. Moran was too experienced a mistress of her position to be +taken aback, and quietly said, "Not at all, my dears. I have three +times to burn them, if he does not follow her; but he has three +minutes to do so." +</p> +<p> +As she spoke there was another shot. Phil M'Dermott could not stand +the heat by himself, and was off to the door after Kate Mulvey. +</p> +<p> +This was a crowning triumph to Mrs. Moran, who quietly put back the +second pair of nuts which she had just selected for another test of +the same couple, and remarked that "it was all right now." +</p> +<p> +The couples, generally speaking, seemed to answer the expectations of +their respective match-makers better than perhaps the results in real +life might subsequently justify. It is not to be supposed that on this +occasion Tom Murdock and Winny Cavana did not find a place upon the +bar of the grate. But as Winny had given no encouragement to any one +to put her down with him, and as the mistress of the mysteries alone +could claim a right to do so openly, as in the case of the rings, +their place, with the result, could be known only to those who put +them down, and perhaps a confidant. +</p> +<p> +There were a few pops occasionally, calling forth exclamations of "The +good-for-nothing fellow!" or "The fickle lass!" while some burned into +bright balls—the admiration of all the true and constant lovers +present. +</p> +<p> +The next portion of the mysteries were three plates, placed in a row +upon the table; one contained earth, another water, and the third a +gold ring. This was, by some, considered rather a nervous test of +futurity, and some objections were whispered by the timid amongst +them. The fearless and enthusiastic, however, clamored that nothing +should be left out, and a handkerchief to blind the adventurers was +produced. The mystery was this: a young person was taken outside the +door, and there blindfolded; he, or she, was then led in again, and +placed opposite to the plates, sufficiently near to touch them; when +told that "all was right," he, with his fore-finger pointed, placed it +upon one of the plates. That with the earth symbolled forth sudden, or +perhaps violent, death; that with the water, emigration or ship-wreck; +while that with the ring, of course a wedding and domestic happiness. +</p> +<p> +Young people were not generally averse to subject themselves to this +ordeal, as in nine cases out of ten they managed either to be +previously acquainted with the position of the plates, or, having been +blindfolded by their own bachelor, to have a peep-hole down by the +corner of their nose, which enabled them to secure the most gratifying +result of the three. +</p> +<p> +With this usual course before his mind, Tom Murdock, as junior host, +presented himself for the test, hoping that Winny Cavana, whom he had +asked to do so, would blindfold him. But in this instance he had +presumed too far; and while she hesitated to comply, the mistress of +the mysteries came to her relief. +</p> +<p> +"No, no, Tom," she said, folding the handkerchief; "that is my +business, and I'll transfer it to no one; come outside with me." +</p> +<p> +Tom was ashamed to draw back, and retired with Mrs. Moran to the hall. +He soon returned, led in by her, with a handkerchief tied tightly over +his eyes; there was no peep-hole by the side of his nose, let him hold +back <a name="513">{513}</a> his head as he might, Mrs. Moran took care of that. Having +been placed near the table, he was told that he was exactly opposite +the plates. He pointed out his fore-finger, and threw back his head as +much as possible, as if considering, but in fact to try if he could +get a peep at the plates; but it was no use. Mrs. Moran had rendered +his temporary blindness cruelly secure. At length his hand descended, +and he placed his finger into the middle of the earth. +</p> +<p> +"Pshaw," said he, pulling the handkerchief off his eyes, "it is all +humbug! Let Lennon try it." +</p> +<p> +"Certainly, certainly," ran from one to the other. It might have been +remarked, however, if any one had been observing, that Winny Cavana +had not spoken. +</p> +<p> +Young Lennon then retired to the hall with Mrs. Moran, and was soon +led in tightly blindfolded, for the young man was no more to her than +the other; beside, she was strictly honorable. The plates had been +re-arranged by Tom Murdock himself, which most people remarked, as it +was some time before he was satisfied with their position. Lennon was +then placed, as Tom had been, and told that "all was right." There was +some nervousness in more hearts than one as he pointed his finger and +brought down his hand. He also placed his finger in the centre of the +plate with the earth, and pulled the handkerchief from his eyes. +</p> +<p> +"Now, you see," said Tom, "others can fail as well as me;" and he +seemed greatly pleased that young Lennon had been as unsuccessful as +himself. +</p> +<p> +A murmur of dissatisfaction now ran through the girls. The two +favorites had been unfortunate in their attempts at divination, and +there was one young girl there who, when she saw Emon-a-knock's finger +fall on the plate with the earth, felt as if a weight had been tied +round her heart. It was unanimously agreed by the elderly women +present, Mrs. Moran amongst the number, that these tests had turned +out directly contrary to what the circumstances of the locality, and +the characters of the individuals, would indicate as probable, and the +whole process was ridiculed as false and unprophetic. "Time will tell, +jewel," said one old croaking crone. +</p> +<p> +A loud burst of laughter from the kitchen at this moment told that the +servant-boys and girls, who had also been invited, were not idle. The +matches having been all either clenched or broken off in the parlor, +and the test of the plates, as if by mutual consent, having been +declared unsatisfactory, old Murdock thought it a good opportunity to +move an adjournment of the whole party, to see the fun in the kitchen, +which was seconded by Mrs. Moran, and carried <i>nem. con.</i> +</p> +<p> +[TO BE CONTINUED. <a href="#657">Page 657</a>] +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="514">{514}</a> +<br> +<h2>Translated from Etudes Religieusea, Historiques, et Littéraires, par +des Pères de la Compagnie de Jesus. +<br><br> +A CITY OF WOMEN. +<br><br> +THE ANCIENT BEGUINAGE OF GHENT.<br><br> +BY THE REV. A. NAMPON, S.J.</h2> +<br> +<p> +According to some authors, St. Begghe, daughter of Pepin, Duke of +Brabant, and sister of St. Gertrude, must have given her name to those +pious assemblages of Christian virgins and widows called from very +remote times <i>beguinages</i>. +</p> +<p> +These holy women, united under the protection and the rule of St. +Begghe, had nothing in common except the name with those Beguines +whose errors were condemned by the council of Vienne. +</p> +<p> +Beguinages exist at Ghent, Antwerp, Mechlin, Alost, Louvain, Bruges, +etc., etc. The rule is not in all places the same, but everywhere +these pious establishments are places of refuge open to devout women, +wherein they may sanctify themselves by prayer, labor, and retirement +from the distractions of the world. +</p> +<p> +Let us transport ourselves to the capital of Flanders. From the centre +of that tumultuous city, in which industry, commerce, activity, and +pleasure reign supreme, are separated two other smaller towns of +venerable aspect—closed to the world, destitute of shops, coaches, +public criers, and all modern inventions. These two towns are the +<i>Great</i> and the <i>Little Beguinage</i>. +</p> +<p> +These places are delightful oases, wherein you breathe a pure air, +where, in the noonday of the nineteenth century, you find the +simplicity of the faith and customs of antiquity. They are surrounded, +as they were five or six centuries ago, by a ditch and a wall; you +enter them by a single gate carefully closed at night, and not less +carefully watched all day. This gate, surmounted by the cross, was +formerly protected by a drawbridge. +</p> +<p> +As soon as you have passed through this gateway, you are forcibly +struck with the calm and pious atmosphere of this peaceful city, and +with the grave and edifying looks of its <i>female</i> inhabitants. I say +female inhabitants, for no man has ever dwelt in this enclosure. The +priests who serve the beguinages only enter to fulfil their sacred +offices, and have no place therein save the pulpit, the altar, and the +confessional. The dress of the inmates is not elegant, but it is in +strict conformity with the model traced in their thirteenth century +rule. +</p> +<p> +All the streets, which are at right angles, are named after saints. +The houses are also distinguished by the names, and frequently by the +statue, of some saint, under whose protection they are placed; thus +you may read, gate of St. Martha, gate of St. Mary-Magdalen, etc., +etc. +</p> +<p> +The houses, which are whitewashed annually, display in their +furniture, as in their construction, no other luxury but a charming +cleanliness. They are of two kinds, <i>convents</i> and <i>hermitages</i>. The +convents are inhabited by communities, each governed by a superior. +The hermitages, which resemble very much the dwellings of the +Carthusians, consist of two or three bed-rooms, a parlor, a kitchen, +and a small garden. Prominent among the convents is the dwelling of +the superior-general, called <i>Grande Dame</i>, who has charge of the +infirmary, and who is conservator of the documents, traditions and +pictures, which date from five or six centuries ago. Lastly, in the +midst of this peaceful city rises the house of God, a large church, +very commodious and clean, surrounded by a <a name="515">{515}</a> cemetery, in +conformity with an ancient custom, which all the beguinages, however, +have not been able to retain. +</p> +<p> +The object of these societies is very clearly stated in a paragraph of +the rule of the beguinage of Notre Dame du Pré', founded at Ghent in +1234. We retain the old style: +</p> +<p> +"Louis, Count of Flanders, of Nevers, and of Rethel, etc., etc., to +all present and to come makes known, that Dame Jane, and Margaret, her +sister of happy memory, who were successively Countesses of Flanders +and of Hainault (as we are, [Footnote 100] by the grace of God), +having remarked that in the Flemish territory there were a great +number of women, who, from their condition in life and that of their +parents, were unable to find a fitting match; observing that honorable +persons, the daughters of nobles and burgesses, who desired to live in +a state of chastity, could not all enter into convents of women, by +reason of their too great number, or for want of means; remarking, +moreover, that many young ladies of noble extraction and others had +fallen into a state of decadence, so that they were reduced to +mendicity, or to a painful existence, to the dishonor of their +families, unless they could be provided for in a discreet and becoming +manner; incited by God, and with the advice, knowledge, and consent of +several bishops and other persons of probity, the aforesaid countesses +founded, in several cities of Flanders, establishments with spacious +dwellings and lands, called beguinages, where noble young ladies and +children of good families were received, to live therein chastely in +community, with or without vows, without humiliation to themselves or +their families, and where they might, by applying themselves to +reasonable labor, procure their food and clothing. They founded among +others a beguinage in our city of Ghent, called the beguinage of Notre +Dame du Pré, enclosed by the river Scheldt, and by walls. In the +centre is a church, a cemetery, and a hospital for infirm or invalid +beguines, the whole given by the before-mentioned princesses, etc." +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 100: This bull is in the original French: <i>"Comteses de + Flandre et de Hainault, comme nous aussi, par la grace de Dieu."</i>] +</p> +<p> +Those young persons who desire to be admitted to the beguinage must +first become postulants, and afterward make their noviciate in the +convents or communities. They remain there even after their profession +up to thirty years of age. Thus are they protected during the most +stormy period of life by the watchfulness of their superior and their +companions, by prayer and labor in common. Later they can enjoy +without danger a larger measure of freedom. They then live two or +three together in one of the hermitages, where they pass their time in +exercises of prayer and labor, to which the early years of their +cenobitical life have accustomed them. +</p> +<p> +"The great beguinage at Ghent," says M. Chantrel, "contains four +hundred small houses, eighteen common halls, one large and one small +church. There are sometimes as many as seven hundred beguines +assembled in the church. The assembly of these pious women, in their +ancient Flemish black dresses, and white bonnets, is very solemn and +impressive. The novices are distinguished by their dress. Those who +have recently taken the veil have their heads encircled by a crown. +</p> +<p> +"The beguines admit within their enclosure, as boarders, persons of +the gentler sex, of every age and condition, who find in these +establishments an asylum for the inexperience of youth, or a calm and +peaceful sojourn where those who are tired of the world may pass their +days without any other rule than that of a Christian life. In the +great beguinage at Ghent there are nearly two hundred secular +boarders, who live either privately or in community with the nuns." +</p> +<p> +Among the novices of the great beguinage at Ghent there lived, fifteen +years ago, a Mlle, de Soubiran, the niece of a former vicar of +Carcassonne. For twenty years this worthy ecclesiastic had communed +with Almighty God, in incessant prayers, to obtain an <a name="516">{516}</a> answer to +this question: "Would it be a useful work to introduce, or rather to +resuscitate, beguinages in France?" +</p> +<p> +Monseigneur de la Bouillerie, whose eloquence and zeal for good works +have made him famous, interpreted in a favorable sense the signs +furnished by a concurrence of providential circumstances; and a small +establishment was opened twelve years ago, in a suburb of +Castelnaudary, under the direction of the Abbé de Soubiran. Since +1856, it has had its postulants, novices, and professed sisters. +</p> +<p> +The buildings of the new beguinage were too small and poor. This +defect was remedied by a great fire which consumed them, and compelled +their reconstruction on a larger plan, and with better materials than +the planks and bricks of the original buildings. +</p> +<p> +There is doubtless a vast distance between this feeble beginning and +the extensive beguinage in Belgium, which so many centuries have +enlarged and brought to perfection. But Mlle, de Soubiran and her +first companions brought with them from Flanders the old traditions, +with the spirit of fervor and of poverty and humble labor. The trials +which they have undergone have only improved their work. They are +happy in the blessing of their bishop, and his alms would not be +wanting in case of need. +</p> +<p> +The Castelnaudary beguinage is already fruitful. A second +establishment is forming at Toulouse, on the Calvary road. Those of +our readers who are acquainted with the capital of Languedoc know the +situation of that road, but all Christians have long since learnt that +the road to Calvary is the way of salvation. +</p> +<p> +Suffice it for the present that we notice the existence of these two +establishments. We shall have at a future time to narrate their +progress and development. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="517">{517}</a> +<br> +<h2>From The Month. +<br><br> +THE DREAM OF GERONTIUS. +<br><br> +BY JOHN HENRY NEWMAN, D.D. +<br><br> +§ 1. +<br><br> +GERONTIUS.</h2> +<br> +<pre> + JESU, MARIA—I am near to death, + And thou art calling me; I know it now. + Not by the token of this faltering breath, + This chill at heart, this dampness on my brow,— + (Jesu, have mercy! Mary, pray for me!) + 'Tis this new feeling, never felt before, + (Be with me, Lord, in my extremity!) + That I am going, that I am no more. + 'Tis this strange innermost abandonment, + (Lover of souls! great God! I look to thee,) + This emptying out of each constituent + And natural force, by which I come to be. + Pray for me, O my friends; a visitant + Is knocking his dire summons at my door, + The like of whom, to scare me and to daunt, + Has never, never come to me before. + 'Tis death,—loving friends, your prayers!—'tis he!… + As though my very being had given way, + As though I was no more a substance now, + And could fall back on naught to be my stay, + (Help, loving Lord! Thou my sole refuge, thou,) + And turn no whither, but must needs decay + And drop from out this universal frame + Into that shapeless, scopeless, blank abyss, + That utter nothingness, of which I came: + This is it that has come to pass in me; + O horror! this it is, my dearest, this; + So pray for me, my friends, who have not strength to pray. + + + ASSISTANTS. + + Kyrie eleïson, Christe eleïson, Kyrie eleïson. + Holy Mary, pray for him. + All holy angels, pray for him. + Choirs of the righteous, pray for him. + Holy Abraham, pray for him. + St. John Baptist, St. Joseph, pray for him. + St. Peter, St. Paul, St. Andrew, St. John, + All apostles, all evangelists, pray for him. + All holy disciples of the Lord, pray for him. + All holy innocents, pray for him. + All holy martyrs, all holy confessors, + All holy hermits, all holy virgins, + All ye saints of God, pray for him. + +<a name="518">{518}</a> + + GERONTIUS. + + Rouse thee, my fainting soul, and play the man; + And through such waning span + Of life and thought as still has to be trod, + Prepare to meet thy God. + And while the storm of that bewilderment + Is for a season spent, + And, ere afresh the ruin on thee fall, + Use well the interval. + + ASSISTANTS. + + Be merciful, be gracious; spare him, Lord. + Be merciful, be gracious; Lord, deliver him. + From the sins that are passed; + From thy frown and thine ire; + From the perils of dying; + From any complying + With sin, or denying + His God, or relying + On self, at the last; + From the nethermost fire; + From all that is evil; + From power of the devil; + Thy servant deliver, + For once and for ever. + + By thy birth, and by thy cross, + Rescue him from endless loss; + By thy death and burial, + Save him from a final fall; + By thy rising from the tomb, + By thy mounting up above, + By the Spirit's gracious love, + Save him in the day of doom. + + GERONTIUS. + + Sanctus fortis, Sanctus Deus, + De profundis oro te, + Miserere, judex meus, + Parce mihi, Domine. + Firmly I believe and truly + God is Three, and God is One; + And I next acknowledge duly + Manhood taken by the Son. + And I trust and hope most fully + In that manhood crucified; + And each thought and deed unruly + Do to death, as he has died. + Simply to his grace and wholly + Light and life and strength belong, + And I love supremely, solely, + Him the holy, him the strong. + +<a name="519">{519}</a> + + Sanctus fortis, Sanctus Deus, + De profundis oro te, + Miserere, judex meus, + Parce mihi, Domine. + And I hold in veneration, + For the love of him alone, + Holy Church, as his creation. + And her teachings, as his own. + And I take with joy whatever + Now besets me, pain or fear, + And with a strong will I sever + All the ties which bind me here. + Adoration aye be given, + With and through the angelic host, + To the God of earth and heaven, + Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. + Sanctus fortis, Sanctus Deus, + De profundis oro te, + Miserere, judex meus, + Mortis in discrimine. + + I can no more; for now it comes again, + That sense of ruin, which is worse than pain, + That masterful negation and collapse + Of all that makes me man; as though I bent + Over the dizzy brink + Of some sheer infinite descent; + Or worse, as though + Down, down for ever I was falling through + The solid framework of created things, + And needs must sink and sink + Into the vast abyss. And, crueller still, + A fierce and restless fright begins to fill + The mansion of my soul. And, worse and worse, + Some bodily form of ill + Floats on the wind, with many a loathsome curse + Tainting the hallowed air, and laughs and flaps + Its hideous wings, + And makes me wild with horror and dismay. + O Jesu, help! pray for me, Mary, pray! + Some angel, Jesu! such as came to thee + In thine own agony. …… + Mary, pray for me. Joseph, pray for me. Mary, pray for me. + + ASSISTANTS. + + Rescue him, O Lord, in this his evil hour, + As of old so many by thy gracious power:—Amen. + Enoch and Elias from the common doom; Amen. + Noe from the waters in a saving home; Amen. + Abraham from th' abounding guilt of heathenesse; Amen. + Job from all his multiform and fell distress; Amen. + Isaac, when his father's knife was raised to slay; Amen. + Lot from burning Sodom on its judgment-day; Amen. + +<a name="520">{520}</a> + + Moses from the land of bondage and despair; Amen. + Daniel from the hungry lions in their lair; Amen. + And the children three amid the furnace-flame; Amen. + Chaste Susanna from the slander and the shame; Amen. + David from Golia and the wrath of Saul; Amen. + And the two apostles from their prison-thrall; Amen. + Thecla from her torments; Amen: + —so, to show thy power, + Rescue this thy servant in his evil hour. + + GERONTIUS. + + Novissima hora est; and I fain would sleep. + The pain has wearied me. …Into thy hands, + Lord, into thy hands. … + + THE PRIEST. + + Proficiscere, anima Christiana de hoc mundo! + Go forth upon thy journey, Christian soul! + Go from this world! Go, in the name of God, + The omnipotent Father, who created thee! + Go, in the name of Jesus Christ our Lord, + Son of the Living God, who bled for thee! + Go, in the name of th' Holy Spirit, who + Hath been poured out on thee! Go, in the name + Of angels and archangels; in the name + Of thrones and dominations; in the name + Of princedoms and of powers; and in the name + Of cherubim and seraphim, go forth! + Go, in the name of patriarchs and prophets; + And of apostles and evangelists, + Of martyrs and confessors; in the name + Of holy monks and hermits; in the name + Of holy virgins; and all saints of God, + Both men and women, go! Go on thy course; + And may thy place to-day be found in peace, + And may thy dwelling be the holy mount + Of Sion: through the same, through Christ, our Lord. +</pre> +<br> +<h2>§ 2.</h2> +<br> +<pre> + SOUL Of GERONTIUS. + + I went to sleep; and now I am refreshed. + A strange refreshment: for I feel in me + An inexpressive lightness, and a sense + Of freedom, as I were at length myself, + And ne'er had been before. How still it is! + I hear no more the busy beat of time, + No, nor my fluttering breath, nor struggling pulse; + Nor does one moment differ from the next. + I had a dream; yes:—some one softly said + "He's gone;" and then a sigh went round the room. + And then I surely heard a priestly voice + Cry "Subvenite;" and they knelt in prayer. + +<a name="521">{521}</a> + + I seem to hear him still; but thin and low, + And fainter and more faint the accents come, + As at an ever-widening interval. + Ah! whence is this? What is this severance? + This silence pours a solitariness + Into the very essence of my soul; + And the deep rest, so soothing and so sweet, + Hath something too of sternness and of pain. + For it drives back my thoughts upon their spring + By a strange introversion, and perforce + I now begin to feed upon myself, + Because I have naught else to feed upon. + + Am I alive or dead? I am not dead, + But in the body still; for I possess + A sort of confidence, which clings to me, + That each particular organ holds its place + As heretofore, combining with the rest + Into one symmetry, that wraps me round, + And makes me man; and surely I could move, + Did I but will it, every part of me. + And yet I cannot to my sense bring home, + By very trial, that I have the power. + 'Tis strange; I cannot stir a hand or foot, + I cannot make my fingers or my lips + By mutual pressure witness each to each, + Nor by the eyelid's instantaneous stroke + Assure myself I have a body still. + Nor do I know my very attitude, + Nor if I stand, or lie, or sit, or kneel. + + So much I know, not knowing how I know, + That the vast universe, where I have dwelt, + Is quitting me, or I am quitting it. + Or I or it is rushing on the wings + Of light or lightning on an onward course, + And we e'en now are million miles apart. + Yet . … is this peremptory severance + Wrought out in lengthy measurements of space, + Which grow and multiply by speed and time? + Or am I traversing infinity + By endless subdivision, hurrying back + From finite toward infinitesimal, + Thus dying out of the expanded world? + + Another marvel; some one has me fast + Within his ample palm; 'tis not a grasp + Such as they use on earth, but all around + Over the surface of my subtle being, + As though I were a sphere, and capable + To be accosted thus, a uniform + And gentle pressure tells me I am not + Self-moving, but borne forward on my way. + And hark! I hear a singing; yet in sooth + +<a name="522">{522}</a> + + I cannot of that music rightly say + Whether I hear or touch or taste the tones. + Oh what a heart-subduing melody! + + ANGEL. + + My work is done,' + My task is o er, + And so I come, + Taking it home, + For the crown is won. + Alleluia, + For evermore. + + My Father gave + In charge to me + This child of earth + E'en from its birth, + To serve and save, + Alleluia, + And saved is he. + + This child of clay + To me was given, + To rear and train + By sorrow and pain + In the narrow way, + Alleluia, + From earth to heaven. + + SOUL. + + It is a member of that family + Of wondrous beings, who, ere the worlds were made, + Millions of ages back, have stood around + The throne of God:—he never has known sin; + But through those cycles all but infinite, + Has had a strong and pure celestial life, + And bore to gaze on th' unveiled face of God, + And drank from the eternal fount of truth, + And served him with a keen ecstatic love. + Hark! he begins again. + + ANGEL. + + Lord, how wonderful in depth and height, + But most in man, how wonderful thou art! + With what a love, what soft persuasive might, + Victorious o'er the stubborn fleshly heart, + Thy tale complete of saints thou dost provide, + To fill the throne which angels lost through pride! + +<a name="523">{523}</a> + + He lay a grovelling babe upon the ground, + Polluted in the blood of his first sire, + With his whole essence shattered and unsound, + And, coiled around his heart, a demon dire, + Which was not of his nature, but had skill + To bind and form his opening mind to ill. + + Then was I sent from heaven to set right + The balance in his soul of truth and sin, + And I have waged a long relentless fight, + Resolved that death-environed spirit to win, + Which from its fallen state, when all was lost, + Had been repurchased at so dread a cost. + + Oh what a shifting parti-colored scene + Of hope and fear, of triumph and dismay, + Of recklessness and penitence, has been + The history of that dreary, lifelong fray! + And oh the grace, to nerve him and to lead, + How patient, prompt, and lavish at his need! + + O man, strange composite of heaven and earth! + Majesty dwarfed to baseness! fragrant flower + Running to poisonous seed! and seeming worth + Cloaking corruption! weakness mastering power! + Who never art so near to crime and shame, + As when thou hast achieved some deed of name; + + How should ethereal natures comprehend + A thing made up of spirit and of clay, + Were we not tasked to nurse it and to tend, + Linked one to one throughout its mortal day? + More than the seraph in his height of place, + The angel-guardian knows and loves the ransomed race. + + SOUL. + + Now know I surely that I am at length + Out of the body: had I part with earth, + I never could have drunk those accents in, + And not have worshipped as a god the voice + That was so musical; but now I am + So whole of heart, so calm, so self-possessed, + With such a full content, and with a sense + So apprehensive and discriminant, + As no temptation can intoxicate. + Nor have I even terror at the thought + That I am clasped by such a saintliness. + + ANGEL. + + All praise to him, at whose sublime decree + The last are first, the first become the last; + By whom the suppliant prisoner is set free, + By whom proud first-borns from their thrones are cast; + Who raises Mary to be queen of heaven, + While Lucifer is left, condemned and unforgiven. +</pre> +<br> +<a name="524">{524}</a> +<br> +<h2>§ 3.</h2> +<br> +<pre> + SOUL. + + I will address him. Mighty one, my Lord, + My guardian spirit, all hail! + + ANGEL. + + All hail, my child! + My child and brother, hail! what wouldest thou? + + SOUL. + + I would have nothing but to speak with thee + For speaking's sake. I wish to hold with thee + Conscious communion; though I fain would know + A maze of things, were it but meet to ask, + And not a curiousness. + + ANGEL. + + You cannot now + Cherish a wish which ought not to be wished. + + SOUL. + + Then I will speak. I ever had believed + That on the moment when the struggling soul + Quitted its mortal case, forthwith it fell + Under the awful presence of its God, + There to be judged and sent to its own place. + What lets me now from going to my Lord? + + ANGEL. + + Thou art not let; but with extremest speed + Art hurrying to the just and holy Judge: + For scarcely art thou disembodied yet. + Divide a moment, as men measure time, + Into its million-million-millionth part, + Yet even less than that the interval + Since thou didst leave the body; and the priest + Cried "Subvenite," and they fell to prayer; + Nay, scarcely yet have they begun to pray. + For spirits and men by different standards mete + The less and greater in the flow of time. + By sun and moon, primeval ordinances— + By stars which rise and set harmoniously— + By the recurring seasons, and the swing, + This way and that, of the suspended rod + Precise and punctual, men divide the hours, + Equal, continuous, for their common use. + Not so with us in th' immaterial world; + But intervals in their succession + +<a name="525">{525}</a> + + Are measured by the living thought alone, + And grow or wane with its intensity. + And time is not a common property; + But what is long is short, and swift is slow, + And near is distant, as received and grasped + By this mind and by that, and every one + Is standard of his own chronology. + And memory lacks its natural resting-points, + Of years, and centuries, and periods. + It is thy very energy of thought + Which keeps thee from thy God. + + SOUL. + + Dear angel, say, + Why have I now no fear at meeting him? + Along my earthly life, the thought of death + And judgment was to me most terrible. + I had it aye before me, and I saw + The Judge severe e'en in the crucifix. + Now that the hour is come, my fear is fled; + And at this balance of my destiny, + Now close upon me, I can forward look + With a serenest joy. + + ANGEL. + + It is because + Then thou didst fear, that now thou dost not fear. + Thou hast forestalled the agony, and so + For thee the bitterness of death is passed + Also, because already in thy soul + The judgment is begun. That day of doom, + One and the same for the collected world— + That solemn consummation for all flesh, + Is, in the case of each, anticipate + Upon his death; and, as the last great day + In the particular judgment is rehearsed, + So now too, ere thou comest to the throne, + A presage falls upon thee, as a ray + Straight from the Judge, expressive of thy lot. + That calm and joy uprising in thy soul + Is first-fruit to thee of thy recompense, + And heaven begun. +</pre> +<br> +<h2>§ 4.</h2> +<br> +<pre> + SOUL. + + But hark! upon my sense + Comes a fierce hubbub, which would make me fear, + Could I be frighted. +</pre> +<p> +(TO BE CONTINUED.) +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="526">{526}</a> +<br> +<h2>From The St. James Magazine +<br><br> +EXTINCT SPECIES</h2> +<br> +<p> +The study of geology teaches us that our planet, has undergone many +successive physical revolutions, the crust of it being made up of +layer upon layer, after the manner of the successive peels of an +onion. Each of these successive depositions constitutes the tomb of +animal forms that have lived and passed away. Now it is a fresh-water +or a marine shell that the exploratory geologist discloses; now the +skeleton, or parts of a skeleton, from the evidence of which a +comparative anatomist can reproduce, by model or picture, the exact +forms. Occasionally science has to build up her presentment of animals +that were, from the scanty evidence of their mere footfalls. As the +poacher is guided to the timid hare, crouching in her seat, by the +vestiges of her footprints on the snow, so the geologist can in many +cases arrive at tolerably certain conclusions relative to the size and +aspect of an extinct animal by the evidence of footsteps on now solid +rock. And if it be demanded how it happens that now solid rocks can +bear the traces of such soft impressions, the reply is simple. There +evidently was a time when these rocks, now so hard and solid, were +mere agglomerations of plastic matter, comparable for consistence to +ordinary clay. It needs not even the weight of a footfall to impress +material of temper so soft as this. The plashes of rain are distinctly +visible upon many rocks now hard, and which have only acquired their +consistence with the lapse of countless ages. +</p> +<p> +The geologist's notion of the word "recent" comprehends a span of time +of beginning so remote that the oldest records of human history fade +to insignificance by comparison. Since this world of ours acquired its +final surface settlement, so to speak, numerous species have become +extinct. The process of exhaustion has gone steadily on. It has been +determined by various causes, some readily explicable, others involved +in doubt. It is a matter well established, for example, that all +northern Asia was at one time, not geologically remote, overrun by +herds of mammoth creatures which, as to size, dwarf the largest +elephants now existing; and which, among other points distinguishing +them from modern elephants, were, unlike these, covered by a crop of +long hair. Very much of the ivory manufactured in Russia consists of +the tusks of these now extinct mammoths, untombed from time to time. +</p> +<p> +Tilesius declares his belief that mammoth skeletons still left in +northern Russia exceed in number all the elephants now existing upon +the globe. Doubtless the process of mammoth extinction was very +gradual, and extended over an enormous space of time. This +circumstance is indicated by the varying condition in which the tusks +and teeth are found. Whereas the gelatine, or soft animal matter, of +many specimens remains, imparting one of the characteristics necessary +to the being of ivory, other specimens have lost this material, and +mineral substances, infiltrating, have taken its place. The gem +turquoise is pretty generally conceded to be nothing else than the +fossilized tooth of some extinct animal—probably the mammoth. +</p> +<p> +Curiosity of speculation prompts the mind to imagine to itself the +time when the last of these gigantic animals succumbed to influences +that were finally destined to sweep them all from the earth. Had men +come upon the scene when they roamed their native wilds? Were those +wilds the same as now as to climate and vegetable growths? <a name="527">{527}</a> +Testimony is mute. Time silently unveils the sepulchred remains, +leaving fancy to expatiate as she will on a topic wholly beyond the +scope of mortal intelligence. +</p> +<p> +Inasmuch as bones and tusks of the mammoth are dug up in enormous +quantities over tracts now almost bare of trees, and scanty as to +other vegetation, certain naturalists have assumed that in times +coeval with mammoth or mastodonic life the vegetation of these regions +must have been richer than now, otherwise how could such troops of +enormous beasts have gained their sustenance? +</p> +<p> +On this point Sir Charles Lyell bids us not to be too confident +affirmatively. He remarks that luxuriance of vegetable growth is not +seen at the time being to correspond with the prevalence of the +associated fauna. The northern island of the New Zealand group, at the +period when Europeans first set foot there, was mostly covered by a +luxuriant growth of forest trees, of shrubs and grasses. Admirably +adapted to the being of herbivorous animals, the land was wholly +devoid of the same. Brazilian forests offer another case in +illustration; a stronger case than the wilds of New Zealand, inasmuch +as the climate may be assumed as more congenial to the development of +animal life. Nowhere on earth does nature teem with an equal amount of +vegetable luxuriance; yet Brazilian forests are remarkable for almost +the total absence of large animals. Perhaps no present tract is so +densely endowed with animal life as that of South Africa, a region +where sterility is the prevailing characteristic; where forest trees +are rare and other vegetation scant; where water, too, is infrequent. +</p> +<p> +Present examples, such as these, should make a naturalist hesitate +before coming to the conclusion that Siberian wilds, even as now, were +wholly incompatible with the existence and support of troops of +mammoths or mastodons. Speculating now as to the latest time of the +existence of mastodons in Siberia, a circumstance has to be noted that +would seem to countenance the belief in the existence of it up to a +not very remote period of historic times. In the year 1843, the season +being warmer than usual, a mass of Siberian ice thawed, and, in +thawing, untombed one of these animals, perfect in all respects, even +to the skin and hair. The flesh of this creature furnished repast to +wolves and bears, so little alteration had it undergone. Another +mastodon was disentombed on the Tas, between the Obi and Yenesei, near +the arctic circle, about lat. 66° 30' N., with some parts of its flesh +in so perfect a state that the bulb of the eye now exists preserved in +the Moscow museum. Another adult carcass, accompanied by an individual +of the same species, was found in 1843, in lat. 75° 15' N., near the +river Taimyr, the flesh being decayed. Associated with it, Middendorf +observed the trunk of a larch tree (<i>Pinus larix</i>), the same wood that +now grows in the same neighborhood abundantly. +</p> +<p> +It is no part of our intention to discuss the causes of mammoth +extinction. This result has assuredly not been caused by any onslaught +of the destroyer man. The Siberian wilds are scantily populated now, +and it has never been suggested that at any anterior period their +human denizens were more plentiful. Nature often establishes the +balance of her organic life through a series of agencies so abstrusely +refined, and acting, beside, over so long a period, that they +altogether escape man's cognizance. The believer in the God of +nature's adaptation of means to ends will see no reason to make an +exception in animal species to what is demonstrated by examples in so +many other cases to be a general law. The dogma, that no general law +is without exceptions, though one to which implicit credence has been +given, may nevertheless be devoid of the universality commonly +imputed. On the contrary, the application of this dogma may extend +over a very narrow field; may be only referable to the codifications, +artificial and wholly <a name="528">{528}</a> conventional, which mankind for their +convenience establish, and under a false impression elevate to the +position of laws. If logical proof in syllogistic form be demanded as +to the proposition that laws established by nature have no exceptions, +the fulfilment of demand would not be possible; inasmuch as human +reason is too impotent for grasping, and too restricted in its +energies for investigating, the multifarious issues which the +discussion of such a thesis would involve. As coming events, however, +are said by the poet to cast their shadows in advance, so, as heralds +and harbingers of truths beyond logical proof, come beliefs, faiths, +even moral convictions. Of this sort is the assurance of the balance +established by nature at each passing epoch of being in the world. +</p> +<p> +The naturalist is impressed with the firm belief that the number of +animal species existing on the earth, and the number of individuals in +each species, are balanced and apportioned in some way and by some +mysterious co-relation to the needs of the universe. +</p> +<p> +Some presumptive testimony in favor of this belief is afforded by the +discussion, barely yet concluded, relative to the effect of small bird +destruction. Without any more elaborate reasoning on this topic than +follows necessarily as the result of newspaper reading, the general +concession will be made by any one of unbiased mind, that if small +bird destruction could be enacted to its exhaustive limits—if every +small bird could be destroyed—the aggregate of vitality thus +disposed of would be balanced through the increase of other organisms. +Insect life would teem and multiply to an extent proportionate with +the removal of an anterior restraining cause. +</p> +<p> +The nature of the topic on which we are engaged does not force upon us +the question whether such proportionate increase of insect life be +advantageous or disadvantageous. What we are wholly concerned in +placing in evidence is the balance kept up between vital organisms of +different species by nature. Nor is the balance of vitality +established between different animal species. It also may be traced, +and even more distinctly, between the vegetable and animal kingdoms; +each regarded in its entirety. Vegetables can only grow by the +assimilation of an element (carbon) which animals evolve by +respiration, as being a poison. Consideration of this fact well-nigh +forces the conclusion upon the mind—if, indeed, the conclusion be +not inevitable—that if through any vast cataclysm animated life were +to become suddenly extinct throughout the world, vegetable life would +languish until the last traces of atmospheric carbon had become +exhausted, and then perish. +</p> +<p> +In maintenance of her vital balance through the operation of some +occult law, it often happens that animals that have ceased to be +"obviously useful," as taking part in a general economy around them, +are seen to die out. Whilst wolves and elks roamed over Ireland the +magnificent Irish wolf-dog was common. With the disappearance of +wolves the breed of wolf-dogs languished, and has ultimately become +extinct. As a matter of zoological curiosity many an Irish gentleman +would have desired to perpetuate this gigantic and interesting race of +dogs; but the operation, the tendency to vital equilibrium has been +over-strong to be contravened—the race of Irish wolf-dogs has fleeted +away. Speaking now of the huge Siberian mammoths, from which we +diverged, of these faith in nature's balanced adaptation assures us +that they died out so soon as they ceased to be necessary as a +compensation to some unknown force in the vital economy. +</p> +<p> +Spans and periods of time, such as those comprehended by the human +mind, and compared with the normal period of individual human +existence, dwindle to nothingness when attempted to be made the units +of measurement in calculations involving the duration of species. +Perhaps the data are not available for enabling the most careful +investigator to come to an approximate <a name="529">{529}</a> conclusion as to the +number of years that must elapse before the race of existing +elephants, African and Indian, will become extinct, departing from the +earth as mammoths have departed. The time, however, must inevitably +arrive for that consummation under the rule of the present course of +things. +</p> +<p> +Without forest for shade and sustenance the race of wild elephants +cannot exist; and, inasmuch as elephants never breed in captivity, +each tame elephant having been once reclaimed from the forests, it +follows, from the consideration of inevitable results, that sooner or +later, but some day, nevertheless, one of two possible issues must be +consummated—either that man shall cease to go on subduing the earth, +cutting down forests and bringing the land into cultivation, or else +elephants must become extinct. Who can entertain a doubt as to the +alternative issue? Man has gone on conquering and to conquer from the +time he came upon the scene. Animals, save those he can domesticate, +have gone on fleeting and fleeting away. It is most probable, +nevertheless, that one proportionate aggregate of vitality has at +every period been maintained. +</p> +<p> +The most marked examples of the passing away of animal species within +periods of time, in some cases not very remote, pronounced of even in +a historical sense, is seen in the record of certain gigantic birds. +The largest individuals of the feathered tribes now extant are +ostriches; but the time was when these plumed denizens of the Sahara +were small indeed by comparison with existing species. Some idea of +the bulk of the epiornis—an extinct species—may be gathered from a +comparison of the bulk of one of its eggs with that of other birds. +According to M. Isidore Geoffroy, who some time since presented one of +these eggs to the French Academy of Sciences, the capacity of it was +no less than eight litres and three-fourths. This would prove it to be +about six times the size of the ostrich's egg, 148 times that of an +ordinary fowl, and no less than 50,000 times the size of the egg of +the humming-bird. The egg exhibited was one of very few that have been +discovered; hence nothing tends to the belief that it was one of the +largest. The first knowledge of the existence of this gigantic bird +was acquired in 1851. The sole remains of the species hitherto found +are some egg-shells and a few bones. These suffice, however, for an +ideal reproduction of the creature under the synthetical treatment of +comparative anatomy. The epiornis inhabited Madagascar. The creature's +height could not have been less than from nine to twelve feet, and the +preservation of its remains is such as to warrant the belief in its +comparatively recent existence. +</p> +<p> +Of a structure as large as the epiornis, probably larger, though +differing from the latter in certain anatomical particulars, according +to the belief of Professor Owen, is a certain New Zealand giant bird, +called by him the dinornis. As in the case of the Madagascar bird, the +evidence relating to this is very recent. Some few years ago an +English gentleman received from a relative settled in New Zealand some +fragments of large bones that had belonged to some creature of species +undetermined. He sent them to Professor Owen for examination, and was +not a little surprised at the assurance that the bones in question, +although seemingly having belonged to an animal as large as an ox, +were actually those of a bird. The comparative anatomist was guided in +coming to this conclusion by a certain cancellated structure possessed +by the bony fragments, a characteristic of the bones of birds. For a +time Professor Owen's dictum was received with hesitation, not to say +disbelief, on the part of some people. The subsequent finding of more +remains, eggs as well as bones, soon justified the naturalist's +verdict, however. Not the slightest doubt remains now upon the mind of +any zoologist relative to the past existence of the dinornis; nay, the +<a name="530">{530}</a> impression prevails that this feathered monster may be living in +some of the more inaccessible parts of the southern island of New +Zealand at the present time. Be that as it may, the dinornis can only +have become extinct recently, even using this word in a historical +sense, as the following testimony will make manifest:— +</p> +<p> +A sort of mummification prevailed amongst the Maories until +Christianity had gained ground amongst them. The process was not +exactly similar to that by which Egyptian mummies were formed, but +resembled it, nevertheless, in the particular of desiccation. Smoking +was the exact process followed; and smoked Maori heads are common +enough in naturalists' museums. In a general way Maori heads alone +were smoked, certain principles of food economy prompting a more +utilitarian treatment for entire bodies. Nevertheless, as a mark of +particular respect to some important chief now and then, affectionate +survivors exempted his corpse from the oven, and smoking it entire, +set it up amongst the Maori lares and penates as an ornament. This +explanation is not altogether <i>par parenthèse</i>, for it brings me to +the point of narrating some evidence favorable to the opinion that the +dinornis cannot have been extinct in New Zealand even at a recent +historical period. Not long ago the body of a Maori was found in a +certain remote crypt, and resting on one hand was an egg of this bird +giant. Contemplate now the bearings of the testimony. The Maori race +is not indigenous to New Zealand, but arrived there by migration from +Hawai. Not alone do the records of the two groups of Pacific islands +in question advert to such migration, but certain radical coincidences +of language lend confirmation. It is further a matter of tradition +that the migration took place about three hundred years ago. Now, even +if the recently discovered specimen of Maori mummy art had been +executed on the very first advent of the race, the period elapsed +would be, historically speaking, recent. The laws of chance, however, +are adverse to any such assumption; and, moreover, the degree of +civilization—if the expression may be used—implied by the dedication +of an entire human body to an aesthetic purpose, instead of devoting +it to one of common utility—could only have been achieved after a +certain lapse of time. +</p> +<p> +According to Professor Owen, there must have been many species of +dinornis. The largest individuals of one species, according to him, +could not have been less than four yards high. According to the same +naturalist, moreover, these birds were not remarkable by their size +alone; they had, he avers, certain peculiarities of form establishing +a link between them and the cassowary and apteryx: the latter a +curious bird still found in New Zealand, but very rare nevertheless. +</p> +<p> +Of colossal dimensions as were the dinornis and epiornis, the size of +both sinks into insignificance by comparison with another giant bird, +traces of which, and only traces, are discoverable in North America, +at the epoch when the deposit of the conchylian stage of Massachusetts +was yet soft enough to yield under the feet of creatures stepping upon +its surface. Footsteps, indeed, are the only traces left of these +giant birds, and they are found side by side with the imprints of +drops of rain which fell on the yielding surface in those early times. +Mostly the footmarks only correspond with three toes, but occasionally +there are traces of a fourth—a toe comparable to a thumb, only +directed forward, not backward. Marks of claws are occasionally found. +Every trace and lineament of the Massachusetts bird is marvellously +exceptional. The feet must have been no less than fifteen inches long, +without reckoning the hinder claw, the length of which alone is two +inches. The width must have been ten inches. The intervals between +these footmarks correspond evidently with the stride of the monster, +which got over the ground by covering successive stages of from <a name="531">{531}</a> +four to five feet! When we consider that the stride of an ostrich is +no more than from ten to twelve inches, the application of this record +will be obvious. Here closes the testimony already revealed in respect +of this bird, except we also refer to it—which is apocryphal—certain +coprolites or excrementitious matters found in the same formation. +</p> +<p> +For the preceding facts naturalists are indebted to the investigations +of Mr. Hitchcock. The evidence adduced leaves no place for doubt as to +the previous existence of a giant bird to which the traces are +referable. Naturalists, however, were slow to come to this conclusion; +so extraordinary did it seem that a bird should have lived at a period +so remote as that when these geological formations were deposited. To +gain some idea of the antiquity of that formation, one has only to +remember that the conchylian stage is only the fifth in the order of +time of the twenty-eight stages of which, according to Alcide +D'Orbigny, the crust of the earth is made up, from the period of +primitive rocks to the present date. However, many recent facts have +tended to prove that several animals, mammalians and saurians amongst +others, are far more ancient than had been imagined; after which +evidence these giant bird footprints have lost much of the +improbability which once seemed to attach to them. +</p> +<p> +Pass we on now to the traces of another very curious bird, the +existence of which has been demonstrated by Professor Owen, according +to whom the creature must have lived at the epoch of the schists of +Sobenhofen. The name given by Professor Owen to this curious extinct +bird is <i>archeopterix</i>. Its peculiarities are so numerous that for +some time naturalists doubted whether it should be considered a +reptile or a bird; between which two there exist numerous points of +similarity. And now, whilst dealing with bird-giants, it would be +wrong not to make some reference to a discovery made in 1855, at Bas +Meudon, of certain osseous remains, referable to a bird that must have +attained the dimensions of a horse; that floated on water like a swan, +and poised itself at roost upon one leg. Monsieur Constant Prevost, +the naturalist who has most studied the bird, gave to it the name of +gastornis Parisiensis. The bony remains of this creature were found in +the tertiary formation in a conglomerate associated with chalk, which +refers the gastornis to a date more remote than any yet accorded to +any other bird. +</p> +<p> +From a bare record of facts contemplate we now our planet as it must +have been when inhabited by the monstrous birds and reptiles and +quadrupeds which preceded the advent of man. These were times when +animated forms attained dimensions which are now wholly exceptional. +That may be described as the age when physical and physiological +forces were dominant, as the force of moral agency dominates over the +present, and is destined, as appearances tend to prove, to rule even +more fully hereafter. Might it not seem that in nature an economy is +recognizable similar to the economy of human existence? Can we not +recognize an antagonism between the development of brute force and of +the quality of mind? Would it not even seem that nature could not at +one and the same time develop mental and corporeal giants? The +physiological reign has only declined to prepare the advent of moral +ascendancy. Giant bodies seem fading from the earth, and giant spirits +commencing to rule. Humanity is progressive; is not its progression +made manifest by these zoological revelations? The first bone traces +of human beings range back to an epoch posterior to the monstrous +quadrupeds entombed in the diluvium. Hereafter giants, probably, will +only be seen in the moral world, grosser corporeal giant forms having +become extinct. The physical gigantesque is not yet indeed banished +from the earth, but the period of its <a name="532">{532}</a> banishment would seem to +be at hand. +</p> +<p> +The probability is that all the great birds to which reference has +been made were, like the ostrich, incapable of flight. This defect, +when contemplated from the point of view suggested by modern +classifications, seems one of the most remarkable aberrations of +nature of which we have cognizance. For a bird to be deprived of what +seems the most essential characteristic of bird-life—to be banished +from the region that we have come to regard as the special domain of +bird-life—bound to the earth, forced to mingle with quadrupeds—seems +to the mind the completest of all possible departures from established +type. +</p> +<p> +Thoughts such as these result from our artificial systems and +classifications. Apart from these, the conditions of giant walking +birds that were, and to a limited extent are, will be found to +harmonize well with surrounding conditions. Suppose we take the case +of the ostrich for example; this bird being the chief living +representative of giant bird-life remaining to us from the past. In +the ostrich, then, do we view a creature so perfectly adapted to +conditions which surround it that no need falls short and no quality +is in excess. A complete bird in most anatomical characteristics, it +borrows others from another type. The sum of the vital elements which +normally, had the ostrich been like flying birds, should have gone to +endow the wings, has been directed toward the legs and feet, and +thereupon concentrated. Bird qualities and beast qualities have +mingled, and, as we now perceive, have harmonized. If to the ostrich +flying is denied—if it can only travel on foot, yet is it an +excellent pedestrian. A quality of which it has been deprived we now +find to have been transmuted into another quality—the ostrich has +found its equivalent. +</p> +<p> +Reflecting thus, we cease to pity the ostrich; we begin to see that +nature has been supremely wise, our classifications only having led us +into error. A new thought dawns upon our apprehension; instead of +longer regarding the ostrich as furnishing an example of nature's +bird-creative power gone astray, we come to look upon this creature as +designed upon the type of ordinary walking animals, and having some +bird characteristics added. Assuredly this point of view is better +than the other; for whereas the first reveals nature to us through the +distorting medium of an abstraction, the other shows us nature +herself. It is not a matter of complete certainty that the bird-type, +as naturalists explain and define it in their systems, exists; but +there can be no doubt as to the existence of the ostrich. In this mode +of expression there is nothing paradoxical; and doubtless, when we +come to reflect upon it, the case will not fail to seem a little +strange that we are so commonly in the habit of testing the +inequalities of beings by reference to systems, instead of following +the opposite course, viz., that of testing the value and completeness +of systems by reference to the qualities of individuals they embrace. +Naturalists invent a system and make it their touchstone of truth; +whereas the real touchstone would be the creature systematized. The +ostrich simply goes to prove that the zoological types imagined by +naturalists are endowed with less of the absolute than philosophers in +their pride of science had imagined. Animal types are not the +strangers to each other that artificial classifications would make +them appear. +</p> +<p> +Nor is flexibility of bird-type only manifested by the examples +wherein a bird acquires characteristics of quadrupeds and other +walking animals. Wings may even become metamorphosed into a sort of +fins, thus establishing a connection between bird-life and fish-life. +This occurs in the manchot, a bird not less aquatic in its habits than +the seal—of flying and walking almost equally incapable—a bird the +natural locomotive condition of which is to be plunged <a name="533">{533}</a> in water +up to the neck. Assuredly nothing can be more absurd than the attempt +to recognize, in these ambiguous organizations, so many attempts of +nature to pass from one type to another. +</p> +<p> +No matter what religious system one may have adopted, or what +philosophical code: the interpretation of nature (according to which +she is represented as making essays—trying experiments) is alike +inadmissible. Neither God omniscient, nor nature infallible, can be +assumed by the philosopher as trying experiments. There are, indeed, +no essays in nature but degrees—transitions. Wherefore these +transitions? is a question that brings philosophy to bay, and +demonstrates her weakness. It is a question that cannot be pondered +too deeply. Therein lies the germ of some great mystery. +</p> +<p> +Reverting to bird-giants, past and present, it is assuredly incorrect +to assume, as certain naturalists have assumed, that flying would have +been incompatible with their bulk. There exist birds of prey, of whose +bodies the specific gravity does not differ much from that of the +ostrich, and are powerful in flight nevertheless. Then another class +of facts rises up in opposition to the hypothesis, that mere grandeur +of dimensions is the limit to winged flying. Neither the apteryx nor +the manchot fly any more than the ostrich. Neither is a large bird, +nor, relatively to size, a heavy bird. As regards the epiornis, the +position is not universally acceded to by naturalists that the +creature was like the ostrich, the apteryx, and cassowary, a mere +walking bird. An Italian naturalist, Signor Bianconi, has noted a +certain peculiarity in the metatarsal bones of the creature which +induces him to refer it to the category of winged birds of prey. If +this hypothesis be tenable, then a sort of giant vulture the epiornis +would have been: one in whose imposing presence the condor of the +Andes would have dwindled to the dimensions of a buzzard. Further, if +Signor Bianconi's assumption hold good, then may we not have done +amiss in banishing the "roc" to the realms of fiction? Old Marco Polo, +writing in the thirteenth century, described the roc circumstantially, +and the account has been long considered as either a fiction or a +mistake. Signor Bianconi, coming to the rescue of his +fellow-countryman, thinks that the Italian traveller may have actually +described a giant bird of prey extant at the time when he wrote, but +which has now become extinct. +</p> +<p> +A notice of extinct birds would be incomplete without reference to the +dodo, the very existence of which had been lately questioned; so +completely has it fleeted away from the earth. Messrs. Broderip, +Strickland, and Melville, however, have amply vindicated the dodo's +claim to be regarded a former denizen of the world we live in. The +dodo was first seen by the Dutch when they landed on the Isle of +France, at that time uninhabited, immediately subsequent to the +doubling of Cape Horn by the Portuguese. These birds were described as +having no wings, but in the place of them three or four black +feathers. Where the tail should be, there grew instead four or five +curling plumes of a grayish color. In their stomachs they were said to +have commonly a stone as big as a fist, and hard as the gray Bentemer +stone. The boat's crew of the <i>Jacob Van Neck</i> called them +Walgh-vogels (surfeit birds), because they could not cook them or make +them tender, or because they were able to get so many turtle-doves, +which had a much more pleasant flavor, so that they took a disgust to +these birds. Likewise, it is said that three or four of these birds +were enough to afford a whole ship's company one full meal. Indeed, +the sailors salted down some of them, and carried them on the voyage. +</p> +<p> +Many descriptions of the dodo were given by naturalists after the +commencement of the seventeenth century; and the British Museum +contains a painting said to have been copied <a name="534">{534}</a> from a living +individual. Underneath the painting is a leg still finely preserved; +and in respect of this leg naturalists are agreed that it cannot +belong to any existing species. The dodo must have been a curious +bird, if Mr. Strickland's notion of him be correct; and Professor +Reinhardt, of Copenhagen, holds a similar opinion. The dodo, these +naturalists affirm, was a vulture-like dove—a sort of ugly giant +pigeon—but with beak and claws like a vulture. He had companions or +neighbors, at least, not dissimilar in nature. Thus a bird called the +solitaire inhabited the small island of Roderigues, three hundred +miles east of the Mauritius. Man has exterminated the solitaire, as +well as other birds nearly allied, formerly denizens of the Isle of +Bourbon. +</p> +<p> +The dodo will be seen no more; the race has fleeted away. Among birds, +the emeu, the cassowary, and the apteryx are species rapidly +vanishing; amongst quadrupeds, the kangaroo—the platypus: others +slowly, but not less surely. After a while they will be gone from the +earth wholly, as bears, wolves, mammoths, and hyenas have gone from +our own island. The <i>Bos primigenius</i>, or great wild bull, was common +in Germany when Julius Caesar flourished. The race has become wholly +extinct, if, indeed, not incorporated with the breed of large tame +oxen of northern Europe. The urus would have become extinct but for +the care taken by Russian emperors to preserve a remnant in Lithuanian +forests. The beaver built his mud huts along the Saone and Rhone up to +the last few generations of man; and when Hannibal passed through Gaul +on his way to Italy, beavers in Gaul were common. Thus have animals +migrated or died out, passed away, but the balance of life has been +preserved. Man has gone on conquering: now exterminating, now +subjecting. Save the fishes of the sea and the birds of the air, the +time will perhaps come when creatures will have to choose between +subjection and death. Ostriches would seem to be reserved for the +first alternative, seeing that in South Africa, in southern France, +and Italy, these birds have lately been bred, domiciled into tame +fowls, in behalf of their feathers. Very profitable would ostrich +farming seem to be. These giant birds want no food but grass, and the +yearly feather yield of each adult ostrich realizes about twenty-five +pounds sterling. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="535">{535}</a> +<br> +<h2>From Chambers's Journal. +<br><br> +A DINNER BY MISTAKE.</h2> +<br> +<p> +"Only one poun'-ten a week, sir, and no extras; and I may say you +won't find such cheap airy lodgings anywhere else in the place; not to +speak of the sea-view;" and the bustling landlady threw open the door +of the tiny sitting-room with an air which would have become a +Belgravian lackey. It certainly was a cosy, sunny little apartment, +with just such a view of the sea, and of nothing else whatsoever, as +is the delight of an inland heart, I was revolving in my mind how to +make terms on one most important point, when she again broke forth: "I +can assure you, sir, I could have let these same rooms again and again +in the last two days, if I had not given my promise to Mrs. Johnson +that she should have them next Friday fortnight, and I would never go +from my word, sir—never! though this month is our harvest, and it's +hard for me to have the rooms standing empty. As I told my niece only +yesterday, I won't let forward again, not to please anybody, for it +don't answer, and it worrits me out of my life. And I'm sure, sir, if +you like to come for the fortnight, I'll do my utmost to make you +comfortable; and I always have given satisfaction; and you could not +get nicer rooms nowhere." +</p> +<p> +"No," said I, taking advantage of her pause for breath; "these are +very nice. I—I suppose you don't object to smoking?" +</p> +<p> +The good woman's face assumed a severe expression, though I detected a +comical twinkle in her eye. "Why, sir, we always do say—but if it's +only a cigar, and not one of them nasty pipes"— +</p> +<p> +I smiled: "To tell the truth, it generally is a pipe." +</p> +<p> +"Is it now? Well, sir, if <i>you</i> please, we won't say anything about it +now. We have a lady-lodger upstairs, and if she should complain, I can +but say that it is against my rules, and that I'll mention it to you. +And so, sir, if you please, I'll go now, and see to your portmanteau +being taken up;" and thereupon she vanished, leaving me in sole +possession. +</p> +<p> +I threw my bag and rug on to the sofa, pushed a slippery horsehair +armchair up to the window, and sat down to rest and inhale the +sea-breezes with a certain satisfaction at being in harbor. As I +before remarked, the prospect was in the strictest sense of the words +a sea-view. Far away to east and west stretched the blue ocean; and +beside it, I could see only a steep grass-bank just beneath my window, +with a broad shingly path running at its base, evidently designed for +an esplanade, though no human form was visible thereon. Away to the +right, I just caught a glimpse of shelving beach, dotted with +fishermen's boats; and of a long wooden jetty, with half-a-dozen +figures slowly pacing from end to end, while the dismal screeching of +a brass band told of an attempt at music more ambitious than +successful. It was not a lively look-out for a solitary man, and I +half wished myself back in my mother's comfortable house at Brompton. +However, I was in for it now; and I could but try how far a fortnight +of open air and exercise would recruit my wasted strength. I had been +reading really hard at Oxford through the last term, and my very +unusual industry had been followed by a languor and weariness which so +awakened my dear mother's solicitude that she never rested till she +had persuaded Dr. Busby to prescribe sea-air and a total separation +from my books. She could not come <a name="536">{536}</a> with me, as she longed to do, +kind soul! but she packed my properties, and gave endless instructions +as to diet, all of which I had forgotten before I had accomplished the +first mile of my journey. I don't know why I came to that +out-of-the-way watering-place, except that I was too languid to have a +will of my own, or to care for the noisy life of country-houses full +of sportsmen. So, on the following morning, behold me in gray +travelling suit and wide-awake, strolling along the beach, watching +the pretty bathers as they dipped their heads under water, and then +reappeared, shaking the dripping tresses from their eyes. Then there +were the fishermen, brawny, bare-legged Goliahs, setting forth on +their day's toil, and launching their boats with such shouts and cries +as, to the uninitiated, might indicate some direful calamity. The +beach was alive now, for the whole visiting population, such as it +was, seemed to have turned out this bright September morning, and were +scattered about, sketching, working, and chattering. I scanned each +group, envying them their merry laughter and gay talk, and half hoping +to recognize some familiar face among those lazy lounging youths and +sun-burned damsels; but my quest was fruitless, and I pursued my +lonely way apart. +</p> +<p> +Really, though, the little place improved upon acquaintance. There +were fine bold cliffs, just precipitous enough to make a scramble to +the top almost irresistible; there were long stretches of yellow sand +and shallow pools glittering in the sunlight; and there was a breeze +coming straight from the north pole, which quickened my blood, and +brought the color into my sallow cheeks, even as I drank it in. I +bathed, I walked, I climbed, I made friends with the boatmen, and got +them to take me out in their fishing-smacks; but still, with returning +vigor, I began to crave not a little for some converse with more +congenial spirits than these honest tars and my loquacious landlady. I +inscribed my name on the big board at the library; I did all that man +could do to make my existence known, but nearly a week passed away, +and still my fellow-creatures held aloof. I had been out for the whole +of one windy afternoon tossing on the waves, watching the +lobster-fishing, and came in at sunset tolerably drenched with spray, +and with a terrific appetite. As I opened the door of my little +sitting-room, I beheld—most welcome sight—the white dinner-cloth, +and lying upon it a card—a large, highly-glazed, most unmistakable +visiting-card. With eager curiosity, I snatched it up, but curiosity +changed to amazement when I read the name, "Sir Philip Hetherton, +Grantham Park." Sir Philip Hetherton! Why, in the name of all that's +incomprehensible, should he call on me? I had never even heard his +name; I knew no more of him than of the man in the moon. Could he be +some country magnate who made it a duty to cultivate the acquaintance +of every visitor to Linbeach? If so, he must have a hard time of it, +even in this little unfrequented region. My impatience could not be +restrained till Mrs. Plumb's natural arrival with the chops; and an +energetic pull at the bell brought her at once courtesying and +smiling. +</p> +<p> +"I suppose," began I, holding the card with assumed carelessness +between my finger and thumb—"I suppose this gentleman, Sir Philip +Hetherton, called here to-day?" +</p> +<p> +"Oh yes, sir, this afternoon; not an hour ago." +</p> +<p> +"He inquired for me?" +</p> +<p> +"Yes, sir; he asked particularly for young Mr. Olifant, and said he +was very sorry to miss you. He's a very pleasant-spoken gentleman, is +Sir Philip." +</p> +<p> +"Ah, I see. Is he often in Linbeach? Does he know many people living +in the place?" +</p> +<p> +"Well, I don't think he has many friends here, sir; at least, I never +understood so; but he owns some of the <a name="537">{537}</a> houses in the town, and +he is very kind to the poor. No one is ever turned away empty-handed +from his door, and I've a right to say so, sir, for my brother's widow +lives in one of the lodges at Grantham. He put her into it when her +husband was drowned at sea, and he's been a good friend to her ever +since." +</p> +<p> +All this was not what I wanted to find out, but I had learned by +experience that Mrs. Plumb's tongue must have its swing. I now mildly +brought her back to the point: "Does he see anything of the visitors?" +</p> +<p> +"Not to my knowledge, sir. He sometimes rides in of an afternoon, for +Grantham is only four miles from Linbeach; but I don't think he ever +stays long." +</p> +<p> +So it was not apparently an eccentric instance of universal +friendliness, but a special mark of honor paid to me. It grew more and +more mysterious. However, there was nothing to be gained by pumping +Mrs. Plumb further; and as I was discreetly minded to keep my own +counsel, I dismissed her. But meditating long and deeply over my +solitary dinner, I came at length to the unwelcome conclusion, that +Sir Philip Hetherton must have been laboring under some strange +delusion, and that I should see and hear no more of him. I was rather +in the habit of priding myself on my judgment and discrimination; but +in this instance they were certainly at fault, for within three days, +I met him face to face. I was strolling slowly along one of the shady +country lanes which led inland between cornfields and hedge-rows, when +I encountered a portly, gray-haired gentleman, mounted on an iron-gray +cob, and trotting soberly toward Linbeach. He surveyed me so +inquisitively out of his merry blue eyes, that the thought crossed me, +could this be the veritable Sir Philip? I smiled at my own vivid +imagination; but I must confess that before I had proceeded another +half mile, I faced round, and returned to Linbeach for more briskly +than I had left it. I had scarcely stepped into Mrs. Plumb's passage, +when that personage herself met me open-mouthed, with a pencil-note in +her hand. "Oh, Mr. Olifant, I wish you had come in rather sooner. Sir +Philip has been here again, and as he could not see you, he wrote this +note, for he had not time to wait. I was quite vexed that it should +happen so." +</p> +<p> +Evidently the good woman was fully impressed with the dignity of the +event, and not a little flattered at the honor paid to her lodger. I +opened the note, and it contained—oh marvel of marvels!—an +invitation to dinner for the following day, coupled with many warm +expressions of regard for my family, and regrets at having been +hitherto unable to see me. +</p> +<p> +"I told Sir Philip that I thought you had only gone down to the beach, +sir; but he laughed, and said he should not know you if he met you. I +suppose you don't know him, do you, sir?" Mrs. Plumb added +insinuatingly. +</p> +<p> +"No." said I; thinking within myself that the baronet need not have +been quite so communicative. However, this confession of his, at any +rate, threw same light upon the subject, and suggested a solution. He +might have known my father or mother. Of course, indeed, he must have +known them, or somebody belonging to me. His own apparent confidence +began to infect me, and I wrote off an elaborate and gracefully-worded +acceptance; and then sat down to my pipe, and a complacent +contemplation of all the benefits that might accrue to me through his +most praiseworthy cordiality. "After all," I reflected, "'tis no +matter where one goes; friends are sure to turn up everywhere;" and +thereon arose visions of partridge-shooting in the dewy mornings, to +be followed by pleasant little dinners with my host and a bevy of +lovely daughters. But on the morrow certain misgivings revisited me, +and I came to the conclusion that it would only be the civil thing to +ride over to Grantham in the afternoon, and get through <a name="538">{538}</a> the +first introductions and explanations before appearing there as a +guest. Accordingly, I hired a long-legged, broken-winded hack, the +only one to be got for love or money, and set forth upon my way. It +was a fruitless journey; the fatal "not at home" greeted my ears, and +I could only drop a card, turn the Roman nose of my gallant steed +toward home, and resign myself to my fate. +</p> +<p> +Seven o'clock was the hour named for dinner, and I had intended to be +particularly punctual, but misfortunes crowded thick upon me. The +first white tie that came to hand was a miserable failure. My favorite +curl would not be adjusted becomingly upon my brow; and the wretched +donkey-boy who had solemnly promised to bring the basket-carriage +punctually to the door, did not appear till ten minutes after the +time. Last of all, when I had descended "got up" to perfection, and +was on the point of starting, I discovered that I was minus gloves, +and the little maid-of-all-work had to be sent fleeing off to the +corner shop, where haberdashery and grocery were picturesquely +combined. So it fell out that, despite hard driving, it was several +minutes past the hour when we drew up under the portico at Grantham. I +had no time to compose my nerves or prepare my opening address. A +gorgeously-arrayed flunkie appeared at the hall-door; a solemn butler, +behind, waved me on to the guidance of another beplushed and +bepowdered individual; and before I fully realized my position, I +stood in a brilliantly-lighted drawing-room, full of people, and heard +my name proclaimed in stentorian tones. The next moment, the florid +gentleman whom I had encountered on the previous day came forward with +outstretched hands and a beaming face, and a perfect torrent of +welcomes burst upon me. +</p> +<p> +"Glad to see you at last, Mr. Olifant, very glad to see you; I began +to think there was a fate against our meeting. Let me introduce you. +Lady Hetherton—my daughter—my son Fred. Come this way, this way." +</p> +<p> +And I was hurried along helpless as an infant in the jovial baronet's +hands. How could I—I appeal to any reasonable being—how could I +stand stock-still, and, under the eyes of all that company, +cross-examine my host as to the why and wherefore of his hospitality? +It will be owned, I think, that in what afterward occurred I was not +wholly to blame. Lady Hetherton was a quiet well-bred woman, with a +mild face and soft voice; she greeted me with a certain sleepy warmth, +and after a few placid commonplaces, resumed her conversation with the +elderly lady by her side, and left me to the care of her son, a +bright, frank young Harrovian, with whom I speedily made friends. +Really it was very pleasant to drop in this way into the centre of a +genial circle, and I found my spirits rising fast as we talked +together, <i>con amore</i>, of cricket, boating, hunting. A fresh arrival, +however, soon disturbed the party, and, directly afterward, dinner was +announced. Sir Philip, who had been busily engaged in welcoming the +last comers, led off a stately dame upon his arm, and we followed in +procession, a demure young daughter of the house being assigned to me. +We were slowly making our way round the dining-room, when, just as we +passed the end of the table, Sir Philip turned and laid his hand upon +my shoulder. +</p> +<p> +"I have scarcely had time for a word yet," he said; "but how are they +all in Yorkshire?" +</p> +<p> +I don't know what answer I gave; some one from behind begged leave to +pass, and I was borne on utterly bewildered. Yorkshire! what had I to +do with Yorkshire? And then, all at once, the appalling truth burst on +me like a thunder-clap—I was the wrong man! Yes; <i>now</i> I recalled a +certain Captain Olifant, whom I had once met at a mess-dinner, and +who, as I had then heard, belonged to an old Yorkshire family. We +could count no sort of kinship with them <a name="539">{539}</a> but here I was, for +some inexplicable reason, assumed as one of them, perhaps as the +eldest son and heir of their broad acres, and regaled accordingly. My +situation was sufficiently unpleasant, and in the first impulse of +dismay, I made a dash at a central seat where I might be as far as +possible from both host and hostess. But my manoeuvre failed. Lady +Hetherton's soft tones were all too audible as she said: "Mr. Olifant, +perhaps you will come up here; the post of honor;" and of danger too, +in my case; but there was no help for it, and I went. As I unfolded my +napkin, striving hard for a cool and easy demeanor, I mentally +surveyed my position, and decided on my tactics. I could not and would +not there and then declare myself an embodied mistake; I must trust to +chance and my own wits to carry me through the evening, and leave my +explanations for another season. Alas! my trials full soon began. "We +had hardly been seated three minutes, when Lady Hetherton turned to +me. +</p> +<p> +"We were so very glad you were able to come to-night, Mr. Olifant; Sir +Philip had quite set his heart upon seeing you here. It is such a +great pleasure to him to revive an old friendship; and he was saying +that he had almost lost sight of your family." +</p> +<p> +I murmured something not very coherent about distance and active life. +</p> +<p> +"Ah, yes, country gentlemen have so much to do that they really are +greatly tied at home. I think, though, that I once had the pleasure of +meeting a sister of yours in town—Margaret her name was, and she was +suffering from some affection of the spine. I hope she is better now?" +</p> +<p> +"Much better, thank you." And then, in the faint hope of turning the +conversation, I asked if they were often in town. +</p> +<p> +"Not so often as I should wish. Sir Philip has a great dislike to +London; but I always enjoy it, for one meets everybody there. +By-the-by, Olifant, the Fordes must be near neighbors of yours. I am +sure I have heard them speak of Calveston." +</p> +<p> +I did not dare to say they were not, lest inquiries should follow +which might betray my extreme ignorance of Yorkshire geography in +general, and the locality of Calveston in particular; so I chose the +lesser peril, and answered cheerfully; "Oh yes, quite near within an +easy walk of us." +</p> +<p> +"What charming people they are!" said Lady Hetherton, growing almost +enthusiastic. "The two eldest girls were staying here last spring, and +we all lost our hearts to them, they were so bright and pleasant; and +Katie, too, is growing so very pretty. She isn't out yet, is she?" +</p> +<p> +"No; I fancy she is to be presented next year," I responded, +reflecting that while I was about it I might as well do it thoroughly. +"She ought to make a sensation." +</p> +<p> +"Ah, then," said Lady Hetherton eagerly, "you agree with me about her +beauty." +</p> +<p> +"Oh, entirely. I expect she will be quite the belle of our country +balls." And then, in the same breath, I turned to the shy Miss +Hetherton beside me, and startled her by an abrupt inquiry whether she +liked balls. She must have thought, at any rate, that I liked talking, +for her timid, orthodox reply was scarcely uttered, before I plied her +with fresh questions, and deluged her with a flood of varied +eloquence. Races, archery, croquet, Switzerland, Paris, Garibaldi, the +American war, Müller's capture, and Tennyson's new poem, all played +their part in turn. For why? Was I not aware that Lady Hetherton's +conversation with the solemn old archdeacon opposite flagged from time +to time, and that, at every lull, she looked toward me, as though +concocting fresh means of torture. But I gained the day; and at +length, with secret exultation, watched the ladies slowly defiling +from the room. Poor innocent! I little knew what was impending. The +last voluminous skirt had scarcely disappeared, when Sir Philip left +his chair, and advancing <a name="540">{540}</a> up the table, glass in hand, seated +himself in his wife's place at my elbow. I tried to believe that he +might intend to devote himself to the arch-deacon, but that good +gentleman was more than half inclined to nod, and my left-hand +neighbor was deep in a geological discussion; so I sat on, +spell-bound, like the sparrow beneath the awful shadow of the hawk. +Certainly, there was not much outward resemblance between that bird of +prey and Sir Philip's comely, smiling visage, as he leaned forward, +and said cheerily: "Well, now, I want to hear all about them." +</p> +<p> +It was not an encouraging beginning for me, but I had committed myself +with Lady Hetherton too far for a retreat. Like Cortes, I had burned +my ships. Before I had framed my answer, the baronet proceeded: "I +don't know any of you young ones, but your father and I were fast +friends once upon a time. Many's the lark we've had together at +Harrow, ay, and at Oxford too; for he was a wild-spirited fellow then, +was Harry Olifant, though, I daresay, he has settled down into a sober +country squire long ago." +</p> +<p> +It was plain that Sir Philip liked to hear himself talk, and my +courage revived. +</p> +<p> +"Why, yes," I said; "years and cares do work great changes in most +men; I daresay you would hardly know him now." +</p> +<p> +"I daresay not. But he is well, and as good a shot as in the old +Oxford days?" +</p> +<p> +"Just as good. He is never happier than among his turnips." And then I +shuddered at my own audacity, as I pictured my veritable parent, a +hard-worked barrister, long since dead, and with about as much notion +of firing a gun as one of his own briefs. +</p> +<p> +"Quite right, quite right," exclaimed Sir Philip energetically, "and +we can find you some fair sport here, my boy, though the birds are +wild this year. Come over as often as you like while you are at +Linbeach; or, better still, come and slay here." +</p> +<p> +I thanked him, and explained that I was staying at Linbeach for the +sea-air, and that I must be in town in a few days. +</p> +<p> +"I'm sorry for that. We ought to have found you out sooner; but I only +chanced to see your name at the library last Friday. And so you are at +Merton?" +</p> +<p> +"Yes, I'm at Merton," said I, feeling it quite refreshing to speak the +truth. +</p> +<p> +"Ah, I'm glad your father's stuck to the old college; you could not be +at a better one. That boy of mine is wild for soldiering, or I should +have sent him there." +</p> +<p> +The mystery stood revealed. I had recorded my name on the visitors' +board as H. Olifant, Merton College, Oxford; and by a strange +coincidence, Sir Philip's former friend had belonged to the same +college, and owned the same initial. The coincidence was indeed so +complete, that it had evidently never dawned upon the baronet that I +could be other than the son of his old chum. He sat now sipping his +wine, with almost a sad expression on his honest face. +</p> +<p> +"Ah, my lad," he said presently, "when you come to my age, you'll look +back to your old college and your old friends as I do now. But what +was I going to ask you? Oh, I remember. Have you seen any of the +Fordes lately?" +</p> +<p> +I glanced round despairingly at the geologists, but they were lost to +everything except blue lias and old red sandstone, and there was no +hope of effecting a diversion in that quarter. +</p> +<p> +"Well, no—not very lately," I responded slowly, as though trying to +recall the exact date when I last had that felicity. "To tell the +truth, I don't go down into those parts so often as I ought to do." +</p> +<p> +"There's a family for you!" Sir Philip went on triumphantly; "how well +they are doing. That young George Forde will distinguish himself one +of these days, or I'm much mistaken; and Willie, too—do you know +<a name="541">{541}</a> whether he has passed for Woolwich yet?" +</p> +<p> +I could not say that I did, but the good baronet's confidence in Forde +genius was as satisfactory as certainty. +</p> +<p> +"He's sure to pass, quite sure; never knew such clever lads; and as +for beauty—that little Katie"—But here the slumbering archdeacon +came to my aid by waking up with a terrific start and a loud "Eh!— +what! time to join the ladies." +</p> +<p> +There was a general stir, and I contrived to make my escape to the +drawing-room. If I could only have escaped altogether; but it was not +yet half-past nine. The tall footmen and severe butler were lounging +in the hall, and I felt convinced that if I pleaded illness, Sir +Philip would lay violent hands on me, and insist on my spending the +night there. After all, the worst was over, and in the crowded +drawing-room, I might with slight dexterity avoid all shoals and +quicksands. So I ensconced myself in a low chair, guarded by a big +table on one side, and on the other by a comfortable motherly-looking +woman in crimson satin, to whom I made myself agreeable. We got on +very well together, and I breathed and chatted freely in the +delightful persuasion that she at least knew no more of the Fordes +than I did. But my malignant star was in the ascendant. I was in the +midst of a glowing description of the charms of a reading-party at the +lakes, when Sir Philip again assailed me: "Well, Mrs. Sullivan," he +said, addressing my companion, "have you been asking after your little +favorite?" +</p> +<p> +"My little favorite?" repeated Mrs. Sullivan inquiringly. +</p> +<p> +She did not know whom he meant, but I did; I knew quite well. +</p> +<p> +"Katie Forde, I mean; the little black-eyed girl who used to go into +such ecstasies over your roses and ferns—you have not forgotten her +yet, have you?" +</p> +<p> +No, unluckily for me, Mrs. Sullivan had not forgotten her. I was +charged with a string of the fond, unmeaning messages which ladies +love to exchange; and it was only by emphatically declaring that I +should not be in Yorkshire for many months, that I escaped being made +the bearer of sundry curious roots and bulbs to the fair Katharine. +</p> +<p> +But Sir Philip soon interrupted us: "There's a cousin of yours in the +next room, Mr. Olifant," he said, evidently thinking that he was +making a most agreeable announcement: "she would like to see you, if +you will let me take you to her." +</p> +<p> +I heard and trembled. A cousin. Oh, the Fordes were nothing to this! +Why did people have cousins; and why, oh why, should every imaginable +evil befal me on this disastrous evening! Such were my agonized +reflections while with unwilling steps I followed my host to +execution. He led me to a young lady who was serenely examining some +prints. "I have brought him to you, Miss Hunter; here's your cousin, +Mr. Olifant." +</p> +<p> +She looked at me, but there was no recognition in her eyes. How could +there be, indeed, when we had never met before! What would she do +next? What she <i>did</i> do was to hold out her hand with a good-humored +smile, and at the same time Sir Philip observed complacently: "You +don't know one another, you know." Not know one another; of course we +didn't; but I could have hugged him for telling me so; and in the joy +of my reprieve, I devoted myself readily to my supposed cousin, a +bright, pleasant girl, happily as benighted regarding her real +relatives as I was about my imaginary ones. The minutes slipped fast +away, the hands of the clock pointed at ten, the guests were beginning +to depart, and I was congratulating myself that the ordeal was safely +passed, when, happening to turn my head, I saw Sir Philip once more +advancing upon me, holding in his hand a photograph book. My doom was +sealed! My relentless persecutor was resolved to expose me, and with +diabolical craft had planned the certain <a name="542">{542}</a> means. Horrible visions +of public disgrace, forcible ejection, nay, even of the pump itself, +floated before my dizzy brain, while on he came nearer and ever +nearer. "There!" he exclaimed, stopping just in front of me, and +holding out the ill-omened book—"There! you can tell me who that is, +can't you?" +</p> +<p> +It was a baby—a baby of a year old, sitting on a cushion, with a +rattle in its hand, and it was of course unlike any creature I had +ever beheld. "Hm, haw," murmured I, contemplating it in utter +desperation; "children are so much alike that really—but"—as a +brilliant idea suddenly flashed on me: "surely it must be a Forde!" +</p> +<p> +"Of course it is," and Sir Philip clapped me on the back in a +transport of delight. "I thought you would recognize it. Capital! +isn't it? The little thing must be exactly like its mother; and I +fancy I see a look of Willie in it too." +</p> +<p> +I could endure no more. Another such victory would be almost worse +than a defeat; and while "my cousin" was rhapsodizing over the +infantine charms so touchingly portrayed, I started up, took an abrupt +farewell of my host, and despite his vehement remonstrances, went off +in search of Lady Hetherton, and beat a successful retreat. As I +stepped out into the portico, the pony-trap which I had ordered drove +up to the door, and jumping in, I rattled away toward Linbeach, +exhausted in body and mind, yet relieved to feel that each succeeding +moment found me further and further from the precincts of Grantham. +Not till I was snugly seated in the arm-chair in Mrs. Plumb's parlor, +watching the blue smoke-wreaths wafted up from my best beloved pipe +—not till then could I believe that I was thoroughly safe, and begin +to review calmly the events of the evening. And now arose the very +embarrassing inquiry: What was next to be done? Sir Philip's parting +words had been an energetic exhortation to come over and shoot, the +next day, or, in fact, whenever I pleased. "We can't give you the +grouse of your native moors," he said as a final thrust, "but we can +find you some partridges, I hope;" and I had agreed with a +hypocritical smile, while internally resolving that no mortal power +should take me to Grantham again. Of one thing there could be no +doubt—an explanation was due to the kind-hearted baronet, and it must +be given. Of course I might have stolen off from Linbeach still +undiscovered, but I dismissed the notion instantly. I had gone far +enough already—too far, Sir Philip might not unnaturally think. No; I +must write to him, and it had best be done at once. "Heigh-ho," I +sighed, as I rummaged out ink and paper, and sat down to the great +work; "so ends my solitary friendship at Linbeach." It took me a long +time to concoct the epistle, but it was accomplished at last. In terms +which I would fain hope were melting and persuasive, I described my +birth and parentage, related how I had only discovered my mistaken +identity after my arrival at Grantham, and made a full apology for +having then, in my embarrassment, perpetuated the delusion. I wound up +by the following eloquent and dignified words: "Of course, I can have +no claim whatever to continue an acquaintance so formed, and I can +only tender my grateful thanks for the warm hospitality of which I +have accidentally been the recipient." The letter was sealed and sent, +and I was left to speculate how it might be received. Would Sir Philip +vouchsafe a reply, or would he treat me with silent contempt? I could +fancy him capable of a very tolerable degree of anger, in spite of his +<i>bonhomie</i>, and I blushed up to my brows when I pictured quiet Lady +Hetherton recalling my remarks about Miss Katie Forde. The second +day's post came in and brought me nothing; and now I began to be +seized with a nervous dread of encountering any of the Grantham Park +party by chance, and this dread grew so <a name="543">{543}</a> unpleasant that I +determined to cut short my visit, and return to town at once. My +resolution was no sooner made than acted on. I packed my portmanteau, +settled accounts with Mrs. Plumb, and went off to take my place by the +next morning's coach. Coming hastily out of the booking-office in the +dusk, I almost ran against somebody standing by the door. It was Sir +Philip, and I stepped hastily back; but he recognized me at once, and +held out his hand with a hearty laugh. "Ah, Mr. Olifant, is it you? I +was on my way to your lodgings, so we'll walk together;" and not +noticing my confusion, he linked his arm in mine, and continued: "I +got your letter last evening, when I came in from a long day's +shooting, and very much amazed I was, that I must own. I did not +answer it at once, for I was half-dead with walking, and, beside, I +always like talking better than writing, So now I have come to tell +you that I think you've behaved like an honest man and a gentleman in +writing that letter; and I'm very glad to have made your acquaintance, +though you are not Harry Olifant's son. As for the mistake, why, 'twas +my own fault for taking it for granted you must be the man I fancied +you. My lady is just the least bit vexed that we should have made such +geese of ourselves; but come over and shoot to-morrow, and we'll give +you a quiet dinner and a bed in your own proper person; and she will +be very glad to see you. Mind I expect you." +</p> +<p> +After all my resolutions, I did go to Grantham on the following day; +and my dinner by mistake was the precursor of a most pleasant +acquaintance, which became in time a warm and lasting friendship. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>From All the Year Round. +<br><br> +NOAH'S ARKS.</h2> +<br> +<p> +In Kew Gardens is a seldom-visited collection of all the kinds of wood +which we have ever heard of, accompanied by specimens of various +articles customarily made of those woods in the countries of their +growth. Tools, implements, small articles of furniture, musical +instruments, sabots and wooden-shoes, boot-trees and shoe-lasts, bows +and arrows, planes, saw-handles—all are here, and thousands of other +things which it would take a very long summer day indeed even to +glance at. The fine display of colonial woods, which were built up +into fanciful trophies at the International Exhibition of eighteen +hundred and sixty-two, has been transferred to one of these museums; +and a noble collection it makes. +</p> +<p> +We know comparatively little in England of the minor uses of wood. We +use wood enough in building houses and railway structures; our +carriage-builders and wheelwrights cut up and fashion a great deal +more; and our cabinet-makers know how to stock our rooms with +furniture, from three-legged stools up to costly cabinets; but +implements and minor articles are less extensively made of wood in +England than in foreign countries—partly because our forests are +becoming thinned, and partly because iron and iron-work are so +abundant and cheap. In America, matters are very different. There are +thousands of square miles of forest which belong to no one in +particular, and the wood of which may be claimed by those who are at +the trouble of felling the trees. <a name="544">{544}</a> Nay, a backwoodsman would be +very glad to effect a clearing on such terms as these, seeing that the +trees encumber the ground on which he wishes to grow corn crops. +</p> +<p> +The wood, when the trees have been felled and converted into boards +and planks, is applied to almost countless purposes of use. Of use, we +say; for the Americans are too bustling a people to devote much time +to the fabricating of ornaments; they prefer to buy these ready made +from Britishers and other Europeans. Pails, bowls, washing-machines, +wringing-machines, knife-cleaning boards, neat light vehicles, neat +light furniture, dairy vessels, kitchen utensils, all are made by the +Americans of clean, tidy-looking wood, and are sold at very low +prices. Machinery is used to a large extent in this turnery and +wood-ware: the manufacturers not having the fear of strikes before +their eyes, use machines just where they think this kind of aid is +likely to be most serviceable. The way in which they get a little bowl +out of a big bowl, and this out of a bigger, and this out of a bigger +still, is a notable example of economy in workmanship. On the +continent of Europe the wood-workers are mostly handicraftsmen, who +niggle away at their little bits of wood without much aid from +machinery. Witness the briar-root pipes of St. Claude. Smart young +fellows who sport this kind of smoking-bowl in England, neither know +nor care for the fact that it comes from a secluded spot in the Jura +mountains. Men and women, boys and girls, earn from threepence to four +shillings a day in various little bits of carved and turned work; but +the crack wages are paid to the briar-root pipe-makers. England +imports many more than she smokes, and sends off the rest to America. +M. Audiganne says that "in those monster armies which have sprung up +so suddenly on the soil of the great republic, there is scarcely a +soldier but has his St. Claude briar-root pipe in his pocket." The +truth is, that, unlike cutties and meerschaums, and other clay and +earthen pipes, these briar-root productions are very strong, and will +bear a great deal of knocking about. The same French writer says that +when his countrymen came here to see our International Exhibition, +some of them bought and carried home specimens of these pipes as +English curiosities: not aware that the little French town of St. +Claude was the place of their production. +</p> +<p> +In Germany the wood-work, so far as English importers know anything of +it, is mostly in the form of small trinkets and toys for children. The +production of these is immense. In the Tyrol, and near the Thuringian +Forest, in the middle states of the ill-organized confederacy, and +wherever forests abound, there the peasants spend much of their time +in making toys. In the Tyrol, for example, there is a valley called +the Grödnerthal, about twenty miles long, in which the rough climate +and barren soil will not suffice to grow corn for the inhabitants, who +are rather numerous. Shut out from the agricultural labor customary in +other districts, the people earn their bread chiefly by wood carving. +They make toys of numberless kinds (in which Noah's Ark animals are +very predominant) of the soft wood of the Siberian pine—known to the +Germans as ziebelnusskiefer. The tree is of slow growth, found on the +higher slopes of the valley, but now becoming scarce, owing to the +improvidence of the peasants in cutting down the forests without +saving or planting others to succeed them. For a hundred years and +more the peasants have been carvers. Nearly every cottage is a +workshop. All the occupants, male and female, down to very young +children, seat themselves round a table, and fashion their little bits +of wood. They use twenty or thirty different kinds of tools, under the +magic of which the wood is transformed into a dog, a lion, a man, or +what not. Agents represent these carvers in various cities of Europe, +to dispose of the wares; but they nearly all find their way back again +<a name="545">{545}</a> to their native valleys, to spend their earnings in peace. +</p> +<p> +Many of the specimens shown at the Kew museums are more elaborate than +those which could be produced wholly by hand. A turning-lathe of some +power must have been needed. Indeed, the manner in which these +zoological productions are fabricated is exceedingly curious, and is +little likely to be anticipated by ordinary observers. Who, for +instance, would imagine for a moment that a wooden horse, elephant, or +tiger, or any other member of the Noah's Ark family, could be turned +in a lathe, like a ball, bowl, or bedpost? How could the turner's +cutting tool, while the piece of wood is rotating in the lathe, make +the head stick out in the front, and the ears at the top, and the tail +in the rear, and the legs underneath? And how could the animal be made +longer than he is high, and higher than he is broad? And how could all +the ins and outs, the ups and downs, the swellings and sinkings, be +produced by a manipulation which only seems* suitable for circular +objects? These questions are all fair ones, and deserve a fair answer. +The articles, then, are not fully made in the lathe; they are brought +to the state of flat pieces, the outline or contour of which bears an +approximate resemblance to the profile of an animal. These flat pieces +are in themselves a puzzle; for it is difficult to see how the lathe +can have had anything to do with their production. The truth is, the +wood is first turned into <i>rings</i>. Say that a horse three inches long is +to be fabricated. A block of soft pine wood is prepared, and cut into +a slab three inches thick, by perhaps fifteen inches in diameter; the +grain running in the direction of the thickness. Out of this circular +slab a circular piece is cut from the center, possibly six inches in +diameter, leaving the slab in the form of a ring, like an extra thick +india-rubber elastic band. While this ring is in the lathe, the turner +applies his chisels and gouges to it in every part, on the outer edge, +on the inner edge, and on both sides. All sorts of curves are made, +now deep, now shallow; now convex, now concave; now with single +curvature, now with double. A looker-on could hardly by any +possibility guess what these curvings and twistings have to do with +each other, for the ring is still a ring, and nothing else; but the +cunning workman has got it all in his mind's eye. When the turning is +finished, the ring is bisected or cut across, not into two slices, but +into two segments or semicircular pieces. Looking at either end of +either piece, lo! there is the profile of a horse—without a tail, +certainly, but a respectably good horse in other respects. The secret +is now divulged. The turner, while the ring or annulus is in the +lathe—a Saturn's ring without a Saturn—turns the outer edge into the +profile of the top of the head and the back of a horse, the one flat +surface into the profile of the chest and the fore legs, and the other +flat surface into the profile of the hind quarters and hind legs, and +the inner edge of the ring into the profile of the belly, and the deep +recess between the fore and hind legs. The curvatures are really very +well done, for the workmen have good models to copy from, and long +practice gives them accuracy of hand and eye. +</p> +<p> +An endless ring of tailless horses has been produced, doubtless the +most important part of the affair; but there is much ingenuity yet to +be shown in developing from this abstract ring a certain number of +single, concrete, individual, proper Noah's Ark horses, with proper +Noah's Ark tails. The ring is chopped or sawn up into a great many +pieces. Each piece is thicker at one end than the other, because the +outer diameter of the ring was necessarily greater than the inner; but +with this allowance each piece may be considered flat. The thick end +is the head of the horse, the thin end the hind quarter; one +projecting piece represents the position and profile of the fore legs, +but they are not separated; and similarly of the hind <a name="546">{546}</a> legs. Now +is the time for the carver to set to work. He takes the piece of wood +in hand, equalizes the thickness where needful, and pares off the +sharp edges. He separates into two ears the little projecting piece +which juts out from the head, separates into two pairs of legs the two +projecting pieces which jut out from the body, and makes a respectable +pair of eyes, with nostrils and mouth of proper thorough-bred +character; he jags the back of the neck in the proper way to form a +mane, and makes, not a tail, but a little recess to which a tail may +comfortably be glued. The tail is a separate affair. An endless ring +of horses' tails is first turned in a lathe. A much smaller slab, +smaller in diameter and in thickness than the other, is cut into an +annulus or ring; and this ring is turned by tools on both edges and +both sides. When bisected, each end of each half of the ring exhibits +the profile of a horse's tail; and when cut up into small bits, each +bit has the wherewithal in it for fashioning one tail. After the +carver has done his work, each horse receives its proper tail; and +they are all proper long tails too, such as nature may be supposed to +have made, and not the clipped and cropped affairs which farriers and +grooms produce. +</p> +<p> +This continuous ring system is carried faithfully through the whole +Noah's Ark family. One big slab is for an endless ring of elephants; +another of appropriate size for camels; others for lions, leopards, +wolves, foxes, dogs, donkeys, ducks, and all the rest. Sometimes the +ears are so shaped as not very conveniently to be produced in the same +ring as the other part of the animal; in this case an endless ring of +ears is made, and chopped up into twice as many ears as there are +animals. Elephant's trunks stick out in a way that would perplex the +turner somewhat; he therefore makes an endless ring of trunks, chops +it up, and hands over the pieces to the carver to be fashioned into as +many trunks as there are elephants. In some instances, where the +animal is rather a bullet-headed sort of an individual, the head is +turned in a lathe separately, and glued on to the headless body. If a +carnivorous animal has a tail very much like that of one of the +graminivorous sort, the carver says nothing about it, but makes the +same endless ring of tails serve both; or they may belong to the same +order but different families—as, for instance, the camel and the cow, +which are presented by these Noah's Ark people with tails cut from the +same endless ring. Other toys are made in the same way. Those eternal +soldiers which German boys are always supposed to love so much, as if +there were no end of Schleswig-Holsteins for them to conquer, are—if +made of wood (for tin soldiers are also immensely in request)—turned +separately in a lathe, so far as their martial frames admit of this +mode of shaping; but the muskets and some other portions are made on +the endless ring system. All this may be seen very well at Kew; for +there are the blocks of soft pine, the slabs cut from them (with the +grain of the wood in the direction of the thickness), the rings turned +from the slabs, the turnings and curvatures of the rings, the profile +of an animal seen at each end, the slices cut from each ring, the +animal fashioned from each slice, the ring of tails, the separate +tails for each ring, the animal properly tailed in all its glory, and +a painted specimen or two to show the finished form in which the +loving couples go into the ark—pigs not so much smaller than +elephants as they ought to be, but piggishly shaped nevertheless. +</p> +<p> +All the English toy-makers agree, with one accord, that we cannot for +an instant compete with the Germans and Tyrolese in the fabrication of +such articles, price for price. We have not made it a large and +important branch of handicraft; and our workmen have not studied +natural history with sufficient assiduity to give the proper +distinctive forms to the animals. <a name="547">{547}</a> The more elaborate +productions—such as the baby-dolls which can say "mamma," and make +their chests heave like any sentimental damsels—are of French, rather +than German manufacture, and are not so much wooden productions as +combinations of many different materials. Papier-mache, moulded into +form, is becoming very useful in the doll and animal trade; while +india-rubber and gutta-percha are doing wonders. The real Noah's Ark +work, however, is thoroughly German, and is specially connected with +wood-working. Some of the more delicate and elaborate specimens of +carving—such as the groups for chimney-piece ornaments, honored by +the protection of glass shades—are made of lime-tree or linden-wood, +by the peasants of Oberammergau, in the mountain parts of Bavaria. +There were specimens of these kinds of work at our two exhibitions +which could not have been produced in England at thrice the price; our +good carvers are few, and their services are in request at good wages +for mediaeval church-work. We should be curious to know what an +English carver would require to be paid for a half-guinea Bavarian +group now before us—a Tyrolese mountaineer seated on a rock, his +rifle resting on his arm, the studded nails in his climbing shoes, a +dead chamois at his feet, his wife leaning her hand lightly on his +shoulder, his thumb pointing over his shoulder to denote the quarter +where he had shot the chamois, his wooden bowl of porridge held on his +left knee, the easy fit and flow of the garments of both man and woman— +all artistically grouped and nicely cut, and looking clean and white +in linden-wood. No English carver would dream of such a thing at such +a price. However, these are not the most important of the productions +of the peasant carvers, commercially speaking; like as our Mintons and +Copelands make more money by everyday crockery than by beautiful +Parian statuettes, so do the German toy-makers look to the Noah's Ark +class of productions as their main stay in the market, rather than to +more elegant and artistic works. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="548">{548}</a> +<br> +<h2>WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE. +<br><br> +BY CARDINAL WISEMAN.</h2> +<br> +<p class="cite"> + [In the autumn of last year a communication was made to his eminence + the late Cardinal Wiseman by H. Bence Jones, Esq., M.D., as Secretary + of the Royal Institution of Great Britain, requesting him to deliver + a lecture before that society. The cardinal, with the prompt + kindness usual to him, at once assented. The Shakespeare + Tercentenary seemed to prescribe the subject, which his eminence + therefore selected. +<br><br> + The following pages were dictated by him in the last weeks of his + life. The latter part was taken down in the beginning of January; + the earlier part was dictated on Saturday the fourteenth of that + month. It was his last intellectual exertion, and it overtaxed his + failing strength. +<br><br> + The Rev. Dr. Clifford, chaplain to the Hospital of St. John and St. + Elizabeth, who acted as his amanuensis, states, from the lips of his + eminence, that the matter contained in these pages is the beginning + and the ending of what he intended to deliver. We have, therefore, + only a fragment of a whole which was never completed except in the + author's mind.] +</p> +<br> +<h2>I.</h2> +<br> +<p> +There have been some men in the world's history—and they are +necessarily few—who by their deaths have deprived mankind of the +power to do justice to their merits, in those particular spheres of +excellence in which they had been pre-eminent. When the "immortal" +Raphael for the last time laid down his palette, still moist with the +brilliant colors which he had spread upon his unfinished masterpiece, +destined to be exposed to admiration above his bier, he left none +behind him who could worthily depict and transmit to us his beautiful +lineaments: so that posterity has had to seek in his own paintings, +among the guards at a sepulchre, or among the youthful disciples in an +ancient school, some figure which may be considered as representing +himself. +</p> +<p> +When his mighty rival, Michelangelo, cast down that massive chisel +which no one after him was worthy or able to wield, none survived him +who could venture to repeat in marble the rugged grandeur of his +countenance; but we imagine that we can trace in the head of some +unfinished satyr, or in the sublime countenance of his Moses, the +natural or the idealized type from which he drew his stern and noble +inspirations. +</p> +<p> +And, to turn to another great art, when Mozart closed his last +uncompleted score, and laid him down to pass from the regions of +earthly to those of heavenly music, which none had so closely +approached as he, the science over which he ruled could find no +strains in which worthily to mourn him except his own, and was +compelled to sing for the first time his own marvelous requiem at his +funeral. [Footnote 101] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 101: The same may be said of the celebrated Cimarosa.] +</p> +<p> +No less can it be said that when the pen dropped from Shakespeare's +hand, when his last mortal illness mastered the strength of even his +genius, the world was left powerless to describe in writing his noble +and unrivalled characteristics. Hence we turn back upon himself, and +endeavor to draw from his own works the only true records of his +genius and his mind. [Footnote 102] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 102: Even in his lifetime this seems to have been + foreseen. In 1664, in an epigram addressed to "Master William + Shakespeare," and first published by Mr. Halliwell, occurred the + following lines: "Besides in places thy wit windes like Maeander. + When (<i>whence</i>) needy new composers borrow more Thence (<i>than</i>) + Terence doth from Plautus or Menander, But to praise thee aright I + want thy store. Then let thine owne words thine owne worth upraise + And help t' adorne thee with deserved baies." <i>Halliwell's Life of + Shakespeare</i>, p. 160.] +</p> +<br> +<a name="549">{549}</a> +<p> +We apply to him phrases which he has uttered of others; we believe +that he must have involuntarily described himself, when he says, +</p> +<pre> + "Take him all in all, + We shall not look upon his like again;" +</pre> +<p> +or that he must even consciously have given a reflection of himself +when he so richly represents to us "the poet's eye in a fine phrenzy +rolling." ("Midsummer-Night's Dream," act v., scene 1.) +</p> +<p> +But in fact, considering that the character of a man is like that +which he describes, "as compounded of many simples extracted from many +objects" ("As You Like It," act iv., scene 1), we naturally seek for +those qualities which enter into his composition; we look for them in +his own pages; we endeavor to cull from every part of his works such +attributions of great and noble qualities to his characters, and unite +them so as to form what we believe is his truest portrait. In truth, +no other author has perhaps existed who has so completely reflected +himself in his works as Shakespeare. For, as artists will tell us that +every great master has more or less reproduced in his works +characteristics to be found in himself, this is far more true of our +greatest dramatist, whose genius, whose mind, whose heart, and whose +entire soul live and breathe in every page and every line of his +imperishable works. Indeed, as in these there is infinitely greater +variety, and consequently greater versatility of power necessary to +produce it, so must the amount of elements which enter into is +composition represent changeable yet blending qualities beyond what +the most finished master in any other art an be supposed to have +possessed. +</p> +<p> +The positive and directly applicable materials which we possess for +constructing a biography of this our greatest writer, are more scanty +than have been collected to illustrate the life of many an inferior +author. His contemporaries, his friends, perhaps admirers, have left +us but few anecdotes of his life, and have recorded but few traits of +either his appearance or his character. Those who immediately +succeeded him seem to have taken but little pains to collect early +traditions concerning him, while yet they must have been fresh in the +recollections of his fellow-countrymen, and still more of his +fellow-townsmen. [Footnote 103] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 103: As evidence of this neglect we may cite the "Journal" + of the Rev. John Ward, Incumbent of Stratford-upon-Avon, to which he + was appointed in 1662. This diary, which has been published by + Doctor Severn, "from the original MSS.," preserved in the library of + the Medical Society of London, contains but two pages relating to + Shakespeare, and those contain but scanty and unsatisfactory + notices. I will quote only two sentences: "Remember to peruse + Shakespeare's Plays—bee much versed in them, that I may not bee + ignorant in that matter, whether Dr. Heylin does well, in reckoning + up the dramatick poets which have been famous in England, to omit + Shakespeare" (p. 184). Shakespeare's daughter was still alive when + this was written, as appears from the sentence that immediately + follows: it seems to us wonderful that so soon after the poet's + death a shrewd and clever clergyman and physician (for Mr. Ward was + both) should have known so little about his celebrated townsman's + works or life. ] +</p> +<p> +It appears as though they were scarcely conscious of the great and +brilliant luminary of English literature which was shining still, or +had but lately passed away; and as though they could not anticipate +either the admiration which was to succeed their duller perceptions of +his unapproachable grandeur, or the eager desire which this would +generate of knowing even the smallest details of its rise, its +appearance, its departure. For by the biography of Shakespeare one +cannot understand the records of what he bought, of what he sold, or +the recital of those acts which only confound him with the common mass +which surrounded him, and make him appear as the worthy burgess or the +thrifty merchant; though even about the ordinary commonplace portions +of his life such uncertainty exists, that doubts have been thrown on +the very genuineness of that house which he is supposed to have +inhabited. +</p> +<p> +Now, it is the characteristic individualizing quality, actions, and +mode of executing his works, to whatever class of excellence he may +belong, that we long to be familiar with in order to say that we know +the man. What matters it to us that he paid so many marks or <a name="550">{550}</a> +shillings to purchase a homestead in Stratford-upon-Avon? The simple +autograph of his name is now worth all the sums that he thus expended. +One single line of one of his dramas, written in his own hand, would +be worth to his admirers all the sums which are known to have passed +between him and others. What has become of the goodly folios which +must have once existed written in his own hand? Where are the books +annotated or even scratched by his pen, from which he drew the +subjects and sometimes the substance of his dramas? What vandalism +destroyed the first, or dispersed the second of these valuable +treasures? How is it that we know nothing of his method of +composition? Was it in solitude and sacred seclusion, self-imprisoned +for hours beyond the reach of the turmoil of the street or the +domestic sounds of home? Or were his unrivalled works produced in +scraps of time and fugitive moments, even perhaps in the waiting-room +of the theatre, or the brawling or jovial sounds of the tavern? +</p> +<p> +Was he silent, thoughtful, while his fertile brain was seething and +heaving in the fermentation of his glorious conceptions; so that men +should have said—"Hush! Shakespeare is at work with some new and +mighty imaginings!" or wore he always that light and careless spirit +which often belongs to the spontaneous facility of genius; so that his +comrades may have wondered when, and where, and how his grave +characters, his solemn scenes, his fearful catastrophes, and his +sublime maxims of original wisdom, were conceived, planned, matured, +and finally written down, to rule for ever the world of letters? +Almost the only fact connected with his literary life which has come +down to us is one which has been recorded, perhaps with jealousy, +certainly with ill-temper, by his friend Ben Jonson—that he wrote +with overhaste, and hardly ever erased a line, though it would have +been better had he done so with many. +</p> +<p> +This almost total absence of all external information, this drying-up +of the ordinary channels of personal history, forces us to seek for +the character and the very life of Shakespeare in his own works. But +how difficult, in analyzing the complex constitution of such a man's +principles, motives, passions, and affections, to discriminate between +what he has drawn for himself, and what he has created by the force of +his imagination. Dealing habitually with fictions, sometimes in their +noblest, sometimes in their vilest forms—here gross and even savage, +there refined and sometimes ethereal, how shall we discover what +portions of them were copied from the glass which he held before +himself, what from the magic mirrors across which flitted illusive or +fanciful imagery? The work seems hopeless. It is not like that of the +printer, who, from a chaotic heap of seemingly unmeaning lead, draws +out letter after letter, and so disposes them that they shall make +senseful and even brilliant lines. It is more like the hopeless labor +of one who, from the fragments of a tesselated pavement, should try to +draw the elegant and exquisitely tinted figure which once it bore. +</p> +<p> +This difficulty of appreciating, and still more of delineating, the +character of our great poet, makes him, without perhaps an exception, +the most difficult literary theme in English letters. +</p> +<p> +How to reduce the subject to a lecture seems indeed a literal paradox. +But when to this difficulty is added that of an impossible compression +into narrow limits of the widest and vastest compass ever embraced by +any one man's genius, it must appear an excess of rashness in any-one +to presume that he can do justice to the subject on which I am +addressing you. +</p> +<p> +It seems, therefore, hardly wonderful that even the last year, +dedicated naturally to the tercentenary commemoration of William +Shakespeare, should have passed over without any public eulogy of his +greatness in this our metropolis. It seemed, indeed, as if the +magnitude of that one man's genius was too oppressive for this +generation. It was not, I believe, an undervaluing <a name="551">{551}</a> of his merits +which produced the frustration of efforts, and the disappointment of +expectations, that seemed to put to rout and confusion, or rather to +paralyze, the exertions so strenuously commenced to mark the year as a +great epoch in England's literary history. I believe, on the contrary, +that the dimensions of Shakespeare had grown so immeasurably in the +estimation of his fellow-countrymen, that the proportions of his +genius to all that had followed him, and all that surround us, had +grown so enormously in the judgment and feeling of the country, from +the nobleman to the workman, that the genius of the man oppressed us, +and made us feel that all our multiplied resources of art and speech +were unequal to his worthy commemoration. No plan proposed for this +purpose seemed adequate to attain it. Nothing solid and permanent that +could either come up to his merits or to our aspirations seemed to be +within the grasp either of the arts or of the wealth of our country. +The year has passed away, and Shakespeare remains without any +monument, except that which, by his wonderful writings, he has raised +for himself. Even the research after a site fit for the erection of a +monument to him, in the city of squares, of gardens, and of parks, +seemed only to work perplexity and hopelessness. +</p> +<p> +Presumptuous as it may appear, the claim to connect myself with that +expired and extinct movement is my only apology for my appearing +before you. If, a year after its time, I take upon myself the eulogy +of Shakespeare, if I appear to come forward as with a funeral oration, +to give him, in a manner, posthumous glory, it is because my work has +dropped out of its place, and not because I have inopportunely +misplaced it. In the course of the last year, it was proposed to me, +both directly and indirectly, to deliver a lecture on Shakespeare. I +was bold enough to yield my assent, and thus felt that I had +contracted an obligation to the memory of the bard, as well as to +those who thought that my sharing what was done for his honor would +possess any value. A task undertaken becomes a duty unfulfilled. When, +therefore, it was proposed to me to perform my portion of the homage +which I considered due to him, though it was to be a month too late, I +felt it would be cowardice to shrink from its performance. +</p> +<p> +For in truth the undertaking required some courage; and to retire +before its difficulties might be stigmatized as a dastardly timidity. +It is a work of courage at any time and in any place to undertake a +lecture upon Shakespeare, more in fact than to venture on the delivery +of a series. The latter gives scope for the thousand things which one +would wish to say—it affords ample space for apposite +illustration—and it enables one to enrich the subject with the +innumerable and inimitable beauties that are flung like gems or +flowers over every page of his magnificent works. But in the midst of +public, or rather universal, celebration of a national and secular +festival in his honor, in the presence probably of the most finished +literary characters in this highly-educated country, still more +certainly before numbers of those whom the nation acknowledges as +deeply read in the works of our poet as the most accomplished critic +of any age has been in the writings of the classics—men who have +introduced into our literature a class-name—that of "Shakespearian +scholars"—to have ventured to speak on this great theme might seem to +have required, not courage, but temerity. Why, it might have been +justly asked, do none of those who have consumed their lives in the +study of him, not page by page, but line by line, who have pressed his +sweet fruits between their lips till they have absorbed all their +lusciousness, who have made his words their study, his thoughts their +meditation,—why does not one at least among them stand forward now, +and leave for posterity the record of his matured observation? Perhaps +I may assign the reason which I have before, that they <a name="552">{552}</a> know, +too, the unapproachable granduer of the theme, and the rare powers +which are required to grasp and to hold it. +</p> +<p> +Be it so; but at any rate, if in the presence of others so much more +capable it would have been rash to speak, to express one's thoughts, +when there is no competition, may be pardonable at least. +</p> +<p> +And yet, when everybody else is silent, it may be very naturally +asked, Have I a single claim to put forward upon your attention and +indulgence? I think I may have <i>one</i>; though I fear that when I +mention it, it may be considered either a paradox or a refutation of +my pretensions. My claim, then, to be heard and borne with is +this—that I have never in my life seen Shakespeare acted; I have +never heard his eloquent speeches declaimed by gifted performers; I +have not listened to his noble poetry as uttered by the kings or +queens of tragedy; I have not witnessed his grand, richly-concerted +scenes endowed with life by the graceful gestures, the classical +attitudes, the contrasting emotions, and the pointed emphasis of those +who in modern times may be considered to have even added to that which +his genius produced; I know nothing of the original and striking +readings or renderings of particular passages by masters of mimic art; +I know him only on his flat page, as he is represented in immovable, +featureless, unemotional type. +</p> +<p> +Nor am I acquainted with him surrounded, perhaps sometimes sustained, +but, at any rate, worthily adorned and enhanced in accessory beauty, +by the magic illusion of scenic decorations, the splendid pageantry +which he simply hints at, but which, I believe, has been now realized +to its most ideal exactness and richness—banquets, tournaments, and +battles, with the almost deceptive accuracy of costume and of +architecture. When I hear of all these additional ornaments hung +around his noble works, the impression which they make upon my mind +creates a deeper sense of amazement and admiration, how dramas written +for the "Globe" Theatre, wretchedly lighted, incapable of grandeur +even from want of space, and without those mechanical and artistical +resources which belong to a later age, should be capable of bearing +all this additional weight of lustre and magnificence without its +being necessary to alter a word, still less a passage, from their +original delivery. [Footnote 104 ] This exhibits the nicely-balanced +point of excellence which is equally poised between simplicity and +gorgeousness; which can retain its power and beauty, whether stript to +its barest form or loaded with exuberant appurtenances. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 104: The chorus which serves as a prologue to "King Henry + V.," shows how Shakespeare's own mind keenly felt the deficiencies + of his time, and almost anticipatingly wrote for the effects which a + future age might supply: +</p> +<pre style="margin-left: 14%; "> + "But pardon, gentles all, + This flat unraised spirit that hath dar'd, + On this unworthy scaffold, to bring forth + So great an object. Can this cock-pit hold + The vasty fields of France? Or may we cram + Within this wooden O the very casques + That did affright the air at Agincourt. + … + Piece out our imperfections with your thoughts; + Into a thousand parts divide one man, + And make imaginary puissance: + Think, when we talk of horses, that ye see them + Printing their proud hoofs i' the receiving earth; + For 'tis your thoughts that now must deck our kings."] +</pre> +<br> +<p> +After having said thus much of my own probably unenvied position, I +think I shall not be wrong in assuming that none of Shakespeare's +enthusiastic admirers, one of whom I profess myself to be, and that +few of my audience, are in this exceptional position. They will +probably consider this a disadvantage on my side; and to some extent I +must acknowledge it—for Shakespeare wrote to be acted, and not to be +read. +</p> +<p> +But, on the other hand, is it not something to have approached this +wonderful man, and to have communed with him in silence and in +solitude, face to face, alone with him alone; to have read and studied +and meditated on him in early youth, without gloss or commentary, or +preface or glossary? For such was my good or evil fortune; not during +the still hours of night, but during that stiller portion of an +Italian <a name="553">{553}</a> afternoon, when silence is deeper than in the night, +under a bright and sultry sun when all are at rest, all around you +hushed to the very footsteps in a well-peopled house, except the +unquelled murmuring of a fountain beneath orange trees, which mingled +thus the most delicate of fragrance with the most soothing of sounds, +both stealing together through the half-closed windows of wide and +lofty corridors. Is there not more of that reverence and that relish +which constitute the classical taste to be derived from the +concentration of thought and feelings which the perusal of the simple +unmarred and unoverlaid text produces; when you can ponder on a verse, +can linger over a word, can repeat mentally and even orally with your +own deliberation and your own emphasis, whenever dignity, beauty, or +wisdom invite you to pause, or compel you to ruminate? +</p> +<p> +In fact, were you desired to give your judgment on the refreshing +water of a pure fountain, you would not care to taste it from a +richly-jewelled and delicately-chased cup; you would not consent to +have it mingled with the choicest wine, nor flavored by a single drop +of the most exquisite essence; you would not have it chilled with ice, +or gently attempered by warmth. No, you would choose the most +transparent crystal vessel, however homely; you would fill at the very +cleft of the rock from which it bubbles fresh and bright, and drink it +yet sparkling, and beading with its own air-pearls the walls of the +goblet. Nay, is not an opposite course that which the poet himself +censures as "wasteful, ridiculous excess?" +</p> +<pre> + "To gild refined gold, to paint the lily; + To throw a perfume on the violet. + … + Or with a taper light + To seek the beauteous eye of heaven to varnish." + (<i>"King John" act iv., scene 2.</i>) +</pre> +<p> +You will easily understand, from long and almost apologetic preamble, +in the first place, that I take it for granted that I am addressing an +audience which is not assembled to receive elementary or new +information concerning England's greatest poet. On the contrary, I +believe myself to stand before many who are able to judge, rather than +merely accept, my opinions, and in the presence of an assembly +exclusively composed of his admirers, thoroughly conversant with his +works. A further consequence is this, that my lecture will not consist +of extracts—still less of recitations of any of those beautiful +passages which occur in every play of Shakespeare. The most celebrated +of these are present to the mind of every English scholar, from his +school-boy days to his maturer studies. +</p> +<br> + +<h2>II.</h2> +<br> +<p> +It would be superfluous for a lecturer on Shakespeare to put to +himself the question, What place do you intend to give to the subject +of your discourse in the literature of England or of Europe? Whatever +difference of opinion may exist elsewhere, I believe that in this +country only one answer will be given. Among our native writers no one +questions that Shakespeare is supremely pre-eminent, and most of us +will probably assign him as lofty a position in the whole range of +modern European literature. Perhaps no other nation possesses among +its writers any one name to which there is no rival claim, nor even an +approximation of equality, to make a balance against it. Were we to +imagine in England a Walhalla erected to contain the effigies of great +men, and were one especial hall to contain those of our most eminent +dramatists, it must needs be so constructed as to have one central +niche. Were a similar structure prepared in France, it would be +natural to place in equal prominence at least two figures, or, in +classical language, two different muses of Tragedy and of Comedy would +have to be separately represented. But in England, assign what place +we may to those who have excelled in either branch in mimic art, <a name="554">{554}</a> +the highest excellence in both would be found centered in one man; and +from him on either side would have to range the successful cultivators +of the drama. +</p> +<p> +But this claim to so undisputed an elevation does not rest upon his +merits only in this field of our literature. Shakespeare has +established his claim to the noblest position in English literature on +a wider and more solid basis than the mere composition of skilful +plays could deserve. As the great master of our language, as almost +its regenerator, quite its refiner—as the author whose use of a word +stamps it with the mark of purest English coinage—whose employment +of a phrase makes it household and proverbial—whose sententious +sayings, flowing without effort from his mind, seem almost sacred, and +are quoted as axioms or maxims indisputable—as the orator whose +speeches, not only apt, but natural to the lips from which they issue, +are more eloquent than the discourses of senators or finished public +speakers—as the poet whose notes are richer, more wondrously varied +than those of the greatest professed bards—as the writer who has run +through the most varied ways and to the greatest extent through every +department of literature and learning, through the history of many +nations, their domestic manners, their characteristics, and even their +personal distinctives, and who seems to have visited every part of +nature, to have intuitively studied the heavens and the earth—as the +man, in fine, who has shown himself supreme in so many things, +superiority in any one of which gains reputation in life and glory +after death, he is preeminent above all, and beyond the reach of envy +or jealousy. +</p> +<p> +And if no other nation can show us another man whose head rises above +all their other men of letters, as Shakespeare does over ours, they +cannot pretend, by the accumulation of separated excellences, to put +in competition with him a type rather than a realization of possible +worth. +</p> +<p> +Until, therefore, some other writer can be produced, no matter from +what nation, who unites in himself personally these gifts of our bard +in an equally sublime degree, his stature overtops them all, wherever +born and however celebrated. +</p> +<p> +The question, however, may be raised, Is he so securely placed upon +his pedestal that a rival may not one day thrust him from it?—is he so +secure upon his throne that a rebel may not usurp it? To these +interrogations I answer unhesitatingly, Yes. +</p> +<p> +In the first place, there have only been two poets in the world before +Shakespeare who have attained the same position with him. Each came at +the moment which closed the volume of the period past and opened that +of a new epoch. Of what preceded Homer we can know but little; the +songs by bards or rhapsodists had, no doubt, preceded him, and +prepared the way for the first and greatest epic. This, it is +acknowledged, has never been surpassed; it became the standard of +language, the steadfast rule of versification, and the model of +poetical composition. His supremacy, once attained, was shaken by no +competition; it was as well assured after a hundred years as it has +been by thousands. Dante again stood between the remnants of the old +Roman civilization and the construction of a new and Christian system +of arts and letters. He, too, consolidated the floating fragments of +an indefinite language, and with them built and thence himself fitted +and adorned that stately vessel which bears him through all the +regions of life and of death, of glory, of trial, and of perdition. +</p> +<p> +A word found in Dante is classical to the Italian ear; a form, however +strange in grammar, traced to him, is considered justifiable if used +by any modern sonneteer. [Footnote 105] He holds the place in his own +country which Shakespeare does in ours; not only is his <i>terza rima</i> +considered inimitable, <a name="555">{555}</a> but the concentration of brilliant +imagery in our words, the flashes of his great thoughts and the +copious variety of his learning, marvellous in his age, make his +volume be to this day the delight of every refined intelligence and +every polished mind in Italy. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 105: Any one acquainted with Mastrofini's "Dictionary of + Italian Verbs" will understand this.] +</p> +<p> +And he, too, like Homer, notwithstanding the magnificent poets who +succeeded him, has never for a moment lost that fascination which he +alone exercises over the domain of Italian poetry. He was as much its +ruler in his own age as he is in the present. +</p> +<p> +In like manner, the two centuries and more which have elapsed since +Shakespeare's death have as completely confirmed him in his legitimate +command as the same period did his two only real predecessors. No one +can possibly either be placed in a similar position or come up to his +great qualities, except at the expense of the destruction of our +present civilization, the annihilation of its past traditions, the +resolution of our language into jargon, and its regeneration, by a new +birth, into something "more rich and strange" than the powerful idiom +which so splendidly combines the Saxon and the Norman elements. Should +such a devastation and reconstruction take place, whether they come +from New Zealand or from Siberia, then there may spring up the poet of +that time and condition who may be the fourth in that great series of +unrivalled bards, but will no more interfere with his predecessor's +rights than Dante or Shakespeare does with those of Homer. +</p> +<p> +But further, we may truly say that the legislator of a people can be +but one, and, as such, can have no rival beyond his own shores. Solon, +Lycurgus, and Numa are the only three men in profane history who have +reached the dignity of this singular title. The first seized on the +character of the bland and polished Athenians, and framed his code in +such harmony with it, that no subsequent laws, even in the periods of +most corrupt relaxation, could efface their primitive stamp, cease to +make the republic proud of their lawgiver's name. +</p> +<p> +Lycurgus understood the stern and almost savage hardihood and +simplicity of the Spartan disposition, and perpetuated it and +regulated it by his harsh and unfeeling system, of which, +notwithstanding, the Lacedaemonian was proud. And so Numa Pompilius +comprehended the readiness of the infant republic, sprung from so +doubtful and discreditable a parentage, to discover a noble descent, +and connect its birth and education with gods and heroes; took hold of +this weakness for the sanction of his legislation; and feigned his +conferences with the nymph Egeria as the sources of his wisdom. No; +whatever may become of kings, legislators are never dethroned. +</p> +<p> +And so is Shakespeare the unquestioned legislator of modern literary +art. No one will contend that, without certain detriment, it would be +possible for a modern writer, especially of dramatic fiction, to go +back beyond him and endeavor to establish a pre-Shakespearian school +of English literature, as we have the pre-Raphaelite in art. Struggle +and writhe as any genius may—even if endowed with giant strength +it—will be but as the battle of the Titans against Jove. Huge rocks +will be rolled down upon him, and the lightning from Shakespeare's +hand will assuredly tear his laurels, if it do not strike his head. +Byron could not appreciate the dramatic genius of Shakespeare; perhaps +his sympathies ranged more freely among corsairs and Suliotes than +among purer and nobler spirits. Certainly he speaks of him with a +superciliousness which betrays his inability fully to comprehend him. +[Footnote 106] And yet, would "Manfred" have existed if the romantic +drama and the spirit-agency of Shakespeare <a name="556">{556}</a> had not given it life +and rule? So in other nations. I shall probably quote to you the +sentiments of foreign writers of highest eminence concerning +Shakespeare, not as authorities, but as illustrations of what I may +say. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 106: Lord Byron thus writes to Mr. Murray, July 14, 1821: + "I trust that Sardanapalus will not be mistaken for a political play + . . . . You will find all this very unlike Shakespeare; and so much + the better, in one sense, for I look upon him to be the worst of + models, though the most extraordinary of writers."—<i>Moore's Life of + Lord Byron.</i>] +</p> +<p> +Singularly enough, the greatest of German modern writers has nowhere +recorded a full and deliberate opinion on our poet. But who can doubt +that "Götz von Berlichingen with the Iron Hand," and even the grand +and tender "Faust," and no less Schiller's "Wallenstein," belong to +the family of Shakespeare, are remotely offsprings of his genius, and +have to be placed as tributary garlands round his pedestal. To imagine +Shakespeare even in intention removed from his sovereignty would be a +treachery parallel only to that of Lear dethroned by his own +daughters. +</p> +<p> +But still more may we say that, in all such positions as that which we +have assigned to Shakespeare, there has always been a culminating +point to which succeeds decline—if not downfall. It is so in art. +Immediately after the death of Raphael, and the dispersion of his +school, art took a downward direction, and has never risen again to +the same height. And while he marks the highest elevation ever reached +in the arts of Europe, a similar observation will apply to their +particular schools. Leonardo and Luini in Lombardy; the Carracci in +Bologna; Fra Angelico in Umbria; Garofalo in Ferrara, not only take +the place of chiefs in their respective districts, but mark the period +from which degeneracy has to date. And so surely is it in our case, +whatever may have been the course of literature which led up to +Shakespeare, without pronouncing judgment on Spenser, or "rare Ben +Jonson," it is certain that after him, although England has possessed +great poets, there stands not one forward among them as Shakespeare's +competitor. Milton, and Dryden, and Addison, and Rowe have given us +specimens of high dramatic writing of no mean quality; others as well, +and even these have written much and nobly, in lofty as in familiar +verse; yet not one has the public judgment of the nation placed on a +level with him. The intermediate space from them to our own times has +left only the traces of a weak and enervated school. It would be +unbecoming to speak disparagingly of the poets of the present age; but +no one, I believe, has ventured to consider them as superior to the +noble spirits of our Augustan age. The easy descent from the loftiest +eminence is not easily reclimbed. +</p> +<p> +Surely, then, we may consider Shakespeare, as an ancient mythologist +would have done, as "enskied" among "the invulnerable clouds," where +no shaft, even of envy, can assail him. From this elevation we may +safely predict that he never can be plucked. +</p> +<br> +<h2>III.</h2> +<br> +<p> +The next point which seems to claim attention is the very root of all +that I have said or shall have still to say. To what does Shakespeare +owe this supremacy, or whence flow all the extraordinary qualities +which we attribute to him? You are all prepared with the answer in one +single word his GENIUS. +</p> +<p> +The genius of Shakespeare is our familiar thought and ready expression +when we study him, and when we characterize him. Nevertheless, simple +and intelligible as is the word, it is extremely difficult to analyze +or to define it. Yet everything that is great and beautiful in his +writings seems to require an explanation of the cause to which it owes +its origin. +</p> +<p> +One great characteristic of genius, easily and universally admitted, +is, that it is a gift, and not an acquisition. It belongs inherently +to the person possessing it; it cannot be transmitted by heritage; it +cannot be infused by parental affection; it cannot be bestowed by +earliest care; neither can it be communicated by the most finished +<a name="557">{557}</a> culture or the most studied education. It must be congenital, or +rather inborn to its possessor. It is as much a living, a natural +power, as is reason to every man. As surely as the very first germ of +the plant contains in itself the faculty of one day evolving from +itself leaves, flowers, and fruit, so does genius hold, however +hidden, however unseen, the power to open, to bring forth, and to +mature what other men cannot do, but what to it is instinctive and +almost spontaneous. It may begin to manifest itself with the very dawn +of reason; it may remain asleep for years, till a spark, perhaps +accidentally, kindles up into a sudden and irrepressible splendor that +unseen intellectual fuel which has been almost unknown to its +unambitious owner. +</p> +<p> +In our own minds we easily distinguish between the highest abilities +or the most rare attainments, when the fruit of education and of +application, and what we habitually distinguish as the manifestation +of genius. But still we do not find it so easy to reduce to words this +mental distinction; the one, after all, however gracefully and however +brightly, walks upon the earth, adorning it by the good or fair things +which it scatters on its way; the other has wings, and flies above the +surface—it is like the aurora of Homer or of Thorwaldsen, which, as +it flies above the plane of mortal actions, sheds down its flowers +along its brilliant path upon those worthy to gaze upward toward it. +We connect in our minds with genius the ideas of flashing splendor and +eccentric movement. It is an intellectual meteor, the laws of which +cannot be defined or reduced to any given theory. We regard it with a +certain awe, and leave it to soar or to droop, to shine or disappear, +to dash irregularly first in one direction and then in another; no one +dare curb it or direct it; but all feel sure that its course, however +inexplicable, is subject to higher and controlling rule. But in order +to define more closely what we in reality understand by genius, it may +be well to consider its action in divided and more restricted spheres +of activity. For although we habitually attribute this singular +quality to many, and often but on light grounds, it is seldom that we +do so seriously and deliberately without some qualifying epithet. We +speak of a military genius, of a mechanical genius, of a poetical +genius, of a musical genius, or of an artistic genius. All these +expressions contain a restrictive clause. We do not understand when we +use them that the person to whom they were attributed possessed any +power beyond the limits of a particular sphere. We do not mean by the +use of the word genius that the soldier knew anything of poetry, or +the printer of mechanism. We understand that each in his own +profession or stage of excellence possessed a complete elevation over +the bulk of those who followed the same pursuits; a superiority so +visible, so acknowledged, and so clearly individual, that no one else +considered it inferiority, still less felt shame at not being able to +rise to the same level. They gather round them acknowledged disciples +and admirers, who rather glory to have been guided by their teaching, +and formed on their example. +</p> +<p> +And in what consisted that complete though limited excellence? If I +might venture to express a judgment, I would say that genius in these +different courses of science or art may be defined a natural sympathy +with all that relates to each of them, with the power of giving full +and certain execution to the mental conception. The military genius is +one who, either untrained by studious preparation, or else starting +out of the lines in which many were ranged level with himself, seizes +the staff of command, and receives the homage of comrades and +superiors. While others have been plodding through the long drill of +theory and of practice, he is found to have discovered a new system of +the science, bold, irregular, but successful. But to possess this +genius, there must be a universal sympathy with all that relates <a name="558">{558}</a> +to its own peculiar province. The military genius of which we are +speaking must embrace or acquire that which relates to the soldier's +life and duty, from the <i>dress</i> of a single soldier, from his duties +in the sentry-box, or on the picquet, to the practice of the regiment +and the evolutions of a field-day; from the complete command of tens +of thousands on the battle-field, with an eagle's eye and a lion's +heart, to the scientific planning, on the chessboard of an empire, of +the campaign, which he meditates, move by move and check by check, +till the final victory is crowned in the capital city. He who has not +given proof of his being equal to all this, has not made good his +claim to military genius. But such a one will find, wherever he puts +his hand, generals and marshals, each able to command a host, or to +take his place in his roughest of enterprises. +</p> +<p> +I need not pass through other forms of genius to reach similar +results; Stephenson, from the labor of the mine, creating that system +of mechanical motion, which may be said to have subdued the world, and +bound the earth in iron links; Mozart giving concerts at the age of +seven that astonished gray-headed musicians; Raphael, before the +ordinary age of finished pupilage, master of every known detail in art +of oil or fresco, drawing, expression, and grand composition; Giotto, +caught in the field as a young shepherd by Cimabue, drawing his sheep +upon a stone, and soon becoming the master of modern art. [Footnote +107] These and many others repeat to us what I have said of the +military genius—an inborn capacity, comprehensive and complete, with +the power of fully carrying out the suggestions of mind. Had there +been a single portion of their pursuits in which they did not excel, +if the result of their work had not exhibited the happy union and +concord of the many qualities requisite for its perfection, they never +would have attained the attribution of genius. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 107: The early manifestation of artistic power is so + frequent and well known, that it would be superfluous to enumerate + other instances. The expression <i>"anch' io son pittore"</i> is become + proverbial. One of the Carracci, on being translated from an + inferior profession to the family studio, was found at once to + possess the pictorial skill of his race. At the present, Mintropp at + Düsseldorf, and Ackermann at Berlin, are both instances of very high + artists, the one in drawing, the other in sculpture, both originally + shepherds.] +</p> +<p> +If this sympathy with one branch of higher pursuits passes beyond it +and associates with it a similar facility of acquisition and execution +in some other and distinct art or science, it is clear that the claim +to genius is higher and more extensive. Raphael was before the world a +painter, but he could scarcely have been so without embracing every +other department of art. Before the science of perspective was matured +or popularly known, when, in consequence, defects are to be found in +the disposition of figures, and in the adjustment of aerial distances, +[Footnote 108] his architecture shows an instinctive familiarity with +its rules and proportions; a proof that he possessed an architectural +eye. And consequently the one statue which he is supposed to have +carved, and the one palace which he is said to have built, show how +easily he could have undertaken and executed beautiful works in either +of those two classes of art. In Orcagna and Michelangelo we have the +three branches of art supremely united; and the second of these adds +poetry and literature to his artistic excellence. In like manner, +Leonardo has left proof of most varied and accurate mechanical as well +as literary genius. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 108: See Mr. Lloyd's article on "Raphael's School of + Athens," in Mr. Woodward's <i>Fine Art Quarterly Review</i>, January, + 1864, p. 67.] +</p> +<p> +It is evident, however, that while a genius has its point of +concentration, every remove from this, though wider, will be fainter +and less complete. We may describe it as Shakespeare himself describes +glory, and say: +</p> +<pre> + "Genius is like a circle in the water, + Which never ceaseth to enlarge itself, + Till, by broad spreading, it disperse to naught." + (<i>"Henry VI.," act i., scene 3.</i>) +</pre> +<p> +The sympathies with more remote subjects and pursuits will be rather +the means of illustration, adornment, and <a name="559">{559}</a> pleasing variety, than +for the essential requirements of the principal aim. But though less +minute in their application, in the hand of genius they will be +wonderfully accurate and apt. +</p> +<br> + +<h2>IV.</h2> +<br> +<p> +All that I have been saying is applicable in the most complete and +marvellous way to Shakespeare's genius. His sympathies are universal, +perfect in their own immediate use, infinitely varied, and strikingly +beautiful, when they reach remoter objects. And hence, though at first +sight he might be classified among those who have displayed a literary +genius, he stretches his mind and his feelings so beyond them on every +side, that to him, almost, perhaps, beyond any other man, the simple +distinctive, without any qualification, belongs. No one need fear to +call Shakespeare simply a grand, a sublime genius. +</p> +<p> +The centre-point of his sympathies is clearly his dramatic art. From +this they expand, for many degrees, with scarce perceptible +diminution, till they lose themselves in far distant, and, to him, +unexplored space. This nucleus of his genius has certainly never been +equalled before or since. Its essence consists in what is the very +soul of the dramatic idea, the power to throw himself into the +situation, the circumstances, the nature, the acquired habits, the +feelings, true or fictitious, of every character which he introduces. +This forms, in fact, the most perfect of sympathies. We do not, of +course, use the word in that more usual sense of harmony of affection, +or consent of feeling. Shakespeare has sympathy as complete for +Shylock or Iago as he as for Arthur or King Lear. For a time he lives +in the astute villain as in the innocent child; he works his entire +power of thought into intricacies of the traitor's brain; he makes his +heart beat in concord with the usurer's sanguinary spite, and then, +like some beautiful creature in the animal world, draws himself out of +the hateful evil, and is himself again; and able, even, often to hold +his own noble and gentle qualities as a mirror, or exhibit the +loftiest, the most generous, and amiable examples of our nature. And +this is all done without study, and apparently without effort. His +infinitely varied characters come naturally into their places, never +for a moment lose their proprieties, their personality, and the exact +flexibility which results from the necessary combination in every man +of many qualities. From the beginning to the end each one is the same, +yet reflecting in himself the lights and shadows which flit around +him. +</p> +<p> +This extraordinary versatility stands in striking contrast with the +dramatic productions of other countries. The Greek tragedian is Greek +throughout—his subjects, his mythology, his sentences, play +wonderfully indeed, but yet restrictedly, within a given sphere. And +Rome is but the imitator in all its literature of its great mistress +and model. +</p> +<pre> + "Graiis eloquium, Gratis dedit ore rotundo, Musa loqui." +</pre> +<p> +Even through the French school, with the strict adhesion to the +ancient rule of the unities, seems to have descended the partiality +for what may be called the chastely classical subjects. Not so with +Shakespeare. +</p> +<p> +Who, a stranger might ask, is the man, and where was he born, and +where does he live, that not only his acts and scenes are placed in +any age, or in any land, but that he can fill his stage with the very +living men of the time and place represented; make them move as easily +as if he held them in strings; and make them speak not only with +general conformity to their common position, but with individual and +distinctive propriety, so that each is different from the rest? Did he +live in ancient Rome, strolling the Forum, or climbing the Capitol; +hear ancient matrons converse with modest dignity; listen to +conspirators among the columns of its porticos; mingle among senators +around Pompey's <a name="560">{560}</a> statue; or with plebeians crowding to hear +Brutus or Anthony harangue? Was he one accustomed to idle in the +piazza of St. Mark, or shoot his gondola under the Rialto? Or was he a +knight or even archer in the fields of France or England during the +period of the Plantagenets or Tudors, and witnessed and wrote down the +great deeds of those times, and knew intimately and personally each +puissant lord who distinguished himself by his valor, by his wisdom, +or even by his crimes? Did he live in the courts of princes, perchance +holding some office which enabled him to listen to the grave +utterances of kings and their counsellors, or to the witty sayings of +court jesters? Did he consort with banished princes, and partake of +their sports or their sufferings? In fine, did he live in great +cities, or in shepherds' cottages, or in fields and woods; and does he +date from John and live on to the eighth Henry—a thread connecting in +himself the different epochs of mediaeval England? One would almost +say so; or multiply one man into many, whose works have been united +under one man. +</p> +<p> +This ubiquity, if we may so call it, of Shakespeare's sympathies, +constitutes the unlimited extent and might of his dramatic genius. It +would be difficult to imagine where a boundary line could at length +have been drawn, beyond which nothing original, nothing new, and +nothing beautiful, could be supposed to have come forth from his mind. +We are compelled to say that his genius was inexhaustible. +</p> +<br> + +<h2>V.</h2> +<br> +<p> +This rare and wonderful faculty becomes more interesting if we follow +it into further details. +</p> +<p> +I remember an anecdote of Garrick, who, in company with another +performer of some eminence, was walking in the country, and about to +enter a village. "Let us pass off," said the younger comedian to his +more distinguished companion, "as two intoxicated fellows." They did +so, apparently with perfect success, being saluted by the jeers and +abuse of the inhabitants. When they came forth at the other end of the +village, the younger performer asked Garrick how he had fulfilled his +part. "Very well," was the reply, "except that you were not perfectly +tipsy in your legs." +</p> +<p> +Now, in Shakespeare there is no danger of a similar defect. Whatever +his character is intended to be it is carried out to its very +extremities. Nothing is forgotten, nothing overlooked. Many of you, no +doubt, are aware that a controversy has long existed whether the +madness of Hamlet is intended by Shakespeare to be real or simulated. +If a dramatist wished to represent one of his persons as feigning +madness, that assumed condition would be naturally desired by the +writer to be as like as possible to the real affliction. If the other +persons associated with him could at once discover that the madness +was put on, of course the entire action would be marred, and the +object for which the pretended madness was designed would be defeated +by the discovery. How consummate must be the poet's art, who can have +so skilfully described, to the minutest symptoms, the mental malady of +a great mind, as to leave it uncertain to the present day, even among +learned physicians versed in such maladies, whether Hamlet's madness +was real or assumed. +</p> +<p> +This controversy may be said to have been brought to a close by one of +the ablest among those in England who have every opportunity of +studying the almost innumerable shades through which alienation of +mind can pass. [Footnote 109] And so delicate are the changeful +characteristics which Shakespeare describes, that Dr. Conolly +considers that a twofold form of <a name="561">{561}</a> disease is placed before us in +the Danish prince. He concludes that he was laboring under real +madness, yet able to put on a fictitious and artificial derangement +for the purposes which he kept in view. Passing through act by act and +scene by scene, analyzing, with experienced eye, each new symptom as +it occurs, dividing and anatomatizing, with the finest scalpel, every +fibre of his brain, he exhibits, step by step, the transitionary +characters of the natural disease in a mind naturally, and by +education, great and noble, but thrown off his pivot by the anguish of +his sufferings and the strain of aroused passion. And to this is +superadded another and not genuine affection, which serves its turn +with that estranged mind when it suits it to act, more especially that +part which the natural ailment did not suffice for. Now, Dr. Conolly +considers these symptoms so accurately as well as minutely described, +that he throws out the conjecture that Shakespeare may have borrowed +the account of them from some unknown papers by his son-in-law, Dr. +Hall. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 109: "A Study of Hamlet," by John Conolly, M.D., London, + 1863. In p. 52 the author quotes Mr. Coleridge and M. Killemain as + holding the opinion that Shakespeare has "contrived to blend both + (feigned and real madness) in the extraordinary character of Hamlet; + and to join together the light of reason, the cunning of intentional + error, and the involuntary disorder of a soul."] +</p> +<p> +But let it be remembered that in those days mental phenomena were by +no means accurately examined or generally known. There was but little +attention paid to the peculiar forms of monomania, or to its +treatment, beyond restraint and often cruelty. The poor idiot was +allowed, if harmless, to wander about the village or the country, to +drivel or gibber amidst the teasing or ill-natured treatment of boys +or rustics. The poor maniac was chained or tied in some wretched +out-house, at the mercy of some heartless guardian, with no protector +but the constable. Shakespeare could not be supposed, in the little +town of Stratford, nor indeed in London itself, to have had +opportunities of studying the influence and the appearance of mental +derangement of a high-minded and finely-cultivated prince. How then +did Shakespeare contrive to paint so highly-finished and yet so +complex an image? Simply by the exercise of that strong sympathetic +will which enabled him to transport, or rather to transmute, himself +into another personality. While this character was strongly before him +he changed himself into a maniac; he felt intuitively what would be +his own thought, what his feelings, were he in that situation; he +played with himself the part of the madman, with his own grand mind as +the basis of its action; he grasped on every side the imagery which he +felt would have come into his mind, beautiful even when dislorded, +sublime even when it was grovelling, brilliant even when dulled, and +clothed it in words of fire and of tenderness, with a varied rapidity +which partakes of wildness and of sense. He needed not to look for a +model out of himself, for it cost him no effort to change the angle of +his mirror and sketch his own countenance awry. It was but little for +him to pluck away the crown from reason and contemplate it dethroned. +</p> +<p> +Before taking leave of Dr. Conolly's most interesting monography, I +will allow myself to make only one remark. Having determined to +represent Hamlet in this anomalous and perplexing condition, it was of +the utmost importance to the course and end of this sublime drama, +that one principal incident should be most decisively separated from +Hamlet's reverse of mind. Had it been possible to attribute the +appearance of the Ghost, as the Queen, his mother, does attribute it +in the fifth act, to the delusion of his bewildered phantasy, the +whole groundwork of the drama would have crumbled beneath its +superincumbent weight. Had the spectre been seen by Hamlet, or by him +first, we should have been perpetually troubled with the doubt whether +or not it was the hallucination of a distracted, or the invention of a +deceitful brain. But Shakespeare felt the necessity of making this +apparition be held for a reality, and therefore he makes it the very +first incident in his tragedy, antecedent to the slightest symptom +<a name="562">{562}</a> of either natural or affected derangement, and makes it first be +seen by two witnesses together, and then conjointly by a third +unbelieving and fearless witness. It is the testimony of these three +which first brings to the knowledge of the incredulous prince this +extraordinary occurrence. One may doubt whether any other writer has +ever made a ghost appear successively to those whom we may call the +wrong persons, before showing himself to the one whom alone he cared +to visit. The extraordinary exigencies of Shakespeare's plot rendered +necessary this unusual fiction. And it serves, moreover, to give the +only color of justice to acts which otherwise must have appeared +unqualified as mad freaks or frightful crimes. +</p> +<p> +What Dr. Conolly has done for Hamlet and Ophelia, Dr. Bucknill had +previously performed on a more extensive scale. In his "Psychology of +Shakespeare" [Footnote 110] he has minutely investigated the mental +condition of Macbeth, King Lear, Timon, and other characters. On +Hamlet he seems inclined to take a different view from Dr. Conolly; +inasmuch as he considers the simulated madness the principal feature, +and the natural unsoundness which it is impossible to overlook as +secondary. But this eminent physician, well known for his extensive +studies of insanity, bears similar testimony to the extraordinary +accuracy of Shakespeare's delineations of mental diseases; the nicety +with which he traces their various steps in one individual, the +accuracy with which he distinguishes these morbid affections in +different persons. He seems unable to account for the exact minuteness +in any other way than by external observation. He acknowledges that +"indefinable possession of genius, call it spiritual tact or insight, +or whatever term may suggest itself, by which the great lords of mind +estimate all phases of mind with little aid from reflected light," as +the mental instrument through which Shakespeare looked upon others at +a distance or within reach of minute observation. Still he seems to +think that Shakespeare must have had many opportunities of observing +mental phenomena. I own I am more inclined to think that the process +by which the genius of Shakespeare reached this painful yet strange +accuracy was rather that of introversion than of external observation. +At any rate, it is most interesting to see eminent physicians +maintaining by some means or other that Shakespeare arrived by some +sort of intuition at the possession of a psychological or even medical +knowledge, fully verified and proved to be exact by the researches two +centuries later of distinguished men in a science only recently +developed. Mrs. Jameson has well distinguished the different forms of +mental aberration in Shakespeare's characters, when she says that +"Constance is frantic, Lear is mad, Ophelia is insane." [Footnote +111] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 110: Pages 58 and 100.] +<br><br> + [Footnote 111: "Characteristics of Women." New York 1833, p. 142.] +</p> +<br> +<h2>VI.</h2> +<br> +<p> +This last quotation may serve to introduce a further and a more +delicate test of Shakespeare's insight into character. That a man +should be able to throw himself into a variety of mind and characters +among his fellow-men, may be not unreasonably expected. He has +naturally a community of feelings, of passions, of temptations, and of +motives with them. He can understand what is courage, what ambition, +what strength or feebleness of mind. Inward observation and matured +experience help much to guide him to a conception and delineation of +the character of his fellow-men. But of the stronger emotions, the +wilder passions, the subdued gentleness and tenderness, the heroic +endurance, the meek bearing, and the saintly patience of the woman, he +can have had no experience. Looking into himself for a reflection, he +will probably find a blank. +</p> +<a name="563">{563}</a> +<p> +It has often been said that in his female characters Shakespeare is +not equal to himself. The work to which I have just alluded meets, I +think completely, this objection, which, I believe, even Schlegel +raises. It required a lady, with mind highly cultivated, with the +nicest powers of discrimination, and with happiness of expression, to +vindicate at once Shakespeare and her sex. The difficulty of this task +can hardly be appreciated without the study of its performance. Its +great difficulty consists in the almost family resemblance of the +different portraits which make up Shakespeare's female gallery. There +is scarcely any room for events, even for incident, still less for +actions, say for bold and unfeminine deeds. Several of the heroines of +Shakespeare are subjected to similar persecutions, and almost the same +trials. In almost every one the affections and their expression have +alone to interest us. From Miranda, the desert-nurtured child in the +simplicity of untempted innocence, to Isabella in her cloistered +virtue, or Hermione in her unyielding fortitude—there are such +shades, such varying yet delicate tints, that not two of these +numerous conceptions can be said to resemble another. And whence did +Shakespeare derive his models? Some are lofty queens, others most +noble ladies, some foreigners, some native; different types in mind +and heart, as in the lineament or complexion. Where did he find them? +Where did he meet them? In the cottages of Stratford, or in the +purlieus of Blackfriars? Among the ladies of the court, or in the +audience in his pit? No one can say—no one need say. They were the +formations of his own quickened and fertile brain, which required but +one stroke, one line, to sketch him a portrait to which he would give +immortality. Far more difficult was this success, and not less +completely was it achieved, in that character which medical writers +seem hardly to believe could be but a conception. We may compare the +mind of Shakespeare to a diamond pellucid, bright, and untinted, cut +into countless polished facets, which, in constant movement, at every +smallest change of direction or of angle caught a new reflection, so +that not one of its brilliant mirrors could be for a moment idle, but +by a power beyond its control was ever busy with the reflection of +innumerable images, either distinct or running into one another, or +repeated each so clearly as to allow him, when he chose, to fix it in +his memory. +</p> +<br> + +<h2>VII.</h2> +<br> +<p> +We may safely conclude that, in whatever constitutes the dramatic art +in its strictest sense, Shakespeare possessed matchless sympathies +with all its attributes. The next and most essential quality required +for true genius is the power to give outward life to the inward +conception. Without this the poet is dumb. He may be a "mute, +inglorious Milton;" he cannot be a speaking, noble Shakespeare. I +should think that I was almost insulting such an audience, were I to +descant upon Shakespeare's position among the bards and writers of +England, and of the modern world. Upon this point there can scarcely +be a dissentient opinion. His language is the purest and best, his +verses the most flowing and rich; and as for his sentiments, it would +be difficult without the command of his own language to characterize +them. No other writer has ever given such periods of sententious +wisdom. +</p> +… +<p> +I have spoken of genius as a gift to an individual man. I will +conclude by the reflection that that man becomes himself a gift; a +gift to his nation; a gift to his age; a gift to the world of all +times. That same Providence which bestows greatness, majesty, +abundance, and grace, no less presents, from time to time, to a people +or a race, these few transcendent men who mark for it <a name="564">{564}</a> periods no +less decisively, though more nobly, than victories or conquests. On +England that supreme power has lavished the choicest blessings of this +worldly life; it has made it vast in dominion, matchless in strength; +it has made it the arbiter of the earth, and mistress of the sea; it +has made it able to stretch its arm for war to the savage antipodes, +and, if it chose, its hand for peace to the utter civilized west; it +has brought the produce of north and south to its feet with skill and +power, to transform and to refashion in forms graceful or useful, to +send them back, almost as new creations, to its very source. Industry +has clothed its most barren plains with luxuriant crops, and with +Titan boldness hollowed its sternest rocks, to plunder them of their +ever-hidden treasures. Its gigantic strength seems but to play with +every work of venturesome enterprise, till its cities seem to the +stranger to overflow with riches, and its country to be overspread +with exuberant prosperity. +</p> +<p> +Well, these are great and magnificent favors of an over-ruling, most +benignant Power; and yet there is a boast which belongs to our country +that may seem to be overlooked. Yet it is a double gift that that same +creating and directing rule has made this country the birthplace and +the seat of the two men who, within a short period, were made the +rulers each of a great and separate intellectual dominion, never to be +deposed, never to be rivalled, never to be envied. To Newton was given +the sway over the science of the civilized world; to Shakespeare the +sovereignty over its literature. +</p> +<p> +The one stands before us passionless and grave, embracing in his +intellectual grandeur every portion of the universe, from the stars, +to him invisible, to the rippling of the tiny waves which the tide +brought to his feet. The host of heaven, that seemed in causeless +dispersion, he marshalled into order, and bound in safest discipline. +He made known to his fellow-men the secret laws of heaven, the springs +of movement, and the chains of connection, which invariably and +unchangeably impel and guide the course of its many worlds. +</p> +<p> +In this aspect one's imagination figures him as truly the director of +what he only describes—as the leader of a complicated army, who, with +his staff, seems to draw or to send forward the wheeling battalions, +intent on their own errands, combining or resolving movements far +remote; or, under a more benign and pleasing form, we may contemplate +him, like a great master in musical science, standing in the midst of +a throng, in which are mingled together the elements of sublimest +harmonies, confused to the eye, but sweetly attuned to the ear, +mingling into orderly combination and flowing sequence, as they float +through the air, which, though he elicit not nor produce, he seems by +his outstretched hand to direct, or, at least, he proves himself fully +to understand. For what each one separately does, unconscious of what +even his companion is doing, he from afar knows, and almost beholds, +understanding from his centre the concerted and sure results of their +united action. And so Newton, from his chamber on this little earth, +without being able more than the most helpless insect to add power or +give guidance to one single element in the composition of this +universe, could trace the orbits of planet or satellite, and calculate +the oscillations and the reciprocal influences of celestial spheres. +</p> +<p> +Then his directing wand seems to contract itself to a space within his +grasp. It becomes that magic prism with which he intercepts a ray from +the sun on his passage to earth; and as a bird seizes in its flight +the bee laden with its honey, and robs it of its sweet treasure—even +so he compels the messenger of light to unfold itself before us, and +lay bare to our sight the rich colors which the rainbow had exhibited +to man since the deluge, and which had lain concealed since creation, +in every sunbeam that had passed through our atmosphere. And further +still, he bequeathes that wonderful alembic of light <a name="565">{565}</a> to +succeeding generations, till, in the hand of new discoverers, it has +become the key of nature's laboratory, in which she has been surprised +melting and compounding, in crucibles huge as ocean, the rich hues +with which she overlays the surfaces of suns and stars, yet, at the +same time, breathes its delicate blush upon the tenderest petals of +the opening rose. +</p> +<p> +And all the laws and all the rules which form his code of nature seem +engraved, as with a diamond point, upon a granite surface of the +primitive rocks—inflexible, immovable, unchangeable as the system +which they represent. +</p> +<p> +Beside him stands the Ruler of that world, which, though even +sublimely intellectual, is governed by him with laws in which the +affections, even the passions, the moralities, and the anxieties of +life have their share; in which there is no severity but for vice, no +slavery but for baseness, no unforgivingness but for calculating +wickedness. In his hand is not the staff of authority, whether it take +the form of a royal sceptre or of a knightly lance, whether it be the +shepherdess's crook or the fool's bauble, it is still the same, the +magician's wand. Whether it be the divining rod with which he draws up +to light the most hidden streams of nature's emotions, or the +potential instrument of Prospero's spells, which raises storms in the +deep or works spirit-music in the air, or the wicked implement with +which the witches mingle their unholy charm, its cunning and its might +have no limit among created things. But it is not a world of stately +order which he rules, nor are the laws of unvarying rigor by which it +is commanded. The wildest paroxysms of passion; the softest delicacy +of emotions; the most extravagant accident of fortune; the tenderest +incidents of home; the king and the beggar, the sage and the jester, +the tyrant and his victim; the maiden from the cloister and the +peasant from the mountains; the Italian school-child and the Roman +matron; the princes of Denmark and the lords of Troy—all these and +much more are comprised in the vast embrace of his dominions. Scarcely +a rule can be drawn from them, yet each forms a model separately, a +finished group in combination. Unconsciously as he weaves his work, +apparently without pattern or design, he interlaces and combines in +its surface and its depth images of the most charming variety and +beauty; now the stern mosaic, without coloring, of an ancient +pavement, now the flowing and intertwining arabesque of the fanciful +east; now the rude scenes of ancient mediaeval tapestry like that of +Beauvais, and then the finished and richly tinted production of the +Gobelins loom. +</p> +<p> +And yet through this seeming chaos the light permeates, and that so +clear and so brilliant as equally to define and to dazzle. Every +portion, every fragment, every particle, stands forth separate and +particular, so as to be handled, measured, and weighed in the balance +of critic and poet. Each has its own exact form and accurate place, so +that, while separately they are beautiful, united they are perfect. +Hence their combinations have become sacred rules, and have given +inviolable maxims not only to English but to universal literature. +Germany, as we have seen, studies with love and almost veneration +every page of Shakespeare; national sympathies and kindred speech make +it not merely easy but natural to all people of the Teutonic family to +assimilate their literature to that its highest standard. France has +departed, or is fast departing, from its favorite classical type, and +adopting, though with unequal power, the broader and more natural +lines of the Shakespearian model. His practice is an example, his +declarations are oracles. +</p> +<p> +Still, as I have said, the wide region of intellectual enjoyment over +which our great bard exerts dominion, is not one parcelled out or +divided into formal and state-like provinces. While the student of +science is reading in his <a name="566">{566}</a> chamber the great "Principia" of +Newton, he must keep before him the solution of only one problem. On +that his mind must undistractedly rest, on that his power of thought +be intensely concentrated. Woe to him if imagination leads his reason +into truant wanderings; woe if he drop the thread of finely-drawn +deductions! He will find his wearied intelligence drowsily floundering +in a sea of swimming figures and evanescent quantities, or floating +amidst the fragments of a shipwrecked diagram. But over Shakespeare +one may dream no less than pore; we may drop the book from our hand +and the contents remain equally before us. Stretched in the shade by a +brook in summer, or sunk in the reading chair by the hearth in winter, +in the imaginative vigor of health, in the drooping spirits of +indisposition, one may read, and allow the trains of fancy which +spring up in any scene to pursue their own way, and minister their own +varied pleasure or relief; and when by degrees we have become familiar +with the inexhaustible resources of his genius, there is scarcely a +want in mind or the affections that needs no higher than human succor, +which will not find in one or other of his works that which will +soothe suffering, comfort grief, strengthen good desires, and present +some majestic example to copy, or some fearful phantom. But when we +endeavor to contemplate all his infinitely varied conceptions as +blended together in one picture, so as to take in, if possible, at one +glance the prodigious extent of his prolific genius, we thereby build +up what he himself so beautifully called the "fabric of a vision," +matchless in its architecture as in the airiness of its materials. +There are forms fantastically sketched in cloud-shapes, such as Hamlet +showed to Polonius, in the midst of others rounded and full, which +open and unfold ever-changing varieties, now gloomy and threatening, +then tipped with gold and tinted with azure, ever-rolling, +ever-moving, melting the one into the other, or extricating each +itself from the general mass. Dwelling upon this maze of things and +imaginations, the most incongruous combinations come before the dreamy +thought, fascinated, spell-bound, and entranced. The wild Ardennes and +Windsor Park seem to run into one another, their firs and their oaks +mingle together; the boisterous ocean boiling round "the still vexed +Bermoothes" runs smoothly into the lagoons of Venice; the old gray +porticos of republican Rome, like the transition in a dissolving view, +are confused and entangled with the slim and fluted pillars of a +Gothic hall; here the golden orb, dropped from the hand of a captive +king, rolls on the ground side by side with a jester's mouldy +skull—both emblems of a common fate in human things. Then the grave +chief-justice seems incorporated in the bloated Falstaff; King John +and his barons are wassailing with Poins and Bardolph at an inn door; +Coriolanus and Shylock are contending for the right of human +sensibilities; Macbeth and Jacques are moralizing together on +tenderness even to the brute. And so of other more delicate creations +of the poet's mind—Isabella and Ophelia, Desdemona and the Scotch +Thane's wife, produce respectively composite figures of inextricable +confusion. And around and above is that filmy world, Ariel and Titania +and Peas-blossom and Cobweb and Moth, who weave as a gossamer cloud +around the vision, dimming it gradually before our eyes, in the last +drooping of weariness, or the last hour of wakefulness. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="567">{567}</a> +<br> +<h2>MISCELLANY. +<br><br> +ART.</h2> +<p> +<i>Domestic.</i>—The south gallery of the new academy is the largest and +best lighted of the several exhibition rooms, and contains some of the +most ambitious pictures of the year. As the visitor, pausing for a +moment to survey the paintings, drawings, studies, architectural +designs, and miscellanea which are hung around the four sides of the +open corridor at the head of the grand staircase, turns naturally into +the great gallery, through whose wide entrance he catches glimpses of +the art treasures within, so do we propose to conduct the reader +thither without further parley. Here confront us specimens of almost +every subject legitimate to the art, and of some not legitimate—great +pictures and little pictures, grave pictures and gay pictures, +landscape and <i>genre</i>, history and portraiture, beasts, birds, fishes, +and flowers. At either end of the room hangs a full-length portrait of +a gentleman of note, which challenges the visitor's attention, be he +never so reluctant. No. 464, the late Governor Gamble, of Missouri, by +F.T.L. Boyle, belongs to a family only too numerous among us (we speak +of the picture only), and whose acquaintance one feels strongly +inclined to cut in the present instance. But that is impossible. There +stands the familiar lay-figure in the old conventional attitude, which +we feel sure the governor never assumed of his own accord. The marble +columns, the draped curtain, the library table and the books—all the +stock accessories in fine—are there; and either for the purpose of +pointing a moral, of instituting a personal comparison, or of calling +attention to its workmanship, the governor blandly directs your +attention to a bust of Washington. He might be intending to do any one +or all of these things so far as the expression of his face affords an +indication. The idea on which the portrait is painted is thoroughly +false, and ought to be by this time discarded; but year after year +artists continue to mint these modish, stiff, and ridiculous figures, +when with a little regard to common sense they could produce portraits +which all would recognize as natural and effective. Especially is this +the case with the present picture, which evinces considerable +executive ability. The other portrait to which we alluded, No. 412, a +full length of Ex-Governor Morgan, painted by Huntington, for the +Governor's Room in the City Hall, is one of the least creditable works +ever produced by that artist, cold and repulsive in color, awkward in +attitude, and unsatisfactory as a likeness. +</p> +<p> +Occupying a less prominent position than either of these pictures, but +conspicuous enough to attract a large share of attention, is the +full-length portrait of Archbishop McCloskey, No. 438, by G.P.A. +Healy. Mr. Healy, though never very happy as a colorist and often +disposed to sacrifice characteristic expression to a passion for +painting brocades and draperies, has generally succeeded in imparting +a refined air to his portraits, however feeble they might be as +likenesses. The present work is coarse in expression, and untrue as a +likeness. It is a mistake to suppose that a free, rapid touch is +adapted to every style of face. The small and delicate features of the +archbishop, with their shrewd, yet refined and benevolent expression, +cannot be dashed off with a few strokes of the brush, but require +careful painting, and, above all, patient painting. Mr. Healy's +portrait of Dr. Brownson in last year's exhibition, though of little +merit as a painting, was much better than this. No. 448, a portrait of +the late Peletiah Perit, by Hicks, is one of the most creditable +specimens of that very unequal painter that we have recently seen. Mr. +Perit is sitting easily and naturally in his library chair, and is not +made to assume the attitude of a posture-master for the time being, in +order that posterity may know how he did <i>not</i> look in life. The +likeness is not remarkable; but the accessories are carefully painted +and agreeably colored. No. 423, portrait of a lady, by R.M. Staigg, is +exactly what it assumes to be—a lady. In the refined air of the +gentlewoman which the artist has so happily conveyed, he recalls some +of the female heads of Stuart, though in the present instance he had +no wide scope for the display <a name="568">{568}</a> of Stuart's charming gift of +color. The resemblance is more in the general sentiment than in any +technical qualities. Almost adjoining this work is another portrait of +a lady, No. 425, by W.H. Furness, a forcible example of the +naturalistic school, of great solidity of texture and purity of color. +There is intelligence, earnestness, and strength in this face, and in +the attitude, though the latter, as well as the accessories, is +studiously simple. Baker and Stone contribute some attractive +portraits to this room. No. 454, a lady, by the latter, is a good +specimen of a style neither strong nor founded on true principles, but +which, on account of a certain conventional gracefulness, which amply +satisfies those who look no deeper than the surface of the canvas, +will always find admirers. No. 458, a portrait of Capt. Riblett, of +the New York 7th Regiment, by Baker, is a clever work, noticeable for +the easy pose of the figure, the clear fresh coloring, and the firm +handling. +</p> +<p> +Two other portrait pieces may be noticed in this room, of very +opposite degrees of merit. They illustrate a method of treating this +branch of the art which has become popular of late years, and which +seeks to combine portraiture with <i>genre</i>; that is to say, the figures +represent real personages, but to the uninitiated seem merely the +actors in some little domestic scene. Any subject verging on the +dramatic is of course inappropriate to this method. Thus the stiffness +too often inseparable from portraiture and its unsympathetic character +to a stranger are avoided, and the "gentlemen" and "ladies" who have +monopolized so much space on the walls awaken an interest in a wider +circle than when appearing simply in their proper persons. No. 441, "A +Picnic in the Highlands," by Rossiter, presents us with portraits of +some twenty ladies and gentlemen, including a fair proportion of +generals, who have been ruthlessly summoned from the pleasures of the +rural banquet or of social intercourse to place themselves in +attitudes which a travelling photographer would blush to copy, and be +thus handed down to posterity. In submitting to this dreadful process +Generals Warren and Seymour afforded a new proof of courage under +adverse circumstances; and one scarcely knows whether they deserve +most to be pitied, or the artist to be denounced for putting brave men +in so ridiculous a position. The picture is simply disgraceful, and +would naturally be passed over in silence had it not been hung in a +position to challenge attention, while many works of merit are placed +far above the line. Thirty or forty years ago, when the academy was +glad to enroll painters of the calibre of Mr. Rossiter among its +members, such productions were perhaps acceptable on the line. But +have hanging committees no appreciation that there is such a thing as +progress? The other picture above alluded to is No. 435, "Claiming the +Shot," by J.G. Brown. It represents a hunting scene in the +Adirondacks, and though thinly painted, with no merit in the +landscape, and of a general commonplace character, tells its story +with humor and point. We have not the pleasure of knowing the party of +amateur hunters whose good-natured altercation forms the subject of +Mr. Brown's picture, but their faces are perfectly familiar to us, and +may be seen any day on Broadway, until the shooting season summons +them to a purer atmosphere than our civic rulers permit us to breathe. +That good-looking and well-dressed young man, with the incipient +aristocratic baldness, and the languid, gentleman-like air, reclining +in a not ungraceful attitude on a stump, and whose incredulous shake +of the head denotes that he will not resign his claim to the +successful shot—is he not a type of our <i>jeunesse dorée?</i> And who has +not met the portly, florid gentleman, his face beaming with good +nature and good living, who claps our young friend on the back and +advises him to give it up? The earnest expression of the half-kneeling +hunter, clinching the argument as he identifies his bullet-hole in the +side of the slain buck, is well rendered, as is also that of another +florid gentleman who looks on, a quiet but highly amused witness of +the dispute. In the background are a party of guides and boatmen +engaged in preparing supper for the disputants, over whose perplexity +they appear to be indulging in a little quiet "chaff." We imagine that +the faces of the principal actors in this group are good likenesses, +and we feel sure that to see them thus depicted amidst scenes +suggesting healthful out-door sports will be pleasant to their +friends. +</p> +<a name="569">{569}</a> +<p> +From portraits we pass naturally to figure pieces, and first pause +with astonishment before No. 394, "The Two Marys at the Sepulchre," by +R.W. Weir. Here is a work which has doubtless cost much thought and +patient labor, but which is so hopelessly beneath the dignity of the +subject as to seem almost like a caricature. When will modern painters +recognize that sacred history is a branch of their art not to be +attempted except under very peculiar and favorable +circumstances?—that the artist must feel and believe what he paints, +unless he wishes to degenerate into insipidity? We do not desire to +impugn Mr. Weir's sincerity, but a work so cold, lifeless, and void of +propriety shows that he is either hiding his light under a bushel, or +is incapable of feeling, perhaps we should say of reflecting, the +religious fervor which should be associated with so awful a scene. Had +he even stuck to the conventional forms and accessories which have +satisfied six centuries of Christian painters, he might have produced +something of respectable mediocrity. But modern realism would not +permit this, and therefore the Virgin is represented as a commonplace +middle-aged woman, who might as well be Mr. Weir's housekeeper, and +whose mawkish expression is positively repulsive. Of St. Mary Magdalen +the attitude, figure, and expression are not less inappropriate. +Surely these personages are raised above the level of ordinary +women—no believer in Christianity will deny that—and cannot the +painter so represent them? In other respects the picture has little +merit, being stiff and mannered in the drawing and of a mixture of +dull gray and salmon in its local coloring. +</p> +<p> +The most conspicuous landscape in this room is Bierstadt's immense +view of the Yo Semite Valley in California, No. 436, which occupies +the place of honor in the middle of the south wall. For months past +the artist has been announced as at work on this picture, and in view +of the great merits recognized in his "Rocky Mountains," public +expectation has been raised to a high pitch. But public expectation +has been doomed to disappointment this time, for the Yo Semite is much +inferior to its predecessor, though, in several respects, both works +show the same characteristics in equal perfection. They have breadth +of drawing, admirable perspective, and convey an idea of the solemn +grandeur of nature in the virgin solitudes of the west. But while in +the older work Mr. Bierstadt succeeded in forgetting for a time the +academic mannerisms which he brought with him from Germany, in the +present one he has, unconsciously, perhaps, lapsed into them again, +and produced something of great mechanical excellence, and with about +as much nature as can be seen through the atmosphere of a Düsseldorf +studio. Yellow appears to be his weakness, and the canvas is +accordingly suffused with yellow tints of every gradation of tone; not +a luminous yellow which the eye may rest upon with pleasure, but a +hard, dusty-looking pigment, without warmth, or transparency, or +depth; such a yellow as never tinged the skies of California or any +other part of the world, but is begotten of men who derive their ideas +of nature from copying <i>pictures</i> of landscapes, instead of going +directly to nature. The grass and the foliage which receive the +sunlight are of a dirty, yellowish green, those in the shadow of the +great mountain ridge on the right of the scene of a yellowish black, +the very rocks and water are yellow, and if Indians or emigrants had +been introduced into the foreground, we feel convinced they would have +received the prevailing hue. Only in the mountain peaks, checkered +with sunlight and shadow, does the artist seem to escape from this +thraldom to one color, and paint with force and truthfulness. The +picture is therefore a failure; and yet viewed from the head of the +great stair-case, across the open space, and through the entrance to +the exhibition-room, it has a mellowness of tone and truthfulness of +perspective which almost induce us to retract our criticism. Approach +it, however, and the illusion vanishes. Another Californian scene by +Bierstadt, in this room, No. 472, "the Golden Gate," shows the +artist's predominant fault even more conspicuously, and is not only +unworthy of him, but absolutely unpleasant to look at. No. 487, "Among +the Alps," by Gignoux, is a solidly, though coarsely painted work, and +notwithstanding a prevalent cold, leaden tone, tolerably effective. +The idea of solemn repose is well conveyed, although scarcely one of +the details is truthfully rendered. The water of the mountain lake is +not water, but an opaque mass, the trees and rocks are so slurred in +the drawing as to be <a name="570">{570}</a> unrecognizable by the naturalist, and the +shadows are unnecessarily deep and sombre. Such painting, however, +pleases the multitude, who do not care much for absolute truth, +provided effect is obtained; and Mr. Gignoux's picture is considered +very fine indeed. No. 466, "A Mountain Lake in the Blue Ridge," by +Sonntag, is a fine piece of scene painting, and, if properly enlarged, +would form an excellent design for a stage drop-curtain. As a +representation of nature it is false in nearly every detail. And yet +no landscape painter deals more readily and dexterously with the +external forms of American forest scenery, or perhaps has more +neatness of touch; and none, it may be added, has wandered further +from the true path. +</p> +<p> +No. 465, "Greenwood Lake," by Cropsey, is a pleasanter picture than we +commonly see from this artist, who, to judge from his productions, +scarcely ever saw a cloudy day, and has a very indifferent +acquaintance with shadows. Here is a still, serene summer afternoon, +in the foreground a newly-mown hayfield, with a group of mowers and +rakers, just pausing from their labor, and beyond the placid bosom of +the lake. Despite its somewhat monotonous uniformity of tone, the +picture is pervaded by an agreeable sentiment of repose, +characteristic of midsummer; and as an honest attempt to portray a +pleasing phase of nature it is welcome. No. 493, "Afternoon in the +Housatonic Valley," by J.B. Bristol, represents the period of the day +selected by Mr. Cropsey, but the tone of his picture is lower and +cooler, and the coloring more harmonious. Its most noticeable feature +is a noble mountain in the background, whose wooded sides afford fine +contrasts of light and shadow. No. 494, "A Foggy Morning—Coast of +France," by Dana, evinces more desire to catch the secret of rich +coloring than success. It is not by scattering warm pigments about, +without regard to harmony or gradation, that Mr. Dana can attain his +end; and so far as color is concerned he shows no improvement upon his +work of former years. In composition he wields, as usual, a graceful +pencil, and his children are pleasingly and naturally drawn. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>NEW PUBLICATIONS.</h2> +<br> +<p> +THE ILIAD OF HOMER RENDERED INTO ENGLISH BLANK VERSE. +By Edward, Earl of Derby. 2 vols. 8vo., pp. 430 and 457. New York: +Charles Scribner & Company. +</p> +<p> +There have been several translations of the Iliad into English verse, +but, practically, only three have hitherto been much in vogue. The +first of these, by Chapman, is a work of considerable spirit, of a +rude, fiery kind; but it is unfaithful, and has long been antiquated. +Pope's brilliant and thoroughly un-Homeric version will always be +popular as a poem, though anything more widely different from the +original was probably never published as a translation. Cowper is +verbally accurate, but tame and tiresome. A translation in blank +verse, by William Munford, of Richmond, Va., appeared in Boston some +twenty years ago, but does not seem to have attracted the attention it +deserved. +</p> +<p> +Lord Derby appears to have avoided nearly all the defects and combined +nearly all the merits of his predecessors. He has aimed "to produce a +translation and not a paraphrase; not, indeed, such a translation as +would satisfy, with regard to each word, the rigid requirements of +accurate scholarship, but such as would fairly and honestly give the +sense and spirit of every passage and of every line, omitting nothing +and expanding nothing, and adhering as closely as our language will +allow, even to every epithet which is capable of being translated, and +which has, in the particular passage, anything of a special and +distinctive character." The testimony of critics is almost unanimous +as to the success with which he has carried out his design. His +translation is incomparably more faithful than either of those we have +mentioned. He almost invariably perceives the delicate shades of +meaning which Pope was <a name="571">{571}</a> not scholar enough to notice, and he is +often wonderfully happy in expressing them in English. His language is +dignified and pure; his style animated and idiomatic; and his verse +has more of the majestic flow of Homer than that of any previous +translator. He has produced by all odds the best version of the Iliad +in the English language. +</p> +<p> +That a statesman should have succeeded in a task of this sort, where +Pope and Cowper failed, is strange indeed. But let our readers judge +for themselves: we give first a somewhat celebrated passage from +Pope—the bivouac of the Trojans, at the end of the eighth +book—premising that Pope prefixes to it four lines which have no +equivalent in the Greek, and which are not only an interpolation but a +positive injury to the sense: +</p> +<pre> + "The troops exulting sat in order round, + And beaming fires illumined all the ground. + As when the moon, refulgent lamp of night, + O'er heaven's clear azure spreads her sacred light, + When not a breath disturbs the deep serene, + And not a cloud o'ercasts the solemn scene; + Around her throne the vivid planets roll, + And stars unnumbered gild the glowing pole, + O'er the dark trees a yellower verdure shed, + And tip with silver every mountain's head; + Then shine the vales, the rocks in prospect rise, + A flood of glory bursts from all the skies; + The conscious swains, rejoicing in the sight, + Eye the blue vault, and bless the useful light. + So many flames before proud Ilion blaze, + And lighten glimmering Xanthus with their rays: + The long reflections of the distant fires + Gleam on the walls, and tremble on the spires; + A thousand piles the dusky horrors gild, + And shoot a shady lustre o'er the field, + Full fifty guards each flaming pile attend, + Whose umbered arms, by fits, thick flashes send, + Loud neigh the coursers o'er their heaps of corn, + And ardent warriors wait the rising morn." +</pre> +<p> +This is not a faultless passage, but no one can help admiring the +felicitous imagery, the vivid word-painting, the wonderful harmony of +the versification. Yet what reader of Homer will hesitate to prefer +Lord Derby's simpler and almost strictly literal rendering? +</p> +<pre> + "Full of proud hopes, upon the pass of war, + All night they camped; and frequent blazed their fires. + As when in heaven, around the glittering moon + The stars shine bright amid the breathless air; + And every crag, and every jutting peak + Stands boldly forth, and every forest glade; + <i>Ev'n to the gates of heaven is opened wide + The boundless sky;</i> shines each particular star + Distinct; joy fills the gazing shepherd's heart. + So bright, so thickly scattered o'er the plain, + Before the walls of Troy, between the ships + And Xanthus' stream, the Trojan watchfires blazed. + A thousand fires burnt brightly; and round each + Sat fifty warriors in the ruddy glare; + With store of provender before them laid, + Barley and rye, the tethered horses stood + Beside the cars, and waited for the morn." +</pre> +<p> +Take now the description of Vulcan serving the gods at a banquet, from +the conclusion of the first book. Cowper gives it as follows: +</p> +<pre> + "So he; then Juno smiled, goddess white-armed, + And smiling still, from his unwonted hand + Received the goblet. He from right to left [Footnote 112] + Rich nectar from the beaker drawn, alert + Distributed to all the powers divine. + Heaven rang with laughter inextinguishable, + Peal after peal, such pleasure all conceived + At sight of Vulcan in his new employ. + So spent they in festivity the day, + And all were cheered; nor was Apollo's harp + Silent, nor did the muses spare to add + Responsive melody of vocal sweets. + But when the sun's bright orb had now declined, + Each to his mansion, wheresoever built + By the same matchless architect, withdrew. + Jove also, kindler of the fires of heaven, + His couch ascending as at other times + When gentle sleep approached him, slept serene, + With golden-sceptred Juno by his side." +</pre> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 112: Just the reverse,—<i>from left to right</i>, +<span style="vertical-align:-25%"> +<img alt="" src="images/i571.jpg"> +</span> + Cowper's blunder is serious, because to proceed from right to left + was looked upon by the Greeks as unlucky.] +</p> +<a name="572">{572}</a> +<p> +Cowper is better than Pope here; but Lord Derby is the most literal +and by far the best of the three. His lines have a dignified +simplicity not unworthy the father of poetry himself; yet the +translation is nearly verbatim: +</p> +<pre> + "Thus as he spoke, the white-armed goddess smiled, + And smiling from his hand received the cup, + Then to th' immortals all in order due + He ministered, and from the flagon poured + The luscious nectar; while among the gods + Rose laughter irrepressible, at sight + Of Vulcan hobbling round the spacious hall. + Thus they till sunset passed the festive hours; + Nor lacked the banquet aught to please the sense, + Nor sound of tuneful lyre, by Phoebus touched, + Nor muses' voice, who in alternate strains + Responsive sang; but when the sun was set, + Each for his home departed, where for each + The cripple Vulcan, matchless architect, + With wondrous skill a noble house had reared. + To his own couch, where he was wont of old, + When overcome by gentle sleep, to rest, + Olympian Jove ascended; there he slept, + And by his side the golden-thronèd queen." +</pre> +<p> +If our space permitted we might easily extend these comparisons, and +show that Lord Derby excels other translators in every phase of his +undertaking—in the rude shock of war, the touching emotions of human +sentiment, the debates of the gods, and the beauties and phenomena of +nature. We cannot refrain, however, from quoting a few passages of +conspicuous excellence. +</p> +<p> +Hector's assault on the ships in the fifteenth book is thus spiritedly +rendered: +</p> +<pre> + "Fiercely he raged, as terrible as Mars + With brandished spear; or as a raging fire + 'Mid the dense thickets on the mountain side. + The foam was on his lips; bright flashed his eyes + Beneath his awful brows, and terribly + Above his temples waved amid the fray + The helm of Hector; Jove himself from heaven + His guardian hand extending, him alone + With glory crowning 'mid the host of men, + But short his term of glory; for the day + Was fast approaching, when, with Pallas' aid + The might of Peleus' son should work his doom. + Oft he essayed to break the ranks, where'er + The densest throng and noblest arms he saw; + But strenuous though his efforts, all were vain; + They, massed in close array, his charge withstood; + Firm as a craggy rock, upstanding high + Close by the hoary sea, which meets unmoved + The boist'rous currents of the whistling winds, + And the big waves that bellow round its + So stood unmoved the Greeks, and undismayed. + At length, all blazing in his arms, he sprang + Upon the mass; so plunging down as when + On some tall vessel, from beneath the clouds + A giant billow, <i>tempest-nursed</i>, descends: + The deck is drenched in foam; the stormy wind + Howls in the shrouds; th' affrighted seamen quail + In fear, but little way from death removed; [Footnote 113] + So quailed the spirit in every Grecian breast." +</pre> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 113: We are particularly struck with the + excellence of Lord Derby's translation of this + magnificent image when we contrast it with Mr., + Munford's: +</p> +<pre style="margin-left: 14%; "> + "As on a ship a wat'ry mountain falls, + Driven from the clouds by all the furious winds; + With foam the deck is covered, pitiless + The deafening tempest roars among the shrouds; + The sailors, whirled along by raging waves. + Tremble, confused and faint; immediate death + Appears before them." +</pre> +<p class="footnote"> + Yet, no less an authority than the late President + Felton, of Harvard, pronounced Munford's + the best of all English metrical versions of the + Iliad.] +</p> +<p> +In book sixth Hector is accosted by his mother on his return from the +battle-field. She offers him wine, wherewith to pour a libation to +Jove and then to refresh himself. Lord Darby's translation of his +answer is very neat and very close to the original: +</p> +<a name="573">{573}</a> + +<pre> + "No, not for me, mine honored mother, pour + The luscious wine, lest thou unnerve my limbs + And make me all my wonted prowess lose. + The ruddy wine I dare not pour to Jove + With hands unwashed; nor to the cloud-girt son + Of Saturn may the voice of prayer ascend + From one with blood bespattered and defiled." +</pre> +<p> +We close our extracts with a few lines from book third. Priam, sitting +with "the sage chiefs and councillors of Troy" at the Scaean gate +watching the hostile armies, thus addresses Helen: +</p> +<pre> + "'Come here, my child, and sitting by my side, + From whence thou canst discern thy former lord, + His kindred and his friends (not thee I blame, + But to the gods I owe this woful war), + Tell me the name of yonder mighty chief + Among the Greeks a warrior brave and strong: + Others in height surpass him; but my eyes + A form so noble never yet beheld, + Nor so august; he moves, a king indeed.' + To whom in answer, Helen, heav'nly fair: + 'With rev'rence, dearest father, and with shame + I look on thee: oh, would that I had died + That day when hither with thy son I came, + And left my husband, friends, and darling child, + And all the loved companions of my youth: + That I died not, with grief I pine away. + But to thy question; I will tell thee true; + Yon chief is Agamemnon, Atreus' son, + Wide-reigning, mighty monarch, ruler good, + And valiant warrior; in my husband's name, + Lost as I am, I called him brother once.'" +</pre> +<br> +<p> +LIFE OF MARCUS TULLIUS CICERO. +By William Forsyth, M.A., Q.C., author of "Hortensius," "Napoleon at +St. Helena and Sir Hudson Lowe," "History of Trial by Jury," etc., and +late fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge. Two volumes, 8vo., pp. 364 +and 341. New York: Charles Scribner & Co. +</p> +<p> +Mr. Forsyth has a very correct notion of the business of a biographer. +His object has been not only to tell Cicero's history but to describe +his private life—to make us acquainted with minute details of his +domestic habits, and to represent him as far as possible in the same +manner as he would a man of the present generation. "The more we +accustom ourselves," he says, "to regard the ancients as persons of +like passions as ourselves, and familiarize ourselves with the idea of +them as fathers, husbands, friends, and <i>gentlemen</i>, the better we +shall understand them." He has therefore carefully gathered up from +the letters and other writings of the Roman orator those little bits +of personal allusion, domestic history, and unconsidered trifles which +indicate, more clearly sometimes than important actions, the bent of +one's mind or the inmost character of one's heart; and he has arranged +them with great skill, and a good eye for effect. He shows but slight +literary polish; his style is not elegant, nor always clear, nor even +dignified; but he has a logical way of putting things, a happy knack +of arrangement, and a habit of keeping to the point and throwing aside +superfluous matter, for which we dare say he is indebted to his +training as a pleader in the courts. As a lawyer, too, he is specially +qualified to give the history of the causes in which Cicero's orations +were delivered; and this he does better than we have ever seen it done +before, explaining the narrative by copious illustrations from modern +jurisprudence. But if in some respects he writes like a lawyer, in +another very important point his practice as an advocate seems not to +have affected him. He is thoroughly impartial. He sums up Cicero's +character more like a judge than a queen's counsel. He admires him but +not blindly; holding the safe middle path between the excessive +veneration shown by Middleton and Niebuhr and the unreasonable +animosity of Drumann and Mommsen. He admits that Cicero was weak, +timid, and irresolute; but these defects were counter-balanced by the +display, at critical periods of his life, of the very opposite +qualities. In the contest with Catiline and the final struggle with +Antony he was as firm and brave as a man need be. One principal cause +of his irresolution was an anxiety to do what was right. If he knew +that he had acted wrongly, he instantly felt all the agony of remorse. +His standard of morality was as high as it was perhaps possible to +elevate it by the mere light of nature. The chief fault of his moral +character was a want of sincerity. In a different sense of the words +from that expressed by St. Paul, he wished to become all things to all +men, if by any means he might win some. His private correspondence and +<a name="574">{574}</a> his public speeches were often in direct contradiction with each +other as to the opinions he expressed of his contemporaries. His +foible was vanity. He was never tired of speaking of himself. As a +philosopher he had no pretensions to originality, but he was the first +to make known to his countrymen the philosophy of Greece, which until +he appeared may be said to have spoken to the Romans in an unknown +tongue. He adhered to no particular sect, but affected chiefly the +school of the new academy. He was a firm believer in a providence and +a future state. As an orator his faults are coarseness in invective, +exaggeration in matter, and prolixity in style. "Many of his sentences +are intolerably long, and he dwells upon a topic with an exhaustive +fulness which leaves nothing to the imagination. The pure gold of his +eloquence is beaten out too thin, and what is gained in surface is +lost in solidity and depth." +</p> +<p> +The position of Cicero with respect to the political parties into +which the republic was divided in his time is not so well described as +his personal character. While Mr. Forsyth displays industry and good +judgment in collecting and arranging the little traits which go to +make up a life-like portrait, he lacks the comprehensive and +philosophical view with which Merivale has recently surveyed the same +period of history. Forsyth writes as one who, having mingled with the +busy crowd in the forum, should come away and tell us what he had seen +and heard, and describe the men with whom he had talked. Merivale +surveys the scene from a distance; and though his perception of +individual objects is less distinct than Forsyth's, his view is +broader and takes in better the relative situations and proportions of +the various features spread out before him. Both are excellent in +their kind: the historian is the more instructive, the biographer the +more entertaining. +</p> +<br> +<p> +BEATRICE. +By Julia Kavanagh, author of "Nathalie," "Adele," "Queen Mab," etc., +etc. Three volumes in one. 12mo., pp. 520. New York: D. Appleton & +Company. +</p> +<p> +The readers of "Adele" and "Nathalie" will hardly be prepared for what +awaits them in the novel now upon our table. Miss Kavanagh has won a +high reputation by her delicate pictures of quiet home life, and +thorough analyses of female character. But lately the prevailing +thirst for sensational stories appears to have enticed her away from +the old path, and led her to attempt a style of novel which will no +doubt please the majority of readers better than her earlier efforts, +though as a work of art it is inferior to them. It is by no means +however a merely sensation story. The heroine is painted with all Miss +Kavanagh's accustomed clearness and skill; although the uninterrupted +series of plots and counterplots, the dramatic terseness of the +dialogue, and the effectiveness of the situations, tempt one to forget +sometimes, in the absorbing interest of the narrative, the higher +merit of vivid and truthful drawing of character. That of Beatrice is +charmingly conceived, and admirably worked out, recalling those +delightful heroines who first gave Miss Kavanagh a hold upon the +popular heart. Beatrice is a spirited, proud, natural, warm-hearted +girl, born in poverty and fallen heiress unexpectedly to great wealth. +Her guardian and step-father, Mr. Gervoise, subjects her to +innumerable wrongs in order that he may get possession of the +property. Poison even and a mad-house are hinted at. The book is +principally a narrative of battle between the defenceless girl and +this villain. Our readers who may wish to know how the struggle ends +are referred to the book itself; they will have no reason to regret +the time they may spend in reading it. +</p> +<br> +<p> +GRACE MORTON; OR, THE INHERITANCE. +A Catholic Tale. By M.L.M. 12mo., pp. 324. +</p> +<br> +<p> +THE CONFESSORS OF CONNAUGHT; OR, +THE TENANTS OF A LORD BISHOP. +A Tale of our Times. By M. L. M., author of Grace Morton, etc. 12mo., +pp.319. Philadelphia: Peter F. Cunningham. New York: D. & J. Sadlier & +Company. +</p> +<p> +These are both religious stories. The first is inscribed to the +Catholic youth of America, and the scene is laid in Pennsylvania. The +second is founded upon the evictions in 1860, in the parish of Partry, +Ireland, of a number of tenants of the Protestant bishop of Tuam, who +had refused to send their children to proselytizing schools. The +well-known missionary, Father Lavelle, is a <a name="575">{575}</a> prominent figure in +the book, slightly disguised under the name of Father Dillon. +</p> +<br> +<p> +A GENERAL HISTORY OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH: +FROM THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE +CHRISTIAN ERA UNTIL THE PRESENT TIME. +By M. l'Abbé J.E. Darras. First American from the last French edition. +With an Introduction and Notes, by the Most Rev. M.J. Spalding, D.D., +Archbishop of Baltimore. Numbers 6, 7, and 8. 8vo. pp. (each) 48. New +York: P. O'Shea. +</p> +<p> +We are pleased to learn that two valuable appendices are to be added +to the American translation of this important work; one by an eminent +Jesuit on the history of the Church in Ireland, the other by the Rev. +C.I. White, D.D., on the history of the Church in America. The English +version of the book ought thus to be far superior to the original +French. The numbers appear with great promptness, and present the same +neat and tasteful appearance which we took occasion to praise in +noticing some of the earlier parts. +</p> +<br> +<p> +LIFE OF THE CURÉ D'ARS. +From the French of the Abbé Alfred Monnin. 12mo., pp. 355. Baltimore: +Kelly & Piet. +</p> +<p> +It is only six years since Jean Baptist Marie Vianney, better known as +the Curé of Ars, closed his mortal life in that little village near +Lyons which will probably be henceforth for ever associated with his +name. "A common consent," says Dr. Manning, in a preface to the book +before us, "seems to have numbered him, even while living, among the +servants of God; and an expectation prevails that the day is not far +off when the Church will raise him to veneration upon her altars." He +was the son of a farmer of Dardilly, near Lyons, and appears to have +inherited virtue from both his parents. God gave him neither graces of +person nor gifts of intellect. His face was pale and thin, his stature +low, his gait awkward, his manner shy and timid, his whole air common +and unattractive. His education was so defective that his teachers +hesitated to recommend him for ordination. But the want of human +learning seems to have been supplied by supernatural illumination. +When he went to Ars, virtue was little known there. To say that he +speedily wrought an entire reformation is but a faint expression of +the extraordinary effect of his ministry. Drunkenness and quarreling +were soon unknown. At the sound of the midday <i>Angelus</i> the laborers +would stop in their work to recite the <i>Ave Maria</i> with uncovered +head. Men and women used to repair to the church after their work was +done, and often came again to pray at two or three o'clock in the +morning. The curé himself, it may be said, never left the church +except to discharge some function of his ministry, to take one scanty +meal a day, of bread or potatoes, and to sleep two or three hours. In +the seventh year of his ministry he founded an asylum for orphan or +destitute girls which he called "The Providence." It is believed that +he was miraculously assisted in providing food and clothing for these +poor children. Once the stock of flour was exhausted, except enough to +make two loaves. "Put your leaven into the little flour you have," +said the curé to the baker, "and to-morrow go on with your baking as +usual." "The next day," says this person, "I know not how it happened, +but as I kneaded, the dough seemed to rise and rise under my fingers; +I could not put in the water quick enough; the more I put in, the more +it swelled and thickened, so that I was able to make, with a handful +of flour, ten large loaves of from twenty to twenty-two pounds each, +as much, in fact, as could have been made with a whole sack of flour." +</p> +<p> +It was in consequence partly of circumstances of this nature connected +with the Providence, and partly of the reputation of M. Vianney as a +spiritual director, that a stream of pilgrims set in toward Ars that +has continued to flow ever since. Before the close of his life, as +many as eighty thousand persons are said to have visited him in a +single year, by a single route. Most of them came to confess; many to +be cured of deformities or disease; others to ask advice in special +difficulties. The number of cures effected at his hands was +prodigious. His labors in the confessional were almost beyond belief; +for thirty years he spent in this severest of all the duties of a +parish priest sixteen or eighteen hours a day. Penitents were content +to await their turn in the church all night, all the next day—even two +<a name="576">{576}</a> days. Devout persons were so eager to get relics of him during +his life, that whenever he laid aside his hat or his surplice the +garment was immediately appropriated. So after a time he never put on +a hat, and never took off his surplice. +</p> +<p> +It seemed at last that his humility could no longer endure the +veneration that was paid him. He resolved to retire to a quiet place, +and spend the rest of his life in prayer. He attempted to escape +secretly by night; but one of his assistant priests discovered his +purpose, and contrived to delay him, until the alarm was sounded +through the village. The inhabitants were roused at the first stroke. +The clangor of the bell was soon mingled with confused cries of "M. le +curé!" The women crowded the market-place and prayed aloud in the +church; the men armed themselves with whatever came first to hand; +guns, forks, sticks, and axes. M. Vianney made his way with difficulty +to the street door, but the villagers would not let him open it. "He +went from one door to another," says his old servant, "without getting +angry; but I think he was weeping." At last he reached the street, and +stood still for a moment, considering how to escape. His assistant +made a last effort to persuade him to remain. The populace fell at his +feet, and cried, with heart-rending sobs, "Father, let us finish our +confession; do not go without hearing us!" And thus saying, they +carried rather than led him to the church. He knelt before the altar +and wept for a long time. Then he went quietly into his confessional +as if nothing had happened. +</p> +<p> +We would gladly quote the whole of the beautiful scene of which we +have attempted to give an outline; but our space forbids. We must pass +over also the graphic description of the abbé's death and funeral, as +well as the narrative of the extraordinary sufferings which made his +life one long purgatory. Let our readers get the book, and they will +find it as interesting as a romance. +</p> +<br> +<p> +THE LIFE OF JOHN MARY DECALOGNE, +STUDENT IN THE UNIVERSITY OF PARIS. +Translated from the French. 18mo., pp. 162. Baltimore: Kelly & Piet. +</p> +<p> +This edifying narrative of the short and almost angelic career of a +school-boy who died in the odor of sanctity, in his seventeenth year, +was a great favorite with our fathers and grandfathers, but we believe +has long been out of print. Its re-publication is a praiseworthy +adventure, which we hope will have the success it deserves. The book +is especially recommended to lads preparing for their first communion. +</p> +<br> +<p> +<i>The New Path</i>, for June (New York: James Miller, publisher), is +devoted wholly to the fortieth annual exhibition of the National +Academy of Design. Our spicy little contemporary has no mercy on the +artists. +</p> +<br> +<p> +<i>Trübner's American and Oriental Literary Record</i>, the first number of +which was published in London last March, is "a monthly register of +the most important works published in North and South America, in +India, China, and the British Colonies; with occasional notes on +German, Dutch, Danish, French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, and +Russian books." We believe it is the first systematic attempt to bring +the young literature of America and the East before the public of +Europe. We commend it to the attention of our book-writing and +publishing friends. +</p> +<br> +<p> +The American News Company issue a little pamphlet on <i>The Russo-Greek +Church, by a former resident of Russia</i>. Its aim is to expose the +absurdity of the attempts at union between the Russian and Protestant +Episcopal Churches. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>BOOKS RECEIVED.</h2> +<br> +<p> +<i>History of England from the fall of Wolsey to the death of Elizabeth.</i> +By James Anthony Froude, M.A. New York: Charles Scribner & Company. +</p> +<p> +<i>The History of the Protestant Reformation, etc.</i> By M.J. Spalding, +D.D., Archbishop of Baltimore. Fourth revised edition. Baltimore: John +Murphy & Company. +</p> +<p> +<i>Ceremonial for the use of the Catholic Churches in the United States +of America. </i>Third edition, revised and enlarged. Baltimore: Kelly & +Piet. +</p> +<p> +<i>Meditations and Considerations for a Retreat of One Day in each Month. +Compiled from the writings of Fathers of the Society of Jesus.</i> +Baltimore: Kelly & Piet. +</p> +<p> +<i>The Year of Mary.</i> Translated from the French of the Rev. M. d'Arville, +Apostolic Prothonotary. Edited and in part translated by Mrs. J. +Sadlier. Philadelphia: Peter F. Cunningham. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="577">{577}</a> +<br> +<h1>THE CATHOLIC WORLD, +<br><br> +VOL. I., NO. 5. AUGUST, 1865.</h1> +<br> + +<h2>Translated from Études Religieuses, Historiques, et Littéraires, +par des Pères de la Compagnie de Jésus. +<br><br> +DRAMATIC MYSTERIES OF +THE FIFTEENTH AND SIXTEENTH CENTURIES. +<br><br> +BY A. CAHOUR, S. J.</h2> +<br> +<p> +The drama of the Middle Ages ends with a sort of theatrical explosion. +Everything disappears at once, under all forms and on every side. It +included, like that of earlier times, "mysteries" drawn from the Old +and the New Testament; "miracles" and plays borrowed from legends, +tragedies inspired by the acts of the martyrs and by chivalric +romances, by ancient history and by modern history; "moralities" whose +allegorical impersonations represent the vices and the virtues; pious +comedies like those of Marguerite de Valois, Queen of Navarre, upon +the Nativity of Jesus Christ, upon the Adoration of the Magi, upon the +Holy Family in the desert; profane comedies like those of the "Two +Daughters" and the "Two Wives" by the same princess; ludicrous farces +like that of Patelin the Advocate; licentious farces <i>ad nauseam;</i> +finally, the <i>"Soties,"</i> satirical plays in which the <i>Clercs de la +Basoche</i> and the <i>Enfants sans souci</i> renewed the audacity of +Aristophanes without reviving his talent. There were representations +for all solemn occasions, for the patron-feasts of cities and +parishes, for the assemblies of a whole country, for the "joyous +entry" of kings and princes. There were also scenic <i>entremets</i> for +banquets; and nearly all these displays were made with proportions so +gigantic, with so much pomp and expense, that everybody must have +participated in them, priests and magistrates, lords and citizens, +carpenters and minstrels. The representation of a "mystery" became the +affair of a whole city, of a whole province. The hangings of the +theatre, the costume of the actors, exhibited the most beautiful +tapestries, the richest dresses, the most precious jewels of the +neighboring chateaux, and even the ornaments of the churches—copes +for the eternal Father, dalmatics for the angels. +</p> +<p> +One of our most ingenious and learned critics, whom it is impossible +not to cite frequently when writing upon the dramatic poetry of the +sixteenth century, M. Sainte-Beuve, in speaking of this prodigious +fecundity, has remarked, that "when things are close to their end they +often have a final season of remarkable brilliancy—it is their +autumn—their vintage; <a name="578">{578}</a> or it is like the last brilliant +discharge in a piece of fireworks." Perhaps there is no better +illustration of this phenomenon than that of a pyrotechnic display, +which multiplying its jets of light, and illuminating the entire +horizon at the very moment of its extinction, disappears into the +night and leaves naught behind but its smoke. What is there left, in +fact, after all this theatrical effervescence? One natural and truly +French inspiration alone—the immortal farce of Patelin, dating from +the second half of the fifteenth century, and revived at the +commencement of the eighteenth by Brueys and Palaprat. +</p> +<p> +However, despite its poverty, this dramatic epoch merits our close +attention. In giving us a picture of the public amusements of our +forefathers, it will indicate, on the one hand, the nature of their +morality and their literary tastes, and on the other, the causes of +the decline of the old Christian drama at the verge of the revolution +which delivered over the French stage to the ideas and the philosophy +of paganism. +</p> +<p> +If we wished to give a catalogue of the productions of the fifteenth +and the sixteenth centuries, we might easily compile it from the +history of the brothers Parfait, the <i>"Recherches"</i> of Beauchamps, and +the <i>"Bibliothèque"</i> of the Duke de la Vallière. Such a task, however +abridged, would require a long chapter, and we neither have time to +undertake it nor are we sorry at being obliged to omit it. Passing +straight to our goal, let us occupy ourselves with the tragic dramas +alone, and even here we must put bounds to our inquiry under penalty +of losing ourselves in endless and uninteresting details. All that +which characterizes the Melpomene of the fifteenth and the +commencement of the sixteenth centuries is found in the two great +works, "The Mystery of the Passion," and "The Mystery of the Acts of +the Apostles." In these, and we may almost say in these only, shall we +study its power and its originality. +</p> +<p> +"The Mystery of the Passion" is the work of two Angevin poets, named +alike Jehan Michel. The first, born toward the end of the fourteenth +century, after having been a canon and at the same time secretary of +Queen Yolande of Aragon, mother of the good King René, Count of Anjou +and of Provence, became bishop of Angers, February 19, 1438, and died +in the odor of sanctity, September 12, 1447. The second Jehan Michel, +a very eloquent and scientific doctor, as la Croix du Maine informs +us, was the chief physician of King Charles VIII., and died in +Piedmont, August 22, 1493. He edited and printed, in 1486, the work of +his namesake. +</p> +<p> +This mystery was played at Metz and at Paris in 1437, and at Angers +three years afterward upon the commencement of the episcopacy of its +first author. It is a gigantic trilogy, into which are fused and +co-ordinated all the dramatic representations borrowed for three +centuries from the canonical and apocryphal gospels. +</p> +<p> +"It is," remarks M. Douhaire, in his eleventh lecture on the History +of Christian Poetry before the Renaissance,—"it is a great central +sea into which flow all the streams of a common poetic region. From +the refreshing pictures of the patriarchal life of Joachim and Ann to +the sublime scenes of the resurrection of Jesus Christ and the saints +of the ancient law, all, or nearly all, that has caught our eyes +before is here found anew, sometimes as a reminiscence, sometimes in +the lifelike and spirited form of a dialogue. The legend of the death +of the Holy Virgin, the legends of the apostles, of Pilate, and of the +Wandering Jew, have alone been omitted; whether because they appeared +to the authors of the mystery to break the theological unity of their +work, or because their length excluded them from a composition already +swollen far beyond reasonable limits." +</p> +<p> +The mystery opens with a council held in heaven upon the redemption +<a name="579">{579}</a> of the human race. On the one side Mercy and Peace, in +allegorical character, implore pardon for our first parents and their +posterity. On the other, Justice and Truth demand the eternal +condemnation of the guilty. To conciliate them, there must be found a +man without sin who will freely die for the salvation of all. They go +forth to seek him on the earth. To the council of heaven succeeds that +of hell. Lucifer in terror convokes his demons to oppose the +redemption of the world. During their tumultuous deliberation the four +virtues return in despair to heaven. They have failed to find the +generous and pure victim necessary for expiation. The Son of God +offers himself, and the mystery of the incarnation is decreed. +[Footnote 114] St. Joachim espouses St. Ann, and Mary is born of the +union so long sterile. Then follows the scenic display of all the +legendary and gospel narratives of her education, her marriage with +St. Joseph, the incarnation of the Word, the birth of Jesus Christ, +and all the wonders of his infancy up to his dispute in the temple +with the doctors. It is at this point that the great drama completes +its first part, which is entitled "The Mystery of the Conception." It +is adapted, after the style of the time, for ninety-seven persons. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 114: This is the idea of St. Bernard dramatized. <i>In festo + Annunciationis B.M.V. Sermo primus</i>, No. 9; vol. i., p. 974.] +</p> +<p> +The second part, which has given its name to the entire drama, is the +"Mystery of the Passion of Jesus Christ." It is divided into four +"days," each of which has its appropriate actors. The first day, which +is for eighty-seven persons, extends from the preaching of St. John +the Baptist, in the wilderness, to his beheading. The second requires +a hundred persons. It comprises the sermons and miracles of our +Saviour, and ends with the resurrection of Lazarus. The third +commences with the triumphal entry of Jesus Christ into Jerusalem and +ends with Annas and Caiphas. This day is for eighty-seven persons, +like the first. The fourth requires five hundred. It is the +representation of all the scenes in the tribunal of Pilate and at the +court of Herod, at Calvary and at the holy sepulchre. +</p> +<p> +The third part, entitled "The Resurrection," represents Jesus Christ +manifesting himself to his disciples in different places after he has +risen from the tomb; then his ascension and entrance into heaven in +the midst of concerts of angels; and finally, the descent of the Holy +Spirit upon the apostles assembled together in an upper chamber. We +have two different forms of this third part. One is in three days; the +other in one. The former has only forty-five persons; one hundred and +forty are needed for the latter. +</p> +<p> +These three dramas, of which the trilogy of the Passion is composed, +were played for a century and a half, sometimes together, sometimes +separately. When represented at Paris, in 1437, at the entrance of +Charles VII., they closed with a spectacle of the final judgment. +[Footnote 115] There are even found amplifiers who carry it back as +far as the origin of the world. It will be difficult to say how much +time the performance of this agglomeration of dramas required. Some +idea, however, can be formed from a representation of the Old +Testament, arranged about 1500, which set out with the creation of the +angels and did not arrive at the nativity of our Lord Jesus Christ +until after twenty-two days. Was the trilogy of the two Angevin poets +sometimes preceded by this immense prelude? We cannot tell. But the +length of the spectacle would render this conjecture incredible, since +the "Triumphant Mystery of the Acts of the Apostles," played at +Bruges, in 1536, lasted forty days, morning and afternoon. <a name="580">{580}</a> These +spectacles commenced ordinarily at nine in the morning. Then at eleven +o'clock the people went to dinner, and returned again two hours after. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 115: "All along the great Rue St. Denis," according to + Alain Chartier, "to the distance of a stone's throw on both sides, + were erected scaffoldings of great and costly construction, where + were played The Annunciation of Our Lady, The Nativity of our Lord, + his Passion, his Resurrection, Pentecost, and the Last Judgment, the + whole passing off quite well." (Beauchamps' <i>Recherches sur les + théâters de France,</i> t. i., p. 254-256).] +</p> +<p> +This drama, thirty or forty times longer than our longest classical +tragedies, contains, at the least, sixty-six thousand verses. It was +printed for the first time, in 1537, in two volumes folio, and proved +its popularity by three different editions within four years. The +emphasis of its title attests, moreover, the immense success of its +representation at Bruges the year before. It was the composition of +two brothers, Arnoul and Simon Greban, born at Compiegne. Arnoul, by +whom it was conceived and commenced about 1450, was a canon of Mans. +He died before he had finished versifying it. Simon, monk of St. +Riquier, in Ponthieu, completed it during the reign of Charles VII., +and, consequently, before 1461. Their dramatic composition is divided +into nine books. They have left to the "directors" of the spectacle +the care of dividing it into more or fewer days, according to +circumstances. +</p> +<p> +The first book commences with the assembling of the disciples in the +upper chamber, and represents the election of St. Matthias, the +descent of the Holy Spirit, and the earlier preaching of the apostles +when braving the persecutions of the synagogue. The second book +extends from the martyrdom of St. Stephen to the conversion of St. +Paul. The third is filled with the legendary traditions concerning the +apostleship of St Thomas in India. The fourth brings back the +spectacle to Jerusalem, where Herod dies after having cut off the head +of St. James the Greater; then the scene is transferred to Antioch, +where St. Peter, at the solicitation of Simon the Magician, is put +into prison, and obtains his liberty by restoring to life the son of +the prince of that city who had been dead ten years. The fifth book +contains, first, the preaching of St. Paul at Athens, where he +converts St. Denis, the future apostle of France; then, the death of +the Blessed Virgin, at which the apostles are present, brought +together suddenly by a miracle. The sixth book is consecrated to the +apostleship and martyrdom of St. Matthew in Ethiopia, of St. Barnabas +in the Isle of Cyprus, of St. Simon and St. Jude at Babylon, and, +finally, of St. Bartholomew, whom Prince Astyages flayed alive. In the +seventh book, St. Thomas ends his apostleship in India, slain by the +sword; St. Matthias is stoned to death by the Jews; St. Andrew is +crucified by the provost of Achaia; the Emperor Claudius dies and Nero +succeeds him. In the eighth book, St. Philip and St. James the Less +suffer martyrdom at Hierapolis. The two princes combine with the +apostles against Simon the Magician and bring his miracles to naught. +St Paul recalls Patroclus to life, who had fallen from a high window +while sleeping over the apostolic sermon. In the ninth and last book, +Simon the Magician, availing himself of his most powerful enchantments +in order to deceive the Romans, having caused himself to be lifted +into the air by the demons, falls at the voice of St. Peter and is +killed. Nero avenges him by imprisoning St. Peter and St. Paul—puts +to death Proces and Martinian, their gaolers, whom they had converted +and by whom they were set at liberty—arrests the two apostles anew, +and condemns one to be crucified, the other to be beheaded. Then, +terrified by the successive apparitions of the two martyrs, who +announce to him the vengeance of heaven, he invokes the demons, +demands their counsel, kills himself, and the devils bear away his +soul to hell. +</p> +<p> +When we add that each book is filled with striking conversions, that +some terminate with the baptism of a whole city or a whole people, and +that the apostles insure the triumph of the gospel even in death, a +sufficient idea will have been given of the historic procession and +the moral unity of this drama, or rather of this epic worked up in +dialogue and arranged for the <a name="581">{581}</a> stage. But in order to get a +clearer notion of its theatrical power and poetic features, it is +necessary to direct our attention, in the first place, to the interest +of the legends which are here blended constantly with history; and, in +the second place, to the fairy art and the magnificence of the +spectacle. +</p> +<p> +Here, for instance, is an example of the legendary poetry interwoven +in the piece. We borrow it from the third book. Gondoforus, king of +India, wishes to build a magnificent palace; but he is in want of +architects, and therefore sends his provost Abanes to Rome in search +of one. The messenger mounts at once on a dromedary: he is followed by +a servant leading a camel. In three and a half hours they are at +Caesarea in Palestine, where the apostle St. James is dwelling. St. +Michael had descended from heaven to anticipate the arrival of Abanes, +and commands the apostle, in the name of our Lord, to offer himself as +architect. Directed by the archangel, he accosts Abanes and tells him +that he is the man he seeks. They breakfast together and set out, not +this time on a dromedary and a camel, but in a ship conducted by +Palinurus, who had just arrived, bringing St. James, the son of +Zebedee, from Spain to Palestine. While they are making the voyage, +the king of Andrinopolis is holding counsel upon the manner of +celebrating the nuptials of his daughter Pelagia, who is espoused to +the young chevalier Denis; and the result of this deliberation is that +he must invite everybody who can come. The apostle and the Provost +disembark at Andrinopolis at very moment when the herald the +proclamation, in the name of the king, summoning to the banquet +citizens of all conditions and even rangers—pilgrims and wayfarers. +St. Thomas consequently is present at the nuptial feast. A young +Jewess chants a roundelay: +</p> +<pre> + There is a God of Hebrew story. + Dwelling in eternal glory + Who first of all things claims our love: + Who made the earth, sea, sky above, + And taught the morning stars to sing. + High would I laud this virtuous king, + And blaming naught, his praises ring + Through every hall, through every grove. + There is a God of Hebrew story, + Dwelling in eternal glory, + Who first of all things claims our love. [Footnote 116] +</pre> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 116: She commences in Hebrew: A sarahel zadab aheboin, Aga + sela tanmeth thavehel Elyphaleth a der deaninin, etc. Then she + translates her roundelay into French.] +</p> +<p> +St. Thomas, charmed with this song, begs that it may be repeated, and +the king's butler boxes his ears. +</p> +<pre> + Ere the morrow shall be through, + Thy hand its fault will sorely rue, +</pre> +<p> +says the apostle, adding— +</p> +<pre> + 'Twere better for thy purgatory, + To suffer anguish transitory. +</pre> +<p> +This prediction is not tardy of accomplishment. The butler is sent to +the fountain by the cup-bearer. A lion comes up, and with a snap of +his teeth bites off the guilty hand, while the poor man dies repentant +and commending his soul to God. In the banquet hall all is gay +confusion, when presently a dog enters with the dissevered hand. The +king, informed of the prophecy and its accomplishment, prostrates +himself with his whole family at the feet of the apostle, who blesses +him. All at once there appears a branch of palm covered with dates. +The wedded couple eat of it and then fall asleep. In their dreams +angels counsel them to preserve their virginity. After having baptized +the king of Andrinopolis and all his household, St. Thomas renews his +journey with his guide, and arrives in India. +</p> +<p> +Gondoforus and his brother Agatus salute the architect whom Abanes has +brought. "Well, master, at what school did you study your art?" "My +master surpasses all others in excellence." "And of whom did he learn +his science?" +</p> +<pre> + "Master and teacher had he none, + He learneth from himself alone." +</pre> +<p> +"Where is he?" +</p> +<pre> + "In a country far away, + He lives and ruleth regally: + The sons of men his servants be, + His twelve apprentices are we." +</pre> +<br> +<a name="582">{582}</a> +<p> +The king, amazed at the knowledge of the stranger, gives him a vast +sum of gold, for the construction of his palace. But it was not an +earthly edifice that the apostle proposed to build—it was a heavenly +and spiritual edifice whose materials were alms and good works. He +therefore distributes among the beggars whom he meets all the money +which has been given him. At the end of two years, Gondoforus comes to +see the building, and not finding it, he thus addresses St. Thomas and +Abanes: +</p> +<pre> + "Scoundrels without conscience born, + Where has all my money gone? + My trust in you has cost me dear. + +THOMAS + + Sire, therewith I did uprear + A palace fair, of rare device + For you— + +AGATUS. + + Where is't? + +THOMAS. + + In Paradise." +</pre> +<p> +The Indian king, who does not understand that style of architecture, +throws St. Thomas and Abanes into prison. Scarcely has he returned +home with his followers, when Agatus suddenly dies. The angels descend +in haste to bear his soul to heaven. [Footnote 117] "What do I see?" +he cries. "The palace which Thomas has made for thy brother," replies +Raphael. "Great God, but I am not pure enough to be its porter!" "Thy +brother," said Uriel, "has made himself unworthy of it. But if thou +desirest, we will supplicate our Lord to restore thee to earth, and +this palace shall be thine when thou hast repaid the king his money." +The soul of Agatus joyfully agreed to this, and was restored to its +body by Uriel. Then Agatus, as soon as life returned, arose and told +Gondoforus all that he had seen, proposing to reimburse him for all +the expenses of this heavenly palace the possession of which he +desired. The amazed king, wishing to secure the beautiful palace for +himself, goes and flings himself at the feet of St. Thomas, beseeching +baptism for himself and court. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 117: "Although the arts of the middle ages," says Father + Cahier, "did not adopt an absolutely invariable form for the + representation of souls, the most ordinary symbol is that of a + small, nude figure escaping from the mouth, like a sword drawn from + the sheath." <i>Monagraphie de la Cathédrale de Bourges</i>, p. 158, note + 2.] +</p> +<p> +When the "Mystery of the Acts of the Apostles" was played at Bruges in +1536, so perfect was the representation of this legend and the other +marvels of the piece, says the old historian Du Berry, that many of +the hearers thought it real and not feigned. They saw, among a +thousand other wondrous sights, the provost of the king of the Indies +enter riding on a huge dromedary, very well constructed, which moved +its head, opened its mouth, and ran out its tongue. When the butler +was punished, they saw a lion steal up and bite off the hand, and a +dog who bore it still bleeding into the midst of the feasters. These +were not the only animal prodigies that passed under the eyes of the +spectators. In the representation of the sixteenth book, for example, +two sorcerers, irritated against St. Matthew, caused a multitude of +serpents to appear, and the apostle summoned forth from the earth a +very terrible dragon which devoured them. In another part of this same +book, St. Philip, having been led before the god Mars, makes a dragon +leap forth from the mouth of the idol, which kills the son of the +pagan bishop, two tribunes, and two varlets. In the course of the +seventh book, a still more extraordinary automaton appears. St. Andrew +delivers Greece from a monstrous serpent fifty cubits long. "Here," +says the note introduced for the ordering of the mystery, "an oak must +be planted, and a serpent must be coiled beneath the said oak, +glaring, and must vomit forth a great quantity of blood and then die." +</p> +<p> +The marvels of the art multiply themselves infinitely and in all +directions. We see, for example, idols crumbling into powder at the +voice of the apostles, and temples crushing the pagans in their fall. +We see Saul <a name="583">{583}</a> struck down from his horse by a great light out of +heaven; St. Thomas walking over red-hot iron; St. Barnabas fast bound +upon a cart-wheel over a pan of live coals, which burn him to cinders. +[Footnote 118] We see, also, the apostles borne through the air to +assist at the death of the Virgin. "Here lightning must be made in a +white cloud, and this cloud must float around St. John, who is +preaching at Ephesus, and he must be borne in the cloud to the gates +of Notre Dame." A moment after, "thunder and lightning must burst +forth from a white cloud which shall veil over the apostles as they +preach in different countries, and bear them before the gates of Notre +Dame." While the apostles are carrying the body of the Holy Virgin to +the tomb, chanting <i>In exitu Israel de Egypto</i>, "a rosy cloud in shape +like a coronet must descend, on which should be many holy saints +holding naked swords and darts." A mob of Jews come to lay hands on +the shrine. "As soon as they touch it, their hands must be glued to +the litter and become withered and black; and the angels in the cloud +must cast down fire upon them and a storm of darts." The sacrilegious +Jews are struck with blindness. Some of them are converted and recover +their sight. Five remain obstinate. The devils come to torment them, +and finally strangle them. "Here their souls rise in the air and the +devils bear them away." Lastly, we have the Assumption of the Holy +Virgin. "Here Gabriel puts a soul into the body of Mary, after Michael +has rolled away the stone. And the Virgin Mary rises to her knees, a +halo of glory round her like the sun. Then a grand pause of the organ +or anthem, while Mary is being placed in the cloud on which she will +ascend. The angels should sing as they disappear <i>Venite ascendamus</i>, +and the angels ought to surround the Virgin and bear her above Gabriel +and the other angels." Lifted thus above nine choirs of angels, she +elicits vast admiration, and beholding from the height of heaven St. +Thomas, who could not arrive in time to assist at her death and +receive her last benediction, she throws him her girdle. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 118: "Daru will pretend to burn Barnabas, and will burn a + feigned body, and will lower Barnabas under the earth."] +</p> +<p> +Thus in this drama, requiring forty days and five hundred and thirty +persons [Footnote 119] for its performance, heaven, air, earth, hell, +all participated in the movement and the spectacle. What kind of a +theatre was required for such scenic action? In the sixteenth century +men saw theatres with two stages for the miracles of Notre Dame. The +Mysteries of the Acts of the Apostles and of the Passion required +three. Heaven was on high, hell below, earth in mid-space. Let us +attempt to build anew these theatres before the eyes of our readers. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 119: This is the number of actors employed in the + representation made at Bruges in 1536, according to the calculation + of M. Chevalier de Saint-Amand. Cahier, "<i>Monographie de la + Cathédrale de Bourges,</i>" p. 153. We find only 484 persons in the + "<i>Repertoire, des noms contenus au jeu des actes des apôtres</i>." See + the edition of this "Mystery" published at Paris in 1541 by Arnoul + and Charles les Angliers, under this title: "<i>Les catholiques + OEuvres et Actes des Apôtres</i>."] +</p> +<p> +Paradise was an amphitheatre in form. High above appeared the Deity, +seated upon a golden throne and overlooking all—the stage and the +audience. At the four corners of his throne sat four persons +representing Peace, Mercy, Justice, Truth. At their feet were nine +choirs of angels ranged by hierarchies upon the steps. There was space +also for the blessed spirits and for the organ which accompanied the +celestial chants. Everything flashed and glittered. The painter and +the carver were prodigal of their wonders. Of this we can form a +judgment from a description of the paradise displayed at Bruges on the +representation of the "Triumphant Mystery of the Acts of the +Apostles." According to a contemporary narrative, five hundred and odd +actors, sallying forth from the abbey of St. Sulpice on Sunday +afternoon, April 30, 1536, bore with them in great pomp the apparatus +of a spectacle which they were about to give at the amphitheatre of +the <i>Arènes</i>. <a name="584">{584}</a> They had a paradise twelve feet long, and eight +feet wide. "It had all around it open thrones painted to resemble +passing clouds, and both without and within were little angels as +cherubim and seraphim, powers and dominations, in bas-relief, their +hands joined and always moving. In the middle was a seat fashioned +like a rainbow, upon which was seated the Godhead—Father, Son, and +Holy Ghost; and behind were two gold suns revolving continuously in +opposing orbits. At the four corners were seats on which reposed +Justice, Peace, Truth, and Mercy, richly clothed; and beside the said +Godhead were two small angels chanting hymns and canticles to the +music of the players on the flute, the harp, the lute, the rebec, and +the viol, who circled about the paradise." +</p> +<p> +The same account describes a hell fourteen feet in length and eight in +width. "It was made in the fashion of a rock, upon which was raised a +tower always burning and sending forth flames. At the four corners of +the said rock were four small towers, within which appeared spirits +undergoing diverse torments, and on the fore-edge of the rock writhed +a great serpent, hissing and emitting fire from his mouth and ears and +nostrils; and along the passages of the said rock twined and crawled +all kinds of serpents and great toads." +</p> +<p> +"The form and dimensions of this fiery cavern varied according to the +exigencies of the dramatic action; but its place was invariably in the +lower part of the theatre. In this were assembled all the <i>diablerie</i>, +usually comprising a dozen principal personages; and from thence +issued a terrible storm of howls and shrieks. Lucifer was there, and +Satan, Belial, Cerberus, Astaroth, Burgibus, Leviathan, Proserpine, +and other devils great and small. The gate through which they passed +when coming to earth to torment mankind, appeared in shape like the +enormous jaws of a dragon, and was called hell's mouth." [Footnote +120] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 120: At the representation of the "Mystery of the Passion" + at Metz, in July, 1437. "The mouth of hell was exceedingly well + made, for it opened and shut when the devils wished to enter or go + forth, and it had a great steel under-work." <i>Chronique de Metz</i>, + MS.; composed by a curé of St. Eustache, cited by Beauchamps, in the + <i>Recherches sur les theatres</i>.''] +</p> +<p> +Limbo, when demanded by the peculiar features of the play, as in the +Mystery of the Resurrection, was placed below hell, and was symbolized +by a huge tower with slits and gratings on all sides, in order that +the spectators might catch glimpses of the spirits confined there. As +these spirits were only statuettes, there was stationed behind the +tower a body of men who howled and shrieked in concert, and when +anything was to be said to the audience, a strong and lusty voice +spoke in the name of all. [Footnote 121] When a purgatory was needed, +it was located and constructed after nearly the same manner. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 121: "<i>Mysteres inèdits du XVe siècle</i>" published by + Achille Jubinal, t.i., preface, p. xlii. (Paris, 1837). Let us + remark here in passing, that M. Jubinal, who is better acquainted + with the manuscripts of the middle ages than with his catechism, has + confounded limbo with purgatory. ] +</p> +<p> +The stage, properly so called, which was on a level with the audience, +represented earth—that is, the different countries to which the +dramatic action was successively transferred. It therefore required a +vastly greater space than hell or paradise; the one symbolized by a +cavern, and the other by an amphitheatre. It was divided into +compartments, and inscriptions indicated the countries and the cities. +This division was effected by scaffolds entirely separate, when there +was room enough. Thus at the "Mystery of the Passion," represented at +Paris in 1437, at the entrance of King Charles VII., the scaffolds +occupied the whole of the Rue St. Denis for a distance of a stone's +throw on either side, and the more remote stage, on which the last +judgment was exhibited, was before Le Chatelet. The spectators were +obliged to travel from one part to the other with the actors. But they +remained seated, and could see the whole without change of place, at +the performance of the same mystery, given the same year at Metz, in +the <a name="585">{585}</a> plain of Veximiel. For the vast semicircle destined for the +assembly had nine rows of seats, and behind were the grand chairs for +the lords and dames assembled from all parts of the province, and even +from Germany. It was the same at Bruges on the preceding year at the +representation of the "Acts of the Apostles." The enclosure occupied +the whole space of the ancient amphitheatre, commonly called the Ditch +of the Arènes. It had two stages, and vast pavilions protected the +spectators from the inclemency of the weather and the heat of the sun. +</p> +<p> +But three years after, in 1541, when the burgesses of Paris played +that immense drama in the hall of l'Hotel de Flandre, or when the +Fraternity of the Passion gave their representations for a century and +a half, at their theatre of the Trinity, in a hall one hundred and +twenty-nine feet long and thirty-six feet deep, how were local +distinctions indicated? Then the stage, in default of space, was +divided by simple partitions, and inscriptions, indicating beyond +mistake the houses, cities, and diverse countries, were more +indispensable than ever. We may remark, finally, that in the great +mysteries, divided by days, it was easy during the temporary +suspension of the play to give a new aspect to the stage by a change +of scenery. Sometimes, also, as in the preceding century, the actors +were obliged to inform the audience that they were transported from +one place to another by saying, "Here we come to Bethlehem—to +Jerusalem. We are making sail for Rome—for Athens, etc." And the +illusion was kept up, as far as could be, by the cessation of the +music, in the interval during which, to use an expression of M. +Sainte-Beuve, the mighty train swept on across space and time. +</p> +<p> +Passing from the architecture of the theatre to the physiognomy of the +actors, let us study the manner in which they were recruited. There +were stock companies, and extemporized companies. Of the first +description were the "Fraternity of the Passion," so celebrated in the +history of the representations of the "mysteries" at the end of the +middle ages. There were also the burgesses of Paris, artisans of all +handicrafts, who, at the end of the fourteenth century, assembled at +the village of St. Maur, near Vincennes, to give on festal days their +pious spectacles. Interdicted June 3, 1398, by ordinance of the +provost of Paris, who mistrusted this novelty, they obtained from King +Charles VI., by letters patent of December 4, 1402, permission to play +even at Paris, and at the same time their society was elevated into a +permanent fraternity, under the title of <i>De la Passion de Notre +Seigneur,</i> and was installed near the gate St. Denis in the ancient +hospital of the Trinity, then for some time disused. +</p> +<p> +It would appear that in certain provinces, cities, and even parishes, +had, like Paris, their association of miracle-players. But, most +commonly, these companies were improvised, and consisted of +volunteers. This was the case at the gigantic representations of the +Mystery of the Acts of the Apostles at Bruges and at Paris. We have +still "the cry and public proclamation made at Paris, Thursday, the +sixteenth of December, 1540, by the command of our lord the king, +Francis I. by name, and monsieur the provost of Paris, summoning the +people to fill the parts necessary for the playing of said mystery." +At eight o'clock of the morning there were assembled at the Hotel de +Flandre, where the "mystery" was to be performed, all those who were +charged with its management, rhetoricians, gentlemen of the long robe +and the short, lawyers and commoners, clergymen and laity, in vast +numbers. They paraded through the streets in fine apparel, all well +mounted according to their estate and capacity, preceded by six +trumpeters and escorted by numerous sergeants of the provost, who kept +the crowd in check. They halted at every square, and, after a triple +flourish of trumpets, a public crier made the proclamation, which was +in bad rhyme. Ten days <a name="586">{586}</a> after, on St. Stephen's day, the large +hall of the Hotel de Flandre—the usual place, says the narrative, for +making the records and holding the rehearsals of the mysteries, was +filled with a crowd of burgesses and merchants, clergy and laity, who +came to exhibit their talents in the presence of the commissioners and +lawyers deputed to hear the voice of each person, retaining and +remunerating them according to the measure of their excellence in the +parts required. The selections having been made, the rehearsals +commenced and continued every day until the performance of the +mystery, which was played at the beginning of the next year. +</p> +<p> +Whoever deemed himself of any value responded generously to these +appeals, not only among the <i>bourgeois</i> and gentlemen—artisans and +magistrates—but also the curés and their vicars, the canons, and +sometimes even the friars. Women alone were excluded, the female parts +being always filled by men. The participation of the clergy in these +scenic diversions is readily accounted for, when one considers the +moral aim and the religious character of the plays. All these dramas +represent the mysteries and history of Christianity. All commence, +either with readings from the Holy Scripture or by the chanting of the +hymns of the Church, or by the recitation of the Ave Maria—the whole +assemblage kneeling and joining in the services. All ended, moreover, +as in preceding centuries, with the <i>Te Deum</i>. The spectacle was +frequently interrupted by preaching, and more than once, at the end of +a dramatic day, actors and spectators might be seen wending their way +to church to offer up thanks to heaven. Beside, did not the clergy +find themselves on their own ground, in these plays, instituted in +order to increase the solemnity of their sacred days, and evincing +unquestionable traces of a liturgic origin? Let us add finally, with +Dom Piolin, that a distinction was rigorously maintained between +profane pieces and those whose aim was the edification and the +instruction of the faithful; that while zealously keeping in check all +acting which could possibly be turned to license, the clergy furthered +with all their power the exhibiting of the "mysteries." The learned +Benedictin presents to us the chapter of St. Julien at Mans +preventing, in 1539, the ringing of the cathedral bells in order not +to interrupt a representation of the Miracle of Theophilus; and +stopping them again, in 1556, and, in addition, hastening the morning +offices and delaying those of evening, in order to accommodate them to +the time of the performance of the "Mystery of the Conception of the +most Holy Virgin." +</p> +<p> +After the distribution of parts, all the actors were obliged on the +spot to pledge themselves by oath and under penalty of a fine never to +be absent from the rehearsals. A second appeal to the public good-will +was necessary to secure a wardrobe for the hundreds of players, who on +the day of exhibition wore sometimes the richest jewels and the most +beautiful stuffs of a whole province. The magnificence of the +spectacle at Bruges, in 1536, would strike us as incredible, if the +author of the narrative which has preserved us the details, had not +taken the precaution to forewarn his readers at the start that he kept +within the truth. As illustrating its splendor, take the following +examples, gathered here and there from the volume. +</p> +<p> +St. James the Lesser wore a scarf estimated at 450 gold crowns. The +girdle of St. Matthew was valued at more than 500 crowns sterling. +Queen Dampdeomopolis, who was mounted on an ambling pad which was +covered with a housing of black velvet and had a gold fringed harness, +wore a petticoat of cloth of gold, beneath a robe of crimson damask +bordered with gold chains, while down the front ran a rich beading of +precious stones, rubies and diamonds, of the value of more than 2,000 +crowns. This is not all. From head to foot gold and jewels glittered +<a name="587">{587}</a> on her person. Her head-dress was surmounted by a white feather, +and on her forehead hung by a little thread of black silk a huge +oriental pearl. The wife of Herod Agrippa had for her girdle a great +gold chain of more than 1,000 crowns in value; from which hung +chaplets carved in facets. She had on her neck another great chain and +a collar of pearls, whence hung a ring and sprig of four diamonds, and +on her stomacher was a <i>dorure</i> which bore a gold dog having a great +ruby hanging from its neck, and a great pearl suspended to the tail. +</p> +<p> +All these princesses—and they could be counted by dozens—had with +them their maids, their squires, and their pages, handsomely clothed. +There were likewise princes, kings, and emperors, who came from all +quarters of the world. +</p> +<p> +Nothing approaches to the magnificence of Nero. It would carry us too +far out of our way if we should mention in detail the numerous and +brilliant cortege which preceded the formidable emperor when the +actors issued from the abbey of St. Sulpice, where they robed +themselves before entering the theatre. First came a troop of +musicians composed of a fifer, six trumpeters, and four players on the +tamborine; next the grand provost of Rome, mounted on a splendid horse +caparisoned with violet-colored satin, fringed with white silk; then +four cavaliers attending the ensign-bearer of Nero; presently four +companies of Moors crowned with laurels and bearing, some, masses of +gilded silver, others, vases of silver and gold or <i>cornucopiae</i> +filled with <i>fleurs de lis</i>—or the armorial bearings of the empire +inter-worked on triumphal hats. Lastly, a horse appeared covered to +the ground with flesh-colored velvet, bordered with tracery of gold, +into which were woven the devices of Nero. This horse, conducted by +two lackeys clothed also with flesh-colored velvet, bore a cushion of +silk and cloth-of-gold in Turkish work, on which lay three crowns, the +first, solid gold; the second, all pearls; the third, composed of +every kind of precious stone of marvellous beauty and richness—and +these three crowns formed the imperial head-gear. +</p> +<p> +Next there came into sight another horse, whose harness and caparison +were of blue satin, fringed with gold and bestrewn with stars made of +embroidery of gold stuff on a violet field. The two lackeys who led it +by the bridle, had their heads uncovered and were clothed with velvet +of a violet crimson, purfled with gold, slashed with broad slashes, +through which the lining of white satin showed itself in folds. This +was the saddle-horse of the emperor. +</p> +<p> +Afterward came six players on the hautboy clothed in sarcinet of a +violet crimson. +</p> +<p> +Nero appeared last, borne on a high tribunal eight feet wide and ten +long, and covered to the earth with cloth-of-gold, strewn with large +embroidered eagles, "copied as closely as possible from the life." The +chair on which he was seated was entirely covered with another +cloth-of-gold crimped. His <i>sagum</i>, or military cloak, was of blue +velvet all purfled with gold, with large flowers in needle-work after +the antique; the sleeves slashed, and displaying beneath the +undulating folds of the lining, which was of gold stuff on a violet +field. His robe, a crimson velvet, adorned with flowers and interlaced +with gold thread, was lined with velvet of the same color. The cape +was serrated, the points interblending, and was bestrewn with a +profusion of great pearls, and at each point hung a great tassel of +other pearls. His hat, of Persian velvet and of <i>a tyrannical +fashion</i>, was bordered with chains of gold and strewn with a great +quantity of rings. His gold crown, with its triple branches, was +filled with gems so numerous, so varied, and of so great a price that +it is impossible to specify them. And his collar was not less +garnished. His buskins, of Persian velvet, with small slashes, were +laced with chains of gold, and some rings hung from his <a name="588">{588}</a> garters. +He placed one of his feet upon a casket which enclosed the imperial +seal and was covered with silver cloth sown with gems, thus +symbolizing that the power of the empire was his, and that all things +were submissive to him. In his hand was a battle-axe well gilded. His +port was haughty and his mien very magnificent. The tribunal, with the +monarch upon it, was borne by eight captive kings, the drapery +concealing from the audience everything save their heads, on which +rested crowns of gold. A troupe of musicians followed with trumpets, +clarions, tamborines, and fifes. The procession was closed by +twenty-four cavaliers, captains, chevaliers, squires, +cup-bearers—some wearing the imperial livery, others clad according +to their pleasure; and by chariots which were loaded with the +emperor's baggage and <i>vivanderie</i>, and were drawn by eighteen or +twenty horses. +</p> +<p> +Nero's sagum, with its splendid flower-work <i>after the antique</i>, his +hat of <i>tyrannical fashion</i>, his battle-axe, the eagles embroidered on +the drapery which covered his tribunal, the laurel crowns which begirt +the brows of his Moorish guards, the <i>cornucopiae</i>, the vases of gold +and silver which they carried, all indicate a tendency toward +historical costume. This is also seen in the robes of the seventy-two +disciples <i>approaching the ancient manner</i>—the caps of the high priests, +Josephus and Abiachar, made <i>according to the Jewish manner</i>—the +dagger of Polemius, king of Armenia, the golden handle of which was +prepared <i>after the antique</i>—the robe, <i>fashioned after the Hebrew +manner</i>, which was worn by the young Jew whom we saw singing at the +marriage of Pelagia and Denis. But apart from these examples and some +others which are found here and there in the pompous catalogue of the +actors of Bruges, everybody used great liberty and much fancifulness +in the choice of habiliments. Each person took the most beautiful +things he could lay hands on. The cortege of Nero closed, as we have +seen, by cavaliers dressed <i>after their own pleasure</i>. The marechal of +Migdeus, king of Greater Ynde, and his valet, had taffeta clothes +while bearing on their shoulders bars of iron and mallets. The lord of +Quantilly, author of the relation from which we have derived our +details, after having spoken of a group of eighteen or twenty persons +blind, halt, demoniac, lepers and vagabonds, confesses that they were +too well clad to accord with their condition. +</p> +<p> +Thus far we have concerned ourselves with the history of the mysteries +and their representation; we shall now proceed to a critical +retrospect of the subject. +</p> +<p> +The trilogy of the "Mystery of the Passion" and the "Triumphant +Mystery of the Acts of the Apostles," deserve an important place in +the history of French dramatic art, not only because they characterize +the epoch of which they were the two chief works, but also because +they have an intimate and an essential connection with the tragic +masterpieces of the eighteenth century—a connection also which has +been little noticed. We propose to consider the literary value and the +influence of those two plays, commencing with an estimate of the <i>mise +en scène</i> and the spectacle whose fairy-like pomp and immense +popularity we have just taken in view. +</p> +<p> +The dramatic writers and the managers of the "mysteries" were well +aware that to move the multitude the eye is of greater power than the +ear. We have seen that they directed all their energies to the marvels +of stage effect. But they did not listen to the precept of the poet, a +precept founded on the very nature of art, which enjoins that only +those things should be interwoven into the composition which can be +witnessed without incredulity and without disgust. If the devils +intervene, they must be introduced with their bat-shaped wings ever +moving, and fire issuing from their nostrils, their mouth, and their +ears, while they held in their hands <a name="589">{589}</a> fiery distaffs shaped like +serpents; that Cerberus, porter of hell, should have on his helmet +three heads emitting flame, and that the keys he carried in his hand +should seem to have just issued from a furnace, they sparkled so; that +the long and hideous breasts of Proserpine should drip incessantly +with blood, and with jets of fire at intervals; that Lucifer should +have a casque vomiting forth flames unceasingly, and should hold in +his grasp handfuls of vipers which moved in fiery twists. It was then +everywhere fire, and, above all, real fire—for the contemporary +authority who furnishes us with the details is particular to tell us, +two several times, that there were people employed to feed this fire. +</p> +<p> +The fire thus carried about by the devils in all their goings and +comings, and ever bursting from the mouth of hell when opened, became +naturally the occasion of numerous accidents. We have an example of +this nature which might have been tragical, but by good luck was only +ludicrous, in the performance of the "Mystery of St. Martin" at +Seurre, in 1496. At the commencement of the spectacle, which lasted +three days, and opened with a scene of <i>diablerie</i>, the man who held +the rôle of Satan having wished, says an official report of this +epoch, to ascend to earth, caught fire in his nether garments, and was +severely burnt. But he was so suddenly rescued and reclothed, that, +without any one being aware of the accident, he went through with his +part and then retired to his house. The affair had occurred in the +morning between seven and eight o'clock. When he returned at one in +the afternoon, the interval allowed, according to usage, for the +audience to dine in being now over, he addressed to Lucifer, who was +the cause of his misadventure, four impromptu verses that the public +applauded exceedingly, but their grossness prevents our reproducing +them. +</p> +<p> +These material imitations of physical nature and these exaggerations +of the spectacle appear everywhere. When they wished, for example, to +represent a martyr, it was necessary that the victim should be visibly +tortured. We have even, in the representation of the "Mystery of the +Acts of the Apostles," St. Barnabas disappearing adroitly and leaving +his counterfeit presentment in the hands of the executioner, who binds +it upon a wheel and sets it revolving over a burning brazier before +the eyes of the spectators. When St. Paul was decapitated, it was +requisite that his head, as it fell to the ground, should leap three +times, and that at each bound, in accordance with the tradition, a +fountain should gush forth. When they represented the crucifixion of +our Lord, and the despair of Judas, it was necessary that the Saviour +of the world should be seen nailed to the cross for the space of three +hours, and that the traitor be hung miserably from a tree. On the +performance of the "Mystery of the Passion" before the people of +Lorraine in 1437, God, according to a chronicler of the time, was +impersonated by "Sir Nicole don Neuf-Chastel, who was curé of St. +Victor at Metz, and would have nearly died on the cross, had he not +been succored; and another priest had to be put in his place to +perfect the representation of the crucifixion. The next day the said +curé, after having reposed, played the resurrection and bore his part +superbly. Another priest, who was called Messire Jehan de Nicey, and +who was chaplain of Metrange, acted Judas, and was almost killed by +hanging, for his heart failed him, and he was right speedily cut +down." +</p> +<p> +The taste of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries for these +materialistic representations was such that for the scenic features of +the longer mysteries they contented themselves sometimes with a simple +pantomime. Indeed, on September 8, 1424, at the solemn entry of the +Duke of Bedford, the English Regent of France, the children of Paris, +to adopt the expression of Sauval, played the Mystery of the Old and +New Testament without <a name="590">{590}</a> speech or sign, as if they had been images +carved on a frieze. +</p> +<p> +The infancy of art, which appeared everywhere at this epoch in the +representation of the "Mysteries," was especially visible in their +style and in their composition. A rapid examination of its literary +faults will suffice to show that the French drama of the middle ages, +progressive, if not as regards its truthfulness, at least in the pomp +of its spectacle, was in rapid decline in respect to poetry. +</p> +<p> +The first and gravest literary fault of this drama in its +decadence—that which includes all the others—is the absence of all +that makes the soul and life of the drama—of everything which +distinguishes it most essentially from history. There is neither plot, +nor peripetia, nor characters, nor passions. In the thirteenth +century, Ruteboeuf, in the Miracle of Theophilus, bestows on his hero +a passionate nature, and develops the action not by events in their +ordinary sequence, but by the stormy struggles of the heart and the +agitations of conscience. One principal personage is put upon the +stage, and a single incident carries the play rapidly forward to a +unique denouement. Jean Bodel, in the "Play of St. Nicholas," less +skilled than his contemporaries in making his intrigue keep step to +the movements of passion, consoled himself with laying violent hands +on the legend, to which he gives an entirely new form. In the +fourteenth century we find no longer, it is true, in the anonymous +authors of the "Miracles of Notre Dame" either that creating power, or +those passionate intrigues, or that simple and rapid movement, but at +least we meet with some true pathos in certain scenes, and in a great +number of monologues there are pronounced and well-sustained +characters in the female parts, especially while the dramatic interest +concentrates on one person. Open the two most celebrated works of the +fifteenth and sixteenth centuries—the "Mystery of the Passion" of the +two Jehan Michels, and the "Triumphant Mystery of the Acts of the +Apostles" of the brothers Greban—there is nothing more than a pure +and simple <i>mise en scène</i> of history or of legend, unrolling itself +slowly as the events arrive in their chronological order. There is no +unity either of time or of place, as in the past; nor is there unity +of action. Personal interest has ceased; the passions have ceased; +vigorous characterizations have ceased. Everybody speaks frigidly from +one end of the piece to the other, and for forty days, and one can +scarcely find throughout the plays a terse or impassioned line. There +is no progression in the movement; no advance in intrigue; no fresh +complication; the tiresome dramatist jogs along without troubling +himself about denouement. +</p> +<p> +This drama, which has no longer a dramatic art save in its dialogue +and its spectacle—is it then absolutely without poetry? Some critics +seem to have thought so, since they dwelt only on its absurdities and +its literary poverty. And it must be avowed that puerility, +triviality, indecency even, so dominate there, that it is easy, when +approaching it, to give one's self over to a universal disgust. +Others, recognizing its poverty as a whole, have found some redeeming +features. Of this number are M. Onesime Le Roy, whose patriotic +admiration of the Artesian works has perhaps led him too far, and M. +Douhaire, who has better controlled his enthusiasm. M. Douhaire is, in +our opinion, the critic who was not only the first to study, but has +also most clearly comprehended the religious beauties of the later +mediaeval "mysteries." "We appeal," he says in 1840, in his lectures +on the History of Christian Poetry,—"we appeal to the memory and the +emotions of the reader. Who is there that does not recall with the +most ineffable sentiments of joy those graceful scenes of the gospel +of the Nativity of our Lady, the interior of the house of Joachim, his +retirement among the shepherds, the triumphal song of St. Ann after +the birth of Mary, the life of the <a name="591">{591}</a> Virgin in the temple? Who has +not present in his memory the grand pictures of the Gospel of +Nicodemus, the conversations of the patriarchs in limbo, the descent +of Jesus Christ into hell, the silent apparition of Charinus and +Leucius in the Sanhedrim, the terrible portrayal of the last days of +Pilate, and that personification of the Jew in Ahasuerus whose +grandeur surpasses the loftiest conceptions of profane poetry? But it +is not alone for its depth, it is also for its form, or at least for +the arrangement and effect of its combinations, that our mysteries are +remarkable. Doubtless in respect to theatrical art they are more than +defective. They have indeed, to speak truly, no art at all. The events +are not co-ordinated with a preconceived idea, and distributed in a +manner to lead forward to a catastrophe or to a final peripetia. The +order of facts is habitually that of time. They are historic dialogues +and nothing more. But as in history the divine and the human, the +supernatural and the real, are almost always blended together, the +composers of the 'mysteries' have diligently worked out this +interrelation. Aided by the construction of their theatres, which +permitted them to move many scenes, they combined these actions in a +manner to elicit extraordinary effects, unfolding simultaneously to +the eye of the spectator heaven, earth, hell. They initiated him into +the secret of life, showed to him the mysterious warfare of souls, and +by this spectacle made his spirit pass through terrors that any other +drama would be powerless to produce." +</p> +<p> +Subscribing entirely, and it is an easy thing for us, to the judgment +of the author of the "Course upon Christian Poetry," let us guard +ourselves from going too far by extending the conclusion beyond the +premises. Where does M. Douhaire find these poetical beauties which he +offers for our admiration? In the trilogy of the "Mystery of the +Passion." Now this vast dramatic composition is nothing more, in fact, +than an agglomeration of the "mysteries" which preceded the work of +the two Jehan Michels. These charming scenes, these grand pictures, +which are met with here and there, are only the fragments of a more +ancient poetry, that have been gathered up anew. When the dramatists +of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries enter upon original +composition, the decline of poetry is seen everywhere, in the detail +as well as in the whole, in the style as in the conception. We know of +but one merit which truly belongs to them—it is the happy development +they have given to stage effect by a simultaneous presentation of +heaven, hell, and the earth—shadowing forth by this triple +theatrical action the incessant intervention of the supernatural +powers in the destinies of humanity. But while this conception is +majestic, its literary execution is wretched. We have a proof in the +"Triumphant Mystery of the Acts of the Apostles," written from +beginning to end without verve, or coloring, or nobleness, by the two +most celebrated dramatic poets of their age, whom Marot calls— +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + "The two Grebans of high-resounding line." +</p> +<p> +Having noticed the literary poverty of the dramatic poetry of this +epoch, we will now point out the principal sources of its faults. They +are two. The first is a misconception of the dramatists respecting the +nature of the types proposed for the imitation of art. The second is a +consequence of the popularity and the indefinite length of their +spectacles. +</p> +<p> +It is impossible to compare the meagreness, the languor, and the +stupidity of the two brothers Greban with the bright and graceful +vivacity of the writer who praises them, without being amazed at the +eulogies he bestows, and demanding what can be the reason of this +misjudgment on the part of a poet, the most spiritual and the most +delicate of the reign of Francis I. It comes from the false idea which +the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries formed of the dramatic style, +or, to speak more <a name="592">{592}</a> exactly, of the entire dramatic art. In place +of seeking the ideal, they sought reality, and, what is worse, it was +in the commonest realities that the dramatists of that time searched +after the type of their language and the morals of their heroes. We +have already remarked the same aberration of public taste in the far +too materialistic imitations of the spectacle. +</p> +<p> +"Under a literary and dramatic point of view," says M. Sainte-Beuve, +"that which is the essential characteristic of the mysteries of the +sixteenth century is its low vulgarity and its too minute triviality. +The authors had but one aim. They sought to portray in the men and +events of other times the scenes of the common life which went on +under their eyes. With them the whole art was reduced to this +imitation, or rather to this faithful <i>facsimile</i>. If they exhibited a +populace, it was recognizable at once as that of the market-places or +of the city. Every tribunal was a copy of the Châtelet or of the +Parliament. The headsmen of Nero, of Domitian, Daru, Pesart, Torneau, +Mollestin, seemed taken from the <i>Place du Palais de Justice</i> or from +Montfaucon. … What the public above all admired, was the perfect +conformity of the dialogue, and of the other features of the play, +with everyday realities. The good townsmen could not cease gazing at +and listening to so natural an imitation of their daily customs and +their domestic bickerings. All contemporary praise bears upon this +exact resemblance. It is in this way that common and uncultured +minds—strangers to the intimate and profound joys of art—readily +accept false coin, and content themselves with pleasures at a low +price." +</p> +<p> +This habitual imitation of the common life and of everything trivial +is found even in scenes of a wholly ideal nature in heaven and in +hell. The language of God and of paradise is vulgar; that of the +devils is grotesque, sometimes even indecent. At the commencement of +the mysteries of the brothers Greban, while the apostles have +assembled together in an upper chamber to elect St. Matthias, Lucifer +orders the demons to wander over the earth, and before going the evil +spirits request his benediction. He replies to them: +</p> +<pre> + "Devils damned, in malediction + O'er you each, with power blighted, + My paw I stretch, of God accursed, + From sins and misdeeds all absolving, + Up! Set forth!" etc. +</pre> +<p> +When Satan and Astaroth bring the souls of Ananias and Saphira to +hell, Lucifer is so transported with joy that he bids the demon hosts +exult: +</p> +<pre> + "Let the crowd of the damned, + Here, before my tribunal, + Sing an anthem infernal!" +</pre> +<p> +Belial and Burgibus, he adds, will lead the treble: Berits, Cerberus, +and some others, the tenor; Astaroth and Leviathan, the bass. At once +they all begin to chant in chorus: +</p> +<pre> + "The more he has, the more he asks for + Our grand devil, Lucifer. + Does he wish the sky to pour + Souls by thousands running o'er? + The more they come, he longs for more, + For his appetite is sore. + The more he has, the more he asks for, + Our grand devil, Lucifer." +</pre> +<p> +Lucifer, deafened by their hubbub, stops his ears, and tries to +silence them. Impossible! "On with the song!" cries Belial, and the +uproar continues. +</p> +<p> +The "Mystery of the Passion" also commences with a scene in hell, the +tone of which appears still more singular. God is in consultation with +the heavenly court upon the redemption of the human race. Lucifer, +alarmed, convokes his assembly. +</p> +<pre> + "Devils of hell-fire, horned and terrible, + Infamous dogs, why sit ye idle? + Start up, ye fat ones, young, old, and naked; + Serpents atrocious, hump-backed and twisted." +</pre> +<p> +The devils hastily assemble. Satan is the first to respond to the +gracious appeal. +</p> +<pre> + "What is't thou wishest, bull-dog outrageous— + Fetid, infected, abhorrent, mendacious? + For thee we have forfeited heaven and all, + To suffer such evils as no one can measure— + And now, is cursing your only pleasure?" +</pre> +<p> +Belial calls Lucifer a <i>bag full of rottenness,</i> whose only food is +toads, and <a name="593">{593}</a> complains also that it is his nature to torment them. +</p> +<p> +"This constant habit with the mystery-makers of representing the +demons as insulting each other in their colloquies," says M. Douhaire, +"is born of a profound thought. We are told that the wicked despise +each other. It is this which the Christian dramatists put into action. +Nothing can give a more terrible idea of hell than these disputes, +where the demons mutually accuse each other of sufferings which cannot +be abated." +</p> +<p> +Here is a reflection full of justice, and indispensable for a right +interpretation of the moral aim of the "mysteries." But there still +remains the literary and philosophical remark of M. Saint-Beuve upon +the general tendency of this epoch to a reproduction of the morals and +language of the most common and vulgar life. For the dramatists might +have represented the wickedness of the demons—the horror and disorder +of hell—without seeking their phrases in a vocabulary of the lowest +stamp. +</p> +<p> +The frequent change from seriousness to buffoonery, from the beautiful +to the burlesque, has a similar origin in the tastes of our ancestors +for the actualities of ordinary life, where these transitions are +habitual. But it also rose out of the necessity of keeping up the +interest of a spectacle which continued many days, sometimes many +weeks. Variety was a necessity. That popular assembly would consent to +weep or even to be serious morning and evening for a month? Let us +take an example where triviality, liveliness, and morality are all +united together, We borrow it from M. Onesime Le Roy, who found it in +an unedited "Mystery of the Passion." and published it in 1837. +</p> +<p> +The anonymous dramatist, after having depicted in beautiful and +touching scenes the sweet virtues and good deeds of St. Joachim and +St. Ann, brings on the stage two knaves who wish to make experiments +on their pious simplicity. "The fellow, who has more than one trick in +his bag," says the learned critic from whom we transcribe the +analysis, "pretending that cold weather makes him insane, styles +himself Claquedent [chatterer]; and the other is called Babin, which +word, according to the lexicographer Rouchi, signifies 'foolish,' +'imbecile.' Babin, despite his name and simple air, is more artful +than even Claquedent, whom he persuades to imitate madness and to let +himself be bound, the better to excite compassion. Claquedent, tied up +with cords by Babin, begins to gnash his teeth and to utter piteous +cries, which bring the wife of Joachim. This holy woman wishes to +relieve him. Babin shouts out not to touch him: +</p> +<pre> + "Ha, good dame! be wary, + Touch him not, I pray thee, + Lest, perchance, he slay thee!" +</pre> +<p> +After a long scene of horrible contortions on one side, and of tender +compassion on the other, Babin says he is going to lead away +Claquedent, and receives money from the charitable dame, who bids him +take good care of his friend, and to return <i>when the money is gone</i>. +Babin, upon the latter part of this advice, replies pleasantly, "O +madame, <i>without fail!</i>" As soon as Ann has gone away, Claquedent says +to Babin, "Quick, untie me!" But the latter, wishing to profit, like +Raton, from the misfortune which another Bertrand has brought on +himself, says to him, +</p> +<pre> + Wait awhile, I beg you, do; + You have what is best for you; + And since I am a trifle clever, + I will manage all this silver. +</pre> +<p> +Claquedent, who sees himself caught in a snare, fills the air with his +shrieks, which have no sham in them now. Babin is not at all +frightened, and tells him, with a remarkable allusion to the fable of +the fox and the goat, +</p> +<pre> + Adieu, good Claquedent. In the well + Till to-morrow you must dwell. +</pre> +<p> +"Murder! a thief, a thief!" cries the entrapped rogue, while the +other, as he runs off, doubtless tells <a name="594">{594}</a> everybody he meets on the +way not to approach the infuriated man. "Don't touch him. He will bite +you!" Finally, they come to Claquedent's assistance, and when they +inquire who put him in this condition, he replies: +</p> +<pre> + <i>Un laroncheau, plein de malfalct.</i> + (A roguish fellow full of mischief). +</pre> +<p> +"All the comedy of this scene," says M. Onesime Le Roy, "lies in this +single word, <i>un laroncheau</i>" a diminutive of <i>larron</i> (rogue), who +has taken in a triple scamp, who thinks himself past mastery! It is +thus that Patelin says of another scamp, his younger brother, "He has +deceived me, who have deceived so many others." "Is there not," adds +M. Douhaire,—"is there not, moreover, in this burlesque and merry +episode, a lesson for those very foolish persons who from excess of +goodness are so easily victimized by the ruses of professional +beggars?" +</p> +<p> +These gay scenes quite naturally turn to farce, and these moralities +degenerate into satires. This occurs, and in a deplorable manner, even +in the representation of the gravest and most solemn "mysteries." The +Fraternity of the Passion, perceiving that the people grew tired of +their pious spectacles, called to their rescue a mischievous and merry +troupe, whose duty it was to attract the crowd to their hall at the +Hospital de la Trinité. It was the <i>Enfants sans souci</i> company, +celebrated at the end of the fourteenth century, and composed of young +gentlemen of family, who, having invented a kingdom founded on the +faults and vices of the human race, called it the Fool's Kingdom, +named as its king the Prince of Fools, and styled their plays +"Fooleries" (sotties)—plays which they made upon everybody, in a +fantastic and allegorical form. At the court and among the subjects of +the prince figure his well-beloved son, the "Prince of Jollity," the +"Mother Fool," the "Affianced Fool," the "Fool Occasion," the +"Dissolute Fool," the "Boasting Fool," the "Cheating Fool," the +"Ignorant Fool," the "Corrupt Fool," and twenty other personages whose +names and qualities vary according to the requirements of the farce, +and of a satire which spared none. In a <i>sottie</i> played on Shrove +Tuesday, in 1511, and directed against Pope Julius II., then at war +with Louis XII., the "Mother Fool" represents the Church. In another +<i>sottie</i> where <i>l'ancien monde</i> is introduced, the "Dissolute Fool" is +dressed as a churchman, the "Boasting Fool" as a <i>gendarme</i>, and the +"Lying Fool" as a merchant. It was the scandalous conduct of these +young Aristophaneses, whose licentiousness equalled their boldness, +which, in 1547, provoked the order of the Parliament against the +representation of "mysteries." The Hospital de la Trinité reverted to +its first destination, and the Fraternity of the Passion, driven from +their theatre after a century and a half of popularity, could only +obtain permission on the following year to construct a new stage at +the Hotel de Bourgogne, on the express condition that they would play +only profane subjects, which should also be lawful and proper. They +accepted this new mode of existence; but their time was past, and +their glory was constantly in a decline. However, they held out +bravely till 1588, at which period they leased their theatre to a +company of travelling comedians, who for some years had been trying to +establish themselves in Paris. The cleverest of them, we are told by +the brothers Parfait, attempted to preserve their fame by giving out +that the religious title of their fraternity did not permit them to +play profane pieces. They had realized this a trifle late in the day; +some forty years too late indeed! +</p> +<p> +The resuscitation of the Greek theatre, four years after the +parliamentary decree, completed the ruin of the medieval spectacles. +They still played the miracles in the provinces, they even composed +new ones. But the pious representations went out, changing more and +more; and the <a name="595">{595}</a> next century, which was that of Boileau, merely +amused itself with ridiculing them. However, in the very simplicity of +the miracles there was something too popular to be completely +forgotten, in countries where the faith and the innocent manners of +our good ancestors survived. On May 18, 1835, M. Guizot, then +minister, recommended to the attention of his historical +correspondents the still surviving traditions of the moralities and +mysteries of the middle ages. "There are yet preserved on festal days, +in certain districts of France," said he, "certain popular dramatic +performances. It will not be a useless labor to examine and note down +these relics of the past, before modern civilization and the usages of +the common language cause their disappearance." +</p> +<p> +The author of "Researches into the Mysteries which have been +represented in Maine," Dom Piolin, has traced these performances from +the end of the sixteenth century up to the present time. He finds the +last one at Laval, during the procession of Corpus Christi. "At its +origin," he says, "one of the principal features of this fete, the +one, at least, which peculiarly attracted the attention of the mob, +consisted in scenes from the Old and New Testament which were +represented on theatres erected along the route of the procession, but +chiefly at the main court of the Convent des Cordeliers, they +belonged, unquestionably, to the miracles' proper, having retained +that characteristic simplicity and brevity which is found in the most +ancient pieces. We know that King René established a similar custom in +the city of Aix. Afterward, when the <i>marionettes</i> were introduced +into France by Catharine de Medicis, puppets were substituted for the +players. This theatre—a remnant of the ancient manners—continued +until the end of the restoration, the last performance being in ??37." +</p> +<p> +M. Douhaire closes his "Course upon the History of Christian Poetry" +by account of a foreign performance, extending from the creation of +the world to the resurrection of the dead, of which he was an +eye-witness. It was in 1830, at a small town on the banks of the +Loire. "What I came to see," he adds, "was the 'Mystery of the +Passion' played by puppets. I did not suppose, before this curious +adventure, that there could be any existing trace of the scenic plays +of the middle ages; but I have since learnt that there still remain +many considerable vestiges in our western and southern provinces—where +not only professional actors and puppets represent the principal +scenes of both Testaments, but even families amuse themselves with +this holy recreation on days of solemn feasts." +</p> +<p> +Permit us to mention, in our turn, the performance of a mystery +witnessed by men still alive, and whose simplicity carries one quite +back to the middle ages. We get the fact from the president of the +modern Bollandists. At the commencement of our century a good priest +of French Hainaut took upon himself to bring out the "Mystery of the +Passion," for the welfare of his flock. An appeal was made to all +well-disposed people, and, as at Paris in 1437, for the "Mystery of +the Acts of the Apostles," the parts were distributed to the burgesses +and artisans of every description, according to the measure of their +talent in such case required. A Judas was wanting. The priest at once +hit upon the apothecary of the place, whose modesty kept him in his +laboratory, and he went in search of him. "My friend," said he, "we +are going, as you know, to represent a fine 'mystery,' and it is +necessary, for the common good, that you should do something. I have +found your place. Your rôle is Judas." "But M. le curé, my memory is +not worth a sou, and you would never be able to stuff so many words +into my head." "Exactly so, my friend. I have selected for you the +shortest part, and I pledge myself to teach you it in no time." +Straightway our man is enrolled in the <a name="596">{596}</a> company. The solemn day +arrives. The parish and all the country round are there. The spectacle +commences, and the actors, duly costumed and seated on benches along +each side of the stage, rise in turn to go through with what they have +to say. The moment of the kiss of Judas is at hand. The poor +apothecary remains glued to his chair, pale with terror. The priest, +who is all eyes, hastens to him, and forces him to get up. Arrived +before the person who represents Jesus Christ, he falls on his knees, +trembling in every limb, and crying with joined hands, "Oh Lord! thou +well knowest it was not my fault! It is monsieur the curé who forces +me." +</p> +<p> +This grand trilogy of the "Mystery of the Passion"—which history +exhibits as closely connected with puppet shows and village +performances, naïve even to the grotesque—has quite another +importance and quite another destiny in the eyes of philosophy, which +discerns therein the principal features of the modern dramatic art. +Let us not quit this subject before presenting a confirmation of the +thesis which the readers of these essays have already seen maintained +in an article where Corneille, Racine, and even Voltaire himself were +shown to be unconsciously the lineal successors of our old dramatists +far more than of AEschylus, of Sophocles, and of Euripides. The father +of French tragedy, who discoursed upon his art with so much philosophy +and toiled night and day to make our poetry Aristotle's—Pierre +Corneille, after having for half a century attempted himself, and seen +attempted around him, every possible denouement, was led to recognize +the necessity in this particular of going contrary to the tragic art +of the Greeks. "The ancients," he wrote at the close of his career, +"very often content themselves in their tragedies with depicting vices +in such a manner as to cause us to hate them, and virtues so as to +cause us to love them, without troubling themselves with recompensing +good actions or punishing bad ones. Clytemnestra and her paramour slay +Agamemnon, and go free. Medea does the same with her children, and +Atreus with those of her brother. It is true that by carefully +studying the actions which were selected for the catastrophe of their +tragedies, there were some criminals whom they punished, but by crimes +greater than their own. … Our drama hardly tolerates such +subjects. … It is the interest which we love to extend to the +virtuous that has obliged us to resort to this other mode of finishing +the dramatic poem by punishing the bad actions and by recompensing the +good. It is not a precept of art, but a custom, which we have +observed." +</p> +<p> +Whence originated this custom Corneille gave his own century the +credit of it; but it is from the middle ages that it dates. What +tragic drama was it which was the most important—the most popular—the +longest played—of that first epoch of the modern theatre? Was it not +the "Mystery of the Passion," which we have seen commencing with a +simple dramatizing of the gospel—growing century by century—and +ending with an immense trilogy, extending from the fall of man to the +birth of our Saviour, from the passion and the death of the Saviour to +his resurrection, from the establishment of the Church to the last +judgment—that solution of human doctrines which regulates all things +retribution for the wicked and recompense for the good, and by making +virtue rise victorious from its battle with the passions? What the +middle ages show us in the "mystery" which was its masterpiece, +appears without exception in all those dramatic compositions which +have come down to us. We have already remarked, and it is moreover a +fact recognized by all scholars, that there is not a tragic drama of +this epoch, whatever may be its subject, which does not close with the +<i>Te Deum</i> or with some other chant of joy, of triumph, or of +forgiveness. Its denouement is always homage rendered by the justice +<a name="597">{597}</a> heaven avenging innocence, or by mercy bestowing on the guilty +repentance and pardon. +</p> +<p> +In speaking three years ago upon the liturgic origin of the modern +tragedy, and the influence of Christianity on the dramatic passions, +we ended by saying that we need no longer seek, as has been too often +done, in Corneille or Racine for the restorers of the ancient tragedy; +that those great dramatists, it is true, received from Greece the +science of the pageant and the <i>mise en scene</i>; but that as much as +they approach the Greek art in their literary form, so much they +depart from it not only by their denouement but also by the moral +character of their intrigue. It was impossible, in fact, to change the +nature of the tragic denouement without changing that of the passions +and of the events which led to them. Let us develop this conclusion of +our essay by showing what it is that prevents our comprehending French +tragedy and defining it. +</p> +<p> +Voltaire has said, "To compress an illustrious and interesting event +into the space of two or three hours, to introduce the <i>personae</i> only +when they ought to appear, to never leave the stage empty, to +construct an intrigue which shall be probable as well as striking, to +say nothing useless, to instruct the mind and to move the heart, to be +always eloquent in verse, and with an eloquence appropriate to each +character represented, to make the dialogue as pure as the choicest +prose, without the constraint of the rhyme appearing to fetter the +thoughts, and never to admit an obscure or harsh or declamatory +verse—these are the conditions which are exacted from a tragedy of +<i>our</i> day, before it can pass to posterity with the approbation of +critics, without which it can never have a true reputation." +</p> +<p> +This definition, or rather this exposition, otherwise so clear and so +elegant, of the demands of our Melpomene, are far from being complete. +In the time of Euripides, a Greek could have said almost as much. It +is because Voltaire has only taken into account the style and the +<i>mise en scène</i>, the laws of which were at Athens what they are at +Paris. The difference between the ancient tragedies and the modern +tragic art consists essentially in their moral character and in that +alone. Christianity, by modifying the passions of the human heart, has +been able to modify them on the stage likewise. It is, then, from the +philosophy of the drama that we ought to set out with Aristotle to +study its nature. +</p> +<p> +The French tragedy, such as our own great century has made it, is the +representation of an action more probable than real, more ideal than +historic, wholly noble, serious, and becoming, restricted to one +place, accomplished in a few hours, without any interruption, except +the interval of the acts, constructed with the majestic simplicity of +the epic, drawing its startling changes from the play of passions +rather from that of events, and leading forward the mind by admiration +and enthusiasm to emotions of pity and of terror. +</p> +<p> +It is not the Greek tragedy—although the ancient Melpomene has +transmitted to our time its <i>cothurnus</i>, its <i>mise en scène</i>, its +triple unity, its heroes themselves, with their terrors and their +tears. The poetic form is the same, the moral force is entirely +different. On the Athenian stage, the will was subjugated by a brutal +fatality; upon ours, the will makes the destiny. Vice becomes more +terrible, virtue more magnanimous, and the struggles of the soul hold +a larger place than the tricks of fortune. The heroes of the ancient +tragedy, to become endurable with us, would have not only to take on +something of our character, of our manners, of our sentiments, and, +above all, of our conscience, but it would be necessary to change +their mode of action, and to lead them to a denouement by paths wholly +new. +</p> +<p> +Returning to the trilogy of the Passion, let us conclude this essay +with a <a name="598">{598}</a> reflection which appears to us of a nature to throw great +light upon the popularity and the gigantic proportions of this +"mystery." The middle age, so penetrated with Christian beliefs and +ideas, loved it only because it found there the supreme manifestation +of Divine Providence, at once merciful and just. It had been induced +to thus represent the whole history of the human race, only to give to +that manifestation all the development demanded by the religious +conscience and the ethics of nations. There was needed the +representation of sin and the fall of the first man to explain the +justice and the pardon of Cavalry: there was needed the spectacle of a +universal judgment to solve the grand tragedy of human destinies. +</p> +<p> +We may blame the literary tastes of our good ancestors, but not their +philosophy. It has established on an immovable basis the fundamental +laws of our dramatic art. We may laugh at the puerile simplicity of +their theatre, but let us laugh reverently, since we find in their +literary infancy the germ, the strength, the character of the manhood +of the great century. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>Translated and Abridged from the Civiltà Cattolica. +<br><br> +ANTONIO CANOVA.</h2> +<br> +<p> +<i>Memorie di Antonio Canova, scritte da Antonio d'Este, e publicate per +cura, di Alessandro d'Este</i>. Firenze: Felice Le Monnier. 1864. +</p> +<p> +"It must be known," says Signor Antonio d'Este, "that when the learned +Missirini undertook to publish the artist-life of Canova, he had +recourse to me as the only person living who could inform him +thoroughly and truly of the principles of the Venetian artist, and +instruct him in some details of a life which I had known intimately +for the space of fifty years. … I put upon paper whatever might +serve to illustrate not only the disposition and character of my +friend, but also the excellent qualities of his heart. … I was +disappointed when the illustrious writer, in sending back my +manuscript, said: 'I have made use of many things, and of some +anecdotes, but not of all, since they appeared to me too familiar.' To +tell the truth, such an answer hurt my self-love, and offended the +unquenchable affection which I felt for Canova." +</p> +<p> +Hence the book before us. The author has apparently endeavored chiefly +to exhibit Canova the artist as a model for the studious, but he has +not overlooked Canova the citizen and the Christian. He begins with +him in the humble Possagno, and shows us his life in Venice, where his +genius first displayed itself, even in the degenerate school with +which alone he was then acquainted. It was in Rome that the young +sculptor saw the ancient purity in its full splendor. It burst upon +him like a sudden revelation. For several days he was like one in a +trance. Then, with his conceptions enlightened, his manner fixed, and +his aim determined, he threw himself into his work. Yet he was never a +servile copyist of Greek or Roman models. He imbibed the spirit of the +classical school, but his genius never was trammelled by imitation. +The last group which he carved under the inspiration drawn from the +ancient masterpieces,—his <i>Daedalus and Icarus</i>,—compared with his +<i>Theseus</i>, the first work which he executed in Rome, shows in a marked +<a name="599">{599}</a> manner the change in his style—we might almost say his +conversion to the true principles of art. +</p> +<p> +From this time Canova, though endowed with rare modesty, and always +ready to take advice, showed a fixed resolution to free sculpture from +the mannerism then so common; and neither the advice of friends nor +the abuse of evil-minded critics could shake his purpose. +</p> +<p> +Nature undoubtedly lavished talents upon him with unsparing hand; but +he was without a parallel in the industry and care with which he +fostered the divine flame. His whole time not passed in labor was +devoted to monuments and museums of art. With his friend d'Este he +often paid a reverential visit to the famous horses at the Quirinal, +before which he gave free vent to his fancy. He used to spend many +hours in contemplating these masterpieces. Long before sunrise he +would spring from his bed and shut himself up in his studio. He took +no relaxation—scarcely even food and rest. After hammering at the +marble all day, he examined it by candlelight, and dreamed about it at +night. He so consumed himself in work that his friends had to wrench +the tools from his hands by force. But if he laid down the chisel, it +was only to return to the study of ancient masterpieces. Not content +with contemplating the works themselves under every possible aspect, +he tried to study out what instruments the artists probably made use +of. He would throw open his studio, and then hide or disguise himself +in order to overhear the honest opinions of his visitors. Extravagant +praise always made him suspicious. Once he was so much pained at a +lavish eulogium upon one of his works that he ran, all trembling, to +his friend Hamilton, and begged him to point out some defect in it; +and having obtained the criticism that he asked, he ran home again in +great glee to correct the fault. He gladly accepted criticism from the +ignorant as well as the learned. One day, when he was quite old, and +recognized as the first sculptor of the time, he begged d'Este to move +to a certain spot a beautiful group that he had finished. Several +laborers were called in to move it. When they had done their task, one +of them, with that connoisseur-air which the Roman laborer knows so +well how to assume, shrugged his shoulders and exclaimed: +</p> +<p> +"Well, perhaps the marchese" (Canova bore this title in his later +years) "knows best; but to me this statue seems to have the goitre." +</p> +<p> +The pupils in the studio sprang up in a rage and loaded the poor man +with abuse, and in the midst of the noisy dispute Canova rushed into +the room, and with some difficulty learned what was the laborer's +offence. He darted a glance of fire at the marble. +</p> +<p> +"Bravo!" he exclaimed after a moment's pause. "You are right. 'Take +this watch—it is yours—you have done me a great service." +</p> +<p> +So saying, he threw his watch and chain upon the man's neck; and +taking up a chisel began immediately to retouch the statue. +</p> +<p> +At the age of twenty-five, Canova was selected by Volpato to execute +the monument of Clement XIV., and it is not too much to say that the +restoration of the art of sculpture dates from this immortal work. The +governments of Venice, Russia, Austria, and France invited him to take +up his residence in their respective capitals; but he was never happy +out of Rome; the ground seemed to burn under his feet whenever he was +away from his beloved studio and the great works of the ancient +sculptors. Few artists ever enjoyed so high a reputation in Europe +during their lifetime as Canova, and few certainly ever sought it +less. He was wholly absorbed in love for his art. and eagerness for +its advancement. +</p> +<p> +But the character of a great artist, according to the Italian ideal, +is not complete without a touch of oddity, and Canova was not free +from some amiable eccentricities. His love passage with the Signorina +Volpato, and the <a name="600">{600}</a> way he got out of it, will perhaps furnish the +subject for a poem by some future Goldoni; but we have no space to +tell of it here. +</p> +<p> +D'Este describes the moral character of Canova extremely well. He was +upright, brave, and sincere, an ardent patriot, and a sensible, +practical Christian. In the midst of his labors he was not insensible +to the dark clouds which obscured the political horizon, and he felt +so deeply the misfortunes which threatened his country that he took +the pains to retouch his <i>Dancing Girls</i> because their expression was +too joyful to accord with his own sadness of heart. He was still +employed on this work when the pope was carried into captivity. He +felt the misfortune as a personal affliction, and on the statue wrote +these words: "Modelled in the most unhappy days of my life, June, +1809." +</p> +<p> +A few weeks after the establishment of the Roman republic, a National +Institute was erected, and Canova was chosen a member. He accepted the +appointment willingly, in the hope of being useful to Rome and to her +artists; but when, on the evening appointed for his formal admission, +the oath of membership was tendered to him, and he heard the words, "I +swear hatred to princes," etc., he sprang to his feet, cried out in +his Venetian dialect, <i>"Mi non odio nessun!"</i> (I hate no one), and left +the hall. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>From The Month. +<br><br> +CONSTANCE SHERWOOD. +<br><br> +AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY. +<br><br> +BY LADY GEORGIANA FULLERTON. +<br><br> +CHAPTER IX.</h2> +<br> +<p> +On the next morning Mr. Congleton called me into the library from the +garden, where I was gathering for Muriel a few of such hardy flowers +as had survived the early frost. She was wont to carry them with her +to the prisons; for it was one of her kindly apprehensions of the +sufferings of others to divide the comfort wherewith things seemingly +indifferent do affect those that be shut out of all kinds of +enjoyments; and where a less tender nature should have been content to +provide necessaries, she, through a more delicate acquaintanceship and +light touch, as it were, on the strings of the human heart, ever +bethought herself when it was possible to minister if but one minute's +pleasure to those who had often well-nigh forgotten the very taste of +it. And she hath told me touching that point of flowers, how it had +once happened that the scent of some violets she had concealed in her +bosom with a like intent did move to tears an aged man, who for many +years past had not seen, no not so much as one green leaf in his +prison; which tears, he said, did him more good than anything else +which could have happened to him. +</p> +<p> +I threw down on a bench the chrysanthemums and other bold blossoms I +had gathered, and running into the house, opened the door of the +library, where, lo and behold, to my no small agitation and amaze, I +discovered Edmund Genings, who cried out as I entered: +</p> +<p> +"O my dear master's daughter and well-remembered playmate, I do greet +you with all mine heart; and I thank God that I see you in so good a +condition, as I may with infinite gladness <a name="601">{601}</a> make report of to +your good father, who through me doth impart to you his paternal +blessing and most affectionate commendations." +</p> +<p> +"Edmund," I cried, scarce able to speak for haste, "is he in London? +is he in prison?" +</p> +<p> +"No, forsooth," quoth Mr. Congleton. +</p> +<p> +"No, verily," quoth Edmund; both at the same time. +</p> +<p> +"Thy fears, silly wench," added the first, "have run away with thy +wits, and I do counsel thee another time to be at more pains to +restrain them; for when there be so many occasions to be afraid of +veritable evils, 'tis but sorry waste to spend fears on present +fancies." +</p> +<p> +By which I did conjecture my uncle not to be greatly pleased with +Edmund's coming to his house, and noticed that he did fidget in his +chair and ever and anon glanced at the windows which opened on the +garden in an uneasy manner. +</p> +<p> +"And wherefore art thou then in London?" I asked of Edmund; who thus +answered: +</p> +<p> +"Because Mr. James Fenn, who is also called Williesden, was taken and +committed close prisoner to the Marshalsea a short time back; which, +when my dear master did hear of, he was greatly disturbed and +turmoiled thereby, by reason of weighty matters having passed betwixt +him and that gentleman touching lands belonging to recusants, and that +extraordinary damage was likely to ensue to several persons of great +merit, if he could not advertise him in time how to answer to those +accusations which would be laid against him; and did seek if by any +means he could have access to him; but could find no hope thereof +without imminent danger not to himself only, but to many beside, if he +had come to London and been recognized." +</p> +<p> +"Wherein he did judge rightly," quoth my uncle; and then Edmund— +</p> +<p> +"So, seeing my master and others of a like faith with him in so great +straits touching their property and their lives also, I did most +earnestly crave his licence, being unknown and of no account in the +world, and so least to be suspected, to undertake this enterprise, +which he could not himself perform; which at last he did grant me, +albeit not without reluctance. And thus resolved I came to town." +</p> +<p> +"And has your hope been frustrated?" Mr. Congleton asked. To whom +Edmund—"I thank God, the end hath answered my expectations. I +committed the cause to him to whom nothing is impossible, and +determined, like a trusty servant, to do all that in me did lie +thereunto. And thinking on no other means, I took up my abode near to +the prison, hoping in time to get acquainted with the keeper; for +which purpose I had to drink with him each day, standing the cost, +beside paying him well, which I was furnished with the means to do. At +last I did, by his means, procure to see Mr. Fenn, and not only come +to speak to him, but to have access to his cell three or four times +with pen and ink and paper to write his mind. So I have furnished him +with the information he had need of, and likewise brought away with me +such answers to my master's questions as should solve his doubts how +to proceed in the aforesaid matters." +</p> +<p> +"God reward thee, my good youth," Mr. Congleton said, "for this thing +which thou hast done; for verily, under the laws lately set forth, +recusants be in such condition that, if not death, beggary doth stare +them in the face, and no remedy thereunto except by such assistance as +well-disposed Protestants be willing to yield to them." +</p> +<p> +"And where doth my father stay at this present time?" I asked; and +Edmund answered: +</p> +<p> +"Not so much as to you, Mistress Constance, am I free to reply to that +question; for when I left, 'Edmund,' quoth my master, 'it is a part of +prudence in these days to guard those that be dear to us from dangers +ensuing on what men do call our perversity; and as these new laws +enact <a name="602">{602}</a> that he which knoweth any one which doth hear mass, be it +ever so privately, or suffers a priest to absolve him, or performs any +other action appertaining to Catholic religion, and doth not discover +him before some public magistrate within the space of twenty days next +following, shall suffer the punishment of high treason, than which +nothing can be more horrible; and that neither sex nor age be a cause +of exemption from the like penalties, so that father must accuse son, +and sister brother, and children their parents;—it is, I say, a +merciful part to hide from our friends where we do conceal ourselves, +whose consciences do charge us with these novel crimes, lest theirs be +also burdened with the choice either to denounce us if called upon to +testify thereon, or else to speak falsely. Therefore I do charge thee, +my son Edmund' (for thus indeed doth my master term me, his unworthy +servant), 'that thou keep from my good child, and my dear sister, and +her no less dear husband, the knowledge of my present, but indeed +ever-shifting, abode; and solely inform them, by word of mouth, that I +am in good health, and in very good heart also, and do most earnestly +pray for them, that their strength and patience be such as the times +do require.'" +</p> +<p> +"And art thou reconciled, Edmund?" I asked, ever speaking hastily and +beforehand with prudence. Mr. Congleton checked me sharply; whereupon, +with great confusion, I interrupted my speech; but Edmund, albeit not +in words yet by signs, answered my question so as I should be +certified it was even as I hoped. He then asked if I should not be +glad to write a letter to my father,—which he would carry to him, so +that it was neither signed nor addressed,—which letter I did sit down +to compose in a hurried manner, my heart prompting my pen to utter +what it listed, rather than weighing the words in which those +affectionate sentiments were expressed. Mr. Congleton likewise did +write to him, whilst Edmund took some food, which he greatly needed; +for he had scarce eaten so much as one comfortable meal since he had +been in London, and was to ride day and night till he reached his +master. I wept very bitterly when he went away; for the sight of him +recalled the dear mother I had lost, the sole parent whose company I +was likewise reft of, and the home I was never like to see again. But +when those tears were stayed, that which at the time did cause sadness +ministered comfort in the retrospect, and relief from worse fears made +the present separation from my father more tolerable. And on the next +Sunday, when I went to the Charter House, with my cousins and Mistress +Ward, I was in such good cheer that Polly commended my prating; which +she said for some days had been so stayed that she had greatly feared +I had caught the infectious plague of melancholy from Kate, whom she +vowed did half kill her with the sound of her doleful sighing since +Mr. Lacy was gone, which she said was a dismal music brought into +fashion by love-sick ladies, and such as she never did intend to +practise; "for," quoth she, "I hold care to be the worst enemy in +life; and to be in love very dull sport, if it serve not to make one +merry." This she said turning to Sir Ralph Ingoldby, the +afore-mentioned suitor for her hand, who went with us, and thereupon +cried out, "Mercy on us, fair mistress, if we must be merry when we be +sad, and by merriment win a lady's love, the lack of which doth so +take away merriment that we must needs be sad, and so lose that which +should cure sadness;" and much more he in that style, and she +answering and making sport of his discourse, as was her wont with all +gentlemen. +</p> +<p> +When we reached the house, Mrs. Milicent was awaiting us at the door +of the gallery for to conduct us to the best place wherein we could +see her majesty's entrance. There were some seats there and other +persons present, some of which were of Polly's acquaintance, with whom +she did keep up a <a name="603">{603}</a> brisk conversation, in which I had occasion to +notice the sharpness of her wit, in which she did surpass any woman I +have since known, for she was never at a loss for an answer; as when +one said to her— +</p> +<p> +"Truly, you have no mean opinion of yourself, fair mistress." +</p> +<p> +"As one shall prize himself," quoth she, "so let him look to be valued +by others." +</p> +<p> +And another: "You think yourself to be Minerva." +</p> +<p> +Whereupon she: "No, sir, not when I be at your elbow;" meaning he was +no Ulysses. +</p> +<p> +And when one gentleman asked her of a book, if she had read it: +</p> +<p> +"The epistle," she said, "and no more." +</p> +<p> +"And wherefore no more," quoth he, "since that hath wit in it?" +</p> +<p> +"Because," she answered, "an author who sets all his wit in his +epistle is like to make his book resemble a bankrupt's doublet." +</p> +<p> +"How so?" asked the gentleman. +</p> +<p> +"In this wise," saith she, "that he sets the velvet before, though the +back be but of buckram." +</p> +<p> +"For my part," quoth a foppish young man, "I have thoughts in my mind +should fill many volumes." +</p> +<p> +"Alack, good sir," cries she, "is there no type good enough to set +them in?" +</p> +<p> +He, somewhat nettled, declares that she reads no books but of one +sort, and doats on <i>Sir Bevis and Owlglass</i>, or <i>Fashion's Mirror</i>, +and such like idle stuff, wherein he himself had never found so much +as one word of profitable use or reasonable entertainment. +</p> +<p> +"I have read a fable," she said, "which speaks of a pasture in which +oxen find fodder, hounds, hares, storks, lizards, and some animals +nothing." +</p> +<p> +"To deliver you my opinion," said a lady who sat next to Polly's +disputant, "I have no great esteem for letters in gentlewomen. The +greatest readers be oft the worst doers." +</p> +<p> +"Letters!" cries Polly; "why, surely they be the most weighty things +in creation; for so much as the difference of one letter mistaken in +the order in which it should stand in a short sentence doth alter the +expression of a man's resolve in a matter of life and death." +</p> +<p> +"How prove you that, madam?" quoth the lady. +</p> +<p> +"By the same token," answered Polly, "that I once did hear a gentleman +say, 'I must go die a beggar,' who willed to say, 'I must go buy a +dagger.'" +</p> +<p> +They all did laugh, and then some one said, "There was a witty book of +emblems made on all the cardinals at Rome, in which these scarlet +princes were very roughly handled. Bellarmine, for instance, as a +tiger fast chained to a post, and a scroll proceeding from the beast's +mouth—'Give me my liberty; you shall see what I am.' I wish," quoth +the speaker, "he were let loose in this island. The queen's judges +would soon constrain him to eat his words." +</p> +<p> +"Peradventure," answered Polly, "his own words should be too good food +for a recusant in her majesty's prisons." +</p> +<p> +"Maybe, madam, you have tasted of that food," quoth the aforesaid +lady, "that you be so well acquainted with its qualities." +</p> +<p> +Then I perceived that Mistress Ward did nudge Polly for to stay her +from carrying on a further encounter of words on this subject; for, as +she did remind us afterward, many persons had been thrown into prison +for only so much as a word lightly spoken in conversation which should +be supposed even in a remote manner to infer a favorable opinion of +Catholic religion; as, for instance, a bookseller in Oxford, for a +jest touching the queen's supremacy in ecclesiastical matters, had +been a short time before arrested, pilloried, whipped, and his ears +nailed to a counter, which with a knife he had himself to cut through +to free himself; which maybe had not been taken much notice of, as +nothing singular in these days, the man being a Catholic and of no +great note, but that much talk had <a name="604">{604}</a> been ministered concerning a +terrible disease which broke out immediately after the passing of that +sentence, by which the judge which had pronounced it, the jury, and +many other persons concerned in it, had died raving mad; to the no +small affright of the whole city. I ween, howsoever, no nudging should +have stopped Polly from talking, which indeed was a passion with her, +but that a burst of music at that time did announce the queen's +approach, and we did all stand up on the tiptoe of expectation to see +her majesty enter. +</p> +<p> +My heart did beat as fast as the pendulum of a clock when the cries +outside resounded, "Long live Queen Elizabeth!" and her majesty's +voice was distinctly heard answering, "I thank you, my good people;" +and the ushers crying out, "La Royne!" as the great door was thrown +open; through which we did see her majesty alight from her coach, +followed by many nobles and lords, and amongst them one of her +bishops, and my Lord and my Lady Surrey, kneeling to receive her on +the steps, with a goodly company of kinsfolks and friends around them. +Oh, how I did note every lineament of that royal lady, of so great +power and majesty, that it should seem as if she were not made of the +same mould as those of whom the Scriptures do say, that dust they are, +and to dust must they return. Very majestic did she appear; her +stature neither tall nor low, but her air exceedingly stately. Her +eyes small and black, her face fair, her nose a little hooked, and her +lips narrow. Upon her head she had a small crown, her bosom was +uncovered; she wore an oblong collar of gold and jewels, and on her +neck an exceeding fine necklace. She was dressed in white silk +bordered with pearls, and over it a mantle of black silk shot with +silver threads; her train, which was borne by her ladies, was very +long. When my lord knelt, she pulled off her glove, and gave him her +right hand to kiss, sparkling with rings and jewels; but when my lady, +in as sweet and modest a manner as can be thought of, advanced to pay +her the same homage, she did withdraw it hastily and moved on. I can +even now, at this distance of time, call to mind the look of that +sweet lady's face as she rose to follow her majesty, who leant on my +lord's arm with a show of singular favor, addressing herself to him in +a mild, playful, and obliging manner. How the young countess's cheek +did glow with a burning blush, as if doubting if she had offended in +the manner of her behavior, or had anyways merited the repulse she had +met with! How she stood for one moment irresolute, seeking to catch my +lord's eye, so as to be directed by him; and failing to do so, with a +pretty smile, but with what I, who loved her, fancied to be a +quivering lip, addressed herself to the ladies of the queen, and +conducted them through the cloisters to the garden, whither her +highness and my lord had gone. +</p> +<p> +In a brief time Mistress Milicent came to fetch us to a window which +looked on the square, where a great open tent was set for a collation, +and seats all round it for the concert which was to follow. As we went +along, I took occasion to ask of her the name of a waiting-gentleman, +who ordered about the servants with no small alacrity, and met her +majesty with many bows and quirks and a long compliment in verse. +</p> +<p> +"Tis Mr. Churchyard," she said; "a retainer of his grace's, and a poet +withal." +</p> +<p> +"Not a <i>grave</i> one, I hope," said Polly. +</p> +<p> +"Nay," answered the simple gentlewoman, "but one well versed in +pageants and tournaments and suchlike devices, as well as in writing +of verses and epigrams very fine and witty. Her majesty doth sometimes +send for him when any pageant is on hand." +</p> +<p> +"Ah, then, I doubt not," quoth Polly, "he doth take himself to be no +mean personage in the state, and so behaves accordingly." +</p> +<a name="605">{605}</a> +<p> +Pretty Milicent left us to seek for Mistress Bess, whom she had charge +of that day; and now our eyes were so intent on watching the spectacle +before us that even Polly for a while was silent. The queen did sit at +table with a store of noblemen waiting on her; and a more goodly sight +and a rarer one is not to be seen than a store of men famed for so +much bravery and wit and arts of state, that none have been found to +surpass them in any age, who be so loyal to a queen and so reverent to +a woman as these to this lady, who doth wear the crown of so great a +kingdom, so that all the world doth hold it in respect, and her hand +sought by so many great princes. But all this time I could not +perceive that she so much as once did look toward my Lady Surrey, or +spoke one single word to her or to my Lady Lumley, or little Bess, and +took very scanty notice also of my Lady Berkeley, his grace's sister, +who was a lady of so great and haughty a stomach, and of speech so +eloquent and ready, that I have heard the queen did say, that albeit +Lady Berkeley bent her knee when she made obeisance to her, she could +very well see she bent not her will to love or serve her, and that she +liked not such as have a man's heart in a woman's body. 'Tis said that +parity breedeth not affection, or affinity respect, of which saying +this opinion of the queen's should seem a notable example. But to see +my Lady Surrey so treated in her own husband's father's house worked +in me such effects of choler, mingled with sadness, that I could +scarce restrain my tears. Methought there was a greater nobleness and +a more true queenly greatness in her meek and withal dignified +endurance of these slights who was the subject, than in the sovereign +who did so insult one who least of all did deserve it. What the queen +did, others took pattern from; and neither my Lord Burleigh, nor my +Lord Leicester, or Sir Christopher Hatton, or young Lord Essex (albeit +my lord's own friend ), or little Sir John Harrington, her majesty's +godson, did so much as speak one civil word or show her the least +attention; but she did bear herself with so much sweetness, and, +though I knew her heart was full almost to bursting, kept up so brave +an appearance that none should see it except such as had their own +hearts wounded through hers, that some were present that day who since +have told me that, for promise of future distinction and true nobility +of aspect and behavior, they had not in their whole lives known one to +be compared with the young Countess of Surrey. +</p> +<p> +Polly did point out to us the aforesaid noblemen and gentlemen, and +also Dr. Cheney, the bishop of Gloucester, who had accompanied her +majesty, and M. de la Motte, the French ambassador, whom she did seem +greatly to favor; but none that day so much as my Lord Surrey, on whom +she let fall many gracious smiles, and used playful fashions with him, +such as nipping him once or twice on the forehead, and shaking her +fan, as if to reprove him for his answers to her questions, which +nevertheless, if her countenance might be judged of, did greatly +content her; albeit I once observed her to frown (and methought, then, +what a terror doth lie in a sovereign's frown) and speak sharply to +him; at the which a high color came into his cheek, and rose up even +to his temples, which her majesty perceiving, she did again use the +same blandishments as before; and when the collation was ended, and +the concert began, which had been provided for her grace's +entertainment, she would have him sit at her feet, and gave him so +many tokens of good-will, that I heard Sir Ralph Ingoldby, who was +standing behind me, say to another gentleman: +</p> +<p> +"If that young nobleman's father is like to be shorter by the head, +his father's son is like to have his own raised higher than ever his +father's was, so he doth keep clear of papistry and overmuch fondness +for his wife, which be the two things her <a name="606">{606}</a>majesty doth most abhor +in her courtiers." +</p> +<p> +My heart moving me to curiosity, I could not forbear to ask: +</p> +<p> +"I pray you, sir, wherefore doth not her majesty like her courtiers to +love their wives?" +</p> +<p> +At the which question he laughed, and said: +</p> +<p> +"By reason, Mistress Constance, that when they be in that case they do +become stayers at home, and wait not on her majesty with a like +diligence as when they are unmarried, or leastways love not their +ladies. The Bible saith a man cannot serve God and mammon. Now her +grace doth opine men cannot serve the queen and their wives also." +</p> +<p> +"Then," I warmly cried, "I hope my Lord Surrey shall never serve the +queen!" +</p> +<p> +"I' faith, say it not so loud, young Mistress Papist," said Sir Ralph, +laughing, "or we shall have you committed for high treason. Some are +in the Tower, I warrant you, for no worse offence than the uttering of +such like rash words. How should you fancy to have your pretty ears +bored with a rougher instrument than Master Anselm's the jeweller?" +</p> +<p> +And so he; but Polly, who methinks was not well pleased that he should +notice mine ears, which were little and well-shaped, whereas hers were +somewhat larger than did accord with her small face, did stop his +further speech with me by asking him if he were an enemy to papists; +for if so, she would have naught to say to him, and he might become a +courtier to the queen, or any one else's husband, for anything she did +care, yea, if she were to lose her ears for it. +</p> +<p> +And he answered, he did very much love some papists, albeit he hated +papistry when it proved not conformable to reason and the laws of the +country. +</p> +<p> +And so they fell to whispering and suchlike discourses as lovers hold +together; and I, being seated betwixt this enamored gentleman and the +wall on the other side, had no one then to talk with. But if my tongue +and mine ears also, save for the music below, were idle, not so mine +eyes; for they did stray from one point to another of the fair +spectacle which the garden did then present, now resting on the queen +and those near unto her, and anon on my Lady Surrey, who sat on a +couch to the left of her majesty's raised canopy, together with Lady +Southwell, Lady Arundell (Sir Robert's wife), and other ladies of the +queen, and on one side of her the bishop of Gloucester, whom, by +reason of his assiduous talking with her, I took more special note of +than I should otherwise have done; albeit he was a man which did +attract the eye, even at the first sight, by a most amiable suavity of +countenance, and a sweet and dignified behavior both in speech and +action such as I have seldom observed greater in any one. His manners +were free and unconstrained; and only to look at him converse, it was +easy to perceive he had a most ready wit tempered with benevolence. He +seemed vastly taken with my Lady Surrey; and either had not noticed +how others kept aloof from her, or was rather moved thereby to show +her civility; for they soon did fall into such eager, and in some sort +familiar, discourse, as it should seem to run on some subject of like +interest to both. Her color went and came as the conversation +advanced; and when she spoke, he listened with such grave suavity, +and, when she stayed her speech, answered in so obliging a manner, and +seemed so loth to break off, that I could not but admire how two +persons, hitherto strangers to each other, and of such various ages +and standing, should be so companionable on a first acquaintanceship. +</p> +<p> +When the queen rose to depart, in the same order in which she came, +every one kneeling as she passed, I did keenly watch to see what +visage she would show to my Lady Surrey, whom she did indeed this time +salute; but in no gracious manner, as one who looks without looking, +notices without <a name="607">{607}</a> heeding, and in tendering of thanks thanketh +not. As my lord walked by her majesty's side through the cloisters to +the door, he suddenly dropped on one knee, and drawing a paper from +his bosom, did present it to her highness, who started as if +surprised, and shook her head in a playful manner—(oh, what a cruel +playfulness methought it was, who knew, as her majesty must needs also +have done, what that paper did contain)—as if she would not be at that +time troubled with such grave matters, and did hand it to my Lord +Burleigh; then gave again her hand to my lord to kiss, who did kneel +with a like reverence as before; but with a shade of melancholy in his +fair young face, which methought became it better than the smiles it +had worn that day. +</p> +<p> +After the queen had left, and all the guests were gone save such few +as my lord had willed to stay to supper in his private apartments, I +went unto my lady's chamber, where I found Mistress Milicent, who said +she was with my lord, and prayed me to await her return; for that she +was urgent I should not depart without speaking with her, which was +also what I greatly desired. So I took a book and read for the space +of an hour or more, whilst she tarried with my lord. When she came in, +I could see she had been weeping. But her women being present, and +likewise Mistress Bess, she tried to smile, and pressed my hand, +bidding me to stay till she was rid of her trappings, as she did term +them; and, sitting down before her mirror,—though I ween she never +looked at her own face, which that evening had in it more of the +whiteness of a lily than the color of the rose,—she desired her women +to unbraid her hair, and remove from her head the diamond circlet, and +from her neck the heavy gold chain with a pearl cross, which had +belonged to her husband's mother. Then stepping out of her robe, she +put on a silk wrapper, and so dismissed them, and likewise little +Bess, who before she went whispered in her ear: +</p> +<p> +"Nan, methinks the queen is foul and red-haired, and I should not care +to kiss her hand for all the fine jewels she doth wear." +</p> +<p> +And so hugged her round the neck and stopped her mouth with kisses. +When they were gone, +</p> +<p> +"Constance," quoth she, "we be full young, I ween, for the burden laid +upon us, my lord and me." +</p> +<p> +"Ay, sweet one," I cried; "and God defend thou shouldst have to carry +it alone;" for my heart was sore that she had had so little favor +shown to her and my lord so much. A faint color tinged her cheek as +she replied: +</p> +<p> +"God knows I should be well cotent that Phil should stand so well in +her majesty's good graces as should be convenient to his honor and the +furtherance of his fortunes, if so be his father was out of prison; +and 'tis little I should reck of such slights as her highness should +choose to put upon me, if I saw him not so covetous of her favor that +he shall think less well of his poor Nan hereafter by reason of the +lack of her majesty's good opinion of her, which was so plainly showed +to-day. For, good Constance, bethink thee what a galling thing it is +to a young nobleman to see his wife so meanly entreated; and for her +majesty to ask him, as she did, if the pale-faced chit by his side, +when she arrived, was his sister or his cousin. And when he said it +was his wife who had knelt with him to greet her majesty"—"Wife!" +quoth the queen; "i' faith, I had forgotten thou wast married—if +indeed that is to be called a marriage which children do contract +before they come to the age of reason; and said she would take +measures for that a law should be passed which should make such +foolish marriages unlawful. And when my lord tried to tell her we had +been married a second time a few months since, she pretended not to +hear, and asked M. de la Motte if, in his country, children were made +to marry in their infancy. To which he gave answer, that the like +practice did sometimes take place <a name="608">{608}</a> in France; and that he had +himself been present at a wedding where the bridegroom was whipped +because he did refuse to open the ball with the bride. At the which +her majesty very much laughed, and said she hoped my lord had not been +so used on his wedding-day. I promise you Phil was very angry; but the +wound these jests made was so salved over with compliments, which +pleasantly tickle the ears when uttered by so great a queen, and marks +of favor more numerous than can be thought of, in the matter of +inviting him to hunt with her in Marylebone and Greenwich park, and +telling him he deserved better treatment than he had, as to his +household and setting forward in the world, that methinks the scar was +not long in healing; albeit in the relating of these passages the pain +somewhat revived. But what doth afflict me the most is the refusal her +highness made to read my lord's letter, lamenting the unhappy position +of the duke his father, and hoping the queen, by his means and those +of other friends, should mitigate her anger. I would have had Phil not +only go down on his knees as he did, but lie on the threshold of the +door, so that she should have walked over the son's body if she +refused to show mercy to the father; but he yet doth greatly hope from +the favor showed him that he may sue her majesty with better effect +some other time; and I pray God he may be right." +</p> +<p> +Here did the dear lady break off her speech, and, hiding her face in +her hands, remained silent for a short space; and I, seeing her so +deeply moved, with the intent to draw away her thoughts from painful +musings, inquired of her if the good entertainment she had found in +conversing with the bishop had been attributable to his witty +discourse, or to the subjects therein treated of. +</p> +<p> +"Ah, good Constance," she answered, "our talk was of one whom you have +often heard me speak of—Mr. Martin's friend, Master Campion, +[Footnote 122] who is now beyond seas at Douay, and whom this bishop +once did hold to be more dear to him than the apple of his eye. He +says his qualifications were so excellent, and he so beloved by all +persons in and outside of his college at Oxford, that none more so; +and that he did himself see in him so great a present merit and +promise of future excellence, that it had caused him more grief than +anything else which had happened to him, and been the occasion of his +shedding more tears than he had ever thought to have done, when he who +had received from him deacon's orders, and whom he had hoped should +have been an honor and a prop to the Church of England, did forsake it +and fly in the face of his queen and his country: first, by going into +Ireland; and then, as he understood, beyond seas, to serve the bishop +of Rome, against the laws of God and man. But that he did yet so +dearly affection him that, understanding we had sometimes tidings of +Mr. Martin, by whose means he had mostly been moved to this lamentable +defection, he should be contented to hear somewhat of his whilom son, +still dear to him, albeit estranged. I told him we did often see +Master Campion when Mr. Martin was here; and that, from what I had +heard, both were like to be at Douay, but that no letters passed +between Mr. Martin and ourselves; for that his grace did not allow of +such correspondence since he had been reconciled and gone beyond seas. +Which the bishop said was a commendable prudence in his grace, and the +part of a careful father; and added, that then maybe he knew more of +what had befallen Master Campion than I did; for that he had a long +epistle from him, so full of moving arguments and pithy remonstrances +as might have shaken one not well grounded and settled in his +religion, and which also contained a recital of his near arrest in +Dublin, where the queen's officers would have arrested him, if a +friend had not privately warned him of his danger. And I do know, good +<a name="609">{609}</a> Constance, who that friend was; for albeit I would not tell the +bishop we had seen Master Campion since he was reconciled, he, in +truth, was here some months ago: my lord met him in the street, +disguised as a common travelling man, and brought him into the garden, +whither he also called me; and we heard then from him how he would +have been taken in Ireland, if the viceroy himself, Sir Henry Sydney, +who did greatly favor him,—as indeed all who know him incline to do, +for his great parts, and nobleness of mind and heart, and withal most +attractive manners,—had not sent him a message, in the middle of the +night, to the effect that he should instantly leave the city, and take +measures for to escape abroad. So, under the name of Patrick, and +wearing the livery of the Earl of Kildare, he travelled to a port +twenty miles from Dublin, and there embarked for England. The queen's +officers, coming on board the ship whereon he had taken his passage, +before it sailed, searched it all over; but through God's mercy, he +said, and St. Patrick's prayers, whose name he had taken, no one did +recognize him, and he passed to London; and the day after, my lord +sent him over to Flanders. So much as the bishop did know thereon, he +related unto me, and stinted not in his praise of his great merits, +and lamentations for what he called his perversion; and hence he took +occasion to speak of religion. And when I said I had been brought up +in the Catholic religion, albeit I now conformed to the times, he said +he would show me the way to be Catholic and still obey the laws, and +that I might yet believe for the most part what I had learnt from my +teachers, so be I renounced the Pope, and commended my saying the +prayers I had been used to; which, he doubted not, were more pleasing +to God than such as some ministers do recite out of their own heads, +whom he did grieve to hear frequented our house, and were no better +than heretics, such as Mr. Fox and Mr. Fulke and Mr. Charke, and the +like of them. But what did much content me was, that he mislikes the +cruel usage recusants do meet with; and he said, not as if boasting of +it, but to declare his mind thereon, that he had often sent them alms +who suffered for their conscience' sake, as many do at this time. But +that I was to remember many Protestants were burnt in the late queen's +time, and that if Papists were not kept under by strict laws, the like +might happen again." +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 122: State Papers.] +</p> +<p> +"You should have told him," I cried, who had been silent longer than I +liked, "that Protestants are burnt also in this reign, by the same +token that some Anabaptists did so suffer a short time back, to your +Mr. Fox's no small disgust, who should will none but Catholics to be +put to death." +</p> +<p> +"Content thee, good Constance," my lady answered; "I be not so +furnished with arguments as thou in a like case wouldst be. So I only +said, I would to God none were burnt, or hanged, or tortured any more +in this country, or in the world at all, for religion; and my lord of +Gloucester declared he was of the same mind, and would have none so +dealt with, if he could mend it, here or abroad. Then the queen rising +to go, our discourse came to an end; but this good bishop says he will +visit me when he next doth come to London, and make that matter plain +to me how I can remain Catholic, and obey the queen, and content his +grace." +</p> +<p> +"Then he will show you," I cried, "how to serve God and the world, +which the gospel saith is a thing not to be thought of, and full of +peril to the soul." +</p> +<p> +My Lady Surrey burst into tears, and I was angered with myself that I +had spoken peradventure over sharply to her who had too much trouble +already; but it did make me mad to see her so beset that the faith +which had been once so rooted in her, and should be her sure and only +stay in the dangerous path she had entered on, should be in such wise +shaken as her words did indicate. <a name="610">{610}</a> But she was not angered, the +sweet soul; and drawing me to herself, laid her head on my bosom, and +said: +</p> +<p> +"Thou art a true friend, though a bold one; and I pray God I may never +lack the benefit of such friendship as thine, for he knoweth I have +great need thereof." +</p> +<p> +And so we parted with many tender embraces, and our hearts more +strictly linked together than heretofore. +</p> +<br> + +<h2>CHAPTER X.</h2> +<br> +<p> +In the month of November of the same year in which the queen did visit +Lord and Lady Surrey at the Charter House, a person, who mentioned not +his name, delivered into the porter's hands at our gate a letter for +me, which I found to be from my good father, and which I do here +transcribe, as a memorial of his great piety toward God, and tender +love for me his unworthy child. +</p> +<p><p class="cite"> + "MY DEARLY BELOVED DAUGHTER (so he),—Your comfortable letter has + not a little cheered me; and the more so that this present one is + like to be the last I shall be able to write on this side of the + sea, if it so happen that it shall please God to prosper my intent, + which is to pass over into Flanders at the first convenient + opportunity: for the stress of the times, and mine own earnest + desire to live within the compass of a religious life, have moved me + to forsake for a while this realm, and betake myself to a place + which shall afford opportunity and a sufficiency of leisure for the + prosecution of my design. The comfortable report Edmund made of thy + health, increased height, and good condition, as also of thy + exceeding pleasant and affectionate behavior to him, as deputed from + thy poor father to convey to thee his paternal blessing, together + with such tokens as a third person may exhibit of that most natural + and tender affection which he bears to thee, his sole child, whom + next to God he doth most entirely value and love,—of which charge + this good youth assured me he did acquit himself as my true son in + Christ, which indeed he now is,—and my good brother's letter and + thine, which both do give proof of the exceeding great favor shown + toward thee in his house, wherein he doth reckon my Constance not so + much a niece (for such be his words) as a most cherished daughter, + whose good qualities and lively parts have so endeared her to his + family, that the greatest sorrow which could befal them should be to + lose her company; which I do not here recite for to awaken in thee + motions of pride or a vain conceit of thine own deserts, but rather + gratitude to those whose goodness is so great as to overlook thy + defects and magnify thy merits;—Edmund's report, I say, coupled with + these letters, have yielded me all the contentment I desire at this + time, when I am about to embark on a perilous voyage, of which none + can foresee the course or the end; one in which I take the cross of + Christ as my only staff; his words, "Follow me," for my motto; and + his promise to all such as do confess him before men, as the assured + anchor of my hope. +<br><br> + "Our ingenuous youth informed thee (albeit I doubt not in such wise + as to conceal, if it had been possible, his own ability, which, with + his devotedness, do exceed praise) how he acquitted both me and + others of much trouble and imminent danger by his fortunate despatch + with that close prisoner. I had determined to place him with some of + my acquaintance, lest perhaps he should return, not without some + danger of his soul, to his own friends; but when he understood my + resolution, he cried out with like words to those of St. Lawrence, + 'Whither goeth my master without his servant? Whither goeth my + father without his son?' and with tears distilling from his eyes, he + humbly entreated he might go together with me, saying, as it were + with St. Peter, 'Master, I am <a name="611">{611}</a> ready to go with you to prison, + yea to death;' but, forecasting his future ability, as also to try + his spirit a little further, I made him answer it was impossible; to + which our Edmund replied, 'Alas! and is it impossible? Shall my + native soil restrain free will? or home-made laws alter devout + resolutions? Am I not young? Can I not study? May I not in time get + what you now have got—learning for a scholar? yea, virtue for a + priest, perhaps; and so at length obtain that for which you now are + ready? Direct me the way, I beseech you; and let me, if you please, + be your precursor. Tell me what I shall do, or whither I must go; + and for the rest, God, who knows my desire, will provide and supply + the want. Can it be possible that he who clothes the lilies of the + field, and feeds the fowls of the air, will forsake him who forsakes + all to fulfil his divine precept, "Seek first the kingdom of God and + his justice, and all other things shall be given to you?"' Finally, + he ended, to my no small admiration, by reciting the words of our + Saviour, 'Whosoever shall forsake home, or brethren, or sisters, or + father, or mother, for my sake and the gospel's, shall receive a + hundredfold and possess life everlasting.' +<br><br> + "By these impulses, often repeated with great fervor of spirit, I + perceived God Almighty's calling in him, and therefore at last + condescended to let him take his adventures, procuring him + commendations to such friends beyond seas as should assist him in + his purpose, and furnishing him with money sufficient for such a + journey; not judging it to be prudent to keep him with me, who have + not ability to warrant mine own passage; and so noted a recusant, + that I run a greater risk to be arrested in any port where I embark. + And so, in all love and affection, we did part; and I have since had + intelligence, for the which I do return most humble and hearty + thanks to God, that he hath safely crossed the seas, and has now + reached a sure harbor, where his religious desires may take effect. + And now, daughter Constance, mine own good child, fare thee well! + Pray for thy poor father, who would fain give thee the blessing of + the elder as of the younger son—Jacob's portion and Esau's also. + But methinks the blessings of this world be not at the present time + for the Catholics of this land; and so we must needs be content, for + our children as for ourselves (and a covetous man he is which should + not therewith be satisfied), with the blessings our Lord did utter + on the mountain, and mostly with that in which he doth say, 'Blessed + are ye when men shall persecute you, and revile you, and say all + manner of evil against you falsely, for my name's sake; for great is + your reward in heaven.' +<br><br> + "Your loving father in natural affection and ten thousand times more + in the love of Christ, H. S." +</p> +<p> +Oh, what a gulf of tenfold separation did those words "beyond seas" +suggest betwixt that sole parent and his poor child! Thoughts travel +not with ease beyond the limits which nature hath set to this isle; +and what lies beyond the watery waste wherewith Providence hath +engirdled our shores offers no apt images to the mind picturing the +invisible from the visible, as it is wont to do with home-scenes, +where one city or one landscape beareth a close resemblance to +another. And if, in the forsaking of this realm, so much danger did +lie, yea, in the very ports whence he might sail, so that I, who +should otherwise have prayed that the winds might detain him, and the +waves force him back on his native soil, was constrained to supplicate +that they should assist him to abandon it,—how much greater, +methought, should be the perils of his return, when, as he indeed +hoped, a mark should be set on him which in our country dooms men to a +cruel death! Many natural tears I shed at this parting, which until +then had not seemed so desperate and final; <a name="612">{612}</a> and for a while +would not listen to the consolations which were offered by the good +friends who were so tender to me, but continued to wander about in a +disconsolate manner in the garden, or passionately to weep in my own +chamber, until Muriel, the sovereign mistress of comfort to others, +albeit ever ailing in her body, and contemned by such as dived not +through exterior deformity into the interior excellences of her soul, +with sweet compulsion and authoritative arguments drawn from her +admirable faith and simple devotion, rekindled in mine the more noble +sentiments sorrow had obscured, not so much through diverting, as by +elevating and sweetening, my thoughts to a greater sense of the +goodness of God in calling my father, and peradventure Edmund also, to +so great an honor as the priesthood, and never more honorable than in +these days, wherein it oftentimes doth prove the road to martyrdom. +</p> +<p> +In December of that year my Lord and my Lady Surrey, by the Duke of +Norfolk's desire, removed for some weeks to Kenninghall for change of +air, and also Lady Lumley, his grace judging them to be as yet too +young to keep house alone. My lord's brothers and Mistress Bess, with +her governess, were likewise carried there. Lady Surrey wrote from +that seat, that, were it not for the duke's imprisonment and constant +fears touching his life, she should have had great contentment in that +retirement, and been most glad to have tarried there, if it had +pleased God, so long as she lived, my lord taking so much pleasure in +field-sports, and otherwise so companionable, that he often offered to +ride with her; and in the evenings they did entertain themselves with +books, chiefly poetry, and sometimes played at cards. They had but few +visitors, by reason of the disgrace and trouble his grace was in at +that time; only such of their neighbors as did hunt and shoot with the +earl her husband; mostly Sir Henry Stafford and Mr. Rookwood's two +sons, whom she commended; the one for his good qualities and honest +carriage, and the other for wit and learning; as also Sir Hammond +l'Estrange, a gentleman who stayed no longer away from Kenninghall, +she observed, than thereunto compelled by lack of an excuse for +tarrying if present, or returning when absent. He often procured to be +invited by my lord, who used to meet him out of doors, and frequently +carried him back with him to dine or to sup, and often both. +</p> +<p> +"And albeit" (so my lady wrote) "I doubt not but he doth set a +reasonable value on my lord's society,—who, although young enough to +be his son, is exceedingly conversable and pleasant, as every one who +knows him doth testify,—and mislikes not, I ween, the good cheer, or +the wine from his grace's cellar; yet I warrant thee, good Constance, +'tis not for the sake only of our poor company or hospitable table +that this good knight doth haunt us, but rather from the passion I +plainly see he hath conceived for our Milicent since a day when he +hurt his arm by a fall not far from hence, and I procured she should +dress it with that rare ointment of thine, which verily doth prove of +great efficacy in cases where the skin is rubbed off. Methinks the +wound in his arm was then transplanted into his heart, and the good +man so bewitched with the blue eyes and dove-like countenance of his +chirurgeon, that he has fallen head-over-ears in love, and is, as I +hope, minded to address her in a lawful manner. His wound did take an +exceeding long time in healing, to the no small discredit of thy +ointment; for he came several days to have it dressed, and I could not +choose but smile when at last our sweet practitioner did ask him, in +an innocent manner, if the wound did yet smart, for indeed she could +see no appearance in it but what betokened it to be healed. He +answered, 'There be wounds, Mistress Milicent, which smart, albeit no +outward marks of such suffering do show themselves.' <a name="613">{613}</a> 'Ay,' quoth +Milicent, 'but for such I be of opinion further dressing is needless; +and with my lady's licence, I will furnish you, sir, with a liquid +which shall strengthen the skin, and so relieve the aching, if so you +be careful to apply it night and morning to the injured part, and to +cork the bottle after using it.' 'My memory is so bad, fair +physician,' quoth the knight, 'that I am like to forget the +prescription.' She answered, he should stand the bottle so as it +should meet his eyes when he rose, and then he must needs remember it. +</p> +<p> +"And so broke off the discourse. But when he is here I notice how his +eyes do follow her when she sets the table for primero, or works at +the tambour-frame, or plays with Bess, to whom he often talks as she +sits on <i>her</i> knees, who, if I mistake not, shall be, one of these +days, Lady l'Estrange, and is as worthy to be so well married as any +girl in the kingdom, both as touching her birth and her exceeding +great virtue and good disposition. He is an extreme Protestant, and +very bitter against Catholics; but as she, albeit mild in temper, is +as firmly settled in the new religion as he is, no difference will +exist between them on a point in which 'tis most of all to be desired +husbands and wives should be agreed. Thou mayst think that I have been +over apt to note the signs of this good knight's passion, and to draw +deductions from such tokens as have appeared of it, visible maybe to +no other eyes than mine; but, trust me, Constance, those who do +themselves know what 'tis to love with an engrossing affection are +quick to mark the same effects in others. When Phil is in the room, I +find it a hard matter at times to restrain mine eyes from gazing on +that dear husband, whom I do so entirely love that I have no other +pleasure in life but in his company. And not to seem to him or to +others too fond, which is not a beseeming thing even in a wife, I +study to conceal my constant thinking on him by such devices as +cunningly to provoke others to speak of my lord, and so appear only to +follow whereunto my own desire doth point, or to propose questions,—a +pastime wherein he doth excel,—and so minister to mine own pride in +him without direct flattery, or in an unbecoming manner setting forth +his praise. And thus I do grow learned in the tricks of true +affection, and to perceive in such as are in love what mine own heart +doth teach me to be the signals of that passion." +</p> +<p> +So far my lady; and not long after, on the first day of February, I +had a note from her, written in great distraction of mind at the +Charter House, where she and all his grace's children had returned in +a sudden manner on the hearing that the queen had issued a warrant for +the duke's execution on the next Monday. Preparations were made with +the expectation of all London, and a concourse of many thousands to +witness it, the tread of whose feet was heard at night, like to the +roll of muffled drums, along the streets; but on the Sunday, late in +the night, the queen's majesty entered into a great misliking that the +duke should die the next day, and sent an order to the sheriffs to +forbear until they should hear further. His grace's mother, the +dowager countess, and my Lady Berkeley his sister (now indeed lowering +her pride to most humble supplication), and my Lord Arundel from his +sick-bed, and the French ambassador, together with many others, sued +with singular earnestness to her majesty for his life, who, albeit she +had stayed the execution of his sentence, would by no means recall it. +I hasted to the Charter House, Mistress Ward going with me, and both +were admitted into her ladyship's chamber, with whom did sit that day +the fairest picture of grief I ever beheld—the Lady Margaret Howard, +who for some months had resided with the Countess of Sussex, who was a +very good lady to her and all these afflicted children. Albeit Lady +Surrey had often greatly commended this young lady, and styled her so +rare a piece of perfection that no one <a name="614">{614}</a> could know and not admire +her, the loveliness of her face, nobility of her figure, and +attractiveness of her manners exceeded my expectations. The sight of +these sisters minded me then of what Lady Surrey had written when they +were yet children, touching my Lord Surrey, styling them "two twin +cherries on one stalk;" and methought, now that the lovely pair had +ripened into early maturity, their likeness in beauty (though +differing in complexion) justified the saying. Lady Margaret greeted +us as though we had not been strangers, and in the midst of her great +and natural sorrow showed a grateful sense of the share we did take in +a grief which methinks was deeper in her than in any other of these +mourners. +</p> +<p> +Oh, what a period of anxious suspense did follow that first reprieve! +what alternations of hope and fear! what affectionate letters were +exchanged between that loving father and good master and his sorrowful +children and servants; now writing to Mr. Dyx, his faithful steward: +</p> +<p><p class="cite"> + "Farewell, good Dyx! your service hath been so faithful unto me, as + I am sorry that I cannot make proof of my good-will to recompense + it. I trust my death shall make no change in you toward mine, but + that you will faithfully perform the trust that I have reposed in + you. Forget me, and remember me in mine. Forget not to counsel and + advise Philip and Nan's unexperienced years; the rest of their + brothers' and sisters' well-doing resteth much upon their virtuous + and considerate dealings. God grant them his grace, which is able to + work better in them than my natural well-meaning heart can wish unto + them. Amen. And so, hoping of your honesty and faithfulness when I + am dead, I bid you this my last farewell. T. H." +</p> +<p> +Now to another trusty friend and honest dependent: +</p> +<p><p class="cite"> + "Good friend George, farewell. I have no other tokens to send my + friends but my books; and I know how sorrowful you are, amongst the + rest, for my hard hap, whereof I thank God; because I hope his + merciful chastisement will prepare me for a better world. Look well + throughout this book, and you shall find the name of duke very + unhappy. I pray God it may end with me, and that others may speed + better hereafter. But if I might have my wish, and were in as good a + state as ever you knew me, yet I would wish for a lower degree. Be a + friend, I pray you, to mine; and do my hearty commendations to your + good wife and to gentle Mr. Dennye. I die in the faith that you have + ever known me to be of. Farewell, good friend. +<br><br> + "Yours dying, as he was living, +<br><br> + "NORFOLK." +</p> +<p> +These letters and some others did pass from hand to hand in that +afflicted house; and sometimes hope and sometimes despair prevailed in +the hearts of the great store of relatives and friends which often +assembled there to confer on the means of softening the queen's anger +and moving her to mercy; one time through letters from the king of +France and other princes, which was an ill shot, for to be so +entreated by foreign potentates did but inflame her majesty's anger +against the duke; at others, by my Lord Sussex and my Lord Arundel, or +such persons in her court as nearly approached her highness and could +deal with her when she was merry and chose to condescend to their +discourse. But the wind shifts not oftener than did the queen's mind +at that time, so diverse were her dispositions toward this nobleman, +and always opposed to such as appeared in those who spoke on this +topic, whether as pressing for his execution, or suing for mercy to be +extended to him. I heard much talk at that time touching his grace's +good qualities: how noble had been his spirit; how moderate his +disposition; how plain his attire; how bountiful his alms. +</p> +<a name="615">{615}</a> +<p> +As the fates of many do in these days hang on the doom of one, much +eagerness was shown amongst those who haunted my uncle's house to +learn the news afloat concerning the issue of the duke's affair. Some +Catholics of note were lying in prison at that time in Norwich, most +of them friends of these gentlemen; of which four were condemned to +death at that time, and one to perpetual imprisonment and loss of all +his property for reconcilement; but whilst the Duke of Norfolk was yet +alive, they held the hope he should, if once out of prison, recover +the queen's favor and drive from their seats his and their mortal +enemies, my Lords Burleigh and Leicester. And verily the axe was held +suspended on the head of that duke for four months and more, to the +unspeakable anguish of many; and, amongst others, his aged and +afflicted mother, the Dowager Countess of Surrey, who came to London +from the country to be near her son in this extremity. Three times did +the queen issue a warrant for his death and then recalled it; so that +those trembling relatives and well-wishers in and out of his house did +look each day to hear the fatal issue had been compassed, In the month +of March, when her majesty was sick with a severe inflammation and +agonizing pain, occasioned, some said, by poison administered by +papists, but by her own physicians declared to arise from her contempt +of their prescriptions, there was a strange turmoil, I ween, in some +men's breasts, albeit silent as a storm brewing on a sultry day. Under +their breath, and with faces shaped to conceal the wish which bred the +inquiry, they asked of the queen's health; whilst others tore their +hair and beat their breasts with no affected grief, and the most part +of the people lamented her danger. Oh, what five days were those when +the shadow of death did hover over that royal couch, and men's hearts +failed them for fear, or else wildly whispered hopes such as they +durst not utter aloud,—not so much as to a close friend,—lest the +walls should have ears, or the pavement open under their feet! My God, +in thy hands lie the issues of life and death. Thou dost assign to +each one his space of existence, his length of days. Thy ways are not +as our ways, nor thy thoughts as our thoughts. She lived who was yet +to doom so many princely heads to the block, so many saintly forms to +the dungeon and the rack. She lived whose first act was to stretch +forth a hand yet weakened by sickness to sign, a fourth time, a +warrant for a kinsman's death, and once again recalled it. Each day +some one should come in with various reports touching the queen's +dispositions. Sometimes she had been heard to opine that her dangers +from her enemies were so great that justice must be done. At others +she vehemently spoke of the nearness of blood to herself, of the +superiority in honor of this duke; and once she wrote to Lord Burleigh +(a copy of this letter Lord Surrey saw in Lord Oxford's hands), "that +she was more beholden to the hinder part of her head than she dared +trust the forward part of the same;" and expressed great fear lest an +irrevocable deed should be committed. But she would not see Lord +Surrey, or suffer him to plead in person for his father's life. Yet +there were good hopes amongst his friends he should yet be released, +till one day—I mind it well, for I was sitting with Lady Surrey, +reading out loud to her, as I was often used to do—my Lord Berkeley +burst into the chamber, and cried, throwing his gloves on the table +and swearing a terrible oath: +</p> +<p> +"That woman has undone us!" +</p> +<p> +"What, the queen?" said my lady, white as a smock. +</p> +<p> +"Verily a queen," he answered gloomily. "I warrant you the Queen of +Scots hath ended as she did begin, and dragged his grace into a pit +from whence I promise you he will never now rise. A letter writ in her +cipher to the Duke of Alva hath been intercepted, in which that +luckless royal <a name="616">{616}</a> wight, ever fatal to her friends as to herself, +doth say, 'that she hath a strong party in England, and lords who +favor her cause; some of whom, albeit prisoners, so powerful, that the +Queen of England should not dare to touch their lives.' Alack! those +words, 'should not dare,' shall prove the death-warrant of my noble +brother. Cursed be the day when he did get entangled in that popish +siren's plots!" +</p> +<p> +"Speak not harshly of her, good my lord," quoth Lady Surrey, in her +gentle voice. "Her sorrows do bear too great a semblance to our own +not to bespeak from us patience in this mishap." +</p> +<p> +"Nan," said Lord Berkeley, "thou art of too mild a disposition. 'Tis +the only fault I do find with thee. Beshrew me, if my wife and thee +could not make exchange of some portion of her spirit and thy meekness +to the advantage of both. I warrant thee Phil's wife should hold a +tight hand over him." +</p> +<p> +"I read not that precept in the Bible, my lord," quoth she, smiling. +"It speaketh roundly of the duty of wives to obey, but not so much as +one word of their ruling." +</p> +<p> +"Thou hadst best preach thy theology to my Lady Berkeley," he +answered; "and then she—" +</p> +<p> +"But I pray you, my lord, is it indeed your opinion that the queen +will have his grace's life?" +</p> +<p> +"I should not give so much as a brass pin, Nan, for his present chance +of mercy at her hands," he replied sadly. And his words were justified +in the event. +</p> +<p> +Those relentless enemies of the duke, my Lords Burleigh and Leicester, +—who, at the time of the queen's illness, had stood three days and +three nights without stirring from her bedside in so great terror lest +she should die and he should compass the throne through a marriage +with the Queen of Scots, that they vowed to have his blood at any cost +if her majesty did recover,—so dealt with parliament as to move it to +send a petition praying that, for the safety of her highness and the +quieting of her realm, he should be forthwith executed. And from that +day to the mournful one of his death, albeit from the great reluctance +her majesty had evinced to have him despatched, his friends, yea unto +the last moment, lived in expectancy of a reprieve; he himself made up +his mind to die with extraordinary fortitude, not choosing to +entertain so much as the least hope of life. +</p> +<p> +One day at that time I saw my Lady Margaret mending some hose, and at +each stitch she made with her needle tears fell from her eyes. I +offered to assist her ladyship; but she said, pressing the hose to her +heart, "I thank thee, good Constance; but no other hands than mine +shall put a stitch in these hose, for they be my father's, who hath +worn them with these holes for many months, till poor Master Dyx +bethought himself to bring them here to be patched and mended, which +task I would have none perform but myself. My father would not suffer +him to procure a new pair, lest it should be misconstrued as a sign of +his hope or desire of a longer life, and with the same intent he +refuseth to eat flesh as often as the physicians do order; 'for,' +quoth he, 'why should I care to nourish a body doomed to such near +decay?'" Then, after a pause, she said, "He will not wear clothes +which have any velvet on them, being, he saith, a condemned person." +</p> +<p> +Lady Surrey took one of the hose in her hand, but Lady Margeret, with +a filial jealousy, sadly smiling, shook her head: "Nay, Nan," quoth +she, "not even to thee, sweet one, will I yield one jot or tittle of +this mean, but, in relation to him who doth own these poor hose, +exalted labor." Then she asked her sister if she had heard of the +duke's request that Mr. Fox, his old schoolmaster, should attend on +him in the Tower, to whom he desired to profess that faith he did +first ground him in. +</p> +<p> +And my Lady Surrey answered yea, that my lord had informed her of +<a name="617">{617}</a> it, and many other proofs beside that his grace sought to +prepare for death in the best manner he could think of. +</p> +<p> +"Some ill-disposed persons have said," quoth Lady Margaret, "that it +is with the intent to propitiate the queen that my father doth show +himself to be so settled in his religion, and that he is not what he +seems; but tis a slander on his grace, who hath been of this way of +thinking since he attained to the age of reason, and was never at any +time reconciled, as some have put forth." +</p> +<p> +This was the last time I did see these afflicted daughters until long +after their father's death, who was beheaded in the chapel of the +Tower shortly afterward. When the blow fell which, striking at him, +struck a no less fatal blow to the peace and well-doing of his +children, they all left the Charter House, and removed for a time into +the country, to the houses of divers relatives, in such wise as before +his death the duke had desired. A letter which I received from Lady +Surrey a few weeks after she left London doth best serve to show the +manner of this disposal, and the temper of the writer's mind at that +melancholy time. +</p> +<p class="cite"> + "My OWN DEAR CONSTANCE,—It may like you to hear that your afflicted + friend is improved in bodily health, and somewhat recovered from the + great suffering of mind which the duke, their good father's death, + has caused to all his poor children—mostly to Megg and Phil and me; + for their brothers and my sister are too young greatly to grieve. My + Lord Arundel is sorely afflicted, I hear, and hath writ a very + lamentable letter to our good Lady Sussex concerning this sad + mishap. My Lady Berkeley and my Lady Westmoreland are almost + distracted with grief for the death of a brother they did singularly + love. That poor lady (of Westmoreland) is much to be pitied, for + that she is parted from her husband, maybe for ever, and has lost + two fair daughters in one year. +<br><br> + "My lord hath shown much affection for his father, and natural + sorrow in this sad loss; and when his last letters written a short + time before he suffered, and addressed "To my loving children," + specially the one to Philip and Nan, reached his hands, he wept so + long and bitterly that it seemed as if his tears should never cease. + My lord is forthwith to make his chief abode at Cambridge for a year + or two; and Meg and I, with Lady Sussex, and I do hope Bess + also—albeit his grace doth appear in his letter to be otherwise + minded. But methinks he apprehended to lay too heavy a charge on + her, who is indeed a good lady to us all in this our unhappy + condition, and was loth Megg should be out of my company. +<br><br> + "The parting with my lord is a sore trial, and what I had not looked + to; but God's will be done; and if it be for the advantage of his + soul, as well as the advancement of his learning, he should reside + at the university, it should ill befit me to repine. And now + methinks I will transcribe, if my tears do not hinder me, his + grace's letters, which will inform thee of his last wishes better + than I could explain them; for I would have thee know how tender and + forecasting was his love for us, and the good counsel he hath left + unto his son, who, I pray to God, may always follow it. And I would + have thee likewise note one point of his advice, which indeed I + should have been better contented he had not touched upon, forasmuch + as his having done so must needs hinder that which thy fond love for + my poor self, and resolved adherence to what he calls 'blind + papistry,' doth so greatly prompt thee to desire; for if on his + blessing he doth charge us to beware of it, and then I should move + my lord to so much neglect of his last wishes as at any time to be + reconciled, bethink thee with what an ill grace I should urge on + him, in other respects, obedience to his commands, which indeed are + such as do commend themselves to any Christian soul as most wise and + profitable. <a name="618">{618}</a> And now, breaking off mine own discourse to + transcribe his words—a far more noble and worthy employment of my + pen—and praying God to bless thee, I remain thy tender and loving + friend,<br> + "ANN SURREY." +</p> +<p> +"The Duke of Norfolk's letters to his children: +</p> +<p class="cite"> + "DEAR CHILDREN,—This is the last letter that ever I think to write + to you; and therefore, if you loved me, or that you will seem + grateful to me for the special love that I have ever borne unto you, + then remember and follow these my last lessons. Oh, Philip, serve + and fear God, above all things. I find the fault in myself, that I + have (God forgive me!) been too negligent in this point. Love and + make much of your wife; for therein, considering the great adversity + you are now in, by reason of my fall, is your greatest present + comfort and relief, beside your happiness in having a wife which is + endued with so great towardness in virtue and good qualities, and in + person comparable with the best sort. Follow these two lessons, and + God will bless you; and without these, as you may see by divers + examples out of the Scripture, and also by ordinary worldly proof, + where God is not feared, all goeth to wreck; and where love is not + between the husband and wife, there God doth not prosper. My third + lesson is, that you show yourself loving and natural to your + brothers and sister and sister-in-law. Though you be very young in + years, yet you must strive with consideration to become a man; for + it is your own presence and good government of yourself that must + get friends; and if you take that course, then have I been so + careful a father unto you, as I have taken such order as you, by + God's grace, shall be well able, beside your wife's lands, to + maintain yourself like a gentleman. Marry! the world is greedy and + covetous; and if the show of the well government of yourself do not + fear and restrain their greedy appetite, it is like that, by + undirect means, they will either put you from that which law layeth + upon you, or else drive you to much trouble in trying and holding + your right. When my grandfather died, I was not much above a year + elder than you are now; and yet, I thank God, I took such order with + myself, as you shall reap the commodity of my so long passed travel, + if you do now imitate the like. Help to strengthen your young and + raw years with good counsel. I send you herewith a brief schedule, + whom I wish you to make account of as friends, and whom as servants; + and I charge you, as a father may do, to follow my direction + therein; my experience can better tell what is fit for you than your + young years can judge of. I would wish you for the present to make + your chief abode at Cambridge, which is the place fittest for you to + promote your learning in; and beside, it is not very far hence, + whereby you may, within a day's warning, be here to follow your own + causes, as occasion serveth. If, after a year or two, you spend some + time in a house of the law, there is nothing that will prove more to + your commodity, considering how for the time you shall have + continual business about your own law affairs; and thereby also, if + you spend your time well, you shall be ever after better able to + judge in your own causes. I too late repent that I followed not this + course that now I wish to you; for if I had, then my case perchance + had not been in so ill state as now it is. +<br><br> + "When God shall send you to those years as that it shall be fit for + you to keep house with your wife (which I had rather were sooner, + than that you should fall into ill company), then I would wish you + to withdraw yourself into some private dwelling of your own. And if + your hap may be so good as you may so live without being called to + higher degree, oh, Philip, Philip, then shall you enjoy that blessed + life which your woful father would fain have done, and never could + be so happy. Beware of high degree. To a vain-glorious, proud + stomach it seemeth at the first sweet. Look into all <a name="619">{619}</a> + chronicles, and you shall find that in the end it brings heaps of + cares, toils in the state, and most commonly in the end utter + overthrow. Look into the whole state of the nobility in times past, + and into their state now, and then judge whether my lessons be true + or no. Assure yourself, as you may see by the book of my accounts, + and you shall find that my living did hardly maintain my expenses; + for all the help that I had by Tom's lands, and somewhat by your + wife's and sister's-in-law, I was ever a beggar. You may, by the + grace of God, be a great deal richer and quieter in your low degree, + wherein I once again wish you to continue. They may, that shall wish + you the contrary, have a good meaning; but believe your father, who + of love wishes you best, and with the mind that he is at this + present fully armed to God, who sees both states, both high and low, + as it were even before his eyes. Beware of the court, except it be + to do your prince service, and that, as near as you can, in the + lowest degree, for that place hath no certainty; either a man, by + following thereof, hath too much of worldly pomp, which, in the end, + throws him down headlong, or else he liveth there unsatisfied; + either that he cannot attain for himself that he would, or else that + he cannot do for his friends as his heart desireth. Remember these + notes, and follow them; and then you, by God's help, shall reap the + commodity of them in your old years. +<br><br> + "If your brothers may be suffered to remain in your company, I would + be most glad thereof, because continuing together should still + increase love between you. But the world is so catching of + everything that falls, that Tom being, as I believe, after my death, + the queen's majesty's ward, shall be begged by one or another. But + yet you are sure to have your brother William left still with you, + because, poor boy, he hath nothing to feed cormorants withal; to + whom you will as well be a father as a brother; for upon my blessing + I commit him to your charge to provide for, if that which I have + assured him by law shall not be so sufficient as I mean it. If law + may take place, your sister-in-law will be surely enough conveyed to + his behoof, and then I should wish her to be brought up with some + friend of mine; as for the present I allow best of Sir Christopher + Heydon, if he will so much befriend you as to receive her to sojourn + with him; if not there in some other place, as your friends shall + best allow of. And touching the bestowing of your wife and Megg, who + I would be loth should be out of your wife's company; for as she + should be a good companion for Nan, so I commit Megg of especial + trust to her. I think good, till you keep house together, if my Lady + of Sussex might be entreated to take them to her as sojourners, + there were no place so fit considering her kindred unto you, and the + assured friend that I hope you shall find of her; beside she is a + good lady. If it will not be so brought to pass, then, by the advice + of your friends, take some other order; but in no case I would wish + you to keep any house except it be together with your wife. +<br><br> + "Thus I have advised you as my troubled memory can at present suffer + me. Beware of pride, stubbornness, taunting, and sullenness, which + vices nature doth somewhat kindle in you; and therefore you must + with reason and discretion make a new nature in yourself. Give not + your mind too much and too greedily to gaming; make a pastime of it, + and no toil. And lastly, delight to spend some time in reading of + the Scriptures; for therein is the whole comfort of man's life; all + other things are vain and transitory; and if you be diligent in + reading of them, they will remain with you continually, to your + profit and commodity in this world, and to your comfort and + salvation in the world to come, whither, in grace of God, I am now + with joy and consolation preparing myself. And, upon my blessing, + beware of blind papistry, which brings nothing but bondage to men's + consciences. <a name="620">{620}</a> Mix your prayers with fasting, not thinking + thereby to merit; for there is nothing that we ourselves can do that + is good,—we are but unprofitable servants; but fast, I say, thereby + to tame the wicked affection of the mind, and trust only to be saved + by Christ's precious blood; for without a perfect faith therein, + there is no salvation. Let works follow your faith; thereby to show + to the world that you do not only say you have faith, but that you + give testimony thereof to the full satisfaction of the godly. I + write somewhat the more herein, because perchance you have + heretofore heard, or perchance may hereafter hear, false bruits that + I was a papist; [Footnote 123] but trust unto it, I never, since I + knew what religion meant (I thank God) was of other mind than now + you shall hear that I die in; although (I cry God mercy) I have not + given fruits and testimony of my faith as I ought to have done; the + which is the thing that I do now chiefliest repent. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 123: There would seem to be no doubt that the Duke of + Norfolk was a sincere Protestant. The strenuous advice to his + children to beware of Popery affords evidence of it. Greatly, + however, as it would have tended to their worldly prosperity to + have followed their father's last injunctions in this respect, all + but one of those he thus counselled were subsequently reconciled + to the Catholic Church. +<br><br> + The Duke's letters in this chapter are all authentic. See the Rev. + M. Tierney's History of Arundel, and the Appendix to Nott's + edition of Lord Surrey's poems.] +</p> +<p class="cite"> + "When I am gone, forget my condemning, and forgive, I charge you, my + false accusers, as I protest to God I do; but have nothing to do + with them if they live. Surely, Bannister dealt no way but honestly + and truly. Hickford did not hurt me in my conscience, willingly; nor + did not charge me with any great matter that was of weight otherways + than truly. But the Bishop of Ross, and specially Barber, did + falsely accuse me, and laid their own treasons upon my back. God + forgive them, and I do, and once again I will you to do; bear no + malice in your mind. And now, dear Philip, farewell. Read this my + letter sometimes over; it may chance make you remember yourself the + better; and by the same, when your father is dead and rotten, you + may see what counsel I would give you if I were alive. If you follow + these admonitions, there is no doubt but God will bless you; and I, + your earthly father, do give you God's blessing and mine, with my + humble prayers to Almighty God that it will please him to bless you + and your good Nan; that you may both, if it be his will, see your + children's children, to the comfort of you both; and afterward that + you may be partakers of the heavenly kingdom. Amen, amen. Written by + the hand of your loving father. T. H." +</p> +<p> +"And to Tom his grace did write: +</p> +<p class="cite"> + "Tom, out of this that I have written to your brother, you may learn + such lessons as are fit for you. That I write to one, that I write + to all, except it be somewhat which particularly touches any of you. + To fear and serve God is generally to you all; and, on my blessing, + take greatest care thereof, for it is the foundation of all + goodness. You have, even from your infancy, been given to be + stubborn. Beware of that vice, Tom, and bridle nature with wisdom. + Though you be her majesty's ward, yet if you use yourself well to my + Lord Burleigh, he will, I hope, help you to buy your own wardship. + Follow your elder brother's advice, who, I hope, will take such a + course as may be to all your comforts. God send him grace so to do, + and to you too! I give you God's blessing and mine, and I hope he + will prosper you." +<br><br> + "And to Will he saith (whom methinks his heart did incline to, as + Jacob's did to Benjamin): +<br><br> + "Will, though you be now young, yet I hope, if it shall please God + to send you life, that you will then consider of the precepts + heretofore written to your brethren. I have committed the charge of + your bringing-up to your elder brother; and therefore I charge you + to be obedient to him, as you would have been to me if I had been + <a name="621">{621}</a> living. If you shall have a liking to my daughter-in-law, Bess + Dacres, I hope you shall have it in your own choice to marry her. I + will not advise you otherways than yourself, when you are of fit + years, shall think good; but this assure yourself, it will be a good + augmentation to your small living, considering how chargeable the + world groweth to be. As you are youngest, so the more you ought to + be obedient to your elders. God send you a good younger brother's + fortune in this world, and his grace, that you may ever be his, both + in this world and in the world to come." +</p> +<p> +"To me, his unworthy daughter, were these lines written, which I be +ashamed to transcribe, but that his goodness doth appear in his good +opinion of me rather than my so poor merits: +</p> +<p class="cite"> + "Well-beloved Nan, that hath been as dear to me as if you had been + my own daughter, although, considering this ill hap that has now + chanced, you might have had a greater marriage than now your husband + shall be; yet I hope that you will remember that, when you were + married, the case was far otherways; and therefore I hope your + dutiful dealings shall be so to your husband, and your sisterly love + to your brothers-in-law and sister-in-law, as my friends that shall + see it may think that my great affection to you was well bestowed. + Thanks be to God, you have hitherto taken a good course; whereby all + that wish you well take great hope rather of your going forward + therein than backward—which God forbid! I will request no more at + your hands, now that I am gone, in recompense of my former love to + you, but that you will observe my three lessons: to fear and serve + God, flying idleness; to love faithfully your husband; and to be + kind to your brothers and sisters—specially committing to your care + mine only daughter Megg, hoping that you will not be a sister-in-law + to her, but rather a natural sister, yea even a very mother; and + that as I took care for the well bestowing of you, so you will take + care for the well bestowing of her, and be a continual caller on + your husband for the same. If this mishap had not chanced, you and + your husband might have been awhile still young, and I would, by + God's help, have supplied your wants. But now the case is changed, + and you must, at your years of fifteen, attain to the consideration + and discretion of twenty; or else, if God send you to live in your + age, you shall have cause to repent your folly in youth, beside the + endangering the casting away of those who do wholly depend upon your + two well-doings. I do not mistrust that you will be mindful of my + last requests; and so doing God bless you, and send you to be old + parents to virtuous children, which is likeliest to be if you give + them good example. Farewell! for this is the last that you shall + ever receive from your loving father. Farewell, my dear Nan!" +<br><br> + "And to his own sweet Megg he subjoined in the same letter these + words: +<br><br> + "Megg, I have, as you see, committed you to your loving sister. I + charge you therefore, upon my blessing, that you obey her in all + things, as you would do me or your own mother, if we were living; + and then I doubt not but by her good means you shall be in fit time + bestowed to your own comfort and contentment. Be good; no babbler, + and ever be busied and doing of somewhat; and give your mind to + reading in the Bible and such other good books, whereby you may + learn to fear God; and so you shall prove, by his help, hereafter + the better wife, and a virtuous woman in all other respects. If you + follow these my lessons, then God's blessing and mine I give you, + and pray that you may both live and die his servant. Amen." +</p> +<p> +When I read these letters, and my Lady Surrey's comments upon them, +what pangs seized my heart! Her <a name="622">{622}</a> messenger was awaiting an +answer, which he said must be brief, for he had to ride to Bermondsey +with a message for my Lord Sussex, and had been long delayed in the +city. I seized a pen, and hastily wrote: +</p> +<p class="cite"> + "Oh, my dear and honored lady, what grief, what pain, your letter + hath caused me! Forgive me if, having but brief time in which to + write a few lines by your messenger, I dwell not on the sorrow which + doth oppress you, nor on the many excellences apparent in those + farewell letters, which give token of so great virtue and wisdom in + the writer, that one should be prompted to exclaim he did lack but + one thing to be perfect, that being a true faith,—but rather + direct my answer to that passage in yours which doth work in me such + regret, yea such anguish of heart, as my poor words can ill express. + For verily there can be no greater danger to a soul than to be lured + from the profession of a true Catholic faith, once firmly received + and yet inwardly held, by deceptive arguments, whereby it doth + conceal its own weakness under the garb of respect for the dead and + duty to the living. For, I pray you, mine own dear lady, what + respect and what duty is owing to men which be not rather due to him + who reads the heart, and will ask a strict account of such as, + having known his will, yet have not done it? Believe me, 'tis a + perilous thing to do evil that good may come. Is it possible you + should resolve never to profess that religion which, in your + conscience, you do believe to be true, nor to move your lord + thereunto, for any human respect, however dear and sacred? I hope + other feelings may return, and God's hand will support, uphold, and + never fail you in your need. I beseech him to guard and keep you in + the right way. +<br><br> + "Your humble servant and truly loving poor friend, +<br><br> + "CONSTANCE SHERWOOD." +</p> +<p> +[TO BE CONTINUED. <a href="#748">Page 748</a>] +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="623">{623}</a> +<br> +<h2>From The Fortnightly Review. +<br><br> +THE HEART AND THE BRAIN. +<br><br> +BY GEORGE HENRY LEWES.</h2> +<br> +<p> +Heart and brain are the two lords of life. In the metaphors of +ordinary speech and in the stricter language of science, we use these +terms to indicate two central powers, from which all motives radiate, +to which all influences converge. They rule the moral and the physical +life: the moral owes to them its continuous supply of feelings and +ideas; the physical its continuous supply of food and stimulus. All +the composite material which serves to build up the bodily fabric, and +repair its daily waste, is only so much "carted material" awaiting the +architect, until it has twice passed through the heart—until having +been sent by the heart to the lungs it has there received its plastic +virtues, and returns to the heart to be thence distributed throughout +the organism. So much is familiar to every one; but less familiar is +the fact that this transmission of the blood from heart to lungs, and +its distribution throughout the organism, are rendered possible and +made effective only under the influence of the brain. Life is +sustained by food and stimulus. The operation of nutrition itself is +indissolubly connected with sensibility. Life is a plexus of nutrition +and sensation, the threads of which may ideally be separated, but +which in reality are so interwoven as to be indissoluble. This is a +paradox which even many physiologists will reject; but it is only a +paradox because biological questions have constantly been regarded +from a chemical point of view. +</p> +<p> +To render my proposition free from ambiguity, it is needful to premise +that the term heart, by a familiar device of rhetoric, here expresses +the whole of that great circulatory apparatus of which it is only a +part; and in like manner the term brain here expresses the whole of +the sensory apparatus. The reader knows perfectly well that in strict +anatomical language the heart is only one organ having a definite +function; and that the brain—although the term is used with +considerable laxity—is only one portion of the complex nervous +mechanism, having also its definite functions. But I am not here +addressing anatomists, and for purposes of simplification I shall +generally speak of the heart as if it were the whole of the vascular +system, and of the brain as if it were the whole of the nervous +system. And there is a philosophic truth suggested by this departure +from the limitations of anatomical definition, namely, that if the +brain as a nervous centre requires to be distinguished from all other +nervous centres, it also requires to be affiliated on them: it has its +special functions as an organ, but it has also a community of +property—<i>i.e.</i>, sensibility—with all other nervous centres. +</p> +<p> +In the study of animal organisms, the scientific artifice called +analysis, which separates ideally what nature has indissolubly united, +isolating each portion of a complex whole to study it undisturbed by +the influences of other portions, has established a division of life +into animal and vegetable. The division is as old as Aristotle, but +has become the common property of science only since the days of +Bichat. It is not exact, but it is convenient. As an artifice it has +proved its utility, but like all such distinctions it has a tendency +to divert the mind from contemplation of the real synthesis of nature. +Even as an artifice the classification is not free from ambiguities; +and perhaps it would be less exceptionable if <a name="624">{624}</a> instead of vegetal +and animal we were to substitute nutritive and sensitive. All the +phenomena of growth, development, and decay—phenomena common to +plants as to animals—may range under the laws of nutrition. All the +phenomena of feeling and motion which specially distinguish animals, +will range under the laws of sensibility. Plants, it is true, manifest +motion, some few of them even locomotion; but in them it is believed +that these phenomena are never due to the stimulus of sensibility. +</p> +<p> +Viewing the animal organism as thus differentiated, we see on the one +hand a complex system of organs—glands, membranes, vessels—all +harmoniously working to one end, which is to build up the body, and +silently repair its continual waste. They evolve the successive phases +of development. They prepare successive generations. On the other +hand, we see a complex system of organs—muscles, tendons, bones, +nerves, and nerve-centres—also harmoniously co-operative. They +stimulate the organs of nutrition. They work first for the +preservation of the individual in the struggle of existence; next, for +the perfection of the individual in the development of his highest +qualities. +</p> +<p> +But it is important to remember that this division is purely ideal—a +scientific artifice, not a reality. Nature knows of none such. In the +organism the two lives are one. The two systems interlace, +interpenetrate each other, so that the slightest modification of the +one is followed by a corresponding change in the other. The brain is +nourished by the heart, and were it not for the blood which is +momently pumped into it by the heart, its sensibility would vanish. +And the heart in turn depends upon the brain, not for food, but for +stimulus, for motive power, without which food is inert. That we may +feel, it is necessary we should feed; that we may feed, it is +necessary we should feel. Nutrition cannot be dissociated from +sensation. The blood which nourishes the brain, giving it impulse and +sustaining power, could never have become arterial blood, could never +have reached the brain, had not the heart which sent it there been +subjected to influences from the brain. The blood itself has no +locomotive impulse. The heart has no spontaneous power: it is a +muscle, and like all other muscles must be stimulated into activity. +Unless the sensitive mechanism were in action, the lungs could not +expand, the blood would not become oxygenated, the heart would not +pump. Look on the corpse from which the life has just vanished. Why is +it inert? There is food within it. It has blood in abundance. There is +air in the lungs. The muscles are contractile, and the tendons +elastic. So little is the wondrous mechanism impaired, that if by any +means we could supply a stimulus to awaken the dormant sensibility, +the chest would expand, the heart would beat, the blood would +circulate, the corpse would revive. +</p> +<p> +It is unnecessary to point out in detail how dependent the brain is +upon the heart; but mention may be made of the fact that more blood is +sent to the brain than to any other organ in the body: according to +some estimates a fifth of the whole, according to others a third. Not +only is a large quantity of blood demanded for the continuous activity +of the brain, but such is the peculiar nature of this great nervous +centre, that of all organs it is the most delicately susceptible to +every variation in the quality of the blood sent to it. If the heart +pumps feebly, the brain acts feebly. If the blood be vitiated, the +brain is lethargic; and when the brain is lethargic, the heart is +weak. Thus do the two great centres interact. They are both lords of +life, and both mutually indispensable. +</p> +<p> +There are two objections which it may be well to anticipate: +Nutrition, it may be objected, cannot be so indissolubly blended with +sensation as I have affirmed, because, in the first place, most of the +nutritive processes go on without the intervention of <a name="625">{625}</a> +sensibility; and in the second place, the nutritive life of plants is +confessedly independent of sensation, since in plants there is no +sensitive mechanism whatever. Nutrition is simply a chemical process. +</p> +<p> +The answers to these objections may be very brief. Nutrition is a +biological not a chemical process: it involves the operation of +chemical laws, but these laws are themselves subordinated to +physiological laws; and one of these laws is the necessary dependence +of organic activity on a nervous mechanism wherever such a mechanism +exists. Although popular language, and the mistaken views (as I +conceive) of physiologists, allow us to say, without any apparent +absurdity, that the processes of respiration, digestion, circulation, +and secretion go on without feeling or sensation—because these +processes do not habitually become distinct in consciousness, but are +merged in the general feeling of existence—we have only to replace the +word feeling, or sensation, by the phrase "nervous influence," and it +then becomes a serious biological error to speak of nutrition as +dissociated from the stimulus of nervous centres, as capable of +continuance without the intervention of sensibility. The chemical +combinations and decompositions do not of course depend on this +intervention, but the <i>transport</i> of materials does. All the disputes +which have been waged on this subject would have been silenced had the +disputants borne in mind this distinction between the chemical and +organic elements in every nutritive process. It is not the stoker who +makes the steam; but if the stoker were not to supply the fire with +coals, and the safety-valve were not to regulate the amount of +pressure, steam might indeed be generated, but no steam-engine would +perform its useful work. In like manner, it is not the vascular system +which makes a secretion; but if the blood did not supply the gland +with materials, the secreting process would quickly end, and the blood +can only be brought to the gland through the agency of muscular +contractions stimulated by nervous influence. +</p> +<p> +Granting that plants have no sensibility, and that in them the process +of nutrition must go on without such an intervention, we are able to +demonstrate that in animals in whose organism the sensitive apparatus +is an integral portion, the processes of nutrition are more or less +under the influence of this apparatus. In saying "more or less," I +indicate the greater or less perfection of the organism; for, as every +one knows, the perfection of each type is due to the predominance of +its sensitive mechanism. In some of the lowest types, no trace of a +nervous mechanism can be discovered. A little higher in the scale, the +mechanism is very slight and simple. Still higher, it becomes complex +and important. It culminates in man. Corresponding with this scale of +complexity in the sensitive life is the scale of complexity in the +nutritive life. As the two rise in importance they rise in the scale +of dependence. Thus a frog or a triton will live long after its brain +is removed. I have kept frogs for several weeks without their brains, +and tritons without their heads. Redi, the illustrious Italian +naturalist, kept a turtle alive five months after the removal of its +brain. Now it is needless to say that in higher animals death would +rapidly follow the loss of the brain. A somewhat similar parallelism +is seen on the removal of the heart. None of the higher animals can +survive a serious injury to the heart; but that organ may be removed +from a reptile, and the animal will crawl away seemingly as lively as +ever. A frog will live several hours without a heart, and will hop, +swim, and struggle as if uninjured. Stilling once removed all the +viscera from a frog, which, however, continued for one hour to hop, +defend itself, and in various ways manifest its vivacity. [Footnote +124] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 124: Stilling, <i>Untersuchungen über die Functionen des + Rückenmarks</i>, p. 38. ] +</p> +<a name="626">{626}</a> +<p> +In spite of these evidences of a temporary independence of brain and +heart, as individual organs, there is nothing more certain than the +intimate interdependence of the sensitive and circulating systems; and +if in lower animals the interdependence of the two great central +organs is less energetic than in the higher, the law of the +intervention of sensibility in all processes of nutrition is +unaffected. In fact, wherever the motor mechanism is muscular, as it +is in all but the simplest animals, the necessary intervention of +sensibility is an <i>à priori</i> axiom. Every action in the organs of such +animals is a manifestation of muscular contractility, and there is no +known means of exciting this contractility except by the stimulus of a +nerve. +</p> +<p> +The heart is a muscle. Some years ago there was a school of +physiologists advocating the hypothesis that the action of the heart +was due to the irritability of its muscular tissue, which was +stimulated by the presence of blood. The great Haller was the head of +this school, and his <i>"Memoires sur la nature sensible et irritable +des parties"</i> [Footnote 125] is still worthy the attention of +experimentalists. And, indeed, when men saw the heart continue its +pulsations some time after death, and even after removal from the +body, and saw, moreover, that after pulsation had ceased it could be +revived by the injection of warm blood, there seemed the strongest +arguments in favor of the hypothesis. Unhappily for the hypothesis, +the heart continues to beat long after all the blood has been pumped +out of it, consequently its beating cannot be due to the stimulus of +the blood. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 125: Lausanne, 1756, in 4 vols. ] +</p> +<p> +In our own day the difficulty has to a considerable extent been +removed by the discovery of a small nervous system specially allotted +to the heart,—nerves and ganglia imbedded in its substance, which +there do the work of nerves and ganglia everywhere else. Cut the heart +into pieces, and each piece containing a ganglion will beat as before; +the other pieces will be still. Beside this special cardiac system +which influences the regular pulsations, there is the general nervous +system, which accelerates and arrests these pulsations at every moment +of our lives. The heart is thus connected with the general organism +through the intervention of the great sensory apparatus. Filaments of +what are called the pneumogastric nerves connect the heart with the +spinal chord and cerebral masses; but it is not the influence of these +filaments which causes the regular beatings of the heart (as +physiologists formerly supposed), and the proof is that these +filaments may all be cut, thus entirely isolating the heart from all +connection with the great nervous centres, and yet the heart will +continue tranquilly beating. What causes this? Obviously the stimulus +comes from the heart's own nerves; and these are, presumably, excited +by the molecular changes going on within it. +</p> +<p> +Physiologists, as we said just now, supposed that the filaments of the +pneumogastric nerves distributed to the heart caused its beating. What +then was their surprise, a few years since, when Weber announced that +the stimulation of these fibres, instead of accelerating the heart's +action, arrested it! Here was a paradox. All other muscles, it was +said (but erroneously said), are excited to increased action when +their nerves are stimulated, and here is a muscle which is paralyzed +by the stimulation of its nerves. The fact was indisputable; an +electric current passed through the pneumogastric did suddenly and +invariably arrest the heart. Physiologists were interested. The frogs +and rabbits of Europe had a bad time of it, called upon to answer +categorically such questions put to their hearts. In a little while it +appeared that although a strong electric current arrested the +pulsations—and in mammals instantaneously—yet a feeble current +accelerated instead of arresting them. The same opposite results +followed a powerful and a gentle excitation of the upper region of the +spinal chord. +</p> +<a name="627">{627}</a> +<p> +To these very important and suggestive facts, which throw a strong +light on many phenomena hitherto obscure, let us add the interesting +facts that in a healthy, vigorous animal, the heart quickly recovers +its normal activity after the withdrawal of the electric stimulus; but +in a sickly or highly sensitive animal the arrest is final. +</p> +<p> +Who does not read here the physiological explanation of the familiar +fact that powerful mental shocks momently arrest the heart, and +sometimes arrest it for ever? That which a powerful current will do +applied to the pneumogastric nerve, will be done by a profound +agitation of grief or joy—truly called a heart-shaking influence. The +agitation of the great centres of thought is communicated to the +spinal chord, and from it to the nerves which issue to various parts +of the body: the limbs are violently moved, the glands are excited to +increased activity, the tears flow, the facial muscles contract, the +chest expands, laughter or sobs, dances of delight and shouts of joy, +these and the manifold expressions of an agitated emotion, are the +after results—the first effect is an arrest, more or less fugitive, +followed by an increase of the heart's action. If the organism be +vigorous, the effect of a powerful emotion is a sudden paleness, +indicating a momentary arrest of the heart. This may be but for an +instant; the heart pauses, and the lungs pause with it—"the breath is +taken away." This is succeeded by an energetic palpitation; the lungs +expand, the blood rushes to face and brain with increased force. +Should the organism be sickly or highly sensitive, the arrest is of +longer duration, and fainting, more or less prolonged, is the result. +In a very sensitive or very sickly organism the arrest is final. The +shock of joy and the shock of grief have both been known to kill. +</p> +<p> +The effects of a gentle stimulus we may expect to be very different, +since we know that a feeble electric current stimulates the heart's +action. The nature of the stimulus is always the same, no matter on +what occasion it arises. It may arise from a dash of cold water on the +face—as we see in the revival of the heart's action when we throw +water on the face of a fainting person. It may arise from inhaling an +irritant odor. It may arise from the pleasurable sight of a dear +friend, or the thrill of delight at the new birth of an idea. In every +case the brain is excited, either through an impression on a sensitive +nerve, or through the impulses of thought; and the sensibility thus +called into action necessarily discharges itself through one or more +of the easiest channels; and among the easiest is that of the +pneumogastric nerve. But the heart thus acted on in turn reacts. Its +increased energy throws more blood into the brain, which draws its +sustaining power from the blood. +</p> +<p> +Experimentalists have discovered another luminous fact connected with +this influence of the brain upon the heart, namely, that although a +current of a certain intensity (varying of course with the nature of +the organism) will infallibly arrest the heart, if applied at once, +yet if we begin with a feeble current and go on gradually increasing +its intensity, we may at last surpass the degree which would have +produced instantaneous arrest, and yet the heart will continue to beat +energetically. +</p> +<p> +The effect of repetition in diminishing a stimulus is here very +noticeable. It will serve to explain why, according to the traditions +of familiar experience, we are careful to break the announcement of +disastrous news, by intimating something much less calamitous, +wherewith to produce the first shock, and then, when the heart has +withstood that, we hope it may have energy to meet the more agitating +emotions. The same fact will also serve, partly, to explain why from +repetition the effect of smoking is no longer as it is at first to +produce paleness, sweating, and sickness. The heart ceases to be +sensibly affected by the stimulus. +</p> +<a name="628">{628}</a> +<p> +Returning to the effects of a gentle stimulus, we can read therein the +rationale of change of scene, especially of foreign travel, in +restoring the exhausted energies. The gentle excitement of novel and +pleasurable sights is not, as people generally suppose, merely a +mental stimulus—a pleasure which passes away without a physical +influence; on the contrary, it is inseparably connected with an +increased activity of the circulation, and <i>this</i> brings with it an +increased activity of all the processes of waste and repair. If the +excitement and fatigue be not too great, even the sickly traveller +finds himself stronger and happier, in spite of bad food, irregular +hours, and many other conditions which at home would have enfeebled +him. I have heard a very distinguished physician (Sir Henry Holland) +say that such is his conviction of the beneficial influence of even +slight nervous stimulus on the nutritive processes, that when the +patient cannot have change of scene, change of room is of some +advantage—nay, even change of furniture, if there cannot be change +of room! +</p> +<p> +To those who have thoroughly grasped the principle of the indissoluble +conjunction of nutrition and sensation, such effects are obvious +deductions. They point to the great importance of pleasure as an +element of effective life. They lead to the question whether much of +the superior health of youth is not due to the greater amount of +pleasurable excitement which life affords to young minds. +</p> +<p> +Certain it is that much of the marvellous activity of some old men, +especially of men engaged in politics or in interesting professions, +may be assigned to the greater stimulus given to their bodily +functions by the pleasurable excitement of their minds. Men who +vegetate sink prematurely into old age. The fervid wheels of life +revolve upon excitement. If the excitement be too intense, the wheels +take fire; but if the mental stimulus be simply pleasurable, it is +eminently beneficial. +</p> +<p> +Every impression reacts on the circulation, a slight impression +producing a slight acceleration, a powerful impression, producing an +arrest more or less prolonged. The "shock" of a wound and the "pain" +of an operation cause faintness, sometimes death. Indeed, it is useful +to know that many severe operations are dangerous only because of the +shock or pain, and can be performed with impunity if the patient first +be rendered insensible by chloroform. On the other hand, the mere +irritation of a nerve so as to produce severe pain will produce +syncope or death in an animal which is very feeble or exhausted. It is +possible to crush the whole of the upper part of the spinal chord (the +<i>medulla oblongata</i>) without arresting the action of the heart, if the +animal has been rendered insensible by chloroform; whereas without +such precautions a very slight irritation of the medulla suffices to +arrest the heart. +</p> +<p> +A moment's reflection will disclose the reason of the remarkable +differences observed in human beings in the matter of sensitiveness. +The stupid are stupid, not simply because their nervous development is +below the average, but also because the connection between the two +great central organs, brain and heart, is comparatively languid; the +pneumogastric is not in them a ready channel for the discharge of +nervous excitement. The sensitive are sensitive because in them the +connection is rapid and easy. All nervous excitement must discharge +itself through one or more channels; but <i>what</i> channels, will depend +on the native and acquired tendencies of the organism. In highly +sensitive animals a mere prick on the skin can be proved to affect the +beating of the heart; but you may lacerate a reptile without sensibly +affecting its pulse. In like manner, a pleasurable sight or a +suggestive thought will quicken the pulse of an intelligent man, +whereas his stupid brother may be the spectator of festal or solemn +scenes and the auditor of noble eloquence with scarcely a change. +</p> +<a name="629">{629}</a> +<p> +The highly sensitive organism is one in which the reactions of +sensibility on the circulation, and of the circulation on the +sensibility, are most direct and rapid. This is often the source of +weakness and inefficiency—as we see in certain feminine natures of +both sexes, wherein the excessive sensitiveness does not lie in an +unusual development of the nervous centres, but in an unusual +development of the direct connection between brain and heart. There +are men and women of powerful brains in whom this rapid transmission +of sensation to the heart is not observable; the nervous force +discharges itself through other channels. There are men and women of +small brains in whom "the irritability" is so great that almost every +sensation transmits its agitating influence to the heart. +</p> +<p> +And now we are in a condition to appreciate the truth which was +confusedly expressed in the ancient doctrine respecting the heart as +the great emotional organ. It still lives in our ordinary speech, but +has long been banished from the text-books of physiology, though it is +not, in my opinion, a whit more unscientific than the modern doctrine +respecting the brain (meaning the cerebral hemispheres) as the +exclusive organ of sensation. That the heart, as a muscle, is not +endowed with the property of sensibility—a property exclusively +possessed by ganglionic tissue—we all admit. But the heart, as the +central organ of the circulation, is so indissolubly connected with +every manifestation of sensibility, and is so delicately susceptible +to all emotional agitations, that we may not improperly regard it as +the ancients regarded it, in the light of the chief centre of feeling; +for the ancients had no conception of the heart as an organ specially +endowed with sensibility—they only thought of it as the chief agent +of the sensitive soul. And is not this the conception we moderns form +of the brain? We do not imagine the cerebral mass, as a mere mass, and +unrelated to the rest of the organism, to have in itself sensibility; +but we conceive it as the centre of a great system, dependent for its +activity on a thousand influences, sensitive because sensibility is +the form of life peculiar to it, but living only in virtue of the +vital activities of the whole organism. Thus the heart, because its +action is momently involved in every emotion, and because every +emotion reacts upon it, may, as truly as the brain, be called the +great emotional centre. Neither brain nor heart can claim that title +exclusively. They may claim it together. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="630">{630}</a> +<br> + +<h2>From The Month. +<br><br> +THE DREAM OF GERONTIUS. +<br><br> +BY JOHN HENRY NEWMAN, D.D. +<br><br> +[Concluded.] +<br><br> +§4.</h2> +<br> +<pre> +SOUL. + + But hark! upon my sense + Comes a fierce hubbub, which would make me fear, + Could I be frighted. + +ANGEL. + + We are now arrived + Close on the judgment-court; that sullen howl + Is from the demons who assemble there. + It is the middle region, where of old + Satan appeared among the sons of God, + To cast his jibes and scoffs at holy Job. + So now his legions throng the vestibule, + Hungry and wild, to claim their property, + And gather souls for hell. Hist to their cry. + +SOUL. + + How sour and how uncouth a dissonance! + +DEMONS. +</pre> + +<table> <!--DO NOT MODIFY anything in this table, especially spaces and newlines --> +<tr> +<td> +<pre> + Low-born clods + Of brute earth, + To become gods, + By a new birth, + And a score of merits, + As if ought + Of the high thought, + Of the great spirits, + The powers blest, + + Of the proud dwelling + Dispossessed, + + + + + Who after expelling + + + + + + + + + + + + +</pre> + </td> + <td width="5%"></td> + <td> + <pre> + + They aspire + + And an extra grace, + + Could stand in place + And the glance of fire + + The lords by right, + The primal owners + And realm of light, + Aside thrust, + Chucked down, + By the sheer might + Of a despot's will, + Of a tyrant's frown, + Their hosts, gave, + Triumphant still, + And still unjust, + Each forfeit crown + To psalm-droners + And canting groaners, + To every slave, + And pious cheat, + And crawling knave, + Who licked the dust + Under his feet. + + </pre> + </td> +</tr> +</table> +<br> +<a name="631">{631}</a> +<br> +<pre> +ANGEL. + + It is the restless panting of their being; + Like beasts of prey, who, caged within their bars, + In a deep hideous purring have their life, + And an incessant pacing to and fro. + +DEMONS. +</pre> + +<table><!--DO NOT MODIFY anything in this table, especially spaces and newlines --> +<tr> +<td> +<pre> + The mind bold + And independent, + The purpose free, + So we are told, + Must not think + To have the ascendant, + One whose breath + Before his death; + Which fools adore, + When life is o'er, + Which rattle and stink, + E'en in the flesh. + No flesh hath he; + Ha! ha! + + + Afresh, afresh, + + + + As priestlings prate, + + + + + And envy and hate +</pre> + </td> + <td width="5%"></td> + <td><!--DO NOT MODIFY anything in this table, especially spaces and newlines --> +<pre> + + + + + + What's a saint? + Doth the air taint + A bundle of bones, + Ha! ha! + + + We cry his pardon! + + For it hath died, + 'Tis crucified + Day by day, + Ha! ha! + That holy clay, + Ha! ha! + And such fudge, + Is his guerdon + Before the judge, + And pleads and atones + For spite and grudge, + And bigot mood, + And greed of blood. +</pre> + </td> +</tr> +</table> +<p> +SOUL. +</p> +<pre> + How impotent they are! and yet on earth + They have repute for wondrous power and skill; + And books describe, how that the very face + Of th' evil one, if seen, would have a force + To freeze the very blood, and choke the life + Of him who saw it. +</pre> +<br> +<a name="632">{632}</a> +<br> +<p> +ANGEL. +</p> +<pre> + In thy trial state + Thou hadst a traitor nestling close at home, + Connatural, who with the powers of hell + Was leagued, and of thy senses kept the keys, + And to that deadliest foe unlocked thy heart. + And therefore is it, in respect of man, + Those fallen ones show so majestical. + But, when some child of grace, angel or saint, + Pure and upright in his integrity + Of nature, meets the demons on their raid, + They scud away as cowards from the fight. + Nay, oft hath holy hermit in his cell, + Not yet disburdened of mortality, + Mocked at their threats and warlike overtures; + Or, dying, when they swarmed like flies, around, + Defied them, and departed to his judge. +</pre> +<p> +DEMONS. +</p> +<table><!--DO NOT MODIFY anything in this table, especially spaces and newlines --> +<tr> + <td> + <pre> + Virtue and vice, + 'Tis all the same; + Of the venomous flame, + Give him his price, + + + + With sordid aim, +</pre> + </td> + <td><!--DO NOT MODIFY anything in this table, especially spaces and newlines--> + <pre> + A knave's pretence. + Ha! ha! + A coward's plea. + Saint though he be, + From shrewd good sense + Ha! ha! + To the heaven above + Not from love. +</pre> +</td> + <td><!--DO NOT MODIFY anything in this table, especially spaces and newlines --> +<pre> + +Dread of hell-fire, + +Ha! ha! +He'll slave for hire; +And does but aspire + +Ha! ha! +</pre> +</td> +</tr> +</table> +<p> +SOUL. +</p> +<pre> + I see not those false spirits; shall I see + My dearest Master, when I reach his throne? + Or hear, at least, his awful judgment-word + With personal intonation, as I now + Hear thee, not see thee, angel? Hitherto + All has been darkness since I left the earth; + Shall I remain thus sight-bereft all through + My penance-time? if so, how comes it then + That I have hearing still, and taste, and touch, + Yet not a glimmer of that princely sense + Which binds ideas in one, and makes them live? +</pre> +<br> +<a name="633">{633}</a> +<p> +ANGEL. +</p> +<pre> + Nor touch, nor taste, nor hearing hast thou now; + Thou livest in a world of signs and types, + The presentations of most holy truths, + Living and strong, which now encompass thee. + A disembodied soul, thou hast by right + No converse with aught else beside thyself; + But, lest so stern a solitude should load + And break thy being, in mercy are vouchsafed + Some lower measures of perception, + Which seem to thee, as though through channels brought, + Through ear, or nerves, or palate, which are gone. + And thou art wrapped and swathed around in dreams, + Dreams that are true, yet enigmatical; + For the belongings of thy present state, + Save through such symbols, come not home to thee. + And thus thou tell'st of space and time and size, + Of fragrant, solid, bitter, musical, + Of fire, and of refreshment after fire; + As (let me use similitude of earth, + To aid thee in the knowledge thou dost ask)— + As ice which blisters may be said to burn. + Nor hast thou now extension, with its parts + Correlative,—long habit cozens thee,— + Nor power to move thyself, nor limbs to move. + Hast thou not heard of those, who after loss + Of hand or foot, still cried that they had pains + In hand or foot, as though they had it still? + So is it now with thee, who hast not lost + Thy hand or foot, but all which made up man. + So will it be, until the joyous day + Of resurrection, when thou wilt regain + All thou hast lost, new-made and glorified.— + —How, even now, the consummated saints + See God in heaven, I may not explicate:— + Meanwhile let it suffice thee to possess + Such means of converse as are granted thee, + Though till the beatific vision thou art blind; + For e'en thy purgatory, which comes like fire, + Is fire without its light. +</pre> +<p> +SOUL. +</p> +<pre> + His will be done! + I am not worthy e'er to see again + The face of day; far less his countenance, + Who is the very sun. Natheless, in life, + When I looked forward to my purgatory, + It ever was my solace to believe, + That, ere I plunged into th' avenging flame, + I had one sight of him to strengthen me. +</pre> +<p> +ANGEL. +</p> +<pre> + Nor rash nor vain is that presentiment; + Yes,—for one moment thou shalt see thy Lord. + Thus will it be: what time thou art arraigned + Before the dread tribunal, and thy lot + Is cast for ever, should it be to sit + On his right hand among his pure elect, + Then sight, or that which to the soul is sight, + As by a lightning-flash, will come to thee, + And thou shalt see, amid the dark profound, + Whom thy soul loveth, and would fain approach, + One moment; but thou knowest not, my child, + What thou dost ask: that sight of the Most Fair + Will gladden thee, but it will pierce thee too. +</pre> +<a name="634">{634}</a> +<p> +SOUL. +</p> +<pre> + Thou speakest darkly, angel; and an awe + Falls on me, and I fear lest I be rash. + +ANGEL. + + There was a mortal, who is now above + In the mid glory; he, when near to die, + Was given communion with the Crucified,— + Such, that the Master's very wounds were stamped + Upon his flesh; and, from the agony + Which thrilled through body and soul in that embrace, + Learn that the flame of the Everlasting Love + Doth burn, ere it transform. … +</pre> + +<h2>§ 5.</h2> +<pre> + … Hark to those sounds! + They come of tender beings angelical, + Least and most childlike of the sons of God. +</pre> +<p> +FIRST CHOIR OF ANGELICALS. +</p> +<table><!--DO NOT MODIFY anything in this table, especially spaces and newlines--> +<tr> +<td> +<pre> + Praise to the Holiest in the height, + In all his words most wonderful; + + To us his elder race he gave + Without the chastisement of pain, + + The younger son he willed to be + Spirit and flesh his parents were; + + The Eternal blessed his child and armed, + To serve as champion in the field + + To be his vice-roy in the world + Upon the frontier, toward the foe, +</pre> + </td> + <td width="5%"></td> + <td><!--DO NOT MODIFY anything in this table, especially spaces and newlines--> + <pre> +And in the depth be praise: +Most sure in all his ways! + +To battle and to win, +Without the soil of sin. + +A marvel in his birth: +His home was heaven and earth. + +And sent him hence afar, +Of elemental war. + +Of matter, and of sense; +A resolute defence. +</pre> + </td> +</tr> +</table> +<br> +<p> +ANGEL. +</p> +<pre> + We now have passed the gate, and are within + The house of judgment; and whereas on earth + Temples and palaces are formed of parts + Costly and rare, but all material, + So in the world of spirits nought is found, + To mould withal and form a whole, + But what is immaterial; and thus + The smallest portions of this edifice, + Cornice, or frieze, or balustrade, or stair, + The very pavement is made up of life— + Of holy, blessed, and immortal beings, + Who hymn their Maker's praise continually. +</pre> +<br> +<a name="635">{635}</a> +<br> +<p> +SECOND CHOIR OF ANGELICALS. +</p> +<table><!--DO NOT MODIFY anything in this table, especially spaces and newlines --> +<tr> +<td> +<pre> + Praise to the Holiest in the height, + In all his words most wonderful; + + Woe to thee, man! for he was found + And lost his heritage of heaven, + + Above him now the angry sky, + Who once had angels for his friends, + + O man! a savage kindred they: + He scaled the sea-side cave and clomb + + With now a fear and now a hope, + From youth to old, from sire to son, + + He dreed his penance age by age; + Slowly to doff his savage garb, + + And quickened by the Almighty's breath, + And taught by angel-visitings, + + And learned to call upon his name, + A household and a fatherland, + + Glory to him who from the mire, + Elaborated into life +</pre> + </td> + + <td width="5%"></td> + +<td><!--DO NOT MODIFY anything in this table, especially spaces and newlines --> +<pre> +And in the depth be praise: +Most sure in all his ways! + +A recreant in the fight; +And fellowship with light. + +Around the tempest's din +Has but the brutes for kin. + +To flee that monster brood +The giants of the wood. + +With aids which chance supplied, +He lived, and toiled, and died. + +And step by step began +And be again a man. + +And chastened by his rod, +At length he sought his God; + +And in his faith create +A city and a state. + +In patient length of days, +A people to his praise! +</pre> + </td> +</tr> +</table> +<p> +SOUL. +</p> +<pre> + The sound is like the rushing of the wind— + The summer wind—among the lofty pines; + Swelling and dying, echoing round about, + Now here, now distant, wild and beautiful; + While scattered from the branches it has stirred, + Descend ecstatic odors. +</pre> +<p> +THIRD CHOIR OF ANGELICALS. +</p> +<table><!--DO NOT MODIFY anything in this table, especially spaces and newlines--> +<tr> + <td> + <pre> + Praise to the Holiest in the height, + In all his words most wonderful; + + The angels, as beseemingly + At once were tried and perfected, + + For them no twilight or eclipse; + Twas hopeless, all-engulfing night, + + But to the younger race there rose + And slowly, surely, gracefully, + + And ages, opening out, divide + And from the hard and sullen mass + + O man! albeit the quickening ray + Takes him at length what once he was, + + Yet still between that earth and heaven— + A double agony awaits + + A double debt he has to pay— + The chill of death is past, and now + + Glory to him, who evermore + Who tears the soul from out its case, +</pre> + </td> + <td width="5%"></td> + <td><!--DO NOT MODIFY anything in this table, especially spaces and newlines --> + <pre> +And in the depth be praise: +Most sure in all his ways! + +To spirit-kind was given, +And took their seats in heaven. + +No growth and no decay: +Or beatific day. + +A hope upon its fall; +The morning dawned on all. + +The precious and the base, +Mature the heirs of grace. + +Lit from his second birth, +And heaven grows out of earth; + +His journey and its goal— +His body and his soul. + +The forfeit of his sins: +The penance-fire begins. + +By truth and justice reigns; +And burns away its stains! +</pre> +</td> +</tr> +</table> +<a name="636">{636}</a> +<br> +<pre> +ANGEL. + + They sing of thy approaching agony, + Which thou so eagerly didst question of: + It is the face of the incarnate God + Shall smite thee with that keen and subtle pain; + And yet the memory which it leaves will be + A sovereign febrifuge to heal the wound; + And yet withal it will the wound provoke, + And aggravate and widen it the more. + +SOUL. + + Thou speakest mysteries; still methinks I know + To disengage the tangle of thy words: + Yet rather would I hear thy angel voice, + Than for myself be thy interpreter. + +ANGEL. + + When then—if such thy lot—thou seest thy Judge, + The sight of him will kindle in thy heart + All tender, gracious, reverential thoughts. + Thou wilt be sick with love, and yearn for him, + And feel as though thou couldst but pity him, + That one so sweet should e'er have placed himself + At disadvantage such, as to be used + So vilely by a being so vile as thee. + There is a pleading in his pensive eyes + Will pierce thee to the quick, and trouble thee. + And thou wilt hate and loathe thyself; for, though + Now sinless, thou wilt feel that thou hast sinned, + As never thou didst feel; and wilt desire + To slink away, and hide thee from his sight; + And yet wilt have a longing aye to dwell + Within the beauty of his countenance. + And these two pains, so counter and so keen,— + The longing for him, when thou seest him not; + The shame of self at thought of seeing him,— + Will be thy veriest, sharpest purgatory. + +SOUL. + + My soul is in my hand: I have no fear,— + In his dear might prepared for weal or woe. + But hark! a deep, mysterious harmony + It floods me, like the deep and solemn sound + Of many waters. +</pre> +<a name="637">{637}</a> +<pre> +ANGEL. + + We have gained the stairs + Which rise toward the presence-chamber; there + A band of mighty angels keep the way + On either side, and hymn the incarnate God. + +ANGELS OF THE SACRED STAIR. + + Father, whose goodness none can know, but they + Who see thee face to face, + By man hath come the infinite display + Of thine all-loving grace; + But fallen man—the creature of a day— + Skills not that love to trace. + It needs, to tell the triumph thou hast wrought, + An angel's deathless fire, an angel's reach of thought. + + It needs that very angel, who with awe + Amid the garden shade, + The great Creator in his sickness saw, + Soothed by a creature's aid, + And agonized, as victim of the law + Which he himself had made; + For who can praise him in his depth and height, + But he who saw him reel in that victorious fight? + +SOUL. + + Hark! for the lintels of the presence-gate + Are vibrating and echoing back the strain. +</pre> +<p> +FOURTH CHOIR OF ANGELICALS. +</p> +<table><!--DO NOT MODIFY anything in this table, especially spaces and newlines --> +<tr> + <td> + <pre> + Praise to the Holiest in the height, + In all his words most wonderful; + + The foe blasphemed the holy Lord, + In that he placed his puppet man + + For even in his best estate, + A sorry sentinel was he, + + As though a thing, who for his help + Could cope with those proud rebel hosts, + + And when, by blandishment of Eve, + He shrieked in triumph, and he cried, + + The Maker by his word is bound, + He must abandon to his doom, +</pre> +</td> +<td width="5%"></td> +<td><!--DO NOT MODIFY anything in this table, especially spaces and newlines --> +<pre> +And in the depth be praise +Most sure in all his ways! + +As if he reckoned ill, +The frontier place to fill. + +With amplest gifts endued, +A being of flesh and blood. + +Must needs possess a wife, +Who had angelic life. + +That earth-born Adam fell, +"A sorry sentinel. + +Escape or cure is none; +And slay his darling Son." +</pre> +</td> +</tr> +</table> +<p> +ANGEL. +</p> +<pre> + And now the threshold, as we traverse it, + Utters aloud its glad responsive chant. +</pre> +<a name="638">{638}</a> +<br> +<p> +FIFTH CHOIR OF ANGELICALS. +</p> +<table><!--DO NOT MODIFY anything in this table, especially spaces and newlines--> +<tr> + <td> + <pre> + Praise to the Holiest in the height, + In all his words most wonderful; + + O loving wisdom of our God! + A second Adam to the fight + + O wisest love! that flesh and blood + Should strive afresh against the foe, + + And that a higher gift than grace + God's presence and his very self, + + O generous love! that he who smote + The double agony in man + + And in the garden secretly, + Should teach his brethren and inspire +</pre> + </td> + <td width="5%"></td> + <td><!--DO NOT MODIFY anything in this table, especially spaces and newlines--> + <pre> + And in the depth be praise: + Most sure in all his ways! + + When all was sin and shame, + And to the rescue came. + + Which did in Adam fail, + Should strive and should prevail. + + Should flesh and blood refine, + And essence all-divine. + + In man for man the foe, + For man should undergo; + + And on the cross on high, + To suffer and to die. +</pre> +</td> +</tr> +</table> + +<h2>§ 6.</h2> +<br> +<pre> +ANGEL. + + The judgment now is near, for we are come + Into the veiled presence of our God. + +SOUL. + + I hear the voices that I left on earth. + +ANGEL. + + It is the voice of friends around thy bed, + Who say the "Subvenite" with the priest. + Hither the echoes come; before the throne + Stands the great angel of the agony, + The same who strengthened him, what time he knelt + Lone in the garden shade, bedewed with blood. + That angel best can plead with him for all + Tormented souls, the dying and the dead. + +ANGEL OF THE AGONY. + + Jesu! by that shuddering dread which fell on thee; + Jesu! by that cold dismay which sickened thee; + Jesu! by that pang of heart which thrilled in thee; + Jesu! by that mount of sins which crippled thee; + Jesu! by that sense of guilt which stifled thee; + Jesu! by that innocence which girdled thee; + Jesu! by that sanctity which reigned in thee; + Jesu! by that Godhead which was one with thee; + Jesu! spare these souls which are so dear to thee, + Who in prison, calm and patient, wait for thee; + Hasten, Lord, their hour, and bid them come to thee, + To that glorious home, where they shall ever gaze on thee. +</pre> +<a name="639">{639}</a> +<pre> +SOUL. + + I go before my Judge. Ah! … + +ANGEL. + + … Praise to his name! + The eager spirit has darted from my hold, + And, with the intemperate energy of love, + Flies to the dear feet of Emmanuel; + But, ere it reach them, the keen sanctity, + Which with its effluence, like a glory, clothes + And circles round the Crucified, has seized, + And scorched, and shrivelled it; and now it lies + Passive and still before the awful throne. + O happy, suffering soul! for it is safe, + Consumed, yet quickened, by the glance of God. + +SOUL. + + Take me away, and in the lowest deep + There let me be, + And there in hope the lone night-watches keep, + Told out for me. + There, motionless and happy in my pain, + Lone, not forlorn,— + There will I sing my sad perpetual strain, + Until the morn. + There will I sing, and soothe my stricken breast, + Which ne'er can cease + To throb, and pine, and languish, till possessed + Of its sole peace. + There will I sing my absent Lord and love:— + Take me away, + That sooner I may rise, and go above, + And see him in the truth of everlasting day. +</pre> +<h2>§ 7.</h2> +<pre> +ANGEL. + + Now let the golden prison ope its gates, + Making sweet music, as each fold revolves + Upon its ready hinge. And ye, great powers, + Angels of purgatory, receive from me + My charge, a precious soul, until the day, + When, from all bond and forfeiture released, + I shall reclaim it for the courts of light. +</pre> +<a name="640">{640}</a> +<p> +SOULS IN PURGATORY. +</p> +<p> +1. Lord, thou hast been our refuge: in every generation; +</p> +<p> +2. Before the hills were born, and the world was: + from age to age thou art God. +</p> +<p> +3. Bring us not, Lord, very low: for thou hast said, + Come back again, ye sons of Adam. +</p> +<p> +4. A thousand years before thine eyes are but as yesterday: + and as a watch of the night which is come and gone. +</p> +<p> +5. Though the grass spring up in the morning; + yet in the evening it shall shrivel up and die. +</p> +<p> +6. Thus we fail in thine anger; and in thy wrath we are troubled. +</p> +<p> +7. Thou hast set our sins in thy sight: + and our round of days in the light of thy countenance. +</p> +<p> +8. Come back, O Lord! how long? and be entreated for thy servants. +</p> +<p> +9. In thy morning we shall be filled with thy mercy: + we shall rejoice and be in pleasure all our days. +</p> +<p> +10. We shall be glad according to the days of our humiliation; + and the years in which we have seen evil. +</p> +<p> +11. Look, O Lord, upon thy servants and on thy work; + and direct their children, +</p> +<p> +12. And let the beauty of the Lord our God be upon us: + and the work of our hands direct thou it. + Glory be to the father and to the Son: and to the Holy Ghost. + As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be; + world without end. Amen. +</p> +<pre> +ANGEL. + + Softly and gently, dearest, sweetest soul + In my most loving arms I now enfold thee, + And, o'er the penal waters, as they roll, + I poise thee, and I lower thee, and hold thee. + + And carefully I dip thee in the lake, + And thou, without a sob or a resistance, + Dost through the flood thy rapid passage take + Sinking deep, deeper, into the dim distance. + + Angels, to whom the willing task is given, + Shall tend, and nurse, and lull thee, as thou liest; + And masses on the earth, and prayers in heaven, + Shall aid thee at the throne of the Most Highest. + + Farewell, but not for ever! brother dear, + Be brave and patient on thy bed of sorrow; + Swiftly shall pass thy night of trial here, + And I will come and wake thee on the morrow. +</pre> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="641">{641}</a> +<br> +<h2>From The Edinburgh Review. (Abridged.) +<br><br> +THE CHURCH AND MOSQUE OF ST. SOPHIA.</h2> +<br> +<p> +1. <i>Byzantine Architecture; illustrated by Examples of Edifices +erected in the East during the earliest ages of Christianity</i>. With +Historical and Archaeological Descriptions. By C. TEXIER and E. P. +PULLAN. Folio. London: 1864. +</p> +<p> +2. <i>Epigraphik von Byzantium und Constantinopolis, von den ältesten +Zeiten bis zum J.</i> 1453. Von Dr. S. A. DETHIER und Dr. A. D. +MORDTMANN. 4to. Wien: 1864. +</p> +<p> +3. <i>Acta Patriarchates Constantinopolitani</i>, 1305-1402, <i>e Codice MS. +Bibliothecae Palat. Vindobonensis; edentibus</i> D. D. MIKLOVISCH et +MULLER. 8vo. 2 vols. Viennse: 1860-2. +</p> +<p> +4. <i>Die alt-christliche Baudenkmale Konstantinopels von V. bis XII. +Jahrhundert. Auf Befehl seiner Majestät des Königs aufgenommen und +historisch erläutert von</i> W. SALZENBERG. <i>Im Anhange des Silentiarius +Paulus Beschreibung der heiligen Sophia und der Ambon, metrisch +übersetzt und mit Anmerkungen versehen, von</i> Dr. C. W. KORTÜM. Fol. +Berlin: 1854. +</p> +<p> +5. <i>Aya Sofia, Constantinople, as recently restored by Order of H. M. +the Sultan Abdul Medjid</i>. From the original Drawings of Chevalier +GASPARD FOSSATI. Lithographed by Louis HAGHE, Esq. Imperial folio. +London: 1854. +</p> +<br> +<p> +There is not one among the evidences of Moslem conquest more galling +to Christian associations than the occupation of Justinian's ancient +basilica for the purposes of Mohammedan worship. The most commonplace +sight-seer from the west feels a thrill when his eye falls for the +first time upon the flaring cresent which surmounts "Sophia's cupola +with golden gleam;" and this emotion deepens into a feeling of awe at +the mysterious dispensations of Providence, when he has stood beneath +the unaltered and still stately dome, and +</p> +<pre> + "surveyed + The sanctuary, the while the usurping Moslem prayed." +</pre> +<p> +For oriental Christians, this sense of bitterness is hardly second to +that with which they regard the Turkish occupation of Jerusalem +itself. In the latter, however they may writhe under the political +supremacy of their unbelieving master, still, as the right of access +to those monuments which form the peculiar object of Christian +veneration is practically undisturbed, they are spared the double +indignity of religious profanation super-added to social wrong. But +the mosque of St. Sophia is, in Christian eyes, a standing monument at +once of Moslem sacrilege and of Christian defeat, the sense of which +is perpetuated and embittered by the preservation of its ancient, but +now desecrated name. +</p> +<p> +To an imaginative visitor of the modern mosque, it might seem as if +the structure itself were not unconscious of this wrong. The very +position of the building is a kind of silent protest against the +unholy use to which its Turkish masters have perverted it. Like all +ancient Christian churches, it was built exactly in the line of east +and west; and, as the great altar, which stood in the semicircular +apse, was directly at the eastern point of the building, the +worshippers in the old St. Sophia necessarily faced directly eastward; +and all the appliances of their worship were arranged with a view to +that position. Now, in the exigencies of Mohammedan ecclesiology, +since the worshipper must turn to the Kibla at Mecca (that is, in +Constantinople, to the south-east), the <i>mihrab</i>, or sacred niche, in +the modern St. Sophia is <a name="642">{642}</a> necessarily placed out of the centre of +the apse; and thus the <i>mimber</i> (pulpit), the prayer carpets, and the +long ranks of worshippers themselves, present an appearance singularly +at variance with every notion of architectural harmony, being arranged +in lines, not parallel, but oblique, to the length of the edifice, and +out of keeping with all the details of the original construction. It +is as though the dead walls of this venerable pile had retained more +of the spirit of their founder than the degenerate sons of the fallen +Rome of the east, and had refused to bend themselves at the will of +that hateful domination before which the living worshippers tamely +yielded or impotently fled! +</p> +<p> +The mosque of St. Sophia had long been an object of curious interest +to travellers in the east. Their interest, however, had seldom risen +beyond curiosity; and it was directed rather toward St. Sophia as it +is, than to the Christian events and traditions with which it is +connected. For those, indeed, who know the grudging and capricious +conditions under which alone a Christian visitor is admitted to a +mosque, and the jealous scrutiny to which he is subjected during his +visit, it will be easy to understand how rare and how precarious have +been the opportunities for a complete or exact study of this, the most +important of all the monuments of Byzantine art; and, notwithstanding +its exceeding interest for antiquarian and artistic purposes, far more +of our knowledge of its details was derived from the contemporary +description of Procopius [Footnote 126] or Agathias, [Footnote 127] +from the verses of Paulus Silentiarius, [Footnote 128] from the casual +allusions of other ancient authorities, and, above all, from the +invaluable work of Du Gauge, which is the great repertory of +everything that has been written upon ancient or mediaeval Byzantium, +than from the observation even of the most favored modern visitors of +Constantinople, until the publication of the works named at the head +of these pages. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 126: <i>De Edificiis</i>, lib. i. c. i. ] +<br><br> + [Footnote 127: Pp. 152-3.] +<br><br> + [Footnote 128: A very good German version, with most valuable notes, + is appended to the text of Saltzenberg's <i>Baudenkmale.</i>] +</p> +<p> +For the elaborate account of the present condition of the mosque of +St. Sophia which we now possess, we are indebted to the happy +necessity by which the Turkish officials, in undertaking the recent +restoration of the building, were led to engage the services of an +eminent European architect, Chevalier Fossati, in whose admirable +drawings, as lithographed in the "Aya Sofia," every arch and pillar of +the structure is reproduced. The archaeological and historical +details, which lay beyond the province of a volume mainly professional +in its object, are supplied in the learned and careful work of M. +Salzenberg, who during the progress of the restoration was sent to +Constantinople at the cost of the late King of Prussia, for the +express purpose of copying and describing exactly every object which +might serve to throw light on Byzantine history, religion, or art, or +on the history and condition of the ancient church of St. Sophia, the +most venerable monument of them all. +</p> +<p> +Nor is it possible to imagine, under all the circumstances of the +case, a combination of opportunities more favorable for the purpose. +From long neglect and injudicious or insufficient reparation, the +mosque had fallen into so ruinous a condition, that, in the year 1847, +the late sultan, Abdul Medjid, found it necessary to direct a +searching survey of the entire building, and eventually a thorough +repair. In the progress of the work, while engaged near the entrance +of the northern transept, M. Fossati discovered, beneath a thin coat +of plaster (evidently laid on to conceal the design from the eyes of +true believers) a beautiful mosaic picture, almost uninjured, and +retaining all its original brilliancy of color. A further examination +showed that these mosaics extended throughout the building; and, with +a liberality which every lover of art must gratefully applaud, the +sultan at once acceded to the suggestion of M. Fossati, <a name="643">{643}</a> and +ordered that the plaster should be removed throughout the interior; +thus exposing once more to view the original decorations of the +ancient basilica. It was while the mosque was still crowded with the +scaffolding erected to carry on this most interesting work, that M. +Salzenberg arrived in Constantinople. He thankfully acknowledges the +facilities afforded to him, as well by the Turkish officials as by the +Chevalier Fossati; and, although the specimens of the purely pictorial +decorations of the ancient church which he has published are not as +numerous as the reader may possibly expect, yet they are extremely +characteristic, and full of religious as well as of historical and +antiquarian interest. +</p> +<p> +Notwithstanding the beauty and attractiveness of M. Louis Haghe's +magnificent lithographs of Chevalier Fossati's drawings published in +the "Aya Sofia," the subject has received in England far less +attention than it deserves. There is not an incident in Byzantine +history with which the church of St. Sophia is not associated. There +is not a characteristic of Byzantine art of which it does not contain +abundant examples. It recalls in numberless details, preserved in +monuments in which time has wrought little change and which the +jealousy or contempt of the conquerors has failed to destroy or even +to travesty, interesting illustrations of the doctrine, the worship, +and the disciplinary usages of the ancient Eastern Church, which are +with difficulty traced, at present, in the living system of her +degenerate representative. To all these researches the wider +cultivation of art and of history, which our age has accepted as its +calling, ought to lend a deeper significance and a more solemn +interest. St. Sophia ought no longer to be a mere lounge for the +sightseer or a spectacle for the lover of the picturesque. +</p> +<p> +The history of this venerable church may be said to reach back as far +as the first selection of Byzantium by Constantine as the new capital +of his empire. Originally, the pretensions of Byzantium to +ecclesiastical rank were sufficiently humble, its bishop being but a +suffragan of the metropolitan of Heraclea. But, from the date of the +translation of the seat of empire, Constantine's new capital began to +rise in dignity. The personal importance which accrued to the bishop +from his position at the court of the emperor, was soon reflected upon +his see. The first steps of its upward progress are unrecorded; but +within little more than half a century from the foundation of the +imperial city, the celebrated fifth canon of the council which was +held therein in 381 not only distinctly assigned to the Bishop of +Constantinople "the primacy of honor, next after the Bishop of Rome," +but, by alleging as the ground of this precedence the principle "that +Constantinople is the new Rome," laid the foundation of that rivalry +with the older Rome which had its final issue in the complete +separation of the Eastern from the Western Church. +</p> +<p> +The dignity of the see was represented in the beauty and magnificence +of its churches, and especially of its cathedral. One of the +considerations by which Constantine was influenced in the selection of +Byzantium for his new capital, lay in the advantages for architectural +purposes which the position commanded. The rich and various marbles of +Proconnesus; the unlimited supply of timber from the forests of the +Euxine; the artistic genius and the manual dexterity of the architects +and artisans of Greece—all lay within easy reach of Byzantium; and, +freely as Constantine availed himself of these resources for the +embellishment of the new city in its palaces, its offices of state, +and its other public buildings, the magnificence which he exhibited in +his churches outstripped all his other undertakings. Of these churches +by far the most magnificent was that which forms the subject of the +present notice. Its title is often a subject of misapprehension to +those who, being accustomed to regard <a name="644">{644}</a> "Sophia" merely as a +feminine name, are led to suppose that the church of Constantine was +dedicated to a saint so called. The calendar, as well of the Greek as +of the Latin Church, does, it is true, commemorate more than one saint +named Sophia. Thus one Sophia is recorded as having suffered martyrdom +under Adrian, in company with her three daughters, Faith, Hope, and +Charity. Another is said to have been martyred in one of the latter +persecutions together with St. Irene; and a third is still specially +venerated as a martyr at Fermo (the ancient Firmum). But it was not +any of these that supplied the title of Constantine's basilica. That +church was dedicated to the +<span style="vertical-align:-25%"> +<img alt="" src="images/i644.jpg"> +</span>,—the HOLY WISDOM; that is, +to the Divine Logos, or Word of God, under the title of the "Holy +Wisdom," borrowed by adaptation from the well-known prophetic allusion +contained in the eighth chapter of Proverbs, and familiar in the +theological language of the fourth century. +</p> +<p> +The original church, however, which Constantine erected in 325-6 was +but the germ out of which the latter St. Sophia grew. The early +history of St. Sophia is marked by many vicissitudes, and comprises, +in truth, the history of four distinct churches, that of Constantine, +that of Constantius, that of Theodosius, and finally that of +Justinian. +</p> +<p> +Thirty-four years after the foundation of St. Sophia by the first +Christian emperor, his son, Constantius, either because of its +insufficient size, or owing to some injury which it had sustained in +an earthquake, rebuilt it, and united with it the adjoining church of +the <i>Irene</i>, or "peace" (also built by his father), forming both into +one grand edifice. And, although the church of Constantius was not +much longer lived than that of his father, it is memorable as the +theatre for several years of the eloquence of St. John Chrysostom, +while its destruction was a monument at once of the triumph and of the +fall of that great father. It was within the walls of this church that +his more than human eloquence was wont to draw, even from the light +and frivolous audiences of that pleasure-loving city, plaudits, the +notice of which in his own pages reads so strange to modern eyes. It +was here that he provoked the petty malice of the imperial directress +of fashion, by his inimitable denunciation of the indelicacy of female +dress. Here, too, was enacted that memorable scene, which, for deep +dramatic interest, has seldom been surpassed in history—the fallen +minister Eutropius clinging to the altar of St. Sophia for protection +against the popular fury, while Chrysostom, in a glorious exordium on +the instability of human greatness, [Footnote 129] disarms the rage +of the populace by exciting their commiseration for their fallen +enemy. Nor can we wonder that those who had hung entranced upon that +eloquent voice should, when it was silenced by his cruel and arbitrary +banishment, have recognized a Nemesis in the destruction of the church +which had so often echoed with the golden melody of its tones. St. +Sophia, by a divine judgment, as the people believed, was destroyed +for the second time in 404, in the tumult which followed the +banishment of St. John Chrysostom. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 129: <i>Horn, in Eutropium Patricium.</i> Opp. tom iii., p. 399 + <i>et seq.</i> (Migne ed.)] +</p> +<p> +The third St. Sophia was built in 415 by Theodosius the Younger. The +church of Theodosius lasted longer than either of those which went +before it. It endured through the long series of controversies on the +Incarnation. It witnessed their first beginning, and it almost +survived their close. It was beneath the golden roof of the Theodosian +basilica that Nestorius scandalized the orthodoxy of his flock, and +gave the first impulse to the controversy which bears his name, by +applauding the vehement declaration of the preacher who denied to the +Virgin Mary the title of mother of God. And it was from its ambo or +<a name="645">{645}</a> pulpit that the Emperor Zeno promulgated his celebrated +Henoticon—the "decree of union" by which he vainly hoped to heal the +disastrous division. The St. Sophia of Theodosius was the scene of the +first act in the long struggle between Constantinople and Rome, the +great Acacian schism; when, at the hazard of his life, an impetuous +monk, one of the fiery "Sleepless Brotherhood," pinned the papal +excommunication on the cope of Acacius as he was advancing to the +altar. And it witnessed the close of that protracted contest, in the +complete and unreserved submission to Rome which was exacted by the +formulary of Pope Hormisdas as the condition of reconciliation. The +structure of Theodosius stood a hundred and fourteen years—from 415 +to 529, but perished at length in the fifth year of Justinian, in a +disaster which, for a time, made Constantinople all but a desert—the +memorable battle of the blue and green factions of the hippodrome, +known in history as the <i>Nika</i> sedition. +</p> +<p> +The restoration of St. Sophia, which had been destroyed in the +conflagration caused by the violence of the rioters, became, in the +view of Justinian, a duty of Christian atonement no less than of +imperial munificence. There is no evidence that the burning of the +church arose from any special act of impiety directed against it in +particular; but it is certain that the ancient feuds of the religious +parties in the east entered vitally as an element of discord into this +fatal sedition; and even the soldiers who had been engaged on the side +of the civil power in the repression of the tumult, and who were +chiefly legionaries enlisted from among the Heruli, the most savage of +the barbarian tribes of the empire, had contributed largely to the +sacrilegious enormities by which, even more than by the destruction of +human life, the religious feelings of the city had been outraged. +</p> +<p> +The entire history of the reconstruction exhibits most curiously the +operation of the same impulse. It was undertaken with a +large-handedness, and urged on with an energy, which bespeak for other +than merely human motives. Scarce had Constantinople begun to recover +after the sedition from the stupor of its alarm, and the affrighted +citizens to steal back from the Asiatic shore to which they had fled +in terror with their families and their most valuable effects, when +Justinian commissioned Anthemius of Tralles to prepare the plans of +the new basilica, on a scale of magnificence till then unknown. On the +23d of February, 532, within forty days from the catastrophe, the +first stone of the new edifice was solemnly laid. Orders, to borrow +the words of the chronicler, [Footnote 130] "were issued +simultaneously to all the dukes, satraps, judges, quaestors, and +prefects" throughout the empire, to send in from their several +governments pillars, peristyles, bronzes, gates, marbles, and all +other materials suitable for the projected undertaking. How +efficiently the order was carried out may yet be read in the motley, +though magnificent array of pillars and marbles which form the most +striking characteristic of St. Sophia, and which are for the most +part, as we shall see, the spoil of the older glories of Roman and +Grecian architecture. We shall only mention here eight porphyry +columns from the Temple of the Sun at Baalbec, which Aurelian had sent +to Rome, and which, having come into the possession of a noble Roman +widow, named Marcia, as her dowry, were presented by that pious lady +to Justinian, as an offering +<span style="vertical-align:-25%"> +<img alt="" src="images/i645.jpg"> +</span>, "for the Salvation of her soul." [Footnote 131] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 130: <i>Anonymi de Antiquit. Constantinop.</i> (in Banduri's + <i>Imperium Orientale</i>), p. 55.] +<br><br> + [Footnote 131: <i>Anonymi</i>, p. 55.] +</p> +<p> +Indeed, some of the incidents of the undertaking are so curious in +themselves, and illustrate so curiously the manners and feelings of +the age, that we are induced to select a few of them from among a mass +of more or less legendary details, supplied by the anonymous <a name="646">{646}</a> +chronicler already referred to, whose work Banduri has printed in his +<i>Imperium Orientals</i> [Footnote 132] and who, if less trustworthy than +Procopius or the Silentiary, has preserved a much greater amount of +the traditionary gossip connected with the building. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 132: Under the title <i>Anonymi de Antiquitatibus + Constantinopoleos</i>. The third part is devoted entirely to a "History + and Description of the Church of St. Sophia."] +</p> +<p> +For the vastly enlarged scale of Justinian's structure, it became +necessary to make extensive purchases in the immediate circuit of the +ancient church; and, as commonly happens, the demands of the +proprietors rose in proportion to the necessity in which the imperial +purchaser was placed. It is interesting to contrast the different +spirit in which each sought to use the legal rights of a proprietor. +</p> +<p> +The first was a widow, named Anna, whose tenement was valued by the +imperial commissaries at eighty-five pounds of gold. This offer on the +part of the commissary the widow unhesitatingly refused, and declared +that she would consider her house cheap at fifty hundred-weight of +gold; but when Justinian, in his anxiety to secure the site, did not +hesitate to wait upon the widow herself in person, she was so struck +by his condescension, and so fired by the contagion of his pious +enthusiasm, that she not only surrendered the required ground, but +refused all payment for it in money: only praying that she might be +buried near the spot, in order that, from the site of her former +dwelling itself, she "might claim the purchase-money on the day of +judgment." She was buried, accordingly, near the <i>Skeuophylacium</i>, or +treasury of the sacred vessels. [Footnote 133] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 133: <i>Anonymi</i>, p. 58. ] +</p> +<p> +Very different, but yet hardly less characteristic of the time, was +the conduct of one Antiochus, a eunuch, and <i>ostiarius</i> of the palace. +His house stood on the spot now directly under the great dome, and was +valued by the imperial surveyor at thirty-five pounds of gold. But +Antiochus exacted a far larger sum, and obstinately refused to abate +his demand. Justinian, in his eagerness, was disposed to yield; but +Strategus, the prefect of the treasury, begged the emperor to leave +the matter in his hands, and proceeded to arrest the obdurate +proprietor and throw him into prison. It chanced that Antiochus was a +passionate lover of the sports of the hippodrome, and Strategus so +timed the period of his imprisonment that it would include an +unusually attractive exhibition in the hippodrome—what in the +language of the modern turf would be called "the best meeting of the +season." At first Antiochus kept up a determined front; but, as the +time of the games approached, the temptation proved too strong; his +resolution began to waver; and, at length, when the morning arrived, +he "bawled out lustily" from the prison, and promised that, if he were +released in time to enjoy his favorite spectacle, he would yield up +possession on the emperor's own terms. By this time the races had +begun, and the emperor had already taken his seat; but Strategus did +not hesitate to have the sport suspended, led Antiochus at once to the +emperor's tribunal, and, in the midst of the assembled spectators, +completed the negotiation. [Footnote 134] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 134: <i>Anonymi</i> p. 59.] +</p> +<p> +A third was a cobbler, called by the classic name of Xenophon. His +sole earthly possession was the stall in which he exercised his trade, +abutting on the wall of one of the houses doomed to demolition in the +clearance of the new site. A liberal price was offered for the stall; +but the cobbler, although he did not refuse to surrender it, +whimsically exacted, as a condition precedent, that the several +factions of the charioteers should salute him, in the same way as they +saluted the emperor, while passing his seat in the hippodrome. +Justinian agreed; but took what must be considered an ungenerous +advantage of the simple man of leather. The letter of Xenophon's. +condition was fulfilled. He was placed <a name="647">{647}</a> in the front of the +centre tribune, gorgeously arrayed in a scarlet and white robe. The +factions, as they passed his seat in procession, duly rendered the +prescribed salute; but the poor cobbler was balked of his anticipated +triumph, being compelled, amid the derisive cheers and laughter of the +multitude, <i>to receive the solute with his back turned to the +assembly!</i> [Footnote 135] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 135: <i>Anonymi</i>, p. 59.] +</p> +<p> +But it is around the imperial builder himself that the incidents of +the history of the work, and still more its legendary marvels, group +themselves in the pages of the anonymous chronicler. For although the +chief architect, Anthemius, was assisted by Agathias, by Isidorus of +Miletus, and by a countless staff of minor subordinates, Justinian, +from the first to the last, may be truly said to have been the very +life and soul of the undertaking, and the director even of its +smallest details. From the moment when, at the close of the +inauguratory prayer, he threw the first shovelful of mortar into the +foundation, till its solemn opening for worship on Christmas-day, 538, +his enthusiasm never abated, nor did his energy relax. Under the glare +of the noon-day sun, while others were indulging in the customary +siesta, Justinian was to be seen, clad in a coarse linen tunic, staff +in hand, and his head bound with a cloth, directing, encouraging, and +urging on the workmen, stimulating the industrious by liberal +donations, visiting the loiterers with his displeasure. Some of his +expedients, as detailed by the chronicler, are extremely curious. We +shall mention only one. In order to expedite the work, it was +desirable to induce the men to work after-hours. The natural way of +effecting this would have been to offer them a proportionate increase +of pay; but Justinian chose rather to obtain the same result +indirectly. Accordingly, he was accustomed—if our authority can be +relied on—to scatter a quantity of coins about the building; and the +workmen, afraid to search for them in the open day, were led to +continue their work till the shades of evening began to fall, in order +that they might more securely carry off the spoil under cover of the +darkness! +</p> +<p> +Some of the building operations which this writer describes are +equally singular. The mortar, to secure greater tenacity, was made +with barley-water; the foundations were filled up with huge +rectangular masses, fifty feet long, of a concrete of lime and sand, +moistened with barley-water and other glutinous fluid, and bound +together by wicker framework. The tiles or bricks of which the cupola +was formed were made of Rhodian clay, so light that twelve of them did +not exceed the weight of one ordinary tile. The pillars and buttresses +were built of cubical and triangular blocks of stone, with a cement +made of lime and oil, soldered with lead, and bound, within and +without, with clamps of iron. +</p> +<p> +It is plain, however, that these particulars, however curious they may +seem, are not to be accepted implicitly, at least if they are judged +by the palpable incredibility of some of the other statements of the +writer. The supernatural appears largely as an element in his history. +On three several occasions, according to this chronicler, the emperor +was favored with angelic apparitions, in which were imparted to him +successive instructions, first as to the plan of the building, again +as to urging on its progress, and finally as to finding funds for its +completion. One of these narratives is extremely curious, as showing +the intermixture of earth and heaven in the legendary notions of the +time. A boy, during the absence of the masons, had been left in charge +of their tools, when, as the boy believed, one of the eunuchs of the +palace, in a resplendent white dress, came to him, ordered him at once +to call back the masons, that the work of heaven might not be longer +retarded. <a name="648">{648}</a> On the boy's refusing to quit the post of which he had +been left in charge, the supposed eunuch volunteered to take his +place, and swore "by the wisdom of God" that he would not depart from +the place till the boy should return. Justinian ordered all the +eunuchs of the palace to be paraded before the boy; and on the boy's +declaring that the visitor who had appeared to him was not any of the +number, at once concluded that the apparition was supernatural; but, +while he accepted the exhortation to greater zeal and energy in +forwarding the work, he took a characteristic advantage of the oath by +which the angel had sworn not to leave the church till the return of +his youthful messenger. Without permitting the boy to go back to the +building where the angel had appeared to him, Justinian <i>sent him away +to the Cyclades for the rest of his life,</i> in order that the perpetual +presence and protection of the angel might thus be secured for the +church, which that divine messenger was pledged never to leave till +the boy should return to relieve him at his post! [Footnote 136] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 136: <i>Anonymi</i>, p. 61.] +</p> +<p> +Without dwelling further, however, on the legendary details, we shall +find marvels enough in the results, such as they appear in the real +history of the building. And perhaps the greatest marvel of all is the +shortness of the period in which so vast a work was completed, the new +church being actually opened for worship within less than seven years +from the day of the conflagration. Ten thousand workmen were employed +on the edifice, if it be true that a hundred master-builders, each of +whom had a hundred men under him, were engaged to accelerate and +complete the undertaking. For the philosophical student of history, +there is a deep subject of study in the bare enumeration of the +materials brought together for this great Christian enterprise, and of +the various quarters from which they were collected. It is not alone +the rich assortment of precious marbles—the spotless white of Paros; +the green of Croceae; the blue of Libya; together with parti-colored +marbles in a variety hardly ever equalled before—the costly +cipolline, the rose-veined white marble of Phrygia, the curiously +streaked black marble of Gaul, and the countless varieties of Egyptian +porphyry and granite. Far more curious is it to consider how the +materials of the structure were selected so as to present in +themselves a series of trophies of the triumphs of Christianity over +all the proudest forms of worship in the old world of paganism. In the +forest of pillars which surround the dome and sustain the graceful +arches of the gynaeconitis, the visitor may still trace the spoils of +the Temple of the Sun at Baalbec, of the famous Temple of Diana at +Ephesus, or that of the Delian Apollo, of Minerva at Athens, of Cybele +at Cyzicus, and of a host of less distinguished shrines of paganism. +When the mere cost of the transport of these massive monuments to +Constantinople is taken into account, all wonder ceases at the +vastness of the sums which are said to have been expended in the work. +It is easy to understand how, "before the walls had risen two cubits +from the ground, forty-five thousand two hundred pounds were +consumed." [Footnote 137] It is not difficult to account for the +enormous general taxation, the oppressive exactions from individuals, +the percentages on prefects' incomes, and the deductions from the +salaries of judges and professors, which went to swell the almost +fabulous aggregate of the expenditure; and there is perhaps an +economical lesson in the legend of the apparition of the angel, who, +when the building had risen as far as the cupola, conducted the master +of the imperial treasury to a subterranean vault in which eighty +hundred weight of gold were discovered ready for the completion of the +work! [Footnote 138] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 137: Gibbon's "Decline and Fall," vol. iii. p. 633.] +<br><br> + [Footnote 138: <i>Anonymi</i>, p. 62.] +</p> +<p> +Even independently of the building itself and its artistic +decorations, the value of the sacred furniture and appliances exceeded +all that had ever before been devised. The sedilia of the <a name="649">{649}</a> +priests and the throne of the patriarch were of silver gilt. The dome +of the tabernacle was of pure gold, ornamented with golden lilies, and +surmounted by a gold cross seventy-five pounds weight and encrusted +with precious stones. All the sacred vessels—chalices, beakers, +ewers, dishes, and patens, were of gold. The candelabra which stood on +the altar, on the ambo, and on the upper gynaeconitis; the two +colossal candelabra placed at either side of the altar; the dome of +the ambo; the several crosses within the bema; the pillars of the +iconastasis; the covers of the sacred books—all were likewise of +gold, and many of them loaded with pearls, diamonds, and carbuncles. +The sacred linens of the altar and the communion cloths were +embroidered with gold and pearls. But when it came to the construction +of the altar itself, no single one of these costly materials was +considered sufficiently precious. Pious ingenuity was tasked to its +utmost to devise a new and richer substance, and the table of the +great altar was formed of a combination of all varieties of precious +materials. Into the still fluid mass of molten gold were thrown pearls +and other gems, rubies, crystals, topazes, sapphires, onyxes, and +amethysts, blended in such proportions as might seem best suited to +enhance to the highest imaginable limit the costliness of what was +prepared as the throne of the Most High on earth! And to this +combination of all that is most precious in nature, art added all the +wealth at its disposal, by the richness of the chasing and the +elaborateness and beauty of the design. +</p> +<p> +The total cost of the structure has been variously estimated. It +amounted, according to the ancient authorities, to "three hundred and +twenty thousand pounds;" but whether these were of silver or of gold +is not expressly stated. Gibbon [Footnote 139] leaves it to each +reader, "according to the measure of his belief," to estimate it in +one or the other metal; but Mr. Neale [Footnote 140] is not deterred +by the sneer of Gibbon from expressing his "belief that gold must be +intended." According to this supposition the expenditure, if this can +be believed possible, would have reached the enormous sum of thirteen +millions sterling! +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 139: "Decline and Fall," vol. iii., p. 523.] +<br><br> + [Footnote 140: "Eastern Church," vol. i., p. 237. ] +</p> +<p> +It was, no doubt, with profound self-gratulation that, at the end of +almost six years of anxious toil, Justinian received the intelligence +of the completion of this great labor of love. At his special +entreaty, the last details had been urged forward with headlong haste, +in order that all might be ready for the great festival of Christmas +in the year 538; and his architect had not disappointed his hopes. +There is some uncertainty as to the precise date of the dedication; +and indeed it is probable that the festival may have extended over +several days, and thus have been assigned to different dates by +different writers. But when it came (probably on Christmas eve, +December 24, 538) it was a day of triumph for Justinian. A thousand +oxen, a thousand sheep, a thousand swine, six hundred deer, ten +thousand poultry, and thirty thousand measures of corn, were +distributed to the poor. Largesses to a fabulous amount were divided +among the people. The emperor, attended by the patriarch and all the +great officers of state, went in procession from his palace to the +entrance of the church. But, from that spot, as though he would claim +to be alone in the final act of offering, Justinian ran, unattended, +to the foot of the ambo, and with arms outstretched and lifted up in +the attitude of prayer, exclaimed in words which the event has made +memorable: "Glory to God, who hath accounted me worthy of such a work! +I have conquered thee, O Solomon!" +</p> +<p> +Justinian's works in St. Sophia, however, were not destined to cease +with this first completion of the building. Notwithstanding the care +bestowed on <a name="650">{650}</a> the dome, the selection of the lightest materials +for it, and the science employed in its construction, an earthquake +which occurred in the year 558 overthrew the semi-dome at the east end +of the church. Its fall was followed by that of the eastern half of +the great dome itself; and in the ruin perished the altar, the +tabernacle, and the whole bema, with its costly furniture and +appurtenances. This catastrophe, however, only supplied a new +incentive to the zeal of Justinian. Anthemius and his fellow-laborers +were now dead, but the task of repairing the injury was entrusted to +Isidorus the Younger, nephew of the Isidorus who had been associated +with Anthemius in the original construction of the church. It was +completed, and the church rededicated, at the Christmas of the year +561; nor can it be doubted that the change which Isidorus now +introduced in the proportions of the dome, by adding twenty-five feet +to its height, contributed materially as well to the elegance of the +dome itself as to the general beauty of the church and the harmony of +its several parts. +</p> +<p> +The church of Justinian thus completed may be regarded as +substantially the same building which is now the chief temple of +Islam. The few modifications which it has undergone will be mentioned +in the proper place; but it may be convenient to describe the +building, such as it came from the hands of its first founder, before +we proceed to its later history. +</p> +<p> +St. Sophia, in its primitive form, may be taken as the type of +Byzantine ecclesiology in almost all its details. Although its walls +enclose what may be roughly [Footnote 141] called a square of 241 +feet, the internal plan is not inaptly described as a Greek cross, of +which the nave and transepts constitute the arm, while the aisles, +which are surmounted by the gynaeconitis, or women's gallery, may be +said to complete it into a square, within which the cross is +inscribed. The head of the cross is prolonged at the eastern extremity +into a slightly projecting apse. The aisle is approached at its +western end through a double narthex or porch, extending over the +entire breadth of the building, and about 100 feet in depth; so that +the whole length of the structure, from the eastern wall of the apse +to the wall of the outer porch, is about 340 feet. In the centre, from +four massive piers, rises the great dome, beneath which, to the east +and to the west, spring two great semi-domes, the eastern supported by +three, the western by two, semi-domes of smaller dimensions. The +central of the three lesser semi-domes, to the east, constitutes the +roof of the apse to which allusion has already been made. The piers of +the dome (differing in this respect from those of St. Peter's at Rome) +present from within a singularly light and elegant appearance; they +are nevertheless constructed with great strength and solidity, +supported by four massive buttresses, which, in the exterior, rise as +high as the base of the dome, and are capacious enough to contain the +exterior staircases of the gynaeconitis. The lightness of the +dome-piers is in great part due to the lightness of the materials of +the dome itself already described. The diameter of the dome at its +base is 100 feet, its height at the central point above the floor is +179 feet, the original height, before the reconstruction in 561, +having been twenty-five feet less. [Footnote 142] The effect of this +combination of domes, semi-domes, and plane arches, on entering the +nave, is singularly striking. It constitutes, in the opinion of the +authors of "Byzantine Architecture," what may regarded as the +characteristic beauty be of St. Sophia; and the effect is heightened +in the modern mosque by the nakedness of the lower part of the <a name="651">{651}</a> +building, and by the absence of those appurtenances of a Christian +church,—as the altar, the screen, and the ambo,—which, by arresting +the eye in more minute observation, withdrew it in the Christian times +from the general proportions of the structure. This effect of +lightness is also increased by numerous window's, which encircle the +tympanum. They are twenty-four in number, small, low, and +circular-headed; and in the spaces between them spring the twenty-four +groined ribs of the dome, which meet in the centre and divide the +vault into twenty-four equal segments. The interior was richly +decorated with mosaic work. At the four angles beneath the dome were +four colossal figures of winged seraphim; and from the summit of the +dome looked down that majestic face of Christ the Sovereign Judge, +which still remains the leading type of our Lord's countenance in the +school of Byzantine art, and even in the Latin reproductions of it +fills the mind with a feeling of reverence and awe, hardly to be +equalled by any other production of Christian art. The exterior of the +dome is covered with lead, and it was originally surmounted by a +stately cross, which in the modern mosque is replaced by a gigantic +crescent fifty yards in diameter; on the gilding of this ornament +Murad III. expended 50,000 ducats, and the glitter of it in the +sunshine is said to be visible from the summit of Mount Olympus—a +distance of a hundred miles. To an eye accustomed to the convexity of +the cupola of western churches, the interior height of the dome of +Sophia is perhaps somewhat disappointing, especially considering the +name "aerial," by which it is called by the ancient authorities. This +name, however, was given to it, not so much to convey the idea of +lightness or "airiness" in the structure, as because its proportions, +as designed by the architect, were intended to represent or reproduce +the supposed convexity of the "aerial vault" itself. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 141: This is not exactly true. The precise + dimensions of the building (excluding the apse and + narthex) are 241 feet by 226 feet.] +<br><br> + [Footnote 142: Later Greek authorities, for the purpose + of exalting the glories of the older church, allege that + the second dome is fifteen feet lower than the first; and + even Von Hammer (<i>Constantinople und der Bosporus</i>, + vol. i., p. 346) adopts this view. But Zonaras and the + older writers agree that the height was increased by + twenty-five feet. See Neale's "Eastern Church," vol. i., + p. 239.] +</p> +<p> +With Justinian's St. Sophia begins what may be called the second or +classic period of Byzantine archaeology. It is proper, therefore, that +we should describe, although of necessity very briefly, its general +outline and arrangements. +</p> +<p> +With very few exceptions, the Greek churches of the earlier period +(including the older church of St. Sophia, whether as originally built +by Constantine and restored by his son, or as rebuilt by Theodosius) +were of that oblong form which the Greeks called "dromic" and which is +known in the west as the type of the basilica. The present St. Sophia, +on the contrary, may be regarded as practically the type of the +cruciform structure. This cruciform appearance, however, is, as has +been already explained, confined to the internal arrangement, the +exterior presenting the appearance of a square, or if the porch be +regarded as part of the church, of an oblong rectangle. +</p> +<p> +To begin with the narthex or porch:—That of St. Sophia is double, +consisting of an outer (exonarthcx) as well as an inner (esonarthex) +porch. Most Byzantine churches have but a single narthex—often a +lean-to against the western wall; and in some few churches the narthex +is altogether wanting. But in St. Sophia it is a substantive part of +the edifice; and, the roof of the inner compartment being arched, it +forms the substructure of the western gynaeconitis, or women's choir, +which is also carried upon a series of unrivalled arches supported by +pillars, most of which are historical, around the northern and +southern sides of the nave. The outer porch is comparatively plain, +and communicates with the inner one by five marble doorways (of which +one is now walled up), the doors being of bronze, wrought in floriated +crosses, still distinguishable, although much mutilated by the Turkish +occupants. The inner porch is much more rich, the floor of watered +marble, and the walls lined with marbles of various colors and with +richly carved alabaster. It opens on <a name="652">{652}</a> the church by nine gates of +highly-wrought bronze; over the central portal is a well-preserved +group in mosaic, bearing the inscription: +<span style="vertical-align:-25%"> +<img alt="" src="images/i652a.jpg"> +</span> +—and representing our Lord, with the Virgin and St. John the Baptist on +either hand, in the act of giving with uplifted right hand his +benediction to an emperor (no doubt Justinian) prostrate at his feet. +This group is represented in one of M. Salzenberg's plates; and it is +specially interesting for the commentary, explanatory of the attitude +of our Lord, given in the poem of Paul the Silentiary, according to +whom the position of our Lord's fingers represents, in the language of +signs then received, the initial and final letters of the sacred name, +<span style="vertical-align:-25%"> +<img alt="" src="images/i652b.jpg">:<br> +</span> +<span style="vertical-align:-25%"> +<img alt="" src="images/i652c.jpg"> +</span>.<br> +The outstretched forefinger meant I; the bent second finger, C or +Σ; the third finger applied to the thumb, X; and the little +finger, Σ. It may also be noted that Justinian in this curious +group is represented with the nimbus. During the progress of the +restoration of the building in 1847, this mosaic was uncovered, and +exactly copied; but like all the other mosaics which contain +representations of the human form, it has been covered with canvas, +and again carefully coated with plaster. It was on the <i>phiale</i> or +fountain of the outer court of this narthex that the famous +palindromic inscription was placed:<br> +<br> +<span style="vertical-align:-25%"> +<img alt="" src="images/i652d.jpg"> +</span>. +<br> + "Wash thy sins, not thy countenance only."<br> +<br> +The interior of St. Sophia, exclusive of the women's choir, consisted +of three great divisions—the nave, which was the place of the laity; +the <i>soleas</i>, or choir, which was assigned to the assisting clergy of +the various grades; and the <i>bema</i>, or sanctuary, the semi-circular +apse at the eastern end in which the sacred mysteries were celebrated, +shut off from the soleas by the <i>inconastasis</i> or screen, and flanked +by two smaller, but similar, semicircular recesses; the <i>diaconicon</i>, +corresponding with the modern vestry; and the <i>prothesis</i>, in which +the bread and wine were prepared for the eucharistic offering, whence +they were carried, in the procession called the "Great Entrance," to +the high altar within the bema. +</p> +<p> +The position of these several parts is still generally traceable in +the modern mosque, although, the divisions having been all swept away, +there is some controversy as to details. +</p> +<p> +The nave, of course, occupies the western end, and is entered directly +from the porch. It was separated from the soleas, or choir, at the +<i>ambo</i>—the pulpit, or more properly gallery, which was used not only +for preaching, but also for the reading or chanting of the lessons and +the gospel, for ecclesiastical announcements or proclamations, and in +St. Sophia for the coronation of the emperor. The ambo of St. Sophia +was a very massive and stately structure of rich and costly material +and of most elaborate workmanship; it was crowned by a canopy or +baldachin, surmounted by a solid golden cross a hundred pounds in +weight. All trace of the ambo has long disappeared from the mosque; +but from the number of clergy, priests, deacons, subdeacons, lectors, +and singers (numbering, even on the reduced scale prescribed by +Justinian, 385) which the soleas was designed to accommodate, as well +as from other indications, it is believed that the ambo, which was at +the extreme end of the soleas, must have stood under the dome, a +little to the east of the centre. The seat of the emperor was on the +left side of the soleas, immediately below the seats of the priests, +close to the ambo, and opposite to the throne of the patriarch. The +seats assigned in the present patriarchal church to the princes of +Wallachia and Moldavia correspond in position to those formerly +occupied by the throne of the emperor and are directly opposite that +of the patriarch. Beside its sacred uses, the ambo of St. Sophia was +<a name="653">{653}</a> the scene of many a striking incident in Byzantine history. The +reader of Gibbon will recall the graphic picture of Heracleonas +compelled by the turbulent multitude to appear in the ambo of St. +Sophia with his infant nephew in his arms for the purpose of receiving +their homage to the child as emperor; [Footnote 143] or his still more +vivid description of the five sons of Copronimus, of whom the eldest, +Nicephorus, had been made blind, and the other four had their tongues +cut out, escaping from their dungeon and taking sanctuary in St. +Sophia. There are few more touching stories in all the bloody annals +of Byzantium than that which presents the blind Nicephorus employing +that faculty of speech which had been spared in him alone, by +appealing from the ambo on behalf of his mute brothers to the pity and +protection of the people! [Footnote 144] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 143: "Decline and Fall," vol. iv.. p. 403. ] +<br><br> + [Footnote 144: <i>Ibid</i>., vol. iv., p. 413. ] +</p> +<p> +But it was upon the bema of St. Sophia, as we have already seen, that +the wealth and pious munificence of Justinian were most lavishly +expended. It was shut off from the soleas by the inconastasis, which +in Byzantine art is a screen resembling, in all except its position, +the rood-screen of western architecture, and derived its name from the +sacred pictures +<span style="vertical-align:-25%"> +<img alt="" src="images/i653a.jpg"> +</span> +represented upon it. In that of St. +Sophia the material was silver, the lower part being highly wrought +with arabesque devices, and the upper composed of twelve pillars, +twined two and two, and separated by panels on which were depicted in +oval medallions the figures of our Lord, his Virgin Mother, and the +prophets and apostles. It had three doors; the central one (called +<span style="vertical-align:-25%"> +<img alt="" src="images/i653b.jpg"> +</span>, +"sacred door") leading directly to the altar, that on +the right to the diaconicon, and that on the left to the prothesis. +The figures on either side of the central door, following what appears +to have been the universal rule, were those of our Lord and the +Virgin, and above the door stood a massive cross of gold. The altar, +with its canopy or tabernacle, has been already described. The +<i>synthronus</i>, or bench with stalls, for the officiating bishop and +clergy, are at the back of the altar along the circular wall of the +bema. The seats were of silver gilt. The pillars which separated them +were of pure gold. All this costly and gorgeous structure has of +course disappeared from the modern mosque. The eye now ranges without +interruption from the entrance of the royal doors to the very +extremity of the bema;—the only objects to arrest observation being +the sultan's gallery (maksure), which stands at the left or north side +of the bema; the mimber, or pulpit for the Friday prayer, which is +placed at the right or southern end of the ancient inconastasis; the +mahfil, or ordinary preaching pulpit, in the centre of the mosque; and +the mihrab, or sacred niche, which is at the south-east side of the +bema. +</p> +<p> +It was more difficult, in converting the church into a mosque, to get +rid of the numerous sacred pictures in gold and mosaic which adorned +the walls and arches. Accordingly, instead of attempting to remove or +destroy them, the Moslem invaders of the church were content with +covering all these Christian representations with a coat of plaster; +and thus in the late reparation of the mosque, the architect, having +removed the plaster, was enabled to have copies made of all the groups +which still remained uninjured. Of the principal of them M. Salzenberg +has given fac-similes. On the great western arch was represented the +Virgin Mary, with Sts. Peter and Paul. On the side walls of the nave, +above the women's choir upon either side, were figures, in part now +defaced, of prophets, martyrs, and other saints. M. Salzenberg has +reproduced in his volume Sts. Anthemius, Basil, Gregory, Dionysius the +Areopagite, Nicolas of Myra, Gregory the Armenian apostle, and the +prophets Jeremiah, Isaiah, and Habakkuk. On the great eastern arch was +a group consisting of the Virgin Mary, St. John the Baptist, and <a name="654">{654}</a> +the Emperor John Palaeologus, the last Christian restorer of the +building; but these figures—and still more the group which decorated +the arch of the bema, our Lord, the Virgin, and the Archangel +Michael—are now much defaced. Much to the credit of the late sultan, +however, he not only declined to permit the removal of these relics of +ancient Christian art, but gave orders that every means should be +taken to preserve them; at the same time directing that they should be +carefully concealed from Moslem eyes, as before, by a covering of +plaster, the outer surface of which is decorated in harmony with those +portions of the ancient mosaic, which, not containing any object +inconsistent with the Moslem worship, have been restored to their +original condition. Accordingly, the winged seraphim at the angles of +the buttresses which support the dome have been preserved, and, to a +Christian visitor, appear in strange contrast with the gigantic Arabic +inscriptions in gold and colors which arrest the eye upon either side +of the nave and within the dome, commemorating the four companions of +the Prophet, Abu-bekr, Omar, Osman, and Ali. +</p> +<p> +But there is one characteristic of St. Sophia which neither time nor +the revolutions which time has brought have been able to efface or +even substantially to modify—the strikingly graceful and elegant, +although far from classically correct, grouping of the pillars which +support the lesser semidomes and the women's choir. It would be +impossible, without the aid of a plan, to convey any idea of the +arrangement of this matchless assemblage of columns, which, as we have +already observed, are even less precious for the intrinsic richness +and beauty of their material than for the interesting associations +which their presence in a Christian temple involves. Most of these may +still be identified. The eight red porphyry pillars standing, two and +two, under the semi-domes at either end of the nave, are the +celebrated columns from the Temple of the Sun, already recorded as the +gift of Marcia, offered by her "for the salvation of her soul." The +eight pillars of green serpentine which support the women's choir, at +either side of the nave, are from the Temple of Diana at Ephesus; and +among the remaining pillars on the ground floor, twenty-four in +number, arranged in groups of four, are still pointed out +representatives of almost every form of the olden worship of the Roman +empire—spoils of the pagan temples of Athens, Delos, Troas, Cyzicus, +and other sanctuaries of the heathen gods. +</p> +<p> +Less grand, but hardly less graceful, are the groups of pillars, +sixty-seven in number, in the women's choir above the aisles and the +inner porch. The occasional absence of uniformity which they present, +differing from each other in material, in color, in style, and even in +height, although it may offend the rules of art, is by no means +ungrateful to the eye. In the total number of the pillars of St. +Sophia, which is the broken number one hundred and seven, there is +supposed to be a mystic allusion to the seven pillars of the House of +Wisdom. [Footnote 145] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 145: Proverbs ix. 1.] +</p> +<p> +Such was St. Sophia in the days of its early glory—a fitting theatre +for the stately ceremonial which constituted the peculiar +characteristic of the Byzantine court and Church. On all the great +festivals of the year—Christmas, Epiphany, Palm Sunday, Easter, +Pentecost, and the Ascension; at the ceremony of the emperor's +coronation; at imperial marriages; and on occasions, more rare in the +inglorious annals of the Lower Empire, of imperial triumphs,—the +emperor, attended by the full array of his family I and court, went in +state to St. Sophia and assisted at the celebration of the divine +mysteries. The emperor himself, with his distinctive purple buskins +and close tiara; the Caesar, <a name="655">{655}</a> and, in later times, the +Sebastocrator, in green buskins and open tiara; the Despots, the +Panhypersebastos, and the Protosebastos; the long and carefully +graduated line of functionaries, civil and military—the Curopalata, +the Logothete and Great Logothete, the Domestic and Great Domestic, +the Prostostrator, the Stratospedarch, the Protospatharius, the Great +AEteriarch, and the Acolyth, with the several trains of attendants in +appropriate costume which belonged to each department,—combined to +form an array for which it would be difficult to find a parallel in +the history of ceremonial; and when to these are added the purely +ecclesiastical functionaries, for whose number even the munificent +provision of space allotted by Justinian's architect was found at +times insufficient, some idea may be formed of the grandeur of the +service, which, for so many ages, lent to that lofty dome and these +stately colonnades a life and a significance now utterly lost in the +worship which has usurped its place. As a purely ecclesiastical +ceremony, probably some of the great functions at St. Peter's in Rome +surpass in splendor such a ceremonial as the "Great Entrance" at St. +Sophia on one of the emperor's days. But the latter had the additional +element of grandeur derived from the presence of a court unrivalled +for the elaborate stateliness and splendor of its ceremonial code. +</p> +<p> +We have said that the church of Justinian is, in all substantial +particulars, the St. Sophia of the present day. In an architectural +view the later history of the building is hardly worth recording. The +eastern half of the dome, in consequence of some settling of the +foundation of the buttresses, having shown indications of a tendency +to give way, it became necessary in the reign of Basil the Macedonian, +toward the end of the ninth century, to support it by four exterior +buttresses, which still form a conspicuous object from the Seraglio +Place. The Emperor Michael, in 896, erected the tower still standing +at the western entrance, to receive a set of bells which were +presented by the doge of Venice, but which the Turks have melted down +into cannon. About half a century later, a further work for the +purpose of strengthening the dome was undertaken by the Emperor +Romanus; and in the year 987 a complete reparation and +re-strengthening of the dome, within and without, was executed under +Basil the Bulgaricide, in which work the cost of the scaffolding alone +amounted to ten hundred weight of gold. +</p> +<p> +No further reparations are recorded for upward of two centuries. But, +to the shame of the founders of the Latin empire of Constantinople, +the church of St. Sophia suffered so much in their hands, that, after +the recovery of the city by the Greeks, more than one of the later +Greek emperors is found engaged in repairing the injuries of the +building. Andronicus the Elder, Cantacuzenus, and John IV. +Palaeologus, each had a share in the work; and, by a curious though +fortuitous coincidence, Palaeologus, the last of the Christian +emperors who are recorded as restorers of St. Sophia, appears to be +the only one admitted to the same honor which was accorded to its +first founder Justinian—that of having his portrait introduced into +the mosaic decorations of the building. John Palaeologus, as we saw, +is represented in the group which adorned the eastern arch supporting +the great dome. The figures, however, are now much defaced. +</p> +<p> +How much of the injury which, from whatever cause, the mosaic and +other decorations of St. Sophia have suffered, is due to the +fanaticism of the Turkish conquerors of Constantinople it is +impossible to say with certainty. Probably, however, it was far less +considerable than might at first be supposed. Owing to the peculiar +discipline of the Greek Church, which, while it freely admits painted +images, endures no sculptured Christian representations except that of +the cross itself, there was little in the marble or bronze of St. +Sophia to provoke Moslem <a name="656">{656}</a> fanaticism. The crosses throughout +the building, and especially in the women's choir, have been modified, +rather than completely destroyed; the mutilator being generally +satisfied with merely chiselling off <i>the head of the cross</i> (the +cruciform character being thus destroyed), sparing the other three +arms of the Christian emblem. For the rest, as we have already said, +the change consisted in simply denuding the church of all its +Christian furniture and appliances, whether movable objects or +permanent structures, and in covering up from view all the purely +Christian decorations of the walls, roof, and domes. The mosaic work, +where it has perished, seems to have fallen, less from intentional +outrage or direct and voluntary defacement, than from the +long-continued neglect under which the building had suffered for +generations, down to the restoration by the late sultan. +</p> +<p> +The alterations of the exterior under Moslem rule are far more +striking, as well as more considerable. Much of the undoubtedly heavy +and inelegant appearance of the exterior of St. Sophia is owing to the +absence of several groups of statues and other artistic objects which +were designed to relieve the massive and ungraceful proportions of the +buttresses and supports of the building as seen from without. Of these +groups the most important was that of the celebrated horses now at St. +Mark's in Venice. On the other hand, the addition of the four minarets +has, in a different way, contributed to produce the same effect of +heaviness and incongruity of proportion. Of these minarets, the first, +that at the south-east angle, was built by Mahomet II. The second, at +the north-east, was erected by Selim, to whose care the mosque was +indebted for many important works, intended as well for its actual +restoration as for its prospective maintenance and preservation. The +north-western and south-western minarets are both the work of Amurath +III. These structures, although exceedingly light and elegant in +themselves, are altogether out of keeping with the massive structure +to which they were intended as an appendage, and the pretentious style +of their decoration only heightens by the contrast the bald and +unarchitectural appearance of the exterior of the church. It is not +too much to say that the effect of these peculiarly Mohammedan +additions to the structure is externally to destroy its Christian +character. +</p> +<p> +But whatever may be said of the works of former sultans, it is +impossible not to regard the late Sultan Abdul Medjid as a benefactor +to Christian art, even in the works which he undertook directly in the +interest of his own worship. From the time of Amurath III. the +building had been entirely neglected. Dangerous cracks had appeared in +the dome, as well as in several of the semi-domes. The lead covering +of all was in a ruinous condition; and the apertures not only admitted +the rain and snow, but permitted free entrance to flocks of pigeons +and even more destructive birds. The arches of the gynaeconitis were +in many places split and in a tottering condition The pillars, +especially on the upper floor, were displaced and thrown out of the +perpendicular; and the whole structure, in all its parts and in all +its appointments, presented painful evidence of gross and +long-continued neglect. M. Louis Haghe has represented, in two +contrasted lithographed sketches, the interior of the mosque such as +it was and such as it now is since the restoration. The contrast in +appearance, even on paper, is very striking; although this can only be +realized by those who have had the actual opportunity of comparing the +new with the old. But the substantial repairs are far more important, +as tending to the security of a pile so venerable and the object of so +many precious associations. The great dome, while it is relieved from +the four heavy and unsightly buttresses, is made more permanently +secure by a double girder of wrought iron around the base. The lead of +the dome and the roof has been <a name="657">{657}</a> renewed throughout. The tottering +pillars of the women's choir have been replaced in the perpendicular, +and the arches which they sustain are now shored up and strengthened. +The mosaic work throughout the building has been thoroughly cleaned +and restored, the defective portions being replaced by a skilful +imitation of the original. All the fittings and furniture of the +mosque—the sultan's gallery, the pulpits, the mihrab, and other +appurtenances of its worship—have been renewed in a style of great +splendor. The work of reparation extended over two years, and owed +much of its success, as well as of the spirit in which it was +executed, to the enlightened liberality of Redschid Pacha. An effort +is said to have been made by the fanatical party in Constantinople to +induce the sultan to order the complete demolition of the mosaic +pictures on the walls, as being utterly prohibited by the Koran. But +he firmly refused to accede to the demand; and it was with his express +permission that the king of Prussia commissioned M. Salzenberg to +avail himself of the occasion of their being uncovered, in order to +secure for the students of the Christian art of Byzantium the +advantage of accurate copies of every detail of its most ancient as +well as most characteristic monument. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>From The Lamp. +<br><br> +ALL-HALLOW EVE; OR, THE TEST OF FUTURITY. +<br><br> +BY ROBERT CURTIS. +<br><br> +CHAPTER VII.</h2> +<br> +<p> +Here it was that the real fun was going on! From the centre of the +veiling hung a strong piece of cord, with cross sticks, about eighteen +inches long, at the end. On each end of one of these sticks was stuck +a short piece of lighted candle, while on the ends of the other were +stuck small apples of a peculiarly good kind. The cross was then set +turning, when some plucky hero snapped at the apples as they went +round, but as often caught the lighted candle in his mouth, when a +hearty laugh from the circle of spectators proclaimed his +discomfiture. On the other hand, if fortunate enough to secure one of +the apples, a clapping of hands, and shouts of "Well done!" proclaimed +his victory. +</p> +<p> +A little to one side of this "merry-go-round" was a huge tub of +spring-water, fresh from the pump, and as clear as crystal. It was +intended that the performers at this portion of the fun should, +stripped to the waist, dive for pence or whatever silver the +by-standers chose to throw in. Up to this it had not come into play, +for until their "betthers came down from the parlor" no silver was +thrown in; and the youngsters were "loth to wet theirsel's for +nothin'." Now, however, a <i>tenpenny-bit</i> from Tom Murdock soon +glittered on the bottom of the tub, a full foot and a half under +water. Forthwith two or three young fellows "peeled off," to prove +their abilities as divers. The first, a black-haired fellow, with a +head as round as a cannon-ball, after struggling and bubbling until +the people began to think he was smothering, came up without the +prize. He was handed a kitchen towel to rub himself with; while one of +the other young gladiators adjusted the tenpenny-bit in the middle of +the tub, drew <a name="658">{658}</a> in a long breath, and down he went like a duck. He +was not nearly so long down as the other had been; he neither +struggled nor bubbled, and came up with the money between his teeth. +</p> +<p> +"It wasn't your first time, Jamesy, anyhow," said one. +</p> +<p> +"How did you get a hoult of it, Jamesy avic?" said another. +</p> +<p> +But he kept drying his head, and never minding them. +</p> +<p> +Another tenpenny was then thrown in by old Ned Cavana; it withstood +repeated efforts, but was at last fairly brought up. Jamesy seemed to +be the most expert, for having lifted this second tenpenny, his +abilities were finally tested with a <i>fippenny-bit</i>, which after one +or two failures he brought up triumphantly in his teeth; all the other +divers having declined to try their powers upon it. +</p> +<p> +By this time the kitchen floor was very wet, and it was thought, +particularly by the contributors to the tub, that there had been +enough of that sort of fun. The girls, who were standing in whatever +dry spots of the flags they could find, thought so too; they, did not +wish to wet their shoes before the dance, and there was another move +back to the parlor. +</p> +<p> +Here the scene was completely changed, as if indeed by magic, as +nobody had been missed for the performance. The long table was no +where to be seen, while the chairs and forms were ranged along the +walls, and old Murrin the piper greeted their entrance with an +enlivening jig. +</p> +<p> +Partners were of course selected at once, and as young Lennon <i>happened</i> +to be coming in from the kitchen with Winny Cavana at the moment, they +were soon with arms akimbo footing it to admiration opposite each +other. Not far from them another couple were exhibiting in like +manner. They were Tom Murdock and Kate Mulvey; while several other +pairs were "footing it" through the room. To judge from the +self-satisfied smile upon Kate Mulvey's handsome lips, she was not a +little proud or well pleased at having taken Tom Murdock from the +belle of the party; for she had too much self-esteem to think that it +was the belle of the party had been taken from Tom Murdock. +</p> +<p> +I need not pursue the several sets which were danced, nor +particularize the pairs who were partners on the occasion. Of course +Tom Murdock took the first opportunity possible to claim the hand of +Winifred Cavana for a dance. Indeed, he was ill-pleased that in his +own house he had permitted any chance circumstance to prevent his +having opened the dance with her, and apologized for it—"but it +happened in a manner over which he had no control." He had picked up +that expression at a race-course. +</p> +<p> +With all his bitterness he had the good sense not to make a scene by +endeavoring to frustrate that which he had not the tact to obviate by +pre-arrangement. Winny had made no reply to his apology, and he +continued, "I did not ask Kate Mulvey to dance until I saw you led out +by young Lennon." +</p> +<p> +"That is a bad compliment to Kate," she observed. +</p> +<p> +"I can't help that," said he gruffly; "some people take time d-mn-bly +by the forelock." +</p> +<p> +"That cannot apply to either him or me in this case; there were two +pairs dancing before he asked me." +</p> +<p> +Now although this was certainly not said by way of reproach to Tom for +not himself being sooner, it was unanswerable, and he did not try to +answer it. He was not however in such good humor as to forward himself +much in Winny's good opinion, and Emon-a-knock, who watched him +closely, was content that he should be her sole beau for the rest of +the evening. +</p> +<p> +Refreshments were now brought in; cold punch for the boys and "nagus" +for the girls; for old Murdock could afford to make a splash, and this +he thought "was his time to do it. If any one was hungry, there was +plenty <a name="659">{659}</a> of cold mate and bread on the kitchen dresser." But after +the calcannon and tea, nobody seemed to hear him. +</p> +<p> +After the liquor on the first tray was disposed of, and the glasses +collected for a replenish, a solo jig was universally called for. The +two best dancers in the province were present—Tom Murdock and Edward +Lennon, so there could be no failure. +</p> +<p> +Old Murdock had never seen young Lennon dance until that night, and so +far as he could judge, "he was not the man that Tom need be afraid +of." He had often seen Tom's best dancing, and certainly nothing which +young Lennon had exhibited there up to that time could at all touch +it. +</p> +<p> +"Come, Tom," said he, "give the girls a specimen of what you can do, +your lone," and he laid the poker and tongs across each other in the +middle of the floor. +</p> +<p> +Paddy Murrin struck up a spirit-stirring jig, which no one could +resist. The girls were all dancing it "to themselves," and young +Lennon's feet were dying to be at it, but of course he must wait. +</p> +<p> +Indeed he was not anxious to exhibit in opposition to his host's son, +but feared his reputation as a dancer would put him in for it. +</p> +<p> +Tom Murdock having been thus called on, was tightening the fung of one +of his pumps, to begin. Turning then to Murrin, he called for "the +fox-hunter's jig." +</p> +<p> +He now commenced, and like a knowing professor of his art "took it +easy" at the commencement, determined however to astonish them ere he +had done. He felt that he was dancing well, but knew that he could +dance much better, and would presently do so. He had often tried the +"poker and tongs jig," but hitherto never quite to his satisfaction. +He had sometimes come off perfectly victorious, without touching them, +but as often managed to kick them about the floor. He was now on his +mettle, not only on account of Winny Cavana, but also because "that +whelp, Lennon, was looking on, which he had no right to be." For a +while he succeeded admirably. He had tipped each division of the cross +with both heel and toe, several times with rapid and successful +precision; but becoming enthusiastic, as the plaudits passed round, he +called to Murrin "to play faster," when after a few moments of +increased speed, he tripped in the tongs, and came flat on his back +upon the floor. He was soon up again, and a few touches of the +clothes-brush set all to rights, except the irrepressible titter that +ran round the room. +</p> +<p> +Of course there was an excuse one of the fungs of his pump had again +loosened and caught in the tongs. This was not merely an excuse, but a +fact, upon which Tom Murdock built much consolation for his "partial +failure," as he himself jocosely called it; but he was savage at +heart. +</p> +<p> +There was a general call now from the girls for young Lennon, and +"Emon-a-knock, Emon-a-knock," resounded on all sides. He would not +rise, however; he was now more unwilling than ever to "dance a match," +as he called it to himself, with his host's son. +</p> +<p> +The "partial failure" of his rival—and he was honest enough to admit +that it was but partial, and could not have been avoided—gave him +well-founded hopes of a triumph. He too had tried his powers of +agility by the poker and tongs test, and oftener with success than +otherwise. It was some time now since he had tried it, as latterly he +had not much time to spare for such amusements. He was unwilling, but +not from fear of failure, to get up; but no excuse would be taken; he +was caught by the collar of his coat by two sturdy handsome girls, and +dragged into the middle of the room. Thus placed before the +spectators, he could not refuse the ordeal, as it might be called. +</p> +<p> +He had his wits about him, however. He had seen Tom Murdock whisper +something to the piper when he was first called on to stand up, and it +<a name="660">{660}</a> proved that he was not astray as to its purport. +</p> +<p> +Recollecting the jig he was in the habit of dancing the poker and +tongs to, he asked the piper to play it. Murrin hesitated, and at last +came out with a stammer that "he hadn't it, but he'd give him one as +good," striking up the most difficult jig in the Irish catalogue to +dance to. +</p> +<p> +"No," said Lennon stoutly, "I heard you play the jig I called for a +hundred times, and no later than last night, Pat, at Jemmy Mullarky's, +as I passed home from work, and I'll have no other." +</p> +<p> +"I took whatever jig he happened to strike up," said Tom with a sneer. +</p> +<p> +"You might have had your choice, for that matter, and I daresay you +had," replied Lennon, "and I'll have mine! It is my right." +</p> +<p> +"If a man can dance," continued Tom, "he ought to be able to dance to +any jig that's given him; it's like a man that can only say his +prayers out of his own book." And there was a suppressed smile at +Lennon's expense. +</p> +<p> +He saw it, and his blood was up in a moment. +</p> +<p> +"He may play any jig he chooses now," exclaimed Lennon, "except one, +and that is the one <i>you</i> told him to play," taking his chance that his +suspicions were correct as to the purport of the whisper. +</p> +<p> +"I'll play the one I pled for the young masther himself; an' if that +doesn't shoot you, you needn't dance at all," said Murrin, apparently +prompted again by Tom Murdock. +</p> +<p> +This was a decision from which no impartial person could dissent, and +Lennon seemed perfectly satisfied, but after all this jaw and +interruption he felt in no great humor to dance, and almost feared the +result. +</p> +<p> +As he stood up he caught a glance from Winny's eye which banished +every thought save that of complying with that look. If ever a look +planted an undying resolve in a man's heart it was that. It called him +"Emon" as plain as if she had spoken it, and said, "Don't let <i>that +fellow</i> put you down," and quick as the glance was it added, "he's a +nasty fellow." +</p> +<p> +To it now Emon went with his whole heart. He cared not what jig Pat +Murrin played, "or any other piper," he was able for them. +</p> +<p> +At first the quiet tipping of his heel and toe upon the floor, with +now and then a flat stamp which threw up the dust, was inimitable. As +he got into the "merits of the thing," the music was obliged to vie +with him in activity. It seemed as much as if he was dancing for the +piper to play to, as that the piper was playing for him to dance. +Those who were up to the merits of an Irish jig, could have told the +one he was dancing to if there had been no music at all. There was a +tip, a curl, or a stamp for every note in the tune. In fact he played +the jig upon the floor with his feet. He now closed the poker and +tongs with confidence, while Tom Murdock looked on with a malicious +hope that he too would bungle the business; and Winny Cavana looked on +with a timid fear of the same result. But he danced through and +amongst them as if by magic—a toe here, and a heel there, in each +compartment of the crossed irons with the rapidity of lightning, but +he never touched one of them. +</p> +<p> +"Quicker! quicker," cried Murdock to the piper, seeing that Lennon was +perfect master of his position. +</p> +<p> +"Aye, as quick as you like," stammered Lennon, almost out of breath; +and the increased speed of the music brought forth more striking +performance, testified to by the applause which greeted his finishing +bow. +</p> +<p> +He caught a short glance again from Winny's eye, as he passed to a +vacant seat. "Thank you, Emon, from my heart," it said, as plainly as +the other had spoken when he stood up. +</p> +<p> +It was now well on in the small hours, and as old Murdock and his son +had both ceased in a manner to do any more honors, their silence was +accepted as a sort of "notice to quit," <a name="661">{661}</a> and there was a general +move in search of bonnets and cloaks. Tom Murdock knew that he was in +the dumps, and wisely left Winny to her father's escort. Lennon's way +lay by the Mulveys, and he was "that far" with Kate and some others. +Indeed, all the branch roads and pathways were echoing to the noisy +chat and opinions of the scattered party on their several ways home. +</p> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER VIII.</h2> +<br> +<p> +The after-reflections of those most interested in the above gathering +were various, and it must be admitted to some extent unsatisfactory. +First of all, old Murdock was keen enough to perceive that he had not +furthered his object in the least by having given the party at all. +From what Tom had told him he had kept a close watch upon young +Lennon, of whose aspirations toward Winny Cavana he had now no doubt, +and if he was not sure of a preference upon her part toward him, he +was quite certain that she had none toward Tom. This was the natural +result of old Murdock's observations of Winny's conduct during the +evening,—who, while she could and did hide the one, could not, and +did not, hide the other. +</p> +<p> +Tom Murdock was the least satisfied of them all with the whole +business, and sullenly told his father, who had done it all to serve +him, that "he had done more harm than good, and that he knew he would, +by asking that whelp Lennon; and he hoped he might never die till he +broke every bone in his body. By hook or by crook, by fair means or +foul, he must put a stop to his hopes in that quarter." +</p> +<p> +His father was silent. He felt that he had not advanced matters by his +party. Old Cavana was not the sharp old man in these matters, either +to mind or divine from how many points the wind blew, and quietly +supposed all had gone on smoothly, as he and old Murdock wished. +</p> +<p> +Winifred had been more than confirmed in her dislike to Tom Murdock, +while her secret preference for Emon-a-knock had been in no respect +diminished. She had depth enough also to perceive that Kate Mulvey was +anxious enough to propitiate the good opinion, to which she had taken +no pains to hide her indifference. She was aware that Kate Mulvey's +name had been associated with young Lennon's by the village gossips, +but she had seen nothing on that night to justify any apprehension, if +she chose to set herself to work. She would take an opportunity of +sounding her friend upon this momentous subject, and finding out how +the land really lay. If that was the side of her head Kate's cap was +inclined to lean to, might they not strike a quiet and confidential +little bargain between them, as regarded these two young men? +</p> +<p> +Kate Mulvey's thoughts were not very much at variance with those of +her friend Winny. She, not having the same penetration into the +probable results of sinister looks and scowling brows; or not, +perhaps, having ever perceived them, had thrown one of the nicest caps +that ever came from a smoothing-iron at Tom Murdock, but she feared he +had not yet picked it up. She was afraid, until the night of the +party, that her friend and rival—yes, it is only in the higher ranks +of society that the two cannot be united—had thrown a still more +richly trimmed one at him; but on that night, and she had watched +closely, she had formed a reasonable belief that her fear was totally +unfounded. She was not quite sure that it had not been let drop in +Emon-a-knock's way, if not actually thrown at him. These girls, in +such cases, are so sharp! +</p> +<p> +The very same thought had struck her. She also had determined upon +sounding her friend Winny, and would <a name="662">{662}</a> take the first favorable +opportunity of having a confidential chat with her upon the subject. +The girls were very intimate, and were not rivals, only they did not +know it. We shall see by-and-by how they "sounded" each other. +</p> +<p> +Young Lennon's after-thoughts, upon the whole, were more satisfactory +than perhaps those of any of the other principal persons concerned. If +Winny Cavana had not shown him a decided preference over the general +set of young men there, she had certainly been still less particular +in her conduct and manner toward Tom Murdock. These matters, no doubt, +are managed pretty much the same in all ranks of society, though, of +course, not with the same refinement; and to young Lennon, whose heart +was on the watch, as well as his eyes, one or two little incidents +during the night gave him some faint hopes that, as yet at least, his +rich rival had not made much way against him. Hitherto, young Lennon +had looked upon the rich heiress of Rathcash as a fruit too high for +him to reach from the low ground upon which he stood, and had given +more of his attention to her poorer neighbor Kate Mulvey. He, however, +met with decided reluctance in that quarter, and being neither +cowardly, ignorant, nor shy, he had improved one or two favorable +occasions with Winny Cavana at the party, whom he now had some, +perhaps delusive, notion was not so far above his reach after all. +</p> +<p> +These are the only persons with whose after-thoughts we are concerned. +There may have been some other by-play on the part of two or three +fine young men and handsome girls, who burned themselves upon the bar, +and danced together after they became cinders, but as they are in no +respect mixed up with our story, we may pass them by without +investigating their thoughts, further than to declare that they were +all well pleased, and that the praises of old Murdock's munificence +rang from one end of the parish to the other. +</p> +<br> +<h2>CHAPTER IX.</h2> +<p> +I must now describe a portion of the garden which stretched out from +the back of old Ned Cavana's premises. A large well-enclosed farmyard, +almost immediately at the rear of the house, gave evidence of the +comfort and plenty belonging not only to the old man himself, but to +everything living and dead about the place; and as we shall be obliged +to pass through this farm-yard to get into the garden, we may as well +describe it first. Stacks of corn, wheat, oats, and barley, in great +variety of size, pointed the pinnacles of their finishing touch to the +sky. Sticking up from some of these were sham weather-cocks, made of +straw, in the shape of fish, fowl, dogs, and cats, the handiwork of +Jamesy Doyle, the servant boy,—the same black-headed urchin who lifted +the tenpenny-bit out of the tub at old Murdock's party. They were +fastened upon sticks, which did not turn round, and were therefore put +up more to frighten away the sparrows than for the purpose of +indicating which way the wind blew, or, more likely still, as mere +specimens of Jamesy Doyle's ingenuity. The whole yard was covered a +foot deep with loose straw, for the double purpose of giving comfort +to two or three litters of young pigs, and that of being used up, by +the constant tramping, into manure for the farm; for cows, heifers, +and calves strayed about it without interruption. A grand flock of +geese, as white as snow and as large nearly as swans, marched in from +the fields, headed by their gander, every evening about the same hour, +to spend their night gaggling and watching and sleeping by turns under +the stacks of corn, which were raised upon stone pillars with mushroom +metal-caps, to keep out the rats and mice. A big black cock, with a +hanging red comb and white jowls, and innumerable hens belonging to +him, something on the Brigham Young system, marched triumphantly +about, calling his favorites <a name="663">{663}</a> every now and then with a quick +melancholy little chuckle as often as he found a tit-bit amongst the +straw. Ducks, half as large as the geese, coming home without a +feather raffled, in a mottled string of all colors, from the stream +below the hill, diving, for variety, into the clean straw, emerging +now and then, and smattering with their flat bills in any little +puddle of water that lay between the pavement in the bare part of the +yard. "Bullydhu," the watch-dog, as evening closed, taking possession +of a small wooden house upon wheels,—Jamesy Doyle's handiwork +too,—that it might be turned to the shelter, whichever way the wind +blew. It was a miracle to see Bully getting into it, the door was so +low; another piece of consideration of Jamesy's for the dog's comfort. +You could only know when he was in it by seeing his large soft paws +under the arch of the low door. +</p> +<p> +Beyond this farm-yard—farm in all its appearance and realities—was +the garden. A thick, high, furze hedge, about sixty yards long, ran +down one side of it, from the corner of the farmyard wall; and at the +further end of this hedge, which was the square of the garden, and +facing the sun, was certainly the most complete and beautiful +summer-house in the parish of Rathcash, or Jamesy Doyle was very much +mistaken. It also was his handiwork. In fact, there was nothing Jamesy +could not turn his hands to, and his heart was as ready as his hands, +so that he was always successful, but here he had outstripped all his +former ingenuity. The bower was now of four years' standing, and every +summer Jamesy was proud to see that nature had approved of his plan by +endorsing it with a hundred different signatures. With the other +portions of the garden or its several crops, we have nothing to do; we +will therefore linger for a while about the furze hedge and in +"Jamesy's bower" to see what may turn up. But I must describe another +item in the locality. +</p> +<p> +Immediately outside the hedge there was a lane, common to a certain +extent to both farms. It might be said to divide them. It lay quite +close to the furze hedge, which ran in a straight line a long distance +beyond where "Jamesy's bower" formed one of the angles of the garden. +There was a gate across the lane precisely outside the corner where +the bower had been made, and this was the extent of Murdock's right or +title to the commonalty of the lane. Passing through this gate, +Murdock branched off to the left with the produce of his farm. It is a +long lane, they say, that has no turning, and although the portion of +this one with which we are concerned was only sixty yards long, I have +not, perhaps, brought the reader to the spot so quickly as I might. I +certainly could have brought him through the yard without putting even +the word "farm" before it, or without saying a word about the stacks +of corn and the weather-cocks, the pigs, cows, heifers, and calves, +the geese, ducks, cock, and hens, "Bullydhu" and his house, etc., and +with a hop, step, and a leap I might have placed him in "Jamesy's +bower" if he had been the person to occupy it—but he was not. With +every twig, however, of the hedge and the bower it is necessary that +my readers should be well acquainted; and I hope I have succeeded in +making them so. +</p> +<p> +Winny Cavana was a thoughtful, thrifty girl, an experienced +housekeeper, never allowing one job to overtake another where it could +be avoided. Of course incidental difficulties would sometimes arise; +but in general she managed everything so nicely and systematically +that matters fell into their own time and place as regularly as +possible. +</p> +<p> +When Winny got the invitation for Mick Murdock's party, which was only +in the forenoon of the day before it came off, her first thought was, +that she would be very tired and ill-fitted for business the day after +it was over. She therefore called Jamesy Doyle to her assistance, and +on that day and <a name="664">{664}</a> the next, she got through whatever household +jobs would bear performance in advance, and instructed Jamesy as to +some little matters which she used to oversee herself, but which on +this occasion she would entrust solely to his own intelligence and +judgment for the day after the party. She could not have committed +them to a more competent or conscientious lad. Anything Jamesy +undertook to do, he did it well, as we have already seen both in the +haggard, the garden, and the tub—for it was he who brought up the +fippenny-bit at Murdock's, and he would lay down his life to serve or +even to oblige Winny Cavana. +</p> +<p> +Having thus purchased an idle day after the party, Winny was +determined to enjoy it, and after a very late breakfast, for her +father, poor soul, was dead tired, she called Jamesy, and examined him +as to what he had done or left undone. Finding that, notwithstanding +he had been up as late as she had been herself the night before, he +had been faithful to the trust reposed in him, and that everything was +in trim order, she then complimented him upon his snapping and diving +abilities. +</p> +<p> +"How much did you take up out of the tub, Jamesy?" she asked. +</p> +<p> +"Be gorra, Miss Winny, I took up two tenpenny-bits an' a fippenny." +</p> +<p> +"And what will you do with all that money, Jamesy? it is nearly a +month's wages." +</p> +<p> +"Be gorra, my mother has it afore this, Miss Winny." +</p> +<p> +"That is a good boy, Jamesy, but you shouldn't curse." +</p> +<p> +"Be gorra, I won't, miss; but I didn't think that was cursing, at all, +at all." +</p> +<p> +"Well, it is swearing, Jamesy, and that is just as bad." +</p> +<p> +"Well, Miss Winny, you'll never hear me say it agen." +</p> +<p> +"That's right, James. Is the garden open? +</p> +<p> +"It is, miss; I'm afther bringing out an armful of leaves to bile for +the pigs." +</p> +<p> +Winny passed on through the yard into the garden. It was a fine, mild +day for the time of year, and she was soon sitting in the bower with +an unopened story-book in her lap. It was a piece of idle folly her +bringing the book there at all. In the first place, she had it by +heart—for books were scarce in that locality, and were often +read—and in the next, she was more in a humor to think than to read. +It was no strange thing, under the circumstances, if, like some +heroines of a higher stamp, "she fell into a reverie." "How long she +remained thus," to use the patent phrase in such a case, must be a +mere matter of surmise; but a step at the gate outside the hedge, and +her own name distinctly pronounced, caused her to start. +Eaves-dropping has been universally condemned, and "listeners," they +say, "never hear good of themselves." But where is the young girl, or +indeed any person, hearing their own name pronounced, and being in a +position to listen unobserved, who would not do so? Our heroine, at +all events, was not "above that sort of thing," and instead of +hemming, or coughing, or shuffling her feet in the gravel, she cocked +her ears and held her breath. We would be a little indulgent to a +person so sorely tempted, whatever our readers may think. +</p> +<p> +"If Winny Cavana," she heard, "was twice as proud, an' twice as great +a lady, you may believe me, Tom, she wouldn't refuse you. She'll have +six hundred pounds as round as the crown of your hat; an' that fine +farm we're afther walkin' over; like her, or not like her, take my +advice an' don't lose the fortune an' the farm." +</p> +<p> +"Not if I can help it, father. There's more reason than you know of +why I should secure the ready money of her fortune at any rate; as to +herself, if it wasn't for that, she might marry Tom Naddy <i>th' +aumadhawn</i> if she had a mind." +</p> +<p> +"Had you any chat with her last night, Tom? Oh then, wasn't she +lookin' elegant!" +</p> +<a name="665">{665}</a> +<p> +"As elegant as you please, father, but as proud as a peacock. No, I +had no chat with her, except what the whole room could hear; she was +determined on that, and I'm still of opinion that you did more harm +than good." +</p> +<p> +"Not if you were worth a <i>thrawncen</i>, Tom. Arrah avic machree, you +don't undherstand her; that was all put on, man alive. I'm afeerd +she'll think you haven't the pluck in you; she's a sperited girl +herself, and depend upon it she expects you to spake, an' its what +she's vexed at, your dilly-dallyin'. Why did you let that fellow take +her out for the first dance? I heerd Mrs. Moran remark it to Kitty +Mulvey's mother." +</p> +<p> +"That was a mistake, father; he had her out before I got in from the +kitchen." +</p> +<p> +"They don't like them mistakes, Tom, an' that's the very thing I blame +you for; you should have stuck to her like a leech the whole night; +they like a man that's in earnest. Take my advice, Tom avic, an put +the question plump to her at wanst fore Shraftide. Tell her I'll lay +down a pound for you for every pound her father gives her, and I'll +make over this place to you out an out. Old Ned an I will live +together while we last, an that can't be long, Tom avic. I know he'll +settle Rathcash upon Winny, and he'll have the interest of her fortune +beside—" +</p> +<p> +"Interest be d—d!" interrupted Tom; "won't he pay the money down?" +</p> +<p> +"He might do that same, but I think not; he's afeerd it might be +dribbled away, but with Rathcash, an Rathcashmore joined, the devil's +in it and she can't live like a lady; at all events, Tom, you can live +like a gentleman; ould Ned's for you entirely, Tom, I can tell you +that." +</p> +<p> +"That is all very well, father, and I wish that you could make me +think that your words would come true, but I'm not come to +four-and-twenty years of age without knowing something of the way +girls get on; and if that one is not set on young Lennon, my name is +not Tom Murdock; and I'll tell you what's more, that if it wasn't for +her fortune and that farm, he might have her and welcome. There are +many girls in the parish as handsome, and handsomer for that matter, +than what she is, that would just jump at me." +</p> +<p> +"I know that, Tom agra, but maybe it's what you'll only fix her on +that whelp, as you call him, the stronger, if you be houldin' back the +way you do. They like pluck, Tom; they like pluck, I tell you, and in +my opinion she's only makin' b'lief, to dhraw you out. Try her, Tom, +try her." +</p> +<p> +"I will, father, and if I fail, and I find that that spalpeen Lennon +is at the bottom of it, let them both look out, that's all. For his +part, I have a way of dealing with him that he knows nothing about, +and as for her—" +</p> +<p> +Here Jamesy Doyle came out into the lane from the farm-yard, and +father and son immediately branched off in the direction of their own +house, leaving Tom Murdock's second part of the threat unfinished. +</p> +<p> +But Winny had heard enough. Her heart, which had been beating with +indignation the whole time, had nearly betrayed itself when she heard +Emon-a-knock called a spalpeen. +</p> +<p> +One thing she was now certain of, and the certainty gave her whole +soul relief,—that if ever Tom Murdock could have had any chance of +success through her father's influence, and her love for him, it was +now entirely at an end for ever. Should her father urge the match upon +her, she had, as a last remedy, but to reveal this conversation, to +gain him over indignantly to her side. +</p> +<a name="666">{666}</a> +<p> +Winny was seldom very wrong in her likings or dislikings, although +perhaps both were formed in some instances rather hastily, and she +often knew not why. In Tom Murdock's case, she was glad, and now +rather "proud out of herself," that she had never liked him. +</p> +<p> +"I knew the dirt was in him," she said to herself as she returned to +the house. "I wish he did not live so near us, for I foresee nothing +but trouble and vexation before me on his account. I'm sorry Jamesy +Doyle came out so soon. I'd like to have heard what he was going to +say of myself, but sure he said enough. Em-on-a-knock may despise +himself and his threat." And she went into the house to prepare the +dinner. +</p> +<p> +Tom Murdock, notwithstanding his shortcomings, and they were neither +few nor far between, was a shrewd, clever fellow in most matters. It +was owing to this shrewdness that he resolved to watch for some +favorable opportunity, rather than seek a formal meeting with Winny +Cavana "<i>at wanst</i>" as had been 'advised by his father. +</p> +<p> +[TO BE CONTINUED. <a href="#785">Page 785</a>] +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>From Once a Week. +<br><br> +SAINT DOROTHEA.</h2> +<br> +<pre> + The sun blazed fiercely out of cloudless blue, + And the deep sea flung back the glare again, + As though there were indeed another sun + Within the mimic sky reflected there; + Not steadily and straight, as from above, + But all athwart the little rippling waves + The broken daybeams sparkling leapt aloft + In glittering ruin; scarce a breath of air + To stir the waters or to wave the trees; + The flowers hung drooping, and the leaves lay close + Against their branches, as if sick and faint + With the dull heat and needing strong support. + The city walls, the stones of every street, + The houses glow'd, you would have thought that none + Would venture forth, till that the gracious night + Should come with sable robe and wrap the earth + In softest folds, and shade men from the day. + But see, from every street the seething crowds + Pour out, and all along the way they stand, + And ribald jest and song resound aloud, + And light accost and careless revelry: + What means this, wherefore flock the people forth? + Ceases the hum, a sudden silence falls + On all around, the tramp of armed men + Rings through the air; and hark, what further sound? + A girl's fresh voice, a sad sweet song is heard + Above the clank of arms, men hold their breath; + Yet not all sadness is that wondrous chant, + That hushes the wild crowd with sudden awe. + As when the nightingale's mellifluous tones + Rise in the woodland, ere the other birds <a name="667">{667}</a> + Have ceased their vesper hymn, that moment drops + Each fluttering songster's wild thanksgiving lay, + So for awhile did silence fall on all + Within the seething crowd at that sweet voice. + She comes, they bring her forth to die, for she + This day must win the martyr's palm, this day + Must witness for her faith, this day must reap + The fruit of all her pains, long rest in heaven! + Long had they spared her, for the governor + Was loth that she should suffer, and her race + Was noble, so they hoped to make her yield, + And waited still and waited; but at length + They grew enraged at her calm steadfastness, + They knew not whence a resolution such + As made a young maid baffle aged men, + So she must die. + + Now as she went along + 'Midst all her guards, again burst forth the mob + Into such bitter taunts, such foul wild words, + As sent the hot blood mantling to her cheek + For shame that she, a maid, must hear such things; + And yet was no remorse within their hearts, + No light of pity in their savage eyes, + Like hungry wolves that scent the blood from far + They howled with joy, expectant of their prey. + There was one there, he in old days had loved + Her fair young face, but he too now, with scorn + Written in his dark eyes and on his brow, + And in the curl of his short lip, stood by; + It 'seemed not such a face, that bitter smile, + For he was passing fair, in youth's heyday; + But if contemptuous was his mien, his words + Were worse for her to bear, for he cried out— + He, whom her heart yet own'd its only love! + He, whom she held first of all living men! + He, whom she honor'd yet, though left by him + In her distress and danger!—this man cried, + "Ho, Dorothea! doth the bridegroom wait? + And goest thou to his arms? Joy go with thee! + But yet when in his palace courts above, + Whereof thou tellest, fair one, think on us + Who toil in this sad world below; on me + Think thou before all others, thine old love, + And send me somewhat for a token, send + Of that same heavenly fruit and of those flowers + That fade not!" + + Then she turn'd and answer'd him, + "As thou hast said, so be it, thy request + Is granted!" and she pass'd on to her death. + She died: her soul was rapt into the skies. + The vulgar horde who watch'd her torture, knew + Nought of the great unfathomable bliss <a name="668">{668}</a> + Which waited her, and when her spirit fled + None saw the angel bands receive her, none + Heard the long jubilant sweet sound that burst + Through heaven's high gates, swept from ten thousand harps + By seraph choirs, for she had died on earth + Only to enter on the life above. + Night fell upon the earth, the city lay + Slumb'ring in cool repose, the restless sea, + Weary with dancing all day 'neath the sun, + Was hushed to sleep by the faint whisp'ring breeze + That, wanting force to sport, but rose and fell + With soothing murmur, like to pine boughs stirr'd + By the north wind: sleep held men's eyelids close. + And he, that youth, slept, aye, slept peacefully, + Nor reck'd of the vile insult he had pour'd + Upon the head of one whom once he swore + To love beyond all others. As he lay, + Wrapt in the dreamless slumber of young health, + Sudden a light unearthly clear hath fill'd + The chamber, and he starts up from his couch, + Gazing in troubled wonder: by his side + What sees he? + + A young boy he deems him first, + But when had mortal such a calm pure smile + Since our first father lost his purity? + A radiant angel, rather, should he be, + Who stands all glorious, bearing in his hands + Such fruit and flowers as surely never grew + On this dull earth; their fragrance fill'd the air, + And smote the senses of Theophilus, + That a sad yearning rose within his heart, + Such as at times a strain of song will raise, + Or some chance word will bring (we know not why), + Flooding the inmost soul with that strange sense, + Half pain, half pleasure, of some bygone time— + Some far off and forgotten happiness, + We know not where nor what. + + The stranger spoke, + And thus he said, "Rise up, Theophilus! + And take these gifts which I from heaven bring. + Fair Dorothea, mindful of her words, + Hath sent thee these, and bids thee that henceforth + Thou scoff not, but believe!" + + With those same words + Vanish'd the cherub, and the room was dark, + Save where the moonbeams made uncertain light, + And where remain'd those blossoms and that fruit, + For from each leaf and stem there stream'd a ray + As of the morning. + + Down upon his couch + Theophilus sank prone, with awe oppress'd; <a name="669">{669}</a> + But for a moment. Starting wildly up, + He cried, "My love, my Dorothea, list! + If thou canst hear me in those starry halls + Where now thou dwellest, I accept thy gift. + Do thou take mine, for I do give myself + Up to the service of thy Lord; thy faith + Shall from this hour be mine, for I believe!" +</pre> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>Translated from Der Katholik. +<br><br> +THE TWO SIDES OF CATHOLICISM. +<br><br> +[Second Article.] +<br><br> +I. THE PROBLEM.</h2> +<br> +<p> +"Neither," says Jesus Christ, "do they put new wine into old bottles; +otherwise the bottles break, and the wine runneth out." The parable +teaches that the new spirit of Christianity requires a new form, +corresponding to its essence. The essence and the form of Christianity +are, therefore, intimately connected. +</p> +<p> +What is thus generally enunciated in regard to the essential +connection of the spirit of Christianity with the forms of its +expression, is equally true of the mutual relations subsisting between +the substance and the manifestation of the Church. Christianity and +the Church are virtually identical. The former, considered as a source +of union and brotherhood, constitutes the Church, In a former article +we have recognized Catholicism as the type of the Church Founded by +Christ. Hence the interdependence of the essence with the form of +Christianity in general is not more thorough than that of the spirit +of the Church with the historical development of Catholicism. +</p> +<p> +These remarks will be found to designate the object of the present +essay. An inquiry into the fundamental principle of Catholicism must +address itself to the elucidation of the cause of the necessary +connection between the spirit and the outer shape of the Church just +mentioned. The direction in which the light is to be sought appears by +the parable cited above. +</p> +<p> +The new wine requires new bottles, because they only correspond with +its nature. By the same induction it is affirmed that if the true +Church is realized only in the form of Catholicism, the reason is to +be found in the inmost nature of the Church, in the catholicity of her +spirit. +</p> +<p> +This idea of the inherent catholicity of the Church, as well as the +foregoing assertion of a necessary inter-dependence of the essence +with the image of Catholicism, is to be established on scriptural +authority by the following disquisition. +</p> +<br> +<h2>II. THE KINGDOM OF GOD ON EARTH.</h2> +<p> +The shape and form in which Catholicism appears in history has its +root in the papacy. It is certainly deserving of attention, that +precisely in the institution of the papacy the Church is designated by +a name which affords an insight into her inmost nature. +</p> +<p> +On that occasion the Church—meaning the Church as apparent in +history—is called the kingdom of heaven. [Footnote 146] The Lord +says to Peter, "I will give <a name="670">{670}</a> unto thee the keys of the kingdom of +heaven;" a promise substantially the same with that given in the same +breath to the same apostle, though under a different metaphor, when +Jesus calls him the rock upon which he will build his Church. The +primate is the subject of both predictions. The apostle Peter is to be +the foundation of the Church, and he is to receive the keys of the +same edifice, that is to say, he is to be the master of the house. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 146: Matt. xvi. 18, 19. ] +</p> +<p> +That the epithet of "kingdom of heaven" expresses the essential +character of the Church, is easily shown by a glance at the passages +of Scripture in which the Church is mentioned. Such is always the case +where the kingdom of God or of heaven is represented as in course of +realization on earth. In this respect the parables of Jesus are +especially significant. They address themselves principally to the +spirit, the organization, and the most essential peculiarities of the +new order of things which Jesus Christ had come into the world to +establish. In these discourses the new foundation is constantly +brought forward as the kingdom of God or of heaven. Thus we cannot but +recognize in this expression a designation of the inner essence of the +institution of Jesus. +</p> +<p> +At a time when his destined kingdom had not yet become historically +manifest, Jesus might still say, in the same acceptation of the term, +that it was already present, and palpable to all who sought to grasp +it. This actual presence of the kingdom is deduced by the Lord from +the efficacy of his miracles. In them the vital principle of +Catholicism was already at work. It had entered the world at the same +instant with the person of the Son of Man. But not until after Christ +was exalted did it assume a historical palpability. No less does the +declaration of Jesus, that from the days of John the Baptist the +kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, display Catholicism as a power +even before it came to figure in history. For this very forwardness +with which even then the violent took it by force, was a product of +the Christ-like power which had entered humanity simultaneously with +the person of the Messiah. And where the Jews are called sons of the +kingdom, it is likewise in reference to this elementary principle of +Catholicism. It had been planted in the first instance on the +historical soil of Judaism, thence, of course, to spread its benign +influence over the earth, and thus to make historically manifest the +vital substance of the Church in its only adequate expression. "Many +shall come from the east and the west, and shall sit down with +Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, in the kingdom." On the other hand, the +kingdom shall be taken from the Jews, because they have made it +unfruitful. +</p> +<p> +No Christian sermon should omit to give this inner view of +Catholicism, or of the advent of the kingdom. Therein lies its +peculiar force. The preacher of the gospel has no more effective word +of consolation for the pious souls who give him a ready hearing, than +the assurance that the kingdom of God has come nigh unto them. In this +word, also, the apostle of Christ has his most potent weapon against +the assailants of the Church. If they receive you not, says the Lord +unto his disciples, go your ways out into the streets of the same +city, and say, Even the very dust of your city, which cleaveth on us, +we do wipe off against you; yet know this, that the kingdom of God is +at hand. The invincibility of Catholicism grows out of the power of +its principle. As of old in enabling the apostles to heal the sick, so +at the present day in her varied fortunes the Church approves herself +the kingdom of God. +</p> +<p> +But how is the interior of the Church related to the exterior? The +word of the kingdom is the seed of Catholicism. According to the +quality of the hearers of the word, the growing grain is fruitful or +empty, the members genuine or spurious. Again, the kingdom of heaven +is like to a net, cast into the sea, and gathering together all kind +of fishes. The kingdom of the Son of Man is not without scandals, and +them that work <a name="671">{671}</a> iniquity. [Footnote 147] Hence the kingdom of +God on earth embraces the entire Church in her temporal existence. The +latter is shown to be a kingdom of long-suffering, in preserving her +connection even with ingredients estranged from her in spirit, leaving +the ultimate separation of the false members to the final judgment. +Even these erring ones carry on their souls the impress of the +kingdom, the signature of baptism. Nevertheless their adhesion to the +kingdom is external and objective merely. In the more accurate sense +of the word, the idea of the kingdom applies only to the marrow, the +soul of the Church. The good seed only are the real children of the +kingdom. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 147: Matt. xiii. 41.] +</p> +<p> +This account of the formation of the kingdom of God explains how the +essence of the true Church becomes a historical reality in the actual +condition of Catholicism, notwithstanding its imperfections. The +position, therefore, that the spirit of the Church is inseparable from +her temporal existence by no means denies that this historical +exterior of Catholicism may be infected with elements having nothing +in common with, and even hostile to, the character of the true Church. +This results from the fact that the true Church, though always +preserving a unitary organization, realizes herself by degrees only. +The form of Catholicism is gradually purified and disclosed by the +sanctifying virtue of its inner life. Thus it is that parasites take +root in the soil of the Church. +</p> +<p> +It is therefore a shifting of the real issue when Mr. Hase defines the +Catholic antagonism to the ideal Church of Protestantism as consisting +in a notion of Catholicism that in all essential attributes there is a +perfect congruity between the idea of the Church and the concrete +Church of Rome; or in other words, that the latter Church is at all +tunes the perfect type of Christianity. Two distinct things are here +confounded. The position of Catholicism—that the essence of the true +Church, so far as realized at all, exists only within the Catholic +Church, where alone, therefore, a further development of this essence +can be accomplished or the ideal of the Church attained—is by no +means equivalent to the pretension, attributed to Catholicism by Hase, +that Catholicism has already attained the ideal, or that it is at all +times the most perfect representation of Christianity. After this +misrepresentation of the position of Catholicism, Hase has no +difficulty in distorting the well-known Catholic doctrine that sinners +also belong to the Church into an unconscious acknowledgment of the +ideal Church of Protestantism. +</p> +<p> +While the toleration of spurious members is a mandate of the +educational mission of the Church, it involves, moreover, a special +dispensation of Divine Providence. Like her divine principle, the +Church appears as a servant among men. The beauty of her inner life is +veiled beneath an exterior covered with manifold imperfections. This +serves as a constant admonition to the Church not to rely upon +externals. Yet even these shadows on the image of the Church are +evidences of her vitality. How superhuman must be an organization +which outlasts all enemies in spite of many deficiencies! It is error, +therefore, to infer from the undeniable, practical incongruity between +the essence of the Church and her outward form that there cannot be an +exclusive, concrete realization of the true Church in history. +</p> +<p> +To make the growth of Catholicism intelligible to his hearers, Jesus +compares the kingdom of heaven with a grain of mustard, which unfolds +the least of all seeds to a stately tree. Immediately thereafter it is +said that the kingdom of heaven penetrates the mass of humanity like +leaven. The law of development of Catholicism is further illustrated +by the following parable: The earth, says Jesus, bringeth forth fruit; +first the blade, then the ear, afterward the full corn in the ear; man +has but to cast the seed into the earth; then he may sleep, and the +seed shall <a name="672">{672}</a> spring and grow up, he knoweth not how. Even so is +the kingdom of God. The Church therefore carries the germs of her +growth in her inmost nature. Catholicism is gradually developed out of +itself, from within. Thanks to the energy of her own principle, the +Church with her arms encircles nation after nation. The faculty of +being all things unto all men she owes to her being the kingdom of +God. Here is the root of Catholicism. As the kingdom of God, the +Church is fraught with a wealth adequate to the mental requirements of +all individuals and all nations. As the kingdom of God, the Church is +adapted to every age and clime. +</p> +<p> +The word "Church" is used by Jesus Christ far more rarely than that of +the "kingdom of heaven;" indeed but twice, and on each occasion in +direct reference to the external form of the Church. +</p> +<p> +That this historical exterior of Catholicism, designated the Church, +is the manifestation of the kingdom of God, We have already deduced +from Matt. xvi. 18, 19, and xiii. 41. The same truth is expressed in +the parable of the treasure hid in the field. He who would possess the +treasure, that is to say, the kingdom of heaven, or the vital +principle of Catholicism, must buy the field in which the gem is +concealed. The field, the Catholic exterior of the Church, is not the +inner life; but the latter is realized only in the historical form of +Catholicism. +</p> +<p> +It now behooves us to more precisely expound this relation between the +spirit and the outer form of the Church from the words of Jesus. The +way to do this is indicated by our Lord himself. It consists in an +extended analysis of the biblical idea of the kingdom of God. In it is +disclosed the inmost nature of the Church and thereby the ultimate +origin of her historical figure as instituted by Christ, or the +principle of Catholicism, which is the object of our search. +</p> +<p> +My kingdom, says the Lord, is not of this world; that is to say, its +origin is not here, and it is not established by the exercise of +worldly power. <i>Regnum meum non est hinc</i>. True, the kingdom of Christ +is established in the midst of the world, but it was not generated +there: from above, from heaven, it was planted in the world as a +supernatural <i>realm of grace</i>. Therefore its existence and its +extension is in no wise dependent on worldly power; its foundations +lie deeper, in the principle of truth which has entered the world with +Christ. For this cause came he into the world, that he should bear +witness unto the truth. All they that are of the truth, do him homage +as their king, and hear his kingly voice. The same principle works in +them as that of a new worship; they worship the Father in spirit and +in truth. +</p> +<p> +But this elevated sense of truth in individual souls is the fruit of a +higher form of being. He that is of God heareth the words of God; but +they hear them not who are not of God. The entrance into the kingdom +of God therefore necessarily presupposes a new beginning of man's +life, a new birth of water and of the Spirit. Wherever the kingdom of +God obtains a foothold, it assumes the form of an entirely new state +of things, of a new creation, of the principle of a new mental +activity, a new <i>nature</i> of the spirit. +</p> +<p> +A transmutation of our souls, such as just described, necessarily +involves a rupture with the natural man, a discarding of the original +individuality. Without this alteration we are impervious to the new +light which is to enter our souls together with the kingdom of God. +This indispensable self-denial is accomplished by a two-fold +instrumentality—by the love of God, which is the first commandment, +and by the love of our neighbor as ourselves. Whoever is in this frame +of mind is pronounced by Jesus to be not far from the kingdom of God. +</p> +<p> +What has been said reveals another peculiarity of the kingdom of God +on earth. It is a <i>supernatural</i> kingdom. At this point only do we +fully comprehend the title of the Church to <a name="673">{673}</a> the designation of +the kingdom of heaven. The kingdom of God historically manifested in +the Church is intimately connected with the intro-divine relations or +the inmost life of the Deity. By admission into the Church God the +Father translates us into the kingdom of his beloved Son. This is not +merely an exercise of the creative love common to the three persons of +the Trinity. On the contrary, it is an evidence what manner of love +the Father hath bestowed upon us that we should be called the sons of +God. Precisely in this is the peculiar supernatural character of this +dispensation made manifest. It is this supernatural characteristic of +the Church which accounts for the bestowal upon the Church of the name +of the coming realm of glory. The germ of the latter is already +contained in the existing Church. While, for this reason, the Church +visible is called the kingdom of heaven, so the latter continues to +bear the name of the Church even in the splendor of its eternal glory. +This circumstance warrants the bold utterance of the apostle that our +conversation is in heaven. In the same sense it is laid down in the +catechism of the council of Trent that the Church militant and the +Church triumphant are but two parts of the one Church, not two +churches; and with entire consistency the same authority speaks of the +Church militant as synonymous with the kingdom of heaven. +</p> +<p> +It is but another expression for the supernatural character of the +Church if she is called the Jerusalem which is above, even in her +historical form and figure. And precisely because this epithet applies +to her, she is free and is our mother. The catholicity of the Church, +her faculty of enfolding all mankind, of being the spiritual mother of +us all, is owing to her supernatural character. +</p> +<p> +This doctrine of the supernaturalness of the Church is the connecting +link between the essence and the form of Catholicism. As the latter is +supernatural in its character, so must the form of its establishment +bear a supernatural impress. How can anything utterly supernatural +attain an adequate form of expression by mere natural development? It +assumes a historical reality in so far only as it assumes +simultaneously with its supernatural essence a corresponding +supernatural image. The form as well as the substance of the Church +must needs be the fruit of an immediate interposition of God, because +the substance must needs exercise its supernatural functions. +</p> +<p> +The idea just expressed may have been dimly present to the mind of +Moehler when he wrote: "But it is the conviction of Catholics that +this purpose of the divine revelation in Christ Jesus would not have +been attained at all, or at least would have been attained but very +imperfectly, if this embodiment of the truth had been but momentary, +and if the personal manifestation of the Word had not been +sufficiently powerful to give its tones the highest degree of +intensified animation, and the most perfect conceivable efficacy, that +is to say, to breathe into it the breath of life, and to create a +union once more setting forth the truth in its vitality, and remaining +emblematically the conclusive authority for all time, or, in other +words, representing Christ himself." +</p> +<p> +Viewed in this light, the historical manifestation of the Church, +instituted Matt. xvi. 18, 19, presents itself as a postulate of her +essence. Because the Church was essentially destined historically to +manifest the kingdom of God, the Lord built her upon Peter, the rock. +A temporal establishment of the kingdom of heaven in the midst of this +world required the divine installation of an individual keeper of the +keys. Thus the idea of the papacy flows from that of a kingdom of God +on earth. +</p> +<p> +If, then, this explanation presents Catholicism as a supernatural +kingdom, and if this very attribute constitutes the characteristic +feature of its being, its inmost life and fundamental <a name="674">{674}</a> principle, +it is manifestly inadmissible to place the kingdom of God as +established in the Church on the same footing with the works of +creation. A juxtaposition like this would entirely ignore the vital +essence of the Church, that is to say, her superiority to nature. +</p> +<p> +The same distinction is overlooked by those who regard Church and +state as simply two manifestations of the same kingdom of God. Such is +the point of view of a system of moral theology, the influence of +which upon the opinions prevailing among a considerable fraction of +the present generation of theologians is not to be mistaken. In the +eye of that doctrine "Mosaism and Christianism—state and Church—both +externally represent the kingdom, and both represent one and the same +kingdom; the former [the state] rather in its negative, the latter +[the Church] rather in its positive aspect. And thus we have two great +formations in which the kingdom on earth is made manifest, Church and +state." Could Hirscher have reached any other conclusion? He regards +it as his task "to dispose of the question whether the germs of the +divine kingdom, like seeds, are implanted in the character of man as +in a fruitful soil, and whether they can spring forth from it [<i>i.e.</i>, +from the character or nature of man himself] and blossom as the +kingdom of God." +</p> +<p> +Although it is here said that "God abode in man with his Holy Spirit +and with its sanctifying grace," yet the Holy Spirit or his grace is +not made the foundation upon which the kingdom is erected; that +foundation is sought, on the contrary, in the "divine powers" infused +into man at his creation. God only assists at the upraising of the +kingdom through them by "dwelling in them for ever as the principle of +divine guidance." +</p> +<p> +The logical inference from these premises, which seek the germs of the +kingdom of God as established on earth in human nature itself, that is +to say, in the "heavenly faculties" inherent in man, is well disclosed +in the definition of the kingdom of God on earth given by Petersen, a +theologian reared in the school of Schleiermacher. "The kingdom of God +on earth," says he, "is at once Church, state, and civilization, +<i>i.e.</i>, it is an organism of community in religion, morals, and +society, and by these three special organisms it essentially +approaches, develops, and perfects its organic unity, in organizing +its religious principle in the Church, its moral framework in the +state, and its natural base in civilization, thus in the unity of all +three rounding its proportions as a universal organism of genuine +humanity." If "the germs of the divine kingdom, like seeds, are +implanted in the character of man as in a fruitful soil," it is +entirely consistent to regard the kingdom of God on earth as +"substantially identical with the idea of the human race," as "the +realization of that idea." +</p> +<p> +It gives us pleasure to state that the notion of the kingdom of God on +earth just alluded to has been declared unscriptural even in a +Protestant exegesis of greater thoroughness. [Footnote 148] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 148: Hofman, <i>Schriftbeweis</i>, 1855. ] +</p> +<br> +<h2>III. THE BODY OF CHRIST.</h2> +<p> +Next to the idea of the kingdom of God, the most significant +expression for the inner essence of Catholicism is found in the +scriptural conception of the body of Christ. As his body, the Church +is intimately connected with him. Christ and the Church belong +together as the head and the body; both constitute a single whole. +This intimate relation between Christ and the Church is described by +the Scriptures in animated terms. The Church, it says, is for Christ +what our own body is for us; as members of the Church we are members +of the body of Christ, of his flesh, and of his bones. On one +occasion, indeed, the apostle uses the word Christ as synonymous with +the Church, so intimate is their relation. +</p> +<a name="675">{675}</a> +<p> +And it is the Son of Man, or Christ in his human capacity, as whose +body the Church is regarded. For as the head thereof the apostle +designates him who was raised from the dead. The Church here enters +into a profoundly intimate relation to the sacred humanity of Christ. +We shall seek further profit from this idea in the sequel. +</p> +<p> +Immediately after having called the Church the body of Christ, he +calls her the +<span style="vertical-align:-25%"> +<img alt="" src="images/i675a.jpg"> +</span>. +This epithet results from the foregoing. +It is because she is the body of Christ that the Church is the +<span style="vertical-align:-25%"> +<img alt="" src="images/i675b.jpg"> +</span>. +I translate these difficult words, the fulness of him who +filleth all in all. God who filleth all things with his essential +presence, in whom we live, and move, and have our being, hath his +fulness in the Church. The Church is entirely filled with God. But +how? Is not God, in his very nature, present everywhere? How then can +the Church be filled with God in a greater degree than the world +without? As the body of Christ, she has this capacity. For if the +Church, as Christ's body, assumes a special relation, peculiar to +herself, to his sacred humanity, then, by that very assumption, she +acquires a share in the +<span style="vertical-align:-25%"> +<img alt="" src="images/i675c.jpg"> +</span> +of the Deity which dwells bodily +in that sacred humanity. She thereby becomes the spot where God is +especially revealed and glorified. For while God, in the fulness of +his nature, is present over all the world, nevertheless this presence +is more largely apparent in the Church than elsewhere. By the Church +alone the manifold wisdom of God is known unto the principalities and +powers in heavenly places. In him is glory in the Church by Christ +Jesus throughout all ages, world without end. Thus she stands approved +as his pleroma, as entirely filled with God. +</p> +<p> +But how are we to understand this repletion of the Church with God? It +is well known that Moehler sees in the visible Church the "Son of God +continually appearing among men in human form, constantly re-creating, +eternally rejuvenating himself, his perpetual incarnation." In this +sense he apprehends the scriptural conception of the body of Christ, +the "interpretation of the divine and the human in the Church." This +proposition, which has become celebrated, was intended, in the first +instance, to afford a more profound insight into the visibility of the +Church, in addition to which it is inseparable from Moehler's views on +the subject of the means of grace. In this twofold light we must make +it the subject of examination. +</p> +<p> +Moehler goes on to argue that, if the Church is a continuance of the +incarnation, she must be, like the latter, a visible one. This can +mean no more than that even as the Son of God during his stay upon +earth wrought visibly for mankind in the flesh, so also the saving +efficacy of Christ, abiding after his departure from the earth, +requires a visible medium. Such a point, however, Protestantism is far +from disputing. In the separate congregations, in their visible means +of grace, and in the audible exposition of the word of God, even +Protestants admit that the efficacy of Christ is visibly perpetuated, +and the idea of Christianity and the Church gradually realized. Every +Protestant denomination aspires to be the palpable image, the living +presentment, of the Christian religion. Moehler's conception of the +Son of God continually appearing among men in human form has even +become a favorite theme of modern Protestant theology. This will +appear from the mere perusal of the disquisitions on this head of the +so-called Christological school. The advantage gained for the Catholic +interpretation amounts to nothing. For the point is not that the +efficacy of Christ is perpetually exercised among men in a visible +manner, but it is in question whether this continued exercise ensues +only in the fold of a particular institution, and by particular means +of grace. +</p> +<p> +Moehler arrived at his doctrine in <a name="676">{676}</a> reference to the Church +through the medium of his views regarding the means of grace. In his +opinion "the Eucharistic descent of the Son of God" (and the same must +be inferred to apply to all the means of grace which it is the +function of the Church to administer [Footnote 149]) "is a part of +the totality of his merit, wherewith we are redeemed." The sacramental +offering of Christ is "the conclusion of his great sacrifice for us," +and in it "all the other parts of the same sacrifice are to be +bestowed upon us; in this final portion of the objective offering, the +whole is to become subjective, a part of our individual being." But +the incarnation of God, or, in other words, the work of our salvation +accomplished by Christ during his walk upon earth, stands in need of +no continuation or completion by a posthumous labor of Christ, +constituting "a part of the totality of his merit, wherewith we are +redeemed." The perpetual condescension of Christ, administered by the +Church, to our helplessness, does not form a complement to the +objective work of salvation; it is not an integral part of it, but +only its continued application. "<i>Christus</i>" says Suarez, "<i>jam vero +nos non redimit, sed applicat nobis redemptionem suam</i>" [Footnote +150] If this work of redemption were even now in progress—that is to +say, if "the Eucharistic descent of the Son of God" were "a part of +the totality of his merits, wherewith we are redeemed," then Christ +would not have fully taken away the sin of the world once for all on +Golgotha. Who would maintain such a proposition? Moehler would be the +last man to do so. He would therefore undoubtedly have renounced the +opinion in question if these, its logical results, had presented +themselves to his mind. The sacramental offering of Christ, as indeed +the whole of his perennial saving efficacy in the sacraments of the +Church, wherewith we are saved, is only the <i>means</i> by which it is +applied to our salvation. The <i>ground</i> of salvation for all mankind +was perfected in the sufferings and death of Christ. The <i>realization</i> +of salvation for individuals is accomplished by their appropriating to +themselves the salvation purchased or achieved for all mankind by the +precious blood of Jesus Christ; a work in which, undoubtedly, Christ +himself co-operates as the head of the Church. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 149: For, according to St. Thomas, "the Eucharist is the + <i>perfectio omnis sacramenti, habens quasi in capitulo et summo + omnia, quae alia sacramenta continent singillatim;</i> the perfection + of the whole sacrament, having as it were in an epitome and a + summary all the virtues which, other sacraments contain + singly."—IV. Sent. a. 8. q. 1, a. 2, <i>solut</i>. 2 <i>ad</i>. 4.] +<br><br> + [Footnote 150: At present Christ does not redeem us, but applies to + us his redemption. <i>De Incarnat., Par. I., Disp</i>. 39, + <i>Sec</i>. 3.] +</p> +<p> +In this sense the apostle says that he fills up those things that are +wanting of the sufferings of Christ in his flesh. By faithfully +following Christ, we partake more and more of the fruits of +redemption. Thus is Christ likewise gradually fulfilled in the +individual Christians—that is to say, he finds in them a more and +more ample expression. And in the same degree in which Christ stamps +himself upon the single members of the Church, the latter also is more +and more filled with him. +</p> +<p> +Scarce has the apostle declared of Christ, in Col. ii. 9, that in him +dwelleth all the +<span style="vertical-align:-25%"> +<img alt="" src="images/i676.jpg"> +</span> +of the Godhead corporally, when he turns +to the Colossians with the words, "And you are filled in" God—that is +to say, "in him," <i>i.e.</i> in Christ, in so far as ye stand in communion +with him, "which is the head of all principality and power." This +communion of individuals with Christ, and their attendant +participation in the fulness of the Godhead which dwelleth in him, is +accomplished by the instrumentality of the Church, particularly by the +sacrament of baptism, which incorporates the individual with the +Church. Verse 10-12: "<i>Et estis in illo repleti. In quo et circumcisi +estis, circumcisione non manu facta, sed in circumcisione Christi, +consepulti ei in baptismo.</i>" +</p> +<p> +Thus the Church is seen to be the pleroma of the Godhead in a twofold +<a name="677">{677}</a> point of view. First, in her members, which, being gradually +filled with God, become partakers of the divine nature. In the second +place, in the active cooperation of the Church herself in the +performance of this work. +</p> +<p> +In the first regard, the repletion of the Church with God is not a +state attained once for all. It is rather a process of measured growth +<span style="vertical-align:-25%"> +<img alt="" src="images/i677a.jpg"> +</span>. +The measure of the age of the fulness of Christ is the +goal and the objective point of the entire development of the Church. +It will be attained when every individual shall have become complete +in Christ, and therewith also in his own person a pleroma of Christ. +In the edifying of the body of Christ, or in the establishment of the +Church, therefore, we must work without repose till we all meet in the +unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God. In this +sense only can it be said that there is a progress in the Church. This +continued development of Catholicism the apostle regards as a gradual +repletion of the single members of the Church with all the fulness of +God,<br> +<span style="vertical-align:-25%"> +<img alt="" src="images/i677b.jpg"> +</span> +</p> +<p> +We have as yet, however, come to know but the one phase of this +relation of the Church to Christ, or to the pleroma of the Godhead. +The Church is not only destined to present herself at the close of her +historical development as the pleroma of him that filleth all in all; +she is even now entitled to this attribute, by virtue of her essential +character. +</p> +<p> +On this head we derive instruction from a nearer contemplation of the +process of development in which the erection of the Church is +completed. "The whole body," says the apostle, meaning the body of +Christ himself, "maketh increase of the body unto the edifying of +itself in charity." The Church therefore carries within herself, in +the inmost recesses of her being, the principle and the germinal power +of her whole development. This fundamental principle of Catholicism is +Christ himself, who pervades the Church as his body. +</p> +<p> +There is a subjective and an objective repletion of the Church with +Christ. The former progresses gradually, in so far as the single +members of the Church assimilate themselves more and more to Christ. +The latter is a given state of things from the first. In it consists +the most subtle essence of the Church. This objective presence of +Christ in her approves itself as the vital power of her growth. The +gradual ripening of the Church therefore grows up into Christ +<span style="white-space:nowrap;"> +( +<span style="vertical-align:-25%"> +<img alt="" src="images/i677c.jpg"> +</span> +, Eph. iv. 15) +</span> +on the one hand, and proceeds from him +<span style="white-space:nowrap;"> +( +<span style="vertical-align:-25%"> +<img alt="" src="images/i677d.jpg"> +</span>) +</span> +on the other. From him—that is to say, by means of the +vivifying influence of the Son of God, present in the Church, she +maketh increase of herself unto the edifying of herself in charity. +</p> +<p> +It is the same idea, when the apostle characterizes the growth of the +Church as an +<span style="vertical-align:-25%"> +<img alt="" src="images/i677e.jpg"> +</span>, +an <i>augmentum Dei, i.e.</i>, a growth +emanating from God. God effects it, but by the instrumentality of the +Church, within her and as issuing from her. For this purpose God hath +installed her as his pleroma. Precisely because the Church is filled +with God, or is his pleroma, the members of the Church may gradually +become complete in him. Thus there is a development and a progress +only for the individual members of the Church. She herself, by virtue +of her essential character, is superior to development, and acts as +the impelling force of this development. Christianity <i>has</i> a history, +but it <i>is</i> not itself a history. The essence of Christianity, which +is that of the Church, is not a thing in process of formation, it is a +thing accomplished and perfect from the beginning. +</p> +<p> +The scriptural idea of the body of Christ presents the principle of +Catholicism in a new light. The Church alone has Christ for her head. +It is her exclusive privilege to be the body of Christ. This gives her +a fellowship of life with Christ, by which she is distinguished from +the world, the <a name="678">{678}</a> latter sustaining to him no relation but that of +subjection and dependence. But upon what rests this privilege of the +Church? Why is she alone the body of Christ, the pleroma of the +God-head? +</p> +<p> +Christology must supply the fundamental reason. According to the +Catholic dogma of the person of Christ, he filleth the universe only +by virtue of his Godhead. With his life as the Son of Man he filleth +only the Church, his body. But how much more largely does God reveal +himself by his personal inhabitation of the sacred humanity of Christ +than by the creative power wherewith he penetrateth and filleth all in +all! Here a single ray, a faint reflection of his glory, flutters +through the veil of created nature, there the fulness of the Godhead +dwelleth bodily. +</p> +<p> +The idea of Catholicism, therefore, coincides with that of fulness. As +the pleroma of him who filleth all in all, the Church harbors in her +bosom a treasure, the richness of which is inexhaustible. Every +created thing, every single period, every particular phase of the +culture of the human mind, has some good attribute. Yet this attribute +is a mere special advantage, a peculiar quality, a feeble reflex of +the chief good, a single ray of the shining sea of goodness inclosed +in the unfathomable abyss of the divine essence, of the fulness of the +Godhead. The completeness of the revelation of God's goodness is found +only in the sacred humanity of Christ, and therefore in the Church. +Hence the Church is the highest good that is to be found on earth. Let +the productions of the human mind, at a given stage of its +development, be ever so glorious and sublime, they can never supplant +the pleroma of the Church. Her wealth is fraught with all the possible +results of the human intellect and imagination; and these, in the +fulness of the Church, are intensified, raised, as it were, to a +higher power of goodness. Every production of the human mind is more +or less in danger of falling short of the requirements of later ages. +The metal of all such fabrics needs to be recast from time to time, as +forms and fashions change. In default of this, it gradually +degenerates into mere antiquity, or, in the most fortunate event, it +preserves only the character of an honored relic. From this fate of +all that comes into existence the Church is exempt. She alone is ever +young, and always on a level with the times. This qualifies her to be +the teacher of the world from age to age. Hence, also, she is enabled +to minister an appropriate remedy for the disease of every generation. +How, then, can a movement which makes war on the Church claim to be an +advance of the human mind in the right direction? The interests of +true civilization will never interfere with those of the Church. +</p> +<p> +As well that the Church is the body of Christ as that in her is the +fulness of him who filleth all in all—both of these attributes adhere +to her in virtue of her divine foundation. Thus Catholicism, whose +fundamental principle we have contemplated in this twofold scriptural +aspect, is not the product of the combination of any external +circumstances. It is grounded in the very idea of the Church, in the +inmost depths of her being. Therefore she remains the Catholic Church +in every vicissitude of her external condition, whether in the +splendor of princely honors, or under the crushing weight of Neronic +persecution. +</p> +<p> +If, then, Catholicism is of the essence of the Church, the momentous +conclusion is irresistible, that the true Church is capable of +realization in such an image only as enables her to present herself in +her essential feature of catholicity. It follows that the papacy, as +necessary to the Catholic manifestation of the Church, is imperatively +demanded by the law of her being. +</p> +<br> +[Continued on <a href="#741">page 741</a>] +<hr> +<br> +<a name="679">{679}</a> +<br> +<h2>From Once a Week. +<br><br> +THE CATHEDRAL LIBRARY.</h2> +<br> +<p> +It is now between forty and fifty years ago that I obtained leave from +the dean and chapter of Winterbury Cathedral to read for some weeks in +their cathedral library. The editions of the fathers and of some +important middle-age writers which are preserved in that quiet library +boast of peculiar excellence, and I well remember the exultation with +which I, then a very young man, received news of the desired +information to ransack those treasures. Having secured a small lodging +in the close, or cathedral enclosure, I set out for Winterbury early +in the year 182-. Through the kindness of one of the canons, who +seldom had to consult the library on his own account, I was provided +with a key to the library buildings, and allowed to keep undisturbed +possession of it as long as my visit lasted. This key gave access not +only to the library, but to all parts of the cathedral likewise, +including even the cloisters, so that I was able to let myself in and +out of the noble edifice at all hours of the day or night, and to +ramble unchallenged through aisle, crypt, stalls, triforium, and +organ-loft. +</p> +<p> +I have never forgotten, and shall never forget, the day on which I +first took my seat in the room which was to be the special scene of my +labors. The library lay on the south side of the cathedral, being a +lower continuation of the south transept, and forming one side of the +cloister court. It was obviously, therefore, raised above the height +of the cloister vaulting, and it was reached by a flight of stairs +opening into the cathedral itself. Narrowness (it measured about +eighty feet by thirty), and a certain antique collegiate air (and +smell, too, to be perfectly accurate) about the bindings of the books +and the coverings of the chairs, were its chief characteristics. There +was a bust of Cicero at one end, and of Seneca at the other. Some +smaller busts of the principal Greek fathers adorned the side-shelves, +and a dingy portrait of the "judicious" Hooker abode in a musty frame +over the heavy stone mantelpiece. The fender itself was of stone, or +rather the fireplace was not protected by a fender at all, but by a +small stone wall, about three inches thick and six inches high, which +afforded blissful repose to the outstretched foot. +</p> +<p> +One April evening, shortly after sunset, when there was still daylight +enough to read the titles on the backs of books, I walked across the +close in order to fetch and bring away with me a couple of volumes of +which I stood in need. It was an hour when the grand old cathedral is +accustomed to put on its very best appearance. The heaven-kissing +spire and the far lower, but beautiful, western towers are tinted with +the faint rose color which suits old stonework so admirably; and the +deep gloom of the cloisters, tempered by the glow from the noble piles +of masonry overhead, makes it possible and easy to realize some of the +rapturous visions of the recluse. I passed as usual down the nave, and +having ascended the little staircase, let myself into the library, and +was on the point of attacking the necessary bookshelf, when instead of +placing the key in my pocket, as it was my habit to do, I tossed it +carelessly on to the sill of an adjoining window. The woodwork of the +library was by no means in a sound condition, and between the inner +edge of the sill and the wall there was a wide chink, opening down +into unseen depths of distance. Into this chink, impelled by my evil +genius, or by one of the ghostly beings that (as <a name="680">{680}</a> I was assured +by the verger) haunt the library and cloisters, down tumbled my +unlucky key. I saw it disappear with a sharp twinge of vexation, +principally, however, at the thought of the time and trouble that +would be consumed in bringing it to light again. To-morrow, I said to +myself, I shall be forced to get a carpenter to remove this sill, and +rake up the key from heaven knows where; while smirking Mr. Screens, +the verger, will watch the whole proceeding, and insinuate with silent +suavity a doubt whether I am a fit person to be entrusted with Canon +Doolittle's key. It was not until I had come down from the short +ladder with the books under my arm, and, warned by the deepening +shades, was about to leave the library, that the full effect of the +key's disappearance presented itself to my mind. The outer gate and +inner door of the nave had been carefully shut by me, according to +custom, on entering the cathedral. All the gates and doors were fitted +with a spring-lock, so that without my key I was double-locked into +the building. My first thought was one of amusement, and I fairly +laughed aloud at my own perplexity. It seemed an impossible and +inconceivable thing that one might really have to pass the entire +night in this situation. Presently I left the library, the door of +which I had not shut on entering, and went down the staircase into the +transept, and then into the nave. I carefully tried the inner door, +but without effect. I had done my duty on entering, and it was +hopelessly and mercilessly fastened against me. Resolved on +maintaining unbroken self-possession, I returned to the library. It +was now quite dark, the only light being that reflected from the +shafts of the cloisters, on which the moonbeams were now beginning to +fall. I sat down in a large arm-chair which stood at one end of the +library table, and thought over all the possible means of extricating +myself from an unexpected durance. Should I go up to the belfry in the +north-western tower and toll one of the bells until the verger, roused +from his first sleep, should come to see what was the matter? but even +this I could not do without the key, which would be required to open +the door at the entrance of the tower. Or should I make my way into +the organ-loft, and filling the bellows quite full, strike a +succession of loud chords, until the music might attract the attention +of some passer-by? this might be done, but it would be a perilous +experiment. Half Winterbury would be seized with the belief that their +old cathedral was haunted. The organ-loft would be invaded by vergers, +beadles, and constables—there were no blue-coated police in those days— +and I should move about the ancient city ever after with the stigma of +a madcap on my head. People would nod knowingly to one another as I +passed, and significantly tap their foreheads, by way of hinting that +I was "a little touched." Canon Doolittle would recall his key, and +abstain from inviting me to his hospitable table. Gradually, +therefore, I gave up the scheme of saving myself by means of the +organ; and the belfry being already set aside, no other resource +remained but to stay where I was, and quietly to pass the hours as +best I could until Mr. Screens should open the doors at about +half-past six in the morning, ready for the seven o'clock prayers in +the Lady chapel. +</p> +<p> +I was luckily undisturbed by any fears arising from the possible +anxiety of my landlady. Winterbury is near the sea; and I had on more +than one occasion spent the greater part of the night on the cliffs, +watching the glorious moonlit effects upon the romantic coast scenery +of that district. These Mrs. Jollisole was accustomed to call my +"coast-guard nights;" and I made no doubt that, should I fail to +appear, the sensible old lady would go contentedly to bed, supposing +me to have mounted guard on the cliffs. +</p> +<p> +I therefore lost no time in composing myself, if not to sleep, at any +rate to an attempt at sleep. The library table was always surrounded +by an <a name="681">{681}</a> array of solemn old oak chairs, padded with cushions of +yellowish leather, and looking as though—if their own opinion were +consulted—no mortal man of lower degree than a prebendary should ever +be allowed to seat himself upon them. At each end of the table there +was a chair of a superior order—a couple of deans, as it were, +keeping high state amidst the surrounding canons. These chairs were +made of precisely the same kind of oak, and covered with leather of +exactly the same yellowish tinge as the others, but their whole design +was larger and more imposing, and what was of the most consequence to +me in my present position—they were <i>arm</i>-chairs, affording opportunity +for all manner of easy and sleep-inviting postures. Throwing myself +into one of these dignified receptacles, I soon fell asleep, and soon +afterward took to dreaming. +</p> +<p> +Leaning in my dream on the sill of the library window, I fancied +myself to be gazing down into a peaceful church-yard. One by one, like +gleams of moonlight in the dark shade of the surrounding cloisters, I +saw a number of young girls assemble, and fall with easy exactitude +into rank, as if about to take part in a procession. Each slender +figure was draped in the purest white muslin, with a veil of the same +material arranged over the head, and partially concealing the face. +Just as one sees at the present day in Roman Catholic churches at the +more important <i>fêtes</i>, the procession was arranged according to the +gradations of height. The very young children were in the front, and +as the other end of the line was approached, the pretty white figures +grew gradually taller, until girls of eighteen or nineteen brought up +the rear. They presently began to move, and it was clear that they +were about to take part in some solemn office for the dead. With two +priests at their head, they made the circuit of the cloisters, moving +along with graceful regularity of step. Between each pair of the +slender columns of the cloister building, I imagined that a small +stone basin (or "<i>benitier</i>") was set, standing on a low pedestal, and +filled with holy water. Each girl walking on the side next to these +basins was furnished with a small broom of feathers, like those which +may at any time be seen in the Continental churches. Dipping these +brooms from time to time into the basins of water, they waved them in +beautiful harmony with their own harmonious movements, sprinkling the +ancient monumental slabs over which they were stepping. They sang to a +strain of rare melody the familiar words of <i>Requiem AEternam</i>. +</p> +<p> +Presently they seemed to change time and tune, and to sing a hymn of +many verses, each verse ending with a refrain. A single voice would +give the verse, but all joined together in the plaintive music of the +refrain: +</p> +<pre> + "Through life's long day and death's dark night, + O gentle Jesus! be our light!" +</pre> +<p> +I have heard much music, secular and sacred, since then; but I know of +no musical effect which abides with me so constantly as that imagined +chanting of young voices heard long ago. +</p> +<p> +One girl in particular attracted my attention as I dreamt. She was one +of the pair who closed the procession, and was of a commanding height +and extremely elegant figure. She had, as it seemed to me, taken +excessive precaution in drawing her ample veil closely around her head +and face, +</p> +* * * * +<p> +On a sudden I awoke. There, in one of the decanal arm-chairs, I was +sitting—in an easy, familiar posture, as if I had been myself a dean— +and there beside me, close at hand, within reach of my outstretched +arm, was a tall figure in white, clearly a female form, and the +precaution had been taken of drawing an ample veil closely around the +head and face. Any one but an imbecile would have acted as I did, +though I remember taking some credit to myself at the time for my +coolness and presence of mind. I simply sat still and stared; and by +degrees I observed, I conned. Years before, in my boyhood, I had +walked a good <a name="682">{682}</a> deal on the stretch; and I had known what it was +in North Devon to wake up "upon the middle of the night," to feel the +hard, unyielding turf underneath one's back, and see and gaze, gaze +wistfully upon the bright unanswering stars above one's head. Even +then one could divine the true value of a bed. But to wake on the +downs in the small hours is a trifle compared with waking in a +cathedral any time between dew and dawn. More especially when, as was +my case, you have a ghost at your elbow. Not that my ghost remained +long stationary. She did not. Starting from my arm-chair, she began a +survey of the shelves by moonlight in so active and business-like a +manner that I felt no doubt, given her <i>quondam</i> or present mortality, +she was or had been a "blue." In five minutes, my powers of decision +were wide awake, and the question of her mortality was settled. She +was not a thing of the past, but alive as I myself was; and the only +scruple was, how or how soon to awaken her from her somnambulist's +dream. While I was debating with myself the best means to pursue, she +suddenly passed out of the library door on to the stone staircase. My +alarm was now fairly excited. She had two courses to pursue in her +sensational career—I employ the word in a more correct use than it is +commonly put to. She might either turn downward toward the floor of +the church itself, in which case she could do herself little or no +harm; or she could mount the ascending staircase, and reach an outward +parapet, with heaven knew what mad scheme in view, before I had time +to overtake her. She chose the second alternative, and—she leading, I +following—we mounted the lofty staircase that leads to the base of +the spire. I was aware that the door at the top of this particular +ascent was not furnished with a lock; it was fastened by a simple +bolt, and I had little doubt that my sleep-walking friend would shoot +that bolt back as readily as she had taken down and replaced the books +on the library shelves. My greatest fear was that she might begin +playing some mad prank upon the parapet before I was sufficiently near +to arrest her movements. I need hardly add that, influenced by the +dread of consequences commonly said to follow on a sudden awakening +from a fit of somnambulism, I inwardly resolved to try every means of +humoring and coaxing my companion down again to <i>terra firma</i>, and +only as a last resort to attempt arousing her. In a few moments we +stood side by side on the platform looking down on Winterbury, which +lay outstretched in the white moonlight. It was a tranquil and +beautiful scene. There was the church of St. Werburgh, a noble +monument of thirteenth century building, which would attract +instantaneous admiration anywhere but under the shadow of Winterbury +cathedral. There was the fine old market-place, with the carved stone +pump at which Cromwell drank as he passed through the city; and the +charmingly quaint guildhall, and the ruins of the abbey skirting the +river in the distance. I was not permitted, however, long to enjoy the +prospect. Before I could lift a finger to arrest her rapid movements, +my mysterious companion had stepped lightly on to the parapet, and +began a quick and perfectly unembarrassed walk around it. Dreading the +experiment of forcible rescue, it occurred to me to try the effect of +quietly accosting her, and endeavoring—by humoring her present mental +condition—to decoy her away from her perilous amusement. It was an +awful moment of suspense. Should she lose her balance and her life, it +would be next to impossible for me ever totally to clear up the +enigmatical circumstance of my having been actually present by her +side during that weird moonlit dance upon the parapet. If, on the +other hand, I were to seize and lift her from the top-stone, she might +rouse the whole close with frightful screams, she might faint—might +even die—in my arms, or from the shock of sudden awakening she might +lose her reason. +</p> +<a name="683">{683}</a> +<p> +But there was no time to stand balancing chances. Accordingly, I +gently drew toward her side, and said, in as easy and collected a tone +as I could command, +</p> +<p> +"I think we left the library door unlocked; before you complete your +rounds, had we not better go down the stairs and secure it? Having +been allowed the entry of the cathedral, I think we are bound in honor +to shut doors after us." +</p> +<p> +"To be sure," she replied, and instantly, to my intense relief, +dropped cleverly down into the space between the parapet and the lower +courses of the spire. "To be sure, the door should be locked at once. +Let us go down. I cannot make out who you are. In none of my former +visits to the cathedral have I met you; but you seem to be no +intruder, and I will certainly go down and secure the door as you +suggest." +</p> +<p> +All this was uttered quickly and easily, but with an abstracted air, +and without the slightest motion of her steadfast eyes. While still +speaking, she stooped under the low door-way at the stair-head, and +began to descend. I followed, busily devising plans for preventing any +fresh ascent, and yet still avoiding the necessity of breaking the +curious spell which bound her. We reached the library door. To my +surprise, she produced a key of her own, and was about to turn the +lock, when I remembered that at this rate I should be deprived for the +rest of the night of my only comforts, the warm atmosphere of the +library and the decanal arm-chair. I therefore extemporized a bold +stroke. +</p> +<p> +"Excuse me," I said, "I have left my hat and a few papers inside, and +having a canon's key, I will save you the trouble of locking up. But +permit me to suggest that it is still very early in April and the +night is cold. Why not give up the rest of your walk for to-night, and +return again on one the glorious nights in May or June?" +</p> +<p> +Without uttering a syllable in reply, she turned on her heel, and +began slowly descending the staircase into the transept. My curiosity +was now fairly on the alert, and I resolved to unravel the mystery, at +least so far as to discover by what means she would leave the +cathedral, and in what direction she would go. Stepping for a moment +inside the library, I hastily but quietly slipped off my shoes on the +matting of the floor, and followed her barefoot and silent. She was +just stepping from the staircase into the transept, when I caught +sight of her again. With the same steady and self-possessed action +which she had displayed throughout, she crossed the transept, and made +straight for a small postern door which led, as I knew, into the +garden of the bishop's palace. This she unlocked, and I made sure +that, having passed through, she would lock it again behind her. +Whether, however, she was a little forgetful that night, or whether +the unexpected <i>rencontre</i> with a stranger had ruffled the tranquil +serenity of her trance, it so happened that she omitted to turn the +lock, and I was able, after gently reopening the door, to trace her +progress still further. Under the noble cedars of the episcopal +gardens, past long flower-beds and fresh-mown lawns, I followed her +barefoot, until we arrived within a few yards of the hinder buildings +of the palace. Here I stopped under the dark shade of a cedar, and +watched my companion walk coolly up to a little oaken, iron-clamped +door, open it, and disappear within the house. Then of course I +retraced my steps toward the cathedral. But stopping again under one +of the magnificent cedars, I could not avoid a few moments' reflection +on the exceedingly odd position into which accident had brought me. +Here was I, alone and barefooted, standing, at two o'clock in the +morning, on the lawn of the palace, where I had no more business than +I had at the top of the spire; and the only place in which I could +find shelter for the night was the cathedral itself, a building <a name="684">{684}</a> +that most people would rather avoid than enter during the small hours. +The queerness of my situation, however, did not prevent me from +enjoying to the full the extreme loveliness of the gardens, and the +glorious view of the splendid edifice, rising white and clear in the +moonlight above their shady alleys and recesses. +</p> +<p> +On regaining the library, I dozed away the remainder of the dark hours +in the same commodious arm-chair, and as soon as the bell began to +toll for the seven o'clock prayers, I passed unnoticed out of the +building and regained my lodgings. +</p> +<p> +"Been keeping a coast-guard night, sir?" said Mrs. Jollisole, as she +set the breakfast things in order. +</p> +<p> +"Why, yes, Mrs. Jollisole," I answered; "I did enjoy some rather +extensive prospects last night." +</p> +<p> +And that was all that passed. I had fixed it in my own mind that I +would keep my own counsel strictly until I should have called at the +palace, and communicated the whole of the circumstances in confidence +to the bishop, with whom I was slightly acquainted. +</p> +<p> +This plan I carried into effect in the course of the morning. His +lordship was at home, and listened with his customary kindness and +courtesy to the whole of my romantic recital. Just as I was finishing, +his study door opened, and a young lady entered, dressed in black, +tall, and strikingly beautiful, though looking pale and fagged. +Glancing at me she gave a slight start, and taking a book from one of +the shelves, instantly left the room, after a few muttered words of +apology for disturbing the bishop. It was my companion of the library +and the tower. +</p> +<p> +"I see," said his lordship, "that you have recognized the ghost. That +young lady is an orphan niece of mine, and has been brought up in my +house from her infancy. Never strong, she has reduced what vigor she +possesses by her ardent love of books, and her intellectual interest +is awake to all kinds of subjects. She is equally unwearied in +visiting amongst the poor, and often returns home from her rounds in a +state of exhaustion from which it is difficult to rouse her. About a +twelvemonth ago we first noticed the appearance of a tendency to +somnambulism. She was removed for several weeks to the sea-side, and +we began to hope that a permanent improvement had set in. A severe +loss, however, which she has lately sustained, has, I fear, done her +great injury, and here is proof of the old malady returning. We are +indebted to you, sir," added the kind old man, "for your judicious and +thoughtful way of proceeding under the circumstances of last night, +and for at once putting me in possession of the details, which will +enable me to take the necessary precautions." +</p> +<p> +Before leaving the bishop's company, I begged him to go with me into +the cathedral, and to be present while a carpenter removed the +woodwork of the library window in order to recover the key. This he +consented at once to do, and we crossed the gardens by the very route +which "the ghost" and I had traversed during the night. On removing +the panelling, we found that the depth of the chink was comparatively +trifling, and the key was soon seen shining among the dust. +</p> +<p> +I was further gratified by another discovery, which, together with the +extreme pleasure that it gave the bishop, quite indemnified me for my +night's imprisonment. We noticed, partially concealed by rubbish in a +niche of the wall below the panelling, the corner of a vellum +covering. On further examination, this proved to be a MS. copy of St. +Matthew's Gospel, not indeed of the most ancient date, but adorned +with very rare and curious illumination, and making an excellent +addition to the stores of the library. After a <i>tête-à-tête</i> dinner +that evening with the friendly bishop, we spent a pleasant hour or two +in a thorough inspection of the newly-found treasure. +</p> +<p> +It was little more than a month afterward that I heard the great bell +in the western tower toll the tidings <a name="685">{685}</a> of a death. One week more, +and a sorrowing procession of school-children and women of the +alms-houses filed from the transept into the quiet cloister-ground, +there to bury the last remains of one who would seem to have been to +them in life a loving and much-loved friend. It was so. The eager +brain and the yearning heart, worn out with unequal labors, were laid +to rest for ever. The bishop's frail nursling was dead. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>From The Month. +<br><br> +CATHOLIC PHILOSOPHY IN THE THIRTEENTH CENTURY</h2> +<br> +<p> +The errors of the present day are generally the consequences of some +false principle admitted long ago, and many may be traced clearly to +the calamities of the sixteenth century. One of these is, that the +mediaeval learning preserved (as was declared at the Council of Trent) +chiefly among the monks was in its nature useless and trifling, fitted +only to amuse ignorant and narrow-minded men in the darkness of the +middle ages, and consisted in certain metaphysical speculations and +logical quibbles, called scholastic teaching. Several French writers +have done much to disabuse men of this prejudice, by making known the +amount of knowledge and science attained by mediaeval scholars, whose +works are despised because they are too scarce to be read, and perhaps +too deep to be understood in a less studious age. One of these +champions of he truth is Ozanam, who has traced with a master-hand the +preservation of all that was valuable in antiquity, through the +downfall of the empire; and he has rendered a subject which otherwise +it would have been presumption to approach a plain matter of history, +which the reader has only to receive, like other facts; so that we see +how, under the safeguard of the Church, the same powers which were +formerly used in vain by the philosophers for the discovery of truth, +were successfully used for the attainment its deeper mysteries. But +all that is human is marked by imperfection; and the very instinct +which led philosophers to "feel after" their Creator, and seek that +supreme good for which we were created, was misled by errors which all +ultimately ended in infidelity. It is not necessary to dwell on these. +A few words will remind the classical scholar that the Ionian school, +which sought truth by experiment, through the perception of the +senses, leads to fatalism and pantheism; while Pythagoras, who sought +by reason and the sciences him who is above and beyond their sphere, +left the disappointed reason in a state of doubt and indifference, or +else despair. Plato alone pursued a course of safety. Taking the +existence of God as a truth derived perhaps from patriarchal teaching, +he used the Socratic method of induction only for the destruction of +falsehood, and received with fearless candor all that the poets taught +of superhuman goodness and beauty; for though the symbolism of the +poets degenerated into disgusting idolatry, they have been called the +truest of heathen teachers. It is well known how Aristotle +strengthened the reasoning power; but the mighty power had no object +on which to put forth its strength, and the more noble minds rejected +at once both reasoning and experiment, and sought for religion in the +mysticism of Alexandria. Such was the wreck and waste of all that man +could do without revelation, <a name="686">{686}</a> and so sickening was the +disappointment, that St. Augustin would fain have closed the Christian +schools to Virgil and Cicero, which he loved once too well; but St. +Gregory, brought up as he was a Roman and a Christian, had nothing to +repent of or to destroy, and classic letters were preserved by +Christians. +</p> +<p> +Ozanam found pleasure in believing that Christianity, while as yet +concealed in the catacombs, was "in all senses undermining ancient +Rome," and that it had an ameliorating effect on the Stoic, which was +then the best sect of the philosophers; so that Seneca, instead of +following the lantern of Zeno, who confused the natures of God and +man, learnt from St. Paul not only to distinguish them, but also the +relation in which man regards his Creator and Father, whom he serves +with free-will and love, by subduing his body to the command of his +soul. But the pride of philosophy may be modified without being +subdued. The principle of heathenism is "the antagonist of +Christianity: one is from man, and for man; the other from God, and +for God." It was the object of St. Paul and the first fathers of the +Church to liberate the intellect as well as the affections from +perversion, and to teach how the treasures of antiquity might be used +by Christians for religion, as the spoils of Egypt and the luxurious +perfumes of the Magdalen. And after the fierce battle of Christianity +with paganism was over, the triumph of the Church was completed under +Constantine by the Christianization of literature; that is, by using +in the service of truth all those powers which had been wasted in the +ineffectual efforts for its discovery. "A mixed mass of ancient +learning was saved from the wreck of the Roman world; and as Pope +Boniface preserved the splendid temple of the Pantheon, and dedicated +it to the worship of God glorified in his saints, so the doctors of +the Church employed the logic and eloquence of the philosophers +without adopting their theories. This was not always easy, and some, +like Origen and Tertullian, fell into error; for the distinctive +character of Christian teaching is to be dogmatic, not argumentative, +submitting the conclusions of reason to the decisions of inspired +authority, and the province of reason has bounds which it cannot +pass." +</p> +<p> +Gradually a Christian literature arose. Not only in the still +classical Roman schools, but in those of Constantinople, Asia, and +Africa, pagan writings were used as subservient to the training of +Christian authors, and the fourth century was the golden age of +intellect as well as sanctity. The fathers employed their classical +training in the study of the Holy Scriptures; but, according to the +true principle of sacred study, they sought from Almighty God himself +the grace which alone can direct the use of the intellectual powers. +"From the three senses of Holy Scripture" (says St. Bonaventure, in a +passage quoted by Ozanam out of his <i>Redactio Artium ad Theologiam</i>) +"descended three schools of Scriptural teaching. The <i>allegorical</i>, +which declares matters of faith, in which St. Augustin was a doctor, +and in which he was followed by St. Anselm and others, who taught by +discussion. The <i>moral</i>, on which St. Gregory founded his preaching +and taught men the rule of life, in which he was followed by St. +Bernard who belongs also to the mystical school and by a host of +preachers. While from the third or <i>analogical</i> sense, St. Dionysius +taught by contemplation the manner in which man may unite himself to +God." Ozanam names a chain of authors as belonging to this school of +"Boethius, who on the eve of martyrdom wrote the consolations of that +sorrow which is concealed under the illusions of the world; Isidore, +Bede, Rabanus, Anselm, Bernard, Peter Damian, Peter the Lombard, who +rejoiced 'to cast his sentences like the widow's mite into the +treasury of the temple, Hugo, and Richard of St. Victor, Peter the +Spaniard, Albert, St. Bonaventure, and St. Thomas." +</p> +<a name="687">{687}</a> +<p> +"Under the barbarian rule, all the intellectual, an well as the +devout, took sanctuary in the cloister; so that when the Arian +Lombards attacked the centre of Christendom, they were opposed only by +the teaching and discipline of the Church as perfected by St. Gregory; +and the power of these must have been supernatural, as the influence +of letters was nearly lost in Rome. Then, in defence of the faith, St. +Benedict marshalled a new band of devoted champions in the mountains +of Subiaco, and he made it a part of their duty to preserve the +treasures of learning, and to employ them in the service of religion; +and these monks," says Ozanam, "who spent six hours in choir, +transcribed in their cells the historians and even the poets of Greece +and Rome, and bequeathed to the middle ages the most valuable writings +of antiquity." +</p> +<p> +It is agreed by all that Charlemagne was the founder of the middle +ages; and he opened the schools in which theology was formed into a +science, and gained the title of scholastics. Alcuin was the +instrument by whom Charlemagne remodelled European literature, with +the authority of the Church and councils, tradition and the fathers. +Of these the Greek were little known west of Constantinople; and the +chief representative of the Latin fathers was St. Augustin. There were +a few later writers, as Boethius on the "Consolation of Philosophy," +and Cassidorus, who wrote <i>De Septem Disciplinis</i>. +</p> +<p> +"Every one knows," says Ozanam, "that when Europe was robbed of +ancient literature by the invasion of barbarians, the remains of +science, saved by pious hands, were divided into seven arts, and +enclosed in the Trivium and Quadrivium." These arts were grammar, +rhetoric, logic, and mathematics, which last comprehended arithmetic +and geometry, music and astronomy. "The establishment of public +schools in cent, ix.," says Ozanam, "assisted the progress of +reasoning, till it became in itself an art capable of being employed +indifferently to prove either side of an argument. The science of +words was no longer that of grammar, but became dialectics; and words +were used lightly as a mere play of the intellect, or as a mechanical +process to analyze truth." But it can never be lawful for a Christian +to discuss what has been revealed, as though it were possible that +those who reject it may be right; nor to consider truth as an open +question, which is still to be decided, and may be sought by those +rules of reasoning which had been laid down by Aristotle for the +discovery of what was as yet unknown. It was for this reason that, as +Ozanam says, Tertullian called Aristotle the patriarch of heretics; +yet his rules of reasoning were right, and the error lay in using them +amiss. Thus the Manichaeans reasoned when they should have believed, +and the Paulicians subjected the Holy Scriptures to their own +interpretation, and rejected all that was above their comprehension; +and thus in after-times did the Albigenses, and then the Protestants +of the sixteenth, and the Liberals of the nineteenth, century. +</p> +<p> +It was in 891 that Paschasius wrote, for the instruction of his +convent, a treatise on the Holy Eucharist, in which he proved by +reasoning that doctrine which "the whole world believes and +confesses;" but he was contradicted by Ratram, who first put forth the +heresy that the real presence is only figurative, and then the Church +pronounced the dogma of transubstantiation. From that time theologians +were obliged to confute the intellectual heresies of philosophers by +fighting, as on common ground, with the weapons of argument which were +used by both, in order to defend the doctrines which had been hitherto +declared simply and by authority, as by our Lord himself. "Now," says +Ozanam, "mysteries were subjected to definitions, and revelation was +divided into syllogisms. And as the love of argument 'increased, the +disputants took up the question which <a name="688">{688}</a> had been discussed among +heathen philosophers as to the abstract existences which are called +universal forms or ideas; types of created things eternally existing +in the mind of God, according to the teaching of St. Bonaventure. And +when these were discovered by metaphysics, logic was exercised upon +them; and a dispute arose as to whether truth exists independently of +the perceptions of man. The Platonists asserted that it does, and this +belief, which they called idealism, was held by the divines, and was +called realism, while those who denied that it exists independently of +man were said to be nominalists." In modern days the dispute of +realism and nominalism is laughed at as an idle war of words; but the +war is, in truth, on principles, and still divides the orthodox and +unbeliever, and the names of realism and nominalism are only changed +for objective and subjective truth. +</p> +<p> +A painful experience had long prevailed that the spirit of controversy +is destructive of devotion; and the more devout, weary of the wars of +philosophers, rejected logic, and found in the mystic school that +repose which had been sought even by heathens in a counterfeit +mysticism, in which the evil powers deluded men by imitating divine +inspirations. According to Ozanam, "Christian mysticism is idealism in +its most brilliant form, which seeks truth in the higher regions of +spontaneous inspiration;" and he goes on to explain, from the writings +of St. Dionysius, that its nature is contemplative, ascetic, and +symbolical. It is <i>contemplative</i>, as it brings man into the presence +of the immense indivisible God, from whom all power, life, and wisdom +descend upon man through the hierarchies of the angels and through the +Church, and whose divine influences act in nine successive spheres +through all the gradations between existence and nothing. It is +<i>ascetic</i>, as it acts on the will through the link which connects the +body with the mind, and regulates the passions through the inferior +part of the soul. This "medicine of souls" was taught by the fathers +of the desert, who were followed by all the mystic doctors; and it was +on this reciprocal action of physics and morals that St. Bonaventure +afterward wrote the Compendium. It is <i>symbolic</i>, because it takes the +creation as a symbol of spiritual things, and the external world as +the shadow of what is invisible. The union of man with God is the +object and fullness of the knowledge which regards both the divine and +human nature, and levels all intellects in the immediate presence of +God. This was imparted to Adam, and restored by Christ our Lord, who +left it in the keeping of the Church. The first uninspired teacher of +this mystic theology is thought to have been Dionysius the Areopagite, +and the martyred Bishop of Athens, or, as some say, of Paris. In the +festival of his martyrdom it is declared "that he wrote books, which +are admirable and heavenly, concerning the divine names, the heavenly +and ecclesiastical hierarchy, and on mystical theology." Ozanam quotes +a fragment from his writings, which teaches that the indivisibility of +God is intangible by mathematical abstractions of quantity, and +indefinable by logic, because definition is analysis; and it is +incomparable, because there are no terms of comparison. +</p> +<p> +The teaching of St. Dionysius was not forgotten when the knowledge of +Greek was lost in the west. He was succeeded in this religious and +Christian philosophy by St. Anselm in the eleventh century. In his +<i>Monologium, De Ratione Fidei</i>, he supposes an ignorant man to be +seeking the truth with the sole force of his reason, and disputing in +order to discover a truth hitherto unknown. "Every one, for the most +part," he says, "if he has moderate understanding, may persuade +himself, by reason alone, as to what we necessarily believe of God; +and this he may do in many ways, each according to that best suited to +himself;" <a name="689">{689}</a> and he goes on to say that his own mode consists in +deducing all theological truths from one point—the being of God. All +the diversity of beautiful, great, and good things supposes an ideal +one or unity of beauty, and this unity is God. Hence St. Anselm +derives the attributes of God—the creation, the Holy Trinity, the +relation of man to God, in a word, all theology. The <i>Proslogium</i>, or +truth demonstrating itself, is a second work, in which St. Anselm +proposes to demonstrate truth which has been already attained. "As in +the first he had, at the request of some brothers, written <i>De Ratione +Fidei</i> in the person who seeks by reasoning what he 'does not know, so +he now seeks for some one of these many arguments which should require +no proof but from itself. He was the first to use the famous argument, +that from the sole idea of God is derived the demonstration of his +existence. He thus begins the <i>Proslogium:</i> 'The fool hath said in his +heart, there is no God. Wherefore the most foolish atheist has in his +mind the idea of the sovereign good, which good cannot exist in +thought only, because a yet greater good can still be conceived. This +sovereign good therefore exists independently of the thought, and is +God.'" It is not worth while to follow out the errors which arose in +the middle ages from nominalism. In the eleventh century Roscelin +carried it to the absurdity of saying that ideas are only words, and +that nothing real exists except in particulars. And Philip of +Champeaux asserted the opposite extreme, and denied the existence of +all but universals; as that humanity alone exists, of which men are +mere parts or fragments. It was in the twelfth century that Abelard, +who had been trained in both these systems, came forth in the pride of +his vast intellect to reconcile them by a new theory, but his search +after truth was by a mere intellectual machinery, to be employed by +science in order to construct general scheme of human knowledge; while +it led to the rejection of that simple faith which believes without +examination, and substituted the system of rationalism, so fruitful to +this day of error and unbelief. +</p> +<p> +It was while men were constructing this intellectual tower of Babel +that Almighty God raised up as the champion of the truth the meek and +holy St. Bernard. Like David he laid aside his weapons of reasoning, +and left his cloister to overthrow the gigantic foe. In the cowl of +St. Benedict, he declared that the truth, which men sought by human +efforts, was to be received in faith as the gift of God, from whom all +knowledge and light proceeds. And it was not the powers of his +well-trained faculties, nor his classical and poetical studies, but +his prayers, which gained the victory; so that, as by miracle, +Abelard, the most eloquent disputant of his age, stood mute before the +saint, who taught that faith is no opinion attained by reasoning, but +a conviction beyond all proof that truth is revealed by God. This had +been the teaching of St. Gregory, who said that faith which is founded +on reason has no merit; and of St. Augustin, who said that faith is no +opinion founded on reflection, but an interior conviction; and of the +apostle, who said that faith is the certainty of things unseen. It is +consoling to read that the holy influence of St. Bernard did not only +silence his adversary; the heart of Abelard was melted, he laid aside +the studies in which he had so nearly lost his soul, and he made his +submission to the Church, and sought the forgiveness of St. Bernard. +Soon afterward he died a penitent, sorrowing for his moral and +intellectual offences. But evil does not end with the guilty; and his +school has continued brilliant in intellect and taste, but +presumptuous in applying them to the examination of truth. On the +other hand, the two folio volumes of St. Bernard have been always a +treasury of devotion, where the saints and pious of all succeeding +ages have been trained. It is impossible for words to <a name="690">{690}</a> contain +more thought; and he had the gift of penetrating thoughts contained in +the inspired writings; as when he wrote twenty-four sermons on the +three first verses of the Canticles. Ozanam says that St. Pierre +perceived a fresh world of insects each day that he examined a single +strawberry-leaf; and thus in the spiritual world the intellect of St. +Bernard contemplated and beheld wonders with a sort of microscopic +infinity, while his vast comprehension was analogous in its +discoveries to the telescope. Such were the gifts conferred by God on +the humble abbot of Clairvaux. +</p> +<p> +There were in the time of St. Bernard other great teachers: Peter the +Venerable, St. Norbert, Godfrey, Richard, and Hugo, all monks of St. +Victor. Ozanam says that he embraced the three great modes of +teaching—that is, the allegorical, moral, and analogical; and +preceded St. Bonaventure in a gigantic attempt to form an +encyclopaedia of human knowledge, based on the truth declared by St. +James, that every good and perfect gift descends from the Father of +light, who is above. +</p> +<p> +With a vast amount of literary treasures the crusaders had brought +from the east, in the twelfth century, the Greek authors, with their +Arab commentators. They brought the physics, metaphysics, and morals +of Aristotle; and they brought also the pantheism, which, says +Ratisbon, the Saracens, like the early Stoics, had learnt from the +Brahmins, who believe that men have two souls—one inferior and led by +instinct, the other united and identical with God. This fatal error +was received by a daring school, to which Frederic of Sicily was +suspected to belong. It was to confute this school that St. Bernard +had taught in his sermons on the Canticles that union with God is not +by confusion of natures, but conformity of will. The poison entered +Europe from the west as well as the east; the Arabs in Spain mixed the +delusions of Alexandria with the subtleties of Aristotle, and the +result was such men as Averroes and Avicenna. Gerbert, afterward +Silvester II., had himself studied in Spain, and brought back into the +European schools not only the philosophy of Aristotle, but the Jewish +translations of Averroes. The unlearned monks of the west were +naturally alarmed at the new works on physics, astronomy, and alchemy, +and especially at the logic of Aristotle, and the terrible eruption of +pantheism. It was then that the Church exercised her paternal +authority, and condemned the confusion of the limits between faith and +opinion, and the degradation of the sciences to mere worldly purposes. +Ozanam gives the bull issued in 1254 by Innocent IV., in which he +complains that the study of civil law was substituted for that of +philosophy, and that theology itself was banished from the education +of priests. "We desire to bring back men's minds to the teaching of +theology, which is the science of salvation; or at least to the study +of philosophy, which, though it does not possess the gentle pleasures +of piety, yet has the first glimpses of that eternal truth which frees +the mind from the hindrance of covetousness, which is idolatry." +</p> +<p> +The tendency of philosophical errors was now rendered apparent by +their development, so that what was at first a vague opinion was now a +broad and well-defined system. Those who were firm in the teaching of +the Church found it necessary to use every means for opposing such +multiplied evils, and they boldly ventured on a Christian eclecticism, +which should employ all the faculties and all the modes of using them +in the service of religion; but it was not like the eclecticism of +Alexandria, where the ideas of Plato were united with the forms of +Aristotle, and adorned by the delusions of magic. The strength of +Christian eclecticism lay in the pure unity of faith, defended by all +the powers of man. <a name="691">{691}</a> "Both analysis and synthesis," says Ozanam, +"are harmonized in true science: they are the two poles of the +intellectual world, and have the same axis and horizon. The +intersecting point of the two systems was the union of what is true in +realism and nominalism with mystic teaching, and the eclectic admitted +the experience of the senses as well as the deductions of reason and +the intuition of mysticism with the testimony of learning. Thus were +united in the study of truth the four great powers of the soul, +reason, tradition, experience, and intuition." But it has been +remarked that some of the masters who taught by experiment and +tradition were persecuted as magicians, and some of those who used +reason and intuition were canonized. Both, however, observed the +ascetic life, of which the abstinence of Pythagoras and the endurance +of the Stoics were imitations, and all practised the virtues most +opposite to heathen morality, namely, humility and charity. The first +attempt at uniting the different opinions of the learned was made by +Peter Lombard, who collected the sentences of the fathers into a work, +which gained him the title of Master of the Sentences, and which was +afterward perfected in the <i>Summa</i> of St. Thomas. Albert the Great +left the palace of his ancestors for the Dominican cloister. He +studied at Cologne, and was unequalled in learning and psychology. +While he reasoned on ideas, he made experiments on matter; nay, he +used alchemy, to discover unknown powers and supernatural agents. It +is said that his twenty-one folio volumes have never been sufficiently +studied by any one to pronounce on their merits. His work on the +universe was written against pantheism, and declares the presence of +God in every part of creation, without being confused with it. That +divine presence is the source of all power. "He was," says Ozanam (p. +33), "an Atlas, who carried on his shoulders the whole world of +science, and did not bend beneath its weight." He was familiar with +the languages of the ancients and of the east, and had imbibed +gigantic strength at these fountains of tradition. He believed in the +title of magician, which his disciples gave him; and he is remembered +by posterity rather as a mythological being than as a man. +</p> +<p> +The contemporary of Albert, says Ozanam, was Alexander Hales, who +wrote the "Summa of Universal Theology." William of Auvergne was a +Dominican and preceptor of St. Louis; he wrote <i>Specimen Doctrinale, +Naturale, Historiale;</i> a division of the sciences and their end, +containing—1, theology, physics, and mathematics; 2, practice, +monastic, economic, and politic; 3, mechanics and arts; 4, logic and +words. Duns Scotus, a Franciscan, was more accurate in learning than +Albert himself; sound, though no discoverer in physics, and deep in +mathematics. He commented on Aristotle and Peter Lombard. From his +strength, sagacity, and precision, he was named the Doctor Subtilis. +He wrote on free will, and says that its perfection is conformity to +the will of God; and derives the moral law from the will of God, +according to St. Paul, "Sin is the transgression of the law." When St. +Thomas taught that the moral law is necessarily good because God is +good, and this question divided the learned into the schools of +Scotists and Thomists, Roger Bacon, an English Franciscan, was the +pupil of Scotus; but he was eclectic, and admitted both exterior and +interior experience, and the deductions of reason, into the +intercourse of the soul with God. Though he condemned magic as an +imposture, he wrote on alchemy, and with the simplicity of enthusiasm +he hoped to find the philosopher's stone, and to read the fall of +empires in the stars. He believed in the powers of human science, and +he hints at the possibility of a vessel moving without sails or oars; +and imagined a balloon, a diving-bell, a suspension bridge, and other +miracles of art, especially a telescope and a multiplying-glass. +Speaking of Greek <a name="692">{692}</a> fire and unquenchable lamps, he says that art +as well as nature has its thunders, and describes the effect of +gun-powder, the attraction of the loadstone, and the sympathies +between minerals, plants, and animals; and says, "When I see the +prodigies of nature, nothing startles my faith either in the works of +man or in the miracles of God;" concluding, that Aristotle may not +have penetrated the deepest secrets of nature, and that the sages of +his own time will be surpassed by the novices of future days. He had +the same clear and sound views of supernatural things, and wrote on +the secret works of art and nature, and the falsehood of magic. "Man +cannot influence the spiritual world except by the lawful use of +prayer addressed to God and the angels, who govern not only the world +of spirits, but the destinies of man." Though called the Doctor +Mirabilis, he was suspected of magic, and died neglected in a prison, +where he had no light to finish his last works. His manuscripts were +burned at the Reformation, in a convent of his order, by men "who +professed," says Ozanam, "to restore the torch of reason, which had +been extinguished by the monks of the middle ages." +</p> +<p> +Raymond Lulli, the Doctor Illuminatus, was a Franciscan, the great +inventor of arts; but he was a philosophical adventurer, whose cast of +mind was Spanish, Arabian, African, and eastern. His youth was +licentious, his life turbulent, and his imagination restless; but he +died as a saint and a martyr on his return from liberating the +Christian slaves in Spain. +</p> +<p> +The glory of the Franciscan order is the Seraphical Doctor, St. +Bonaventure. He was educated under Hales, the Irrefragable Doctor. His +genius was keen and his judgment just, and he was a master of +scholastic theology and philosophy. But when he studied, it was at the +foot of a crucifix, with eyes drowned in tears from incessant +meditation on the passion of Christ. His life was dedicated to the +glory of God and his own sanctification; yet he spent much time in +actual prayer, because he knew from mystic theology that knowledge and +obedience are the gifts of God; and devoted himself to mortifications, +because they alone prepare the soul for the reception of divine grace +and intuition. Yet though he obtained the gift of ecstacy and the +grace of crucifying the human nature, he placed Christian perfection +not in heroic acts of virtue, but in performing ordinary actions well. +Ozanam quotes his words: "A constant fidelity in small things is a +great and heroic virtue; it is a continued crucifixion of self-love, a +complete sacrifice of self, an entice submission to grace." And his +own pale and worn countenance shone with a happiness and peace which +exemplified his maxim that spiritual joy is a sign that grace is +present in the soul. Though his desire for sacramental communion was +intense, yet we are told his great humility once kept him at a +distance from the altar, till an angel bore to him the consecrated +host; and the raptures with which he always received his God are +expressed, though doubtless imperfectly, in the burning words, +<i>Transfige Domine</i>, etc., which he was wont to utter after he had +himself offered the holy sacrifice. His devotional works, written for +St. Louis and others in his court, fill the heart with their unction, +and rank him as the great master of spiritual life. It was during the +intervals of ecstasies that he wrote; and while he was occupied on the +life of St. Francis, St. Thomas beheld him in his cell raised above +the earth, and the future saint exclaimed: "Leave a saint to write the +life of a saint." +</p> +<p> +It is with profound reverence that we must inquire what was the +intellectual teaching of so holy a man; and it is, indeed, so vast and +yet so deep that it exhausts all the human powers in contemplating the +nature of God and the end of man, which is his union to God. Ozanam +gives a passage from his work on the "Reduction of Arts to +Philosophy," in which he <a name="693">{693}</a> says that philosophy is the medium by +which the theologian forms for himself a mirror (<i>speculum</i>) from +created things, which serve him as steps by which he may ascend to +heaven. He begins by the revealed truth, that every good and perfect +gift descends from the Father of light, and teaches of its descent by +these four ways—exterior, inferior, interior, and superior—through +successive irradiations, namely, Holy Scripture, experimental +mechanics, and philosophy, which succeed each other like the days of +creation, all converging in the light of Holy Scripture, and all +succeeded by that seventh day in which the soul will rest in the +perfect knowledge of heaven. +</p> +<p> +1. Exterior light, or tradition, relates to the exterior forms of +matter, and produces the mechanical arts, which were divided by Hugo +into seven—weaving, work in wood and in stone, agriculture, hunting, +navigation, theatricals, and medicine. +</p> +<p> +2. Inferior light, or that of the senses, awakens in the mind the +perceptions of the five senses, as St. Augustin says, by that fine +essence whose nature and whose seat baffles all our discoveries. +</p> +<p> +3. Interior light, or reason, teaches us by the processes of thought +those intellectual truths which are fixed in the human mind by +physics, logic, and ethics, through rational, natural, and moral +action on the will, the conduct, and the speech, which are the triple +functions of the understanding, and on the three faculties of the +reason—apprehension, judgment, and action; this interior light acts +on outward things by physics, mathematics, and metaphysics, and +perceives God in all things by logic, by physics, and by ethics. And +he goes on to consider truth as it is in the essence of words, things, +and actions. +</p> +<p> +4. The superior light proceeds from grace and from the Holy +Scriptures, and reveals the truths relating to salvation and +sanctification. It is named from its raising us to the knowledge of +things above us, and because it descends from God by way of +inspiration and not by reflection. This light also is threefold. Holy +Scripture contains, under the literal sense of the words, the +allegorical, which declares what must be believed concerning God and +man; the moral, which teaches us how to live; the analogical, which +gives the laws by which man may unite himself to God. And the teaching +of Holy Scripture contains three points—faith, virtue, and beatitude. +The course by which knowledge must be sought is by, +</p> +<p> +1, tradition; 2, experiment; 3, reason; and 4, a descent as it were by +the same road, so as to find the stamp of the divinity on all which is +conceived, or felt, or thought. All sciences are pervaded by +mysteries; and it is by laying hold of the clue of the mystery that +all the depths of each science are explored. +</p> +<p> +It was to Mount Alvernia, where his master, St. Francis, so lately +received the stigmata, that St. Bonaventure retired to write the +<i>Itinerarium Mentis ad Deum</i>, in which he treats on the divine nature, +and considers God as manifesting himself in three modes, and man as +receiving the knowledge of him by the three functions of memory, +understanding, and will. +</p> +<p> +Ozanam says: "To these triple functions of the mind God manifests +himself in three ways: 1, by the traces of his creation in the world; +2, by his image in human nature; 3, by the light which he sheds on the +superior region of the soul. Those who contemplate him in the first +are in the vestibule of the tabernacle; those who rise to the second +are in the holy place; those who reach the third are within the holy +of holies, where the two cherubim figured the unity of the divine +essence and the plurality of divine persons." He likens the invisible +existence of God to the light, which, though unseen, enables the eye +to perceive colors; and proves from his existence his unity, eternity, +and perfection; and from the eternal action of his goodness he deduces +the doctrine of the Trinity. +</p> +<a name="694">{694}</a> +<p> +The <i>Breviloquium</i> treats on the nature of man, who exists not of +himself, nor by emanation from God, but was called into life out of +nothing by the Creator, and lives by no mortal life borrowed from the +outer world, but by its own and immortal life, intelligent and free. +These attributes of God are communicated by him to his creatures +according to his own law, "that the superior shall be the medium of +grace to the inferior." The happiness of the soul must be immortal and +is in God, and she can exist separated from this body which she +inhabits and moves. Ozanam says: "The <i>Compendium Theologies +Veritatis</i> treats of the connection between physics and morals, and +inquires how the body indicates the variations of the soul by that +mysterious link on which the scientific speculate, but which the saint +treats as a subject not for dogmatizing but for contemplation, +assisted by the mortification which alone brings the passions into +subserviency. But the Seraphic Doctor left his teaching unfinished. +Some of his spiritual works have been translated by the Abbé +Berthaumier; and the reader will find that what has been said gives an +imperfect idea of the writings of this doctor of the Church, which +fill six folio volumes, and have scarcely been mastered by a few, +though they have warmed the devotion of many; and one short treatise, +called the "Soliloquy," is of such a nature as to include the whole +science of devotion. It represents the soul contemplating God, not in +his creatures, but within itself, and asking what is her own position +in his presence: created by him, and sinning against him; redeemed by +him, and yet sinning; full of contrition, yet firm in the hope of +glory. The teaching of St. Paul is continued by St. Augustin, St. +Ambrose, and St. Bernard; and it seems as if no other book were +needful. One passage, and one only, may show the treasures it +contains. The soul is convinced of the vanity of created things, and +asks how men are so blinded as to love them. Because the soul is +created with so glorious and sensitive a nature, that it cannot live +without love; and while the elect find nothing in created things which +can satisfy their desire of happiness, and therefore rest in the +contemplation of God, the deluded multitude neglect themselves for +passing objects, and love their exile as if it were their home. But +Ozanam does not leave his history of intellectual progress to treat of +spiritual gifts. +</p> +<p> +St. Thomas was born nearly at the same time as St. Bonaventure, in the +same wild valleys of the Apennines. They studied together at Paris; +they lived and died and were canonized together. +</p> +<p> +It was said by Pallavicini that "when, in the twelfth century, the +Arabs made Cordova a second Athens, and Averroes used the philosophy +of Aristotle as a weapon against the faith, God raised up the +intellect of St. Thomas, who, by deep study of Aristotle, found in his +own principles a solution of the arguments used by infidels; and the +scholastics, following him, have so employed Aristotle to defend +Christianity, that whosoever rebels against the Vatican rebels also +against the Lycaeum." St. Thomas had, however, to confute the errors +of Aristotle, and of Abelard and others who had followed them, while +he set forth the great truths of reason which he taught. It was in +1248 that he published a comment on the "Ethics." He had himself, says +Ozanam, the learning and the weight of Aristotle; his power of +analysis and classification, and the same sobriety of language. He had +also studied the Timaeus of Plato, the doctrines of Albert, Alexander +Hales, and John of Salisbury. He followed the school of St. Augustin, +and drew from St. Gregory his rule of morals. His comments on the +Sentences contain a methodical course of philosophy, as his <i>Summa</i> +contains an abridgment of divinity. In an extract given by Ozanam, St. +Thomas says, faith considers beings in relation to God; philosophy, as +they <a name="695">{695}</a> are in themselves. Philosophy studies second causes; faith, +the first cause alone. In philosophy the notion of God is sought from +the knowledge of creatures, so that the notion of God is second to +that of his creatures; faith teaches first the notion of God, and +reveals in him the universal order of which he is the centre, and so +ends by the knowledge of creatures; and this is the most perfect +method, because human understanding is thus assimilated to the divine; +which contemplating itself contemplates all things in itself. +Theology, therefore, only borrows from philosophy illustrations of the +dogmas she offers to our faith. +</p> +<p> +It was in 1265 that, at the request of St. Raymond de Pennafort, St. +Thomas wrote the <i>Summa Theologies</i> against the infidels in Spain; a +book which has ever since been considered as a perfect body of +theology and the manual of the saints. "In the philosophy of St. +Bonaventure," says Ozanam, "the leading guide was perhaps rather the +divine love than the researches of intellect." St. Thomas combined all +the faculties under the rule of a lofty meditation and a solemn +reason, uniting the abstract perceptions beheld by the understanding +with the images of external things received by the senses. "It was a +vast encyclopaedia of moral sciences, in which was said all that can +be known of God, of man and his relations to God; in short, <i>Summa +totius theologies</i>. This monument, harmonious though diverse, colossal +in its dimensions, and magnificent in its plan, remained unfinished, +like all the great political, literary, and architectural creations of +the middle age, which seem only to be shown and not suffered to +exist." And the Doctor Angelicus left the vast outline incomplete. +That outline is to be appreciated only by the learned; the ignorant +may guess its greatness by a catalogue, however meagre, of its +contents. In the first part, or the natural, St. Thomas treats of the +nature of God and of creatures; his essence, his attributes, and the +mystery of the Holy Trinity; then, in relation to his creatures, as +their Creator and Preserver. In the second, or moral, part he treats +of general principles, of virtues and vices, of the movement of the +reasonable creature toward God, of his chief end, and on the qualities +of the actions by which he can attain it, of the theological and moral +virtues. In the third, or theological, part he examines the means of +attaining God, the incarnation and the sacraments. In the <i>Summa</i>, +says Ozanam, "the notions of things lead to the attributes of the +divinity, unity, goodness, and truth; thus, natural theology arrived +at the unity as well as the attributes of God, while from his action +is deduced his Personality and Trinity. Then follows the nature of +good and bad angels, of souls in a separate state; and then the +science of man considered as a compound being of soul and body, +endowed with intellect for receiving impressions from the divine light +above, and from its reflection on things below. He is also endowed +with desire, by which he is formed to seek goodness and happiness, but +is free in will to chose vice or virtue; and the rejection of sin, and +acquisition of virtue, in a life regulated by divine human law, is a +shadow of life in heaven. Enough has been said to show how lofty was +the teaching of the saint; to whose invocation large indulgences are +attached, and who had the task of composing the office used on the +festival of Corpus Domini. The great object of his adoration and +contemplation was the mystery of the real presence; and his <i>Adoro Te +devote</i> may be used as an act of worship at the holiest moment of the +sacrifice of the altar. The ecstasy of his joy in communion is +expressed in the <i>Gratias Tibi ago</i>; and he declared his faith in the +mystery as he lay on the ashes where he died. And this pure faith is +recorded by Raphael, who represents him in his picture of the 'Dispute +on the Blessed Eucharist' among the doctors of all ages before the +miraculous host." +</p> +<a name="696">{696}</a> +<p> +Like all other saints, he sought detachment by mortification, and the +love of God by prayer. His principle was, that prayer must precede +study, because more is learnt from the crucifix than from books; and +his last maxim was, that in order to avoid being separated from God by +sin, a man must walk as in the sight of God and prepared for judgment. +When he laid aside his religious studies to prepare for eternity, he +used the words of St. Augustin: "Then shall I truly live when I am +full of thee and thy love; now am I a burden to myself, because I am +not entirely full of thee." +</p> +<p> +Mystic theology was now carried to perfection by Gersen, abbot of the +Benedictine monastery of Verceuil from 1220 to 1240. Many attribute to +him the authorship of the "Imitation of Christ;" there are, however, a +number of others who do not agree with this opinion. The "Imitation" +is generally ranked as coming very close after the inspired writings. +What is said of the interior life is more or less intelligible to +those who are endeavoring after perfection, but must be unintelligible +to any who have not the faith: <i>"Una vox librorum"</i> (iii. 43), says +the author; but the one voice does not teach all alike, for he who is +within is the teacher of truth. The four books are in the hands of +all. The contents of the first are on the conduct of men as to the +exterior world, and the qualities necessary for the following of +Christ—humility, detachment, charity, and obedience; then grace will +be found, not in external things, but within, in a mind calm, +obedient, and seeking not to adapt but to master circumstances. The +second teaches him who turns from creatures that the kingdom of God is +within, and that the government of this inner world is the science of +perfection: "Give room to Christ and refuse entrance to others; then +will man be free amid the chaos, and creatures will be to him only the +<i>speculum vitae</i>." Seek Christ in all, and you will find him in all; +seek self, and you will find it everywhere: one thing is above all, +that leaving all you leave self. In the third book the soul listens to +the internal voice of God, who makes known to her that he is her +salvation; and she therefore prays for the one gift of divine love. It +is impossible, perhaps not desirable, to repeat the devout aspirations +of this divine love. May those who read the holy words receive their +import through the light of grace! The fourth book relates to the +union of the soul with her Lord through sacramental communion; and +this can only be read in the hours of devotion. +</p> +<p> +It is presumptuous to say even thus much of the great saints who lived +in the thirteenth century, how is it possible to undervalue the +progress they made in all the highest powers of the soul? or who can +speak of the schools of the middle ages as deserving of contempt in +days which cannot comprehend them? +</p> +<p> +Ozanam desires to show that Dante was trained in this exalted +learning, and has embodied what he learnt in his <i>Divina Commedia</i>. He +speaks of the full development attained by scholastic teaching in +those great teachers, after whom no efforts were made to extend the +limits of human knowledge; and he speaks of the perplexities which +arose with the anti-papal schism. "It was to the calm and majestic +philosophy of the thirteenth century," says Ozanam, "that Dante turned +his eyes; and his great poem declared to an age, which understood him +not, the contemplative, ascetic, and symbolical teaching of the mystic +school, which he had studied in the <i>Compendium</i> of St. Bonaventure +and the <i>Summa</i> of St. Thomas;" and he proves by an analysis of that +wonderful poem that it contains not only the great truths of +revelation, but the spirit of the decaying mediaeval philosophy: +</p> +<pre> + "O voi che avete gli intelletti sani, + Mirate la dottrina che ascende + Sotto 'l velame del versi strani." +</pre> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="697">{697}</a> +<br> +<h2>Translated from the Revue du Monde Catholique. +<br><br> +WHAT CAME OF A PRAYER.</h2> +<br> +<p> +In the fifth story of an old house in the Rue du Four-Saint-Germain, +lay a sick woman whose pale emaciated face bore traces of age and +sorrow. Beside her bed was a young man, whose tender care showed him +to be her son. The furniture of the apartment, though of the plainest +kind, was neatly and carefully arranged, while the crucifix at the +head of the bed and a statue of the Blessed Virgin marked the +Christian family. The youth had just given his mother a spoonful of +gruel, and she had fallen asleep smiling on her son—that quiet sleep +attendant on recovery from severe illness. He knelt to thank God for +having saved his mother's life, and while he prays, and she sleeps, +without disturbing the prayer of the one, or the sleep of the other, I +will tell you their story in a few words. +</p> +<p> +The father was a printer at Sceaux. Industrious, prudent, of +scrupulous integrity, loving justice and fearing God, he acquired by +his honest labor a competence for his old age and a fair prospect for +his son. Losses, failures, and unforeseen misfortunes ruined him, and +he found himself bankrupt. This blow sensibly affected him, but did +not overwhelm him. He was offered a situation as compositor in a +printing office in Paris, resumed the workman's dress, and +courageously began to work. His wife, as strong as he, never uttered a +complaint or regret. Their son was withdrawn from college to learn his +father's trade, and although so young, his heart was penetrated with +profound religious faith. Thus lived this humble household, resigned +and happy, because they loved each other, feared God, and accepted +trials. Several years elapsed, years of toil in their endeavors to +liquidate the debts of the past: fruitful, however, in domestic joys. +The child became a young man, and fulfilled the promises of his +childhood. God blessed these afflicted parents in their son. +</p> +<p> +Suddenly the father fell sick and died. Those of us who have wept at +the death-bed of a father, know the anguish of those hours when we +contemplate for the last time the beloved features which we are to see +no more on earth; the impressions of which grief time softens but can +never efface. For those who live entirely in the domestic circle, the +separation, in breaking the heart, breaks at the same time the tie to +life. Left thus alone, the mother and son were more closely united, +each gave to the other the love formerly bestowed upon him who was no +more. Jacques Durand was now twenty-five years old. His countenance +was frank and open, but serious and grave. He had the esteem of his +employer, the respect of his companions, and the sympathy of all who +knew him. He was not ashamed to be a mechanic, knowing the hidden +charm of labor when that labor is offered to God. During the month of +his mother's illness he did not leave her pillow. The physician +pronounced her, the day before our story opens, out of danger. You +understand now why the young man prayed with so much fervor while his +mother slept. His devotions were interrupted by a knock at the door. +It was Mme. Antoine, the porter's wife, a little loquacious, but +obliging to her tenants, in a word, such a portress as we find only in +books. Jacques, who was going out, had requested her to take his place +beside his mother. She entered quietly for fear of disturbing the +patient, received the directions which the young man gave her in a low +voice, and seating herself near the bedside, busied her skilful +fingers with her knitting. Old Antoine, the porter, stopped our friend +Jacques at the foot <a name="698">{698}</a> of the staircase. He was polite, benevolent, +attached to his tenants, did not despise them if they were poor, and +rendered them a service if he could. He was an old soldier of 1814. He +delighted to speak of the French campaign, wore with pride the medal +of St. Helena, and showed a seal which he received at Champaubert. "In +remembrance of Napoleon," he says, raising his hat and straightening +his bent figure. I don't know of any fault that he had except relating +too often the battle of Champaubert. +</p> +<p> +"Well," said he, "how is Mme. Durand?" "Much better," replied the +youth, "she has just fallen into a quiet sleep, which the doctor +declares favorable to her recovery." "God be praised," resumes +Antoine. "Beg pardon, M. Jacques, I can tell you now Mme. Durand has +made us very uneasy." In saying this he gave the young man a cordial +shake of the hand, which the latter heartily returned. +</p> +<p> +In going out Jacques took the Rue du Vieux-Colembier, and entered the +office of the Mont-de-piété at the corner of La Croix-Rouge. +</p> +<p> +During his mother's illness he had spent many hard-earned savings, for +you already know he had imposed on himself the obligation of paying +the debts of the failure, and beside, detained at home with his +mother, he had been unable to earn anything during the month. Still +the doctor had to be paid, and medicines bought; the small sum +advanced by his employer was nearly exhausted, and he was now on his +way to pawn a silver fork and spoon. A young girl stood beside him in +the office, and as there were many to be served before himself, he +relieved the weariness of waiting by watching her. Her cap had no +ribbons, but was gracefully placed on her light hair; a woollen dress, +not new, nor of the latest fashion, but clean and well kept, a wedding +ring (doubtless her mother's legacy), and a plain shawl, completed her +poor toilette. Jacques was attracted by her modest air. Some +industrious seamstress, he said to himself. As his turn had now come, +he presented the fork and spoon—the value was ascertained—and the +sum paid. The girl, following him, drew from a napkin a half worn +cloak, which she offered with a timid air. +</p> +<p> +"Ten francs," says the clerk. +</p> +<p> +"Oh!" said she blushing, "if you could give me fifteen for it! See, +sir, the cloak is still good." +</p> +<p> +"Well, twelve francs; will you trade at that price?" +</p> +<p> +Having given her assent, she took the money and the receipt, and went +out. Jacques preceded her, and before passing out the door, he saw her +dry a tear. "She is weeping," he said to himself; "I suppose the rent +is unpaid. Poor girl! Stupid clerk!" With these reflections he arrived +at the druggist's; he bought the remedies prescribed by the doctor; +then certain that Mme. Antoine was taking good care of his charge, he +thought he should have time to say a prayer at the church of St. +Sulpice. Jacques had a particular devotion to the Blessed Virgin. It +is to her intercession he attributed his mother's cure: it is before +her altar that he knelt. His prayer was an act of thanksgiving and a +petition for a new favor. His mother wished him to marry; he had often +dreamed of cheering her old age by the affection of a daughter, and he +asked the Virgin to guide him in his choice. +</p> +<p> +Happiness disposes the soul to charity. He thought of the motherless, +the suffering, and the sorrowful, and prayed for them. He remembered +the young girl he had just seen weeping, and prayed for her. At this +moment, a woman kneeling in front of him rose, and as she passed him +to leave the church he recognized the young girl. Prayer has the +secret of drying our tears; her face had resumed its usual serenity. +He still prayed for her: "Holy Virgin, watch over that child, grant +that she may be ever pious and chaste, and all else shall be added to +her." As he prepared to leave, he saw a letter beside the chair where +<a name="699">{699}</a> the girl had knelt. He made haste to rejoin her in order to +restore it; but she had already left the church. He put it in his +pocket, intending to burn it when he reached home. +</p> +<p> +That evening, as he sat by his mother's side while she slept, +here-viewed the events of the day, according to his custom, +preparatory to his examination of conscience. Thus he recalled the +incidents of the morning, and having drawn the letter from his pocket +prepared to burn it. He approached the fire and was about to throw it +in. What restrains his hand? In the letter he feels something—a piece +of gold, perhaps. It was not sealed; he opened it, and drew out a +medal of the Blessed Virgin. The open letter excited his curiosity; he +was tempted to read it. Do not blame him too severely, reader, if he +yields to the temptation. He has finished his perusal, and I see he is +affected. His emotion excites my curiosity, and I am tempted to read +it in my turn. Will you be angry with me, or will you be accomplices +in my fault? Here are the contents of the letter: +</p> +<p class="cite"> + TO M. LUCIEN RIGAUT,<br> + CORPORAL IN THE 110TH REGIMENT, METZ. +<br><br> + "MY DEAR BROTHER:—I cannot send you the hundred francs you ask me + for. Do not blame me, it is not my fault; work is not well paid, and + everything is very dear in Paris, and you must know last month I had + to pay something to the man who takes care of mamma's tomb. When you + return I am sure you will be much grieved if that is neglected. You + shall receive fifty francs. Here are thirty from me; the remainder + is from the good Abbé Garnier whom I went to see, and who wishes + also to assist his extravagant child. At the same time he gave me + for you a medal of the Blessed Virgin, which you will find in my + letter, and which you must wear on your neck. That, my naughty + brother, will preserve you from danger and keep you from sin. + Promise me never more to associate with bad companions, who lead you + to the cafes and who are not too pious, I am sure. You must say your + prayers morning and night, go to mass on Sunday, confess, and live + like a good Christian. I will not reproach you for having neglected + your duties, but I am grieved, and if you could have seen your poor + sister weep I am sure you would reform. Do you remember when mamma + was about to leave us, and we were beside her bed restraining our + tears that she might have as a last joy in this world the smile of + her children, how she made us promise to be always good and + religious? Never forget that promise, Lucien, for the good God + punishes perjured children. What will you think of my letter? Oh, + you will call me a little scold. You will be angry at first, then + you will pardon me; you will put the medal around your neck, and you + will write me a good letter to restore gaiety to my heart. You do + not know how well I have arranged my room. When you return you will + recognize our old furniture. Mamma's portrait hangs over the bureau, + and I have placed our first communion pictures on each side. When I + have money I buy flowers, and for four sous I give to my abode the + sweet odor of the country. Shall I tell you how I employ my time? I + am an early riser. First my housekeeping, then my breakfast; + afterward I hear mass, and from the church to my day's work. Thanks + to the recommendation of the Abbé Garnier and of the sister at the + Patronage, I do not want for work. In the evening, before returning, + I say a prayer in the church; then my supper, and a little reading + or mending till bed-time. On Sunday after mass I go to the cemetery + to pray at mamma's tomb, afterward to the Patronage, where we enjoy + ourselves much. I wish you could see how good the sister is, how she + spoils me, how gently she scolds me when I am not good, for in spite + of all my sermons it sometimes happens that I deserve to be scolded. + You see, brother, that I have no time to be sad. If in the evening I + feel <a name="700">{700}</a> lonely, I think of God, who is always near us, of my good + friends, of you, whom I shall see next year, and these sweet + thoughts make me forget the isolation of my little room. How proud I + shall be to go out leaning on your arm, and to walk with you on + Sunday in the Luxembourg! With the corporal's ribbons and the + Italian medal, I am sure everybody will turn round to look at you. + Do you know I have made a novena that you may be made sergeant + before the beginning of next year? I will send you every month ten + francs to finish paying your debt. Have no scruples in accepting + them; it is superfluous money which would have served to buy + gew-gaws. You do me a favor in taking it, as I shall be prevented + from becoming a coquette. What shall I say more to you? Be good, be + a Christian; but I have already said that. Do not forget me, but + write often. We must love one another, since each of us is all the + family of the other. Farewell, Lucien.<br> + "Your affectionate sister,<br> + MADELEINE." +</p> +<p> +I do not regret having been curious. I understand the emotion of +Jacques. I am also moved. This letter from a sister to a brother, so +simple and naive, breathes in every word the perfume of sincere piety, +and in each line is found the candor of an innocent heart. When +Jacques had finished reading it, he still lingered before throwing it +into the fire. He wished to read it again. He read it several times; +then he shut it up in a drawer, and put the medal around his neck. He +was charmed. He loved this simple letter, and he loved, almost without +knowing it, this child whose thoughts had been accidentally made known +to him. He guessed what the sister did not tell her brother, the +pawning of the cloak to complete the fifty francs, the privations to +which she submits in order to send every month the promised ten +francs. "I understand now," said he, "the secret of her tears. Three +francs are wanting for the required sum." +</p> +<p> +He was still more moved by her tears now that he had the secret of +them. "A good Christian girl," thought he. In his evening prayer she +was not forgotten. +</p> +<p> +The following day, as his mother was tolerably restored, he returned +to the printing office. As he worked he thought of Madeleine, and was +sad that he should see her no more. It was a folly, but who has not +been foolish? A little folly is the poetry of youth. +</p> +<p> +Time passed, the impression grew fainter, but was not effaced. It was +like a dream we try to retain on awakening, but whose brilliant colors +fade by the light of day. Mme. Durand was fully restored, but although +occupied with the care of the household, she did not go out, and this +explains why on Easter Sunday Jacques was alone at high mass in the +church of St. Sulpice. This festival, when the faithful are united in +one common joy, disposes the heart to serene impressions. After having +thanked God for his mother's recovery, he dreamed of a new affection, +and begged the blessed Virgin to guide him in his choice. Mass being +ended, a young girl on her knees in front of him rose to leave the +church, and he recognized Madeleine. He left in his turn, and during +the day he thought of that sweet face, which had twice appeared to +him, as if in answer to his prayer. It is Madeleine whom he will +marry, her smile shall make the joy of his Christian fireside; still, +how is he to see her again? He knows not; the Blessed Virgin, when she +chooses, will bring him back to her. +</p> +<p> +In their evening chats, when his mother made plans of marriage for +him, he never uttered Madeleine's name. +</p> +<p> +Again, on one of those mild days which are the charm of the month of +April, he was walking in the Luxembourg. It was a beautiful Sunday, +the lilacs were in flower, and the old garden seemed rejuvenated in +its new dress. As he thought of Madeleine, <a name="701">{701}</a> two verses from +Brizeux recurred to his memory: +</p> +<pre> + "Vienne Avril, et jeunesse, amours, fleurs sont écloses; + Dieu sous la même loi mit les plus belles choses." +</pre> +<p> +At the turn of a walk, in a fresh, simple dress, he saw her once more. +When she had passed he followed her. He knew not why himself, but an +indescribable charm attracted and retained him near her. He left the +Luxembourg, went down the Boulevard Mont Parnasse, and saw her enter a +house which he recognized as an asylum for young work-women. +</p> +<p> +One morning, as he stopped at Antoine's lodging, he saw on his face +traces of sorrow. +</p> +<p> +"You seem sad," he said to him; "has any misfortune happened to you?" +</p> +<p> +"No," replied Antoine, "but I am grieved. A young woman, beg pardon, +who has lived above for two months, has just fallen ill, of bad fever, +the doctor says. She is a good girl, M. Jacques—a good industrious +girl. She has worked hard and sat up late, which brought on fever, and +when I think of it I am troubled." +</p> +<p> +"Is she alone?" asked Jacques. +</p> +<p> +"Entirely alone; but so gay, of a disposition so sweet, that though +poorly fed and overworked she never complained. When she passed, +morning and night, she had always a pleasant word for old Antoine. You +will not believe it, but for three days she has not been down. I have +been as much afflicted as if she were my own child." +</p> +<p> +So saying, he wiped a tear which fell on his white mustache. +</p> +<p> +During the day Jacques recalled the words of the old man. He was sad +at the thought of the poor girl, sick without a friend near her, for +even Antoine was detained at the lodge during his wife's absence. He +did not know her (and that was not surprising, as in Paris two +neighbors often live strangers to each other) and had never seen her: +he was troubled that she suffered, and that no one was near her to +alleviate her suffering. He resolved to speak to his mother in the +evening of her case, that she might go and take care of her. He +thought how Madeleine might fall sick, and have no one near her. He +determined to confide to his mother the secret of his love, and to beg +her to see Madeleine and obtain her consent to their marriage. +</p> +<p> +In the evening he informed his mother of their neighbor's illness, and +the next day Mme. Durand took her place at her bedside. It was a +dangerous illness, but youth, good care, prayer, and a novena to the +Blessed Virgin triumphed, and at the end of fifteen days she began to +improve. During this time Mme. Durand devoted herself to this sweet, +patient child. When her care was no longer necessary she continued to +go every morning to her patient's room. They worked and talked +together. Mme. Durand spoke of her son and she of her mother whom she +had lost, and insensibly a mutual affection sprang up between them. +Jacques listened with interest to his mother's praise of the sick +child, and was for a moment distracted from his remembrance of +Madeleine. He had, moreover, that modesty of true love which shrank +from the avowal of its tenderness. His mother knew nothing of his +love, and touched by the sweetness and patience of the young girl whom +she had nursed, hoped she might yet become her son's wife. +</p> +<p> +One evening in the month of June he was walking with his mother in the +gardens of the Luxembourg. He remembered his last meeting with +Madeleine, which recalled these verses of Brizeux: +</p> +<pre> + "Un jeune homme + Natlf du même eudroit, travailleur, économe + En vòyant sa belle âme, en voyant sou beau corps + L'airnée: les vieilles gens firent lea deux accords." +</pre> +<p> +He was about to speak to his mother of Madeleine when she said to him, +"My son, you are entering your <a name="702">{702}</a> twenty-sixth year, it is time for +you to marry, and if you wish, I should like to call our neighbor, the +young girl whom I have nursed, my daughter." +</p> +<p> +"Mother," said Jacques, "I cannot marry her, I love another." He then +related his simple story, and pronounced for the first time +Madeleine's name. Mme. Durand listened much moved. She understood and +shared the trusting faith of her son. "My child," said she, "it shall +be as you desire. I will go on Sunday to the Patronage." +</p> +<p> +The week passed. Mme. Durand continued to see her patient often, and +she, nearly restored, came sometimes to her apartment at the time +Jacques was at the printing office, for his mother wished to prevent a +meeting which might perhaps trouble an innocent heart. But on +Saturday, having returned sooner than usual, he found the young girl +in his mother's room. They conversed a moment, and she withdrew. In +the pallid face he recognized the sweet countenance of Madeleine. When +she had gone, he embraced his mother, weeping and smiling at the same +time. "It is she, it is my sweet Madeleine." His mother, returning his +embrace, exclaimed, "She shall be your wife and my daughter." +</p> +<p> +I must tell you how, on Jacques' return from work, Mme. Durand went +for Madeleine, how they passed many a pleasant evening in conversation +or in reading a good book, and under their mother's eye loved each +other with a pure and earnest love. +</p> +<p> +At the end of a month Mme. Durand obtained the consent of Madeleine, +but she said nothing to her of her son's secret, of their meeting, of +the letter, of the feelings so long cherished, nor of the protection +of Mary, who had brought together these two Christian souls. This she +left for him to relate one day when he was alone with his betrothed. +She listened much affected, and you may be surprised to learn that she +forgot to ask for the lost letter and the medal of the Virgin. +</p> +<p> +Mme. Durand saw the good abbé and the sister at the Patronage, and +they approved the marriage. The consent of the soldier brother was +asked and obtained. +</p> +<p> +The marriage was to take place in a few days. "Beg pardon," says +Antoine, "these two young people were made for each other—a fine +match really. You will not believe me, but I love them as if they were +my own children." +</p> +<p> +Lucien came to Paris for the wedding. From the first he made a +conquest of Antoine. It turned out that Antoine too had served in the +110th. The two heroes talked of their campaigns. One related the +battle of Champaubert, the other that of Solferino. The medal of St. +Helena fraternized with the Italian medal; they drank to the laurels +of the old 110th, to the triumphs of the new. The veteran and the +conscript became the best friends in the world. +</p> +<p> +The great day arrived. The abbé blessed the union and Antoine gave +away the bride. He straightened his bent figure; he put a new ribbon +in his medal. He was prouder than on the evening of Champaubert, when +Napoleon said, "Soldiers of the 110th, you are heroes?" Brother +Lucien, with his corporal's badge and his Italian medal, added much to +the brilliancy of the cortege. Mesdames Durand and Antoine put on +their richest dresses. What shall we say of Madeleine in her bridal +dress? of her veil, and the wreath upon her auburn tresses? of the +sweet face reflecting the purity of an innocent heart and a chaste +love? of the tears which flow when the heart is too full? of the +sacred hour when this Christian couple unite in a common prayer? +</p> +<p> +Now they are married they do not seek pleasures abroad. Their +happiness is found in their daily labor, their evening conversation, +or reading; on Sunday, after mass, a walk to the Tuileries, while +their mother at their side smiles on their love. Their hearts are +drawn so near together that <a name="703">{703}</a> they beat in unison, they think and +feel at the same time. At last a child makes one more joy in this +joyous house—one stronger bond between these united souls. Such is +their pure affection: a love which age can never wither, a love born +of a prayer, and blest by God. +</p> +<p> +Jacques has reaped the fruit of his labor; he has paid all the debts +of the past, and ease and plenty have returned to the household. He +hopes to be soon taken into partnership with his employer. +</p> +<p> +They do not wish to leave the old house in the Rue du +Four-Saint-Germain, so filled with sweet memories, but they have taken +a lower floor, they have a large apartment, and are almost rich. The +poor have their share of their riches. +</p> +<p> +Lucien, the soldier, has entirely reformed, and has risen to the rank +of sergeant. Perhaps he may yet wear an officer's epaulettes. +</p> +<p> +Old Antoine grows old, but his heart remains young; his figure is more +bent, but he still straightens it when he speaks of Napoleon, and +relates to our friends the battle of Champaubert. He was the godfather +of the little boy. "A fine child," said he "Beg pardon, we will make a +general of him." "I am willing, I am sure," said Madeleine, "but we +must first make him a Christian." +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>From The London Review. +<br><br> +CATHOLIC PROGRESS IN LONDON.</h2> +<br> +<p> +There are few questions upon which there exists a greater variety of +opinion, and with regard to which such contradictory statements are +published, as upon the increase of Roman Catholicism in the +metropolis. There are those on one hand who believe that it has made +no progress at all, and that the rumors of "conversions," and even +those Roman Catholic buildings which have of late years sprung up in +such abundance around us, are not to be taken as proofs of such an +increase in the numbers of Roman Catholics as the latter at least seem +to indicate. Others believe without doubting that the Catholic Church +is silently and energetically spreading its ramifications over the +metropolis, and that there is hardly a household of any respectability +in which its agents, in some form or other, have not contrived to get +a footing; while there are persons who go so far as to assert that +many of the Protestant clergy themselves are the direct emissaries of +Rome, doing her work, and doing it consciously—nay, doing it under +compact—while receiving the pay of the National Church. We believe +that the truth will be found to lie between these extreme views. Not +only has the Church of Rome gained ground in London, but it is +steadily progressing, even at the present time, though by no means at +such a rate, except in certain parishes, as to occasion the slightest +danger to the Protestant cause, if only a moderate amount of energy +and good will is shown by the Reformed denominations in securing their +flocks within their own folds. We have already stated our belief that +the fact of a clergyman holding High or Low Church views is not in any +manner whatever necessarily connected with the increase of Catholicism +among his congregation, but that such increase is owing either to the +lack of a sufficient staff of the Protestant clergy to <a name="704">{704}</a> repel its +advances, or to the apathy or inefficiency of the incumbent, or, as +may be especially shown in some wealthy districts, to that mysterious +want of power in the clergy of the Church of England over the minds of +the rich and influential of their parishioners. And that this view is +not without some basis in fact, will be seen when we have described +the present relative position of the Catholic and Anglican Churches in +the wealthy, aristocratic, and populous parish of Kensington, +comprising as it does the three wards of Notting-hill, Kensington, and +Brompton. +</p> +<p> +Formerly, for the accommodation of the whole of the Roman Catholics of +the parish of Kensington, there was but one small chapel near the High +street, which appeared amply sufficient for the members of that creed. +But ten or twelve years ago a Roman Catholic builder purchased, at an +enormous price, a plot of ground about three acres in extent beside +the church of the Holy Trinity, Brompton. For a time considerable +mystery prevailed as to the uses it was to be applied to; but, shortly +after the buildings were commenced, they were discovered to be for the +future residence and church of the Oratorian fathers, then established +in King William street, Strand. As soon as a portion of the building +was finished, the fathers removed to it from their former dwelling; +and the chapel, a small and commodious erection, was opened for divine +service. At first the congregation was of the scantiest description; +even on Sundays at high mass, small as the chapel was, it was +frequently only half filled, while, on week days, at many of the +services, it was no uncommon circumstance to find the attendances +scarcely more numerous than the number of priests serving at the +altar. By degrees the congregation increased, till the chapel was +found too small for their accommodation, and extensive additions were +made to it; but these, again, were soon filled to overflowing, and +further alterations had to be made, till at last the building was +capable of holding without difficulty from 2,000 to 2,500 persons. It +is now frequently so crowded at high mass that it is difficult for an +individual entering it after the commencement of the service to find +even standing room. In the meantime the monastery itself, if that is +the proper term, was completed—a splendid appearance it presents— +and we believe is now fully occupied. +</p> +<p> +The Roman Catholic population in the parish, or mission, under the +spiritual direction of the fathers of the Oratory, now comprises +between 7,000 and 8,000 souls. The average attendance at mass on +Sundays is about 5,000, and the average number of communions for the +last two years has been about 45,000 annually. But in addition to this +church, Kensington has three others, St. Mary's, Upper Holland street, +St. Simon Stock, belonging to the Carmelite Friars, and the church of +St. Francis Assissi in Notting Hill. Of monasteries, or religious +communities of men, it has the Oratorians before mentioned, and the +Discalced Carmelites, in Vicarage place. Of convents of ladies, it has +the Assumption in Kensington square, the Poor Clares Convent in Edmond +terrace, the Franciscan Convent in Portobello road, the Sisters of +Misericorde, 195 Brompton road, and the Sisters of Jesus, 4 Holland +villas. Of schools, the Roman Catholics possess, in the parish of +Kensingtion, the Orphanage in the Fulham road, the Industrial School +of St. Vincent de Paul, as well as the large Industrial Schools for +girls in the southern ward. All these schools are very numerously +attended, the gross number of pupils amounting to 1,200, those of the +Oratory alone being 1,000. The kindness and consideration shown by the +Roman Catholic teachers to the children of the poor is above all +praise, not only in Kensington, but in all localities where they are +under their charge. +</p> +<p> +It might be imagined from this account of the Roman Catholic +institutions in Kensington, that a general <a name="705">{705}</a> rush had been made +upon that parish, and that the surrounding districts were +comparatively free from Roman Catholics. Such, however, is very far +from being the case. In the union of Fulham and Hammersmith we have +the Roman Catholic church of St. Thomas of Canterbury, the church of +the Holy Trinity, Brook-green, and the church of Our Lady of Grace, +Turnham-green. Of monasteries there are the St. Mary's Training +College and the Brothers of Mercy, and for ladies there is the order +of the Good Shepherd. Of charities and schools they have the Holy +Trinity alms-houses on Brook-green, a home for aged females, a refuge +for female penitents, most admirably managed and producing a most +beneficial effect, an excellent reformatory for criminal boys, the +large industrial schools of St. Vincent de Paul, and a home, St. +Joseph's, for destitute boys. In Bays-water there is the cathedral of +St. Mary's of the Angels (of which the celebrated Dr. Manning is the +superior) and the convent of Notre Dame de Sion. In Chelsea there is +the church of St. Mary's, Cadogan terrace, a convent for the Sisters +of Mercy, another for the Third Order of Servites, as well as two well +conducted and numerously attended schools. +</p> +<p> +In the united parishes of St. Margaret's and St. John's, Westminster, +a few years since, the priests opened their campaign with considerable +energy. In addition to their church in the Horsferry road, which was +opened in 1813, they erected those of St. Peter's and St. Edmond's in +Palace street, the superior priest of the latter being the celebrated +Father Roberts, a man not only respected for the energy he shows in +the cause of his religion, but beloved by all classes for his +philanthropy. To these some schools and convents were added, the most +celebrated of the latter being that of the Sisters of Charity in +Victoria street. At first the priests seemed to be sanguine of success +in the parish; but their advance was met by men of as much ability, +courage, and energy as themselves. +</p> +<p> +On the Surrey side of the water the Catholic Church has the +magnificent cathedral dedicated to St. George, in St. George's Fields; +the church of the Most Holy Trinity, Parker's road, Dockhead, +Bermondsey; the church of Our Lady of the Immaculate Conception, +Trinity road, Rotherithe; that of Our Lady of La Salette and St. +Joseph, Melior street, Southwark; and the church of the Sacred Heart +of Jesus, Windham street, Camberwell; beside several others in +Peckham, Clapham, Lambeth, and the surrounding districts. Of +communities of men there are the Capuchines at Peckham and at Clapham, +the Redemptorists, and the Brothers of the Christian Schools. Of +convents they have the Religious of the Faithful Virgin at Norwood, +which also comprises an orphanage; the order of the Sisters of Mercy +in Bermondsey; the order of the Sisters of the Christian Retreat, St. +Joseph's, Kennington; the Little Sisters of the Poor, Fentiman road, +Lambeth; beside one or two others of minor importance. It should also +be remarked that all these establishments, with one or two exceptions, +have sprung up within the last ten or twenty years. Of the numbers of +the congregations of the different churches it would be difficult to +form a just idea, but they are certainly very great; that properly +attached to St. George's cathedral alone we have been assured, on most +reliable Roman Catholic authority, amounting to 12,000 or 13,000. The +number of children attending the schools is doubtless proportionably +great. +</p> +<p> +In the north-eastern portion of the metropolis, we find the Roman +Catholics, although they have lately built several new churches, are +fully occupied in holding their own ground without exerting themselves +to make converts. And here, opposed as we are to their creed on +doctrinal points, it would be unjust to withhold our meed of praise to +the exertions of the priests in relieving the temporal miseries of +<a name="706">{706}</a> their poor. It would be difficult to imagine charitable efforts +carried on more indefatigably or nobly. Few who have not visited and +personally inspected the different courts and alleys in the +neighborhood of Spitalfields, Bethnal-green, St. George's-in-the-East, +and Ratcliffe Highway, inhabited as they are by the poor Irish, can +have an idea of the abject poverty which reigns in them, or the amount +of patience, courage, and Christian feeling necessary to relieve it. +Yet all this is cheerfully performed by the Roman Catholic priesthood, +their energies appearing to increase in proportion as the difficulties +and dangers before them become greater. It would perhaps be an +injustice to their body in this district to select any for notice in +preference to the rest; but we cannot refrain from making special +mention of the labors of the Rev. Father Kelley, of Ratcliffe Highway, +and the Rev. Father Chaurain, of Spitalfields, into the results of +whose exertions we have made personal investigation. +</p> +<p> +In the northern districts of the metropolis, especially in Islington +and its surrounding neighborhoods, the Roman Catholics appear to have +made considerable progress. They have lately built several new +churches as well as houses for religious communities, both for men and +women. That their progress in the metropolis is not solely the result +of the High-Church practices in the establishment may be presumed from +the fact that, although the inhabitants of Islington and its vicinity +are particularly noted for their attachment to Low-Church principles, +Catholicism has gained more ground there than in localities where +Puseyism is dominant. In the north-western districts it does not +appear to have increased, though the churches are well attended, and +the congregations apparently very numerous. That of one of the +largest, Our Lady's church, in St. John's Wood, is 6,000, and the +children in the schools 600. In the central districts of London Roman +Catholic churches are very numerous and proportionately well attended; +those in Moorfields, and those in the neighborhood of Covent Garden +and Piccadilly, being particularly so. +</p> +<p> +One of the most effective means employed by the Roman Catholics to +make the conversions is the opening of schools for the education of +children of the poor; nor do they hesitate to admit that these schools +are not only open to the children of their own persuasion, but to all +who may choose to avail themselves of them. This is clear from the +speech of the late Cardinal Wiseman at the Roman Catholic Congress +held at Malines in the autumn of 1863. Speaking of the hundreds of +ragged children, scarcely knowing their parents, he had been +accustomed to meet in the different lanes and alleys of the poorer +London localities, he says: "We are doing all we can to gather these +poor little outcasts together, and to give them Christian training. +The schools in which they are taught, and to which I am at present +alluding, are themselves situated in a truly fearful spot, Charles +street, Drury lane. We owe them in a great measure to the great zeal +of the fathers of the Oratory. Their cost has been no less than +£12,000. The Religious Sisters from Tournay, with a devotion truly +heroic, have undertaken the care of the girls' school. For some time +past we have had the consolation of seeing increased, by 1,000 a year, +the number of children attending our schools for the poor; there still +remain 17,000 poor children who attend no school." +</p> +<p> +The Catholic Church judges rightly that a few years hence the children +under its care will not only augment the number of adult members of +its faith, but will proportionately swell their ranks in the next +generation. Nor is this danger to the Protestant cause to be despised. +All their schools are admirably managed, and the children in them are +treated with the greatest kindness and consideration. We have visited +several, and in all we remarked a great affection and <a name="707">{707}</a> respect +existing in the minds of the pupils for their teachers, the latter not +considering that their duties are over when the classes are dismissed, +but afterward entering into their amusements and occupations with +great patience and good humor. We lately visited unexpectedly the +school alluded to by Cardinal Wiseman, and although lessons were over +we found one of the masters in the large play-room busily employed in +instructing a dozen of the most ragged urchins it would be possible to +find in that squalid and impoverished locality in the mysteries of +spinning peg-tops. Such acts of kindness to children are not forgotten +when they grow up, and a better means of binding them to their faith +when adults it would be impossible to imagine. +</p> +<p> +In Gate street, Lincoln's Inn-fields, is another school of the same +description. We have watched its progress since its establishment, and +marked the great increase in the number of its scholars. It commenced +with very few, but must now number several hundreds. Those in +Drury-lane have more than four hundred children, among whom, perhaps, +not ten before the buildings were erected were receiving any +instruction whatever. All the Roman Catholic charities appear to be +admirably managed; their orphanages especially so. Those of the +Sisters of Charity in Victoria street, Westminster, and Norwood, +considering the comparatively small means at the disposal of their +priesthood, are perfect models of what institutions of the kind ought +to be; at the same time, it must not be imagined that the Roman +Catholic charities in London are solely of a description calculated to +obtain converts to their creed. Their reformatories for fallen women +and their exertions for the relief of the sick are worthy of the +highest praise. An hospital, with a church attached, solely for +chronic and incurable diseases, has for some time been established in +Great Ormond street, at the expense of a gentleman of wealth. The +hospital is under the care of the prioress and sisters of the Order of +St. John of Jerusalem, and we never saw an infirmary of the kind +better managed. A large staff of nuns nurse the sick; and not only are +their numbers greater in proportion to those of the patients than in +any of our metropolitan hospitals, but their attention and kindness to +those under their charge might serve as a model to many of our +Protestant institutions of a similar character. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="708">{708}</a> +<br> +<h2>From Chambers's Journal. +<br><br> +A VANISHING RACE.</h2> +<br> +<p> +The residence of Captain C. F. Hall in the arctic regions, and his +explorations among the solemn and majestic wastes surrounded by the +"hyperborean seas," have invested the Esquimaux with a degree of +interest which they had never previously excited. The savage +inhabitants of the more beautiful and fertile regions of the earth +have been observed by travellers with close and careful attention, +which leads to hopeful efforts for their civilization. As the map of +the world is opened up to our comprehension, new schemes and prospects +for the advance of the human race are opened with it; savans, artists, +missionaries, merchants, gird themselves to the contest with the +material and moral conditions of the peoples yet, though the world's +day has lasted so long, in their infancy, whose unknown future may +contain histories as brilliant as those of the civilizations of the +present and the past. But there is a race who have not excited such +hopes, who have not given rise to such exertions—a race whose life of +unimaginable hardship gives them a mysterious resemblance to the +phantoms of mythological belief, and places them beyond the reach of +the sympathies of civilization by its physical conditions, the +amelioration of which is impossible. Beyond the stern barrier which +nature has set in the northernmost part of her awful realm, behind the +terrible rampart of snow and ice, and storm and darkness, these +creatures of her wrath, rather than of her bounty, dwell. To reach +their land, the traveller must leave behind him every familiar object, +and abandon every habit or need of ordinary life. He must bid farewell +to green trees, to fertile fields, to the crops which give food to man +and beast, to the domestic animals, to every mode of conveyance, to +every implement of common use, to food and clothing such as even the +poorest and roughest sons of a less terrible clime may command; to the +thousand voices of nature, even in its secluded nooks, It is a mockery +to speak of the arctic regions as the land of the Esquimaux, for +nowhere on the earth is man less sovereign. Here nature is indeed +grand beyond conception, but also terrible, implacable, and +impenetrable. She sets man aside in her awful scorn; he is a thing of +no moment, a cumberer of the ice-fields, learning the simple lessons +whereby he supports his squalid existence from the brutes, which are +lordlier than he, inasmuch as the ice-slavery is no chain of servitude +to them; and heedless of him, of his terrible hunger and destitution, +of his hopeless isolation, she builds her ice-palaces upon the seas, +and locks the land in her glittering ice-chains, and flings her +terrific banners of flame wide against the northern sky; and sends her +voice abroad, without a tone of pity in its vibrations, sounding +through the troubled depths of the waters and the rent masses of the +many-tinted icebergs. Nature is indeed beautiful in her northern +strongholds, but her beauty shows only its terrible aspects, its dread +grandeur. The face of the mighty mother does not soften into a smile +for the feebleness of her youngest-born offspring, but is fixed in its +awful sublimity. There is no point of contact between this ice-kingdon +and European civilization, and men of our race and tongue shrink from +it with an appalled sadness, for has it now been the tomb of many of +our brave and beloved? Three centuries ago it earned that evil +reputation, which, in the then elementary state of geographical +knowledge, and the general prevalence of superstition, assumed a weird +and baleful form. It has but increased <a name="709">{709}</a> in degree, though +differing in kind, in our days, and we think of the arctic regions as +the sepulchre of the beloved dead, the land toward which the heart of +England yearned, and which kept pitiless silence through long years of +hope deferred. But of its people we do not think; we are satisfied to +have but a vague notion of them; to wonder, amid the many marvels of +that mighty problem—the distribution of the human race—how human +beings ever found their way to those dreadful fastnesses, more cruel +in their exaction of human suffering than the desert and the forest. +This indifference gives way when we learn what manner of people these +are whom we call Esquimaux, a word which signifies "eaters of raw +food," but who call themselves <i>Innuit</i>, or "the people," and explain +their own origin by a story which is a pleasing testimony to the +common possession of self-conceit by all nations. They say that the +Creator made white men first, but was dissatisfied with them, regarded +them as worthless unfinished creatures, and straightway set about +making the Innuit people, who proved perfectly satisfactory. +</p> +<p> +Captain Hall lived among this strange race for two years and a half, +and he is about to return and prosecute his researches in Boothia and +King William's Land. This time, his object is to trace the remnants of +the Franklin expedition, which—as he finds the history of the few +events which have ever marked the progress of time in that distant +land handed down by oral tradition with extraordinary distinctness—he +has no doubt of being able to do. His first journey was in search of +relics of the Frobisher expedition, and was as successful as it was +daring, patient, and persevering. His experiences were strange in all +respects, and in many most revolting; but we owe much to this +cheerful, courageous, simple-hearted American gentleman, who has +revealed the Esquimaux to us as Captain Grant has revealed the African +tribes, and oriental tourists the dwellers in the deserts. There is +poetical harmony in the stern conditions of life among the Innuits; +there is the impress of sadness and of sterility upon them all. Time +itself changes its meaning in a land where +</p> +<pre> + "The sun starts redly up + To shine for half a year," +</pre> +<p> +and dim wintry twilight lasts throughout the other half, and hunger is +the normal state of the people. The traveller's route is to be traced +on the map, which is mere guess-work hitherto, up the western side of +Davis's Strait; and once away from Holsteinborg, the journey assumes +all its savage features. The terrible icebergs rear their menacing +masses in the track of the ship; the sun pours its beams upon them, +and bathes them in golden light; they appear in fantastic shapes of +Gothic cathedral, of battlemented tower, of clear single-pierced +spire, of strong fenced city, of jewel-mountain, of vast crystal +hills; and so, as the voyager leaves art and civilization behind, +their most supreme forms flash a mirage-like reminiscence upon him, +intensifying the contrast of the prospect, and luring him to a frantic +and futile regret. +</p> +<p> +A grand and terrible confusion reigns around; the voyager shrinks from +the overwhelming scene, where ranges of mountains, islands, rocks, +castles, huge formless masses, and gorgeous prismatic lights, surround +that laboring speck upon the mystic sea, of whose littleness he is so +small an atom; and a strange sense, which is not fear, but awe, comes +to him with the knowledge that nothing of this sublime confusion is +real, on the horizon or beyond it. For all the time of his stay in the +arctic regions he is to be surrounded by contradictions, by the +sublimest manifestations of nature, by the lowest conditions of +humanity, by gorgeous and majestic optical delusions, and by the +hardest and most grovelling facts of daily existence; he must share, +to their fullest extent, the relentless physical needs of the <a name="710">{710}</a> +people, and live, if he would live at all, in close contact with +them—and yet his solitude must be inwardly profound and +unapproachable; his purposes unintelligible to his associates; and +their language, elementary in itself, dimly and scantily comprehended +by him even in its most sparing forms. All this without any of the +alleviations of life among savages in southern countries—without the +warmth, which, if sometimes oppressive, is ordinarily +grateful—without the rich and genial beauties of nature—without the +resources of sport without the natural fruits of the earth—without +the intellectual occupation of speculating upon development, of +ascertaining capabilities, or of investigating sources of wealth. The +civilized dweller in arctic regions has none of these. He beholds, +with admiration so solemn as to be painful, the unapproachable dignity +and hard implacable stillness of nature; but he never dreams of +treasure to be wrested from the cells of the ice-prison; he seeks the +dead—the dead of centuries ago—the dead of a decade since, to be +found, it may be, incorporated with their frozen resting place; for +the fiat of nature arrests decay in these terrible regions, where +death and life are always at close gripes with one another. While the +mind is ceaselessly impressed with sadness and solemnity, the body +asserts its claim to superiority; it will not be forgotten or +neglected, for cold encompasses it with unrelaxing menace of death, +and hunger preys upon the vitals, whose heat wanes rapidly in the +pitiless climate, and which crave for the nutriment so hard to +procure, so repulsive when procured. +</p> +<p> +Toil is the law of the ice-clad land—toil, not to wrest from the +bosom of the earth her children's sustenance, but to tear from the +amphibious creatures, from whom they have learned how to shelter +themselves from the cold, and whose skins cover them, the unctuous +flesh, which they devour raw in enormous quantities. The Innuit are, +on the whole, a gentle people, driven by the relentless need and +severity of their lives into close and peaceful companionship. They +have no king, no government, no law, no defined religion, no property; +they have, for all these, custom—the oldest law; they are animated by +the same spirit that dictated the reply once made to one who sat by +Jacob's well: "Our fathers worshipped in this mountain, and we +worship." As "the old Innuits" did, so do their successors. They have +no bread, no medicine, no household furniture; they are poor human +waifs upon the wide white bosom of the frozen seas; and they have, no +help or resource but in the seal, the walrus, the white bear, the +rein-deer, and the wonderful Esquimaux dogs, which are by far the +noblest living creatures in all those sterile wastes. From the seal +they have learned to make the <i>igloo</i>, which is the house of the +Innuit. They eat the flesh of this animal, and drink its fresh warm +blood; they kill its young, and eagerly swallow the milk of the +mother, found in the stomach of the baby seal. When the sudden summer +comes, and the snow melts, and leaves the surface of the ice bare, +they are houseless; the igloo melts away; their home is but of frozen +water, and suddenly it disappears. Then they have recourse to the +<i>tupic</i>, which is a huge sheet of skins hung across a horizontal pole, +supported at either end. Their bed is a snow platform, strewn with the +moss which is the rein-deer's food, and covered with skins. Their +choicest dainties are the fat of the <i>tuktoo</i>, or rein-deer, the +marrow procured by mashing the bones of the legs, and the thick, +white, unctuous lining of the whale-hide. +</p> +<p> +The interior of an igloo presents a picture more repulsive than that +of any African hut or Indian wigwam, more distressing to human +feelings and degrading to human pride. The igloo is a dome-shaped +building, made of ice-blocks, with an aperture in the roof, and a rude +doorway at one side, closed <a name="711">{711}</a> with ice-blocks, when the inmates +are assembled. The snow platform which forms the bed is occupied by +the women and the stranger. Men and women are clad in skins, put +together with neatness and ingenuity. The dress of the sexes differs +only in two particulars; that of the women is furnished with a long +tail, depending from the jacket, and has a sort of hood, in which +loads and children are carried. The life of the infant is preserved by +its naked body being kept in contact with that of the mother. One +household implement they possess—it is a stone lamp; something like +a trough, with a deep groove in it, in which the dried moss, used as a +wick, floats in the seal oil, expressed by the teeth of the women from +lumps of blubber, which they patiently "mill" until the precious +unguent is all procured. But this lamp too often fails them, and +darkness and hunger take up frequent abode with the Innuit. Days and +nights are passed by the men, sitting singly, in death-like stillness +and silence, by the hole which they have found, far under the snow, at +which the seal will "blow." It is strange and terrible to think of +those watches, in the midst of the desolation, under that arctic sky, +with the cold dense fog now swooping, now lifting, in the enforced +stillness, with famine gnawing the watcher, and famine at home in the +igloo, and the chance of food depending on the sureness of one +instantaneous stroke, down through the snow, through the narrow +orifice in the ice, into the throat of the animal with the sleek skin, +and the mournful human eyes, which vainly implore mercy from raging +hunger. +</p> +<p> +When the Innuit brings the seal to the igloo, a crowd invades the +narrow space, for the simplest hospitality prevails, and the long +watch, the skilful stroke, do not constitute sole ownership of the +prize. The skin is stripped off the huge unsightly carcass, and a +horrible scene ensues. The flesh is torn or cut with the stone knives +in large lumps, and having been first licked by the women, to remove +any hairs or other adhesive matter, is distributed to the party, and +devoured raw; the blood is drunk, the bones are mashed, the entrails +are greedily eaten, the dogs sharing in all; and the blubber is made +to yield its oil by the disgusting process already described. One +turns silenced from the picture; from the sights, and sounds, and +scents; from the vision of dark faces, eager with gluttonous longing, +gathered round the red, flaring light; from the skin-clothed bodies, +reeking with grease and filth, and the foul exhalations of the +mutilated animal; from the lumps of flesh torn by savage hands, and +crammed dripping into distended mouths; from the steaming blood, and +the human creatures who rapturously quaff it in the presence of the +white man, who sits among them and feeds with them, whose heart yearns +with dumb compassion for them, who has wonderful scientific +instruments in his pockets, and his Bible in his breast. As the seal +teaches the Innuits the art of housing themselves, so the white bear +teaches them how to kill the walrus, their most plentiful and frequent +food, when the ice is drifting, and the unwieldy creatures lie upon +the blocks close inshore; then the bear climbs the overhanging +precipice, and taking a heavy block in his deft forepaws, he hurls it +with rare skill and nicety of aim upon the basking monster below. So +brutes train men in those dreadful regions, and not men brutes. The +life of the Innuits is full of such contradictions. And their deaths? +From the contemplation of these one turns away appalled, for they die +in utter solitude. +</p> +<p> +When Captain Hall first heard of this horrible custom, he started off +at once to see its truth; and having removed the blocks with which the +doorway had been built up, entered an igloo, and found a woman who +had yet many days to linger thus fastened up in her living tomb. +Again, hearing that a woman had been abandoned to die, at a great +distance, he set forth, <a name="712">{712}</a> and having reached the spot with immense +difficulty and danger, he managed to remove the snow and the block +which closed the hole in the top of the igloo, lowered himself into +it, and found the woman dead, and frozen as hard as her bier and her +tomb, with a sweet serene smile upon the marble face. So this is the +close of a life of toil and privation—the withdrawal of every kindred +face, the fearful solitude of the ice-walls, the terrible arctic +darkness and silence, and the frozen corpse lying unshrouded, naked, +beneath the frozen skins, until the resurrection. Surely the angel of +death is an angel of mercy there, and does his errand gently, bearing +away the lonely, terrified spirit to the city of gold, the gates of +pearl, the jasper sea, the land where there is no darkness, physical +or mental, for evermore. The earth, always pitiless to them, which +never feeds them from her bosom, does not suffer her dead children of +the Innuit people to sleep their last sleep in her lap. Their graves +are only blocks of ice piled around and above the corpses, which +remain unharmed, unless when the blocks melt, as they sometimes do, +and the wolves, dogs, or bears gain access to the frozen remains. The +Innuits are dying out; disease is making havoc among them; +consumption, formerly unknown, is thinning their numbers by its slow, +furtive, murderous advance; their children are few, and fewer still +are reared; and the long story of awful desolation draws to a close. +Who can regret it? Who can do aught but desire that the giant wastes +of the arctic regions should be left to the soulless creatures of God; +that the great discord between them and human life has ceased to +trouble the harmony of creation; that the mystery of such an existence +is quietly laid at rest, among the things which "we know not now, but +which we shall know hereafter?" +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>MISCELLANY. +<br><br> +SCIENCE.</h2> +<br> +<p> +<i>A New Kind of Mirror.—The Chemical News</i> states that M. Dode, a +French chemist, has introduced platinum mirrors, which are greatly +admired, and which present this advantage, that the reflecting metal +is deposited on the outer surface of the glass, and thus any defect in +the latter is concealed. The process, which is patented in Paris, is +described as follows: Chloride of platinum is dissolved in water, and +a certain quantity of oil of lavender is added to the solution. The +platinum immediately leaves the aqueous solution and passes to the +oil, which holds it in suspension in a finely divided state. To the +oil so charged the author adds litharge and borate of lead, and paints +a thin coat of this mixture over the surface of the glass, which is +then carried to a proper furnace. At a red heat the litharge and +borate of lead are fused, and cause the adhesion of the platinum to +the softened glass. The process is very expeditious. A single baking, +M. Dode says, will furnish 200 metres of glass ready for commerce. It +would take fifteen days, he says, to coat the same extent with mercury +by the ordinary plan. +</p> +<br> +<p> +<i>African Silkworm</i>.—A silkworm before unknown in Europe has been +introduced into France from Senegal, and without suffering from change +of climate. It yields a richer silk than that of any other worm known +to naturalists, and its cocoons are twice the ordinary weight. It is +to be tried in Algiers, and if successful there, this new and rich +silk may become in time an important article of commerce. +</p> +<br> +<p> +<i>Science in a Balloon</i>.—Mr. Glaisher has <a name="713">{713}</a> given, in a lecture at +the Royal Institution, a <i>resumé</i> of his scientific experiments in +balloons. Tables recording the decline of temperature with elevation, +show that when the sky was clear a more rapid decline took place than +when the sky was cloudy. Under a clear sky, a fall of 1° takes place +within 100 feet of the earth, but at heights exceeding 25,000 feet it +is necessary to pass through 1,000 feet of vertical height to obtain a +fall of 1° in temperature. At extreme elevations, in both states of +the sky, the air became very dry, but as far as his experiments went, +was never quite free from water. From ascents made before and after +sunset, Mr. Glaisher concludes that the laws which hold good by day do +not hold good by night; indeed, it seemed probable that at night, for +some little distance, the temperature may increase with elevation, +instead of decreasing. From experiments made on solar radiation with a +blackened bulb thermometer, and with Herschel's actinometer, it was +inferred that the heat rays from the sun pass through space without +loss, and become effective in proportion to the density or the amount +of water present in the atmosphere through which they pass. If this be +so, the proportion of heat received at Mercury, Venus, Jupiter, and +Saturn may be the same as that received at the earth, if the +constituents of their atmospheres be the same as that of the earth, +and greater if the amount of aqueous vapor be greater, so that the +effective solar heat at Jupiter and Saturn may be greater than at +either the inferior planets, Mercury or Venus, notwithstanding their +far greater distances from the sun. This conclusion is most important +as corroborating Professor Tyndall's experiments on aqueous vapor. +Experiments on the wind showed that the velocity of the air at the +earth's surface was very much less than at a high elevation. A +comparison of the temperature of the dew point, as shown by different +instruments, gave results proving that the temperatures of the dew +point, as found by the use of the dry and wet bulb thermometers, and +Daniell's hygrometer, are worthy of full confidence as far as the +experiments went. +</p> +<br> +<p> +<i>The Eruption of Mount Etna</i>.—At a recent meeting of the Paris +Academy of Sciences, an important letter was read from M. Fouqué to M. +Saint-Claire Deville on the eruption of Etna, which has presented +several phenomena of great scientific interest. +</p> +<p> +The eruption commenced at half-past ten on the evening of January 31. +On the previous day two successive shakings of the earth had been +noticed. Just before the eruption began a violent earthquake was felt, +the wave travelling to the north-east; after this, slight oscillations +continued until about 4 A.M. Large flames now rose from a point on the +north-east side of Etna 5,500 feet above the snow line, and lava began +to flow rapidly. In two or three days the lava traversed a space of +19,000 feet, with a width of from 10,000 to 12,000, and a variable +thickness, but often reaching to the depth of 30 or 60 feet. After +destroying for some distance everything in its passage, the current of +lava struck one of the old craters, and then bifurcated. The stream on +the west side moved very slowly, and, becoming subdivided, it nearly +ceased to move; the stream on the east side fell over a deep and +precipitous valley, which it soon filled, being then able to continue +its progress, until finally it was stopped by a lava mound of a +previous eruption. +</p> +<p> +The number of the craters is seven; of these five form a vast +elliptical enclosure, the major axis of which is directed toward the +north-east. A deep fissure, 1,500 feet in length, opened from the base +of a former crater, Frumento, to the nearest of the present cones. +This chasm, M. Fouqué shows, was probably formed by the shock at the +commencement of the eruption. This fissure, and also a depression of +the crater Frumento, is in a right line with the major axis of the +ellipse formed by the craters. The same general fact has been several +times noticed in previous eruptions. +</p> +<p> +The vapors attending an eruption have been divided into the dry, +containing chiefly chloride of sodium and no water, the acid, which +contain a large amount of watery vapor, the alkaline, and the +carbonic. The first indicates the maximum, and the last the minimum of +volcanic action. Each of these varieties of vapor, succeeding in their +order, were noticed at this eruption. M. Fouqué found the dry vapor +upon the still incandescent lava; the acid vapor in those parts where +the temperature was over <a name="714">{714}</a> 400°; the alkaline, where the +temperature was lower, but generally over 100°; and finally, carbonic +acid has been detected in one of the adjacent old craters, which was +at the ordinary temperature. The first three varieties of vapor were +thus found upon the same transverse section of the lava, less than 150 +feet distant from each other. In all these vapors the atmospheric air +which accompanied them was deprived of part of its oxygen, generally +containing only from 18 to 19 per cent., and in some alkaline vapors +the proportion was still less. +</p> +<p> +In this eruption there was a remarkable absence of sulphur and its +compounds; chemical tests as well as the sense of smell could detect +no trace of them. The eruption indeed was characterized by the absence +of the compounds of sulphur and the abundance of the compounds of +chlorine. Hydro-chlorate of ammonia, which was found in abundance, has +generally been regarded as exclusively belonging to the alkaline +vapors; but here it has been discovered among the other varieties, +whilst the alkaline vapors were distinguished by the carbonate rather +than by the hydrochlorate of ammonia. +</p> +<p> +At the present time, M. Fouqué writes, the eruption is most active in +the four lowest craters; these throw liquid lava into the air, and +emit a nearly colorless smoke; the three superior craters eject +solidified lava and black stones, at the same time pouring out a dense +smoke charged with aqueous vapor and brown-colored ashes. +</p> +<p> +The three higher craters produce every two or three minutes a very +loud report resembling the rolling of thunder; the four lower craters, +on the contrary, send forth a rapid succession of ringing sounds, +which it is impossible to count. These sounds follow each other +without any cessation, and are only to be compared to the noise +produced by a series of blows from a hammer falling on an anvil. If +the ancients heard these noises in former eruptions, it is easily +conceivable how they imagined a forge to exist in the centre of the +volcano, with Cyclops for the master workman. The lava is black, rich +in pyroxene, and strongly attracted by a magnet. Since the +commencement of the eruption, the central crater of Etna has emitted +white vapors, which continually cover its summit. Several good +photographs of the eruption have been taken by M. Berthier, who +accompanied M. Fouqué in his explorations, which were by no means +unattended with danger. +</p> +<p> +M. Saint-Claire Deville then made some observations on this paper. He +explained the almost entire absence of sulphur by the fact that M. +Fouqué only examined the vapors from the lava. These nearly always +contain chlorine for their electro-negative element, and scarcely +show, and that not until later, sulphuretted and carbonic vapors. +After the eruption of Vesuvius in 1861, very light deposits of sulphur +were found covering the hydrochlorate of ammonia, which shows that the +former body is not absent from the lava. The existence of +hydrochlorate of ammonia in the emanations does not necessarily +exclude that of the vapors of hydrochloric and sulphuric acids. +</p> +<br> +<p> +<i>Magnetism of Iron-clad Ships</i>.—Staff-Commander Evans, of the British +navy, and Mr. Archibald Smith, who have devoted themselves for several +years to investigations into the character of the magnetism of +iron-built and armor-plated ships, have embodied the results of their +studies in an interesting paper read at a recent meeting of the Royal +Society. It is well known that iron ships have been very difficult to +navigate because of the disturbing effect of the iron upon the +compass, and serious accidents have happened in consequence. But +underwriters, and the whole naval profession, will be glad to hear +that the difficulty and risk are now greatly lessened, if not entirely +removed. For the results established by the paper in question +are—That it is no longer necessary to swing a ship in order to +ascertain the compass deviation, or error, seeing that it is possible +to determine the various forms of error by mathematics; that an iron +ship should always be built with her head to the south; if built head +north, there is such a confused amount of magnetism concentrated in +the stern as to have a violent disturbing effect on the compass; that +if, after building, a ship is to be armor-plated, the head, during the +fixing of the plates, should be turned in the opposite direction— +that is, to the north; and that especial pains should be taken while +building an iron ship to provide a <a name="715">{715}</a> suitable place for the +standard-compass. Beside these particulars, the shot and shell stowed +in the vessel, the iron water-tanks, and, indeed, all the iron used in +her interior fittings, are to be taken into account; and it is +satisfactory to know that the influence exerted on the compass by any +one or all of these conditions can be ascertained, and allowed for, as +in the other cases above mentioned. +</p> +<br> +<p> +<i>"Gyges" Explained</i>.—The London <i>Reader</i> gives the following +explanation of a curious experiment in optics which has been performed +at one of the London theatres under the name of "Eidos AEides," and +reproduced in New York under the appellation of "Gyges." It consists +in causing an actor or an inanimate object which is in full view of +the audience at one moment to disappear instantly, and then to +reappear with the same rapidity. The means by which this is +accomplished are very simple, and are to some extent similar to those +used in exhibiting "Pepper's Ghost." A sheet of plain unsilvered glass +is placed upon the stage, either upright or inclined at a suitable +angle, at the place where the actor or object is to disappear. This +glass is not perceived by the audience, and it does not interfere with +their view of the scenery, etc., behind the plate. A duplicate scene +representing that part of the back of the stage covered by the glass +is placed at the wing, out of sight of the spectators. With the +ordinary lighting of the stage the reflection of this counterfeit +scene in the glass is too faint to be observed; but when a strong +light is thrown upon the scene, the stage lights being lowered at the +same time, the image becomes visible. This duplicate scene being an +exact <i>fac-simile</i> of the background of the stage, the change is not +noticed by the audience, the only difference being that they now see +by reflection that which they saw a moment previously by direct +vision. The actor, standing a sufficient distance behind the glass, is +completely hidden from view, and he is again rendered visible by +turning down the light on the false scene and allowing the stage +lights to predominate. When "Eidos AEides" was being performed at Her +Majesty's Theatre, it was, however, possible, with a good opera-glass, +to distinguish the outline of the figure behind the plate. The effects +produced may of course be modified. An actor may be made to appear +walking or flying in the air, or dancing on a tight-rope, by eclipsing +or obscuring a raised platform on which he may be placed. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>NEW PUBLICATIONS.</h2> +<br> +<p> +HISTORY OF ENGLAND FROM THE FALL OF WOLSEY +TO THE DEATH OF ELIZABETH.<br> +By James Anthony Froude, M.A., late fellow of Exeter College, Oxford. +Volumes I. and II. 8vo., pp. 447 and 501. New York: Charles Scribner & +Company. +</p> +<p> +In these two luxurious volumes we have the first instalment of an +important work upon the most important period of English history. Six +other volumes are to follow. Mr. Froude is a thorough good Protestant. +His main purpose in this history seems to have been the glorification +of the English reformers. For the worst sovereigns of the house of +Tudor he displays an enthusiastic admiration which, one is tempted to +believe, is half genuine sentiment, and half love of paradox. +Catholics, of course, he could not have expected to satisfy; but he +has gone too far to please even the members of his own Church. Of +Henry VIII., whose apologist he has appropriately been called, he +draws a flattering portrait: +</p> +<p> +"If Henry VIII.," he says, "had died previous to the first agitation +of the divorce, his loss would have been deplored as one of the +heaviest misfortunes which had ever befallen the country; and he would +have left a name which would have taken its place in history by the +side of that of the Black <a name="716">{716}</a> Prince or of the conqueror of +Agincourt. Left at the most trying age, with his character unformed, +with the means at his disposal of gratifying every inclination, and +married by his ministers when a boy to an unattractive woman far his +senior, he had lived for thirty-six years almost without blame, and +bore through England the reputation of an upright and virtuous king. +Nature had been prodigal to him of her rarest gifts. In person he is +said to have resembled his grandfather, Edward IV., who was the +handsomest man in Europe. His form and bearing were princely; and +amidst the easy freedom of his address, his manner remained majestic. +No knight in England could match him in the tournament except the Duke +of Suffolk; he drew with ease as strong a bow as was borne by any +yeoman of his guard; and these powers were sustained in unfailing +vigor by a temperate habit and by constant exercise." His state papers +and letters lose nothing by comparison with those of Wolsey and +Cromwell. He was an accomplished musician; he wrote and spoke in four +languages; he was one of the best physicians of his age, an engineer, +and a theologian. "He was 'attentive,' as it is called, 'to his +religious duties,' being present at the services in the chapel two or +three times a day with unfailing regularity, and showing to outward +appearance a real sense of religious obligation in the energy and +purity of his life." In private he was good-humored and good-natured. +But "like all princes of the Plantageuet blood, he was a person of a +most intense and imperious will. His impulses, in general nobly +directed, had never known contradiction; and late in life, when his +character was formed, he was forced into collision with difficulties +with which the experience of discipline had not fitted him to +contend." "He had capacity, if his training had been equal to it, to +be one of the greatest of men. With all his faults about him he was +perhaps the greatest of his contemporaries." +</p> +<p> +Mr. Froude does not believe that the king's scruples respecting the +validity of his marriage with Catharine of Aragon were inspired by his +affection for Anne Boleyn. "They had arisen to their worst dimensions +before he had ever seen Anne Boleyn." But Mr. Froude's narrative of +the king's early intercourse with Anne is extremely unsatisfactory, +not to say disingenuous. How long Henry may have cherished his +scruples in secret, our author affords us no means of guessing; but +the earliest intimation which he finds of an intended divorce was in +June, 1527. It was in 1525, he says, that Anne came back from France +and appeared at the English court. This is an error, and is +inconsistent with other statements in the same chapter; the date was +1522; and almost immediately afterward the king began to pay Anne +marked attention. Her celebrated love-passage with Lord Percy took +place in 1523. Mr. Froude speaks of it as follows: "Lord Percy, eldest +son of Lord Northumberland, as we all know, was said to have been +engaged to her. He was in the household of Cardinal Wolsey; and +Cavendish, who was with him there, tells a long romantic story of the +affair, which, if his account be true, was ultimately interrupted by +Lord Northumberland himself." Now what will be thought of our author's +honesty when we say that Cavendish repeats again and again that the +match was broken off <i>by command of the king?</i> Lord Northumberland did +not appear in the matter at all until Wolsey, by his majesty's orders, +had remonstrated with the young nobleman, and threatened him with dire +consequences if he should persist in a pursuit which was displeasing +to his sovereign. Mr. Froude carefully suppresses all allusion to +intercourse between the king and his fair favorite, until the project +of the divorce was well advanced,—not discussing or discrediting the +statements of other historians respecting Henry's early passion for +Anne Boleyn; but simply putting them behind his back, as matters of +which it did not suit his purpose to take notice. This fashion of +writing may do for romance, but not for history. +</p> +<p> +In demanding a divorce from his first queen, Henry has, as we might +suppose, Mr. Froude's full approval: +</p> +<p> +"It may be admitted, or it ought to be admitted, that if Henry VIII. +had been contented to rest his demand for a divorce merely on the +interests of the kingdom; if he had forborne, while his request was +pending, to affront the princess who had for many years been his +companion and his queen; if he had shown her that respect which her +<a name="717">{717}</a> high character gave her a right to demand, and which her +situation as a stranger ought to have made it impossible to him to +refuse, his conduct would have been liable to no imputation, and our +sympathies would without reserve have been on his side. … His +kingdom demanded the security of a stable succession; his conscience, +it may not be doubted, was seriously agitated by the loss of his +children; and looking upon it as the sentence of heaven upon a +connection the legality of which had from the first been violently +disputed, he believed that he had been living in incest and that his +misfortunes were the consequence of it. Under these circumstances he +had a full right to apply for a divorce." +</p> +<p> +With all its faults, Mr. Froude's book tells many wholesome truths in +a very forcible manner. Here is an admission which from such an +out-and-out Protestant we should hardly have looked for; he is +speaking of religious persecution: +</p> +<p> +"We think bitterly of these things, and yet we are but quarrelling +with what is inevitable from the constitution of the world. … The +value of a doctrine cannot be determined on its own apparent merits by +men whose habits of mind are settled in other forms; while men of +experience know well that out of the thousands of theories which rise +in the fertile soil below them, it is but one here and there which +grows to maturity; and the precarious chances of possible vitality, +where the opposite probabilities are so enormous, oblige them to +discourage and repress opinions which threaten to disturb established +order, or which, by the rules of existing beliefs, imperil the souls +of those who entertain them. Persecution has ceased among ourselves, +because we do not any more believe that want of theoretic orthodoxy in +matters of faith is necessarily fraught with the tremendous +consequences which once were supposed to be attached to it. If, +however, a school of Thugs were to rise among us, making murder a +religious service; if they gained proselytes, and the proselytes put +their teaching in execution, we should speedily begin again to +persecute opinion. What teachers of Thuggism would appear to +ourselves, the teachers of heresy actually appeared to Sir Thomas +More, only being as much more hateful as the eternal death of the soul +is more terrible than the single and momentary separation of it from +the body. There is, I think, no just ground on which to condemn +conscientious Catholics on the score of persecution, except only this: +that as we are now convinced of the injustice of the persecuting laws, +so among those who believed them to be just, there were some who were +led by an instinctive protest of human feeling to be lenient in the +execution of those laws; while others of harder nature and more narrow +sympathies enforced them without reluctance, and even with +exultation." +</p> +<p> +The following extract from an account of the feelings of the mass of +the English people during the early stages of the divorce affair, must +be rather unpalatable to the High-Church Episcopalians: +</p> +<p> +"They believed—and Wolsey was, perhaps, the only leading member of +the privy council, except Archbishop Warham, who was not under the +same delusion—that it was possible for a national church to separate +itself from the unity of Christendom, and at the same time to crush or +prevent innovation of doctrine; that faith in the sacramental system +could still be maintained, though the priesthood by whom those +mysteries were dispensed should minister in golden chains. This was +the English historical theory handed down from William Rufus, the +second Henry, and the Edwards; yet it was and is a mere phantasm, a +thing of words and paper fictions, as Wolsey saw it to be. Wolsey knew +well that an ecclesiastical revolt implied, as a certainty, innovation +of doctrine; that plain men could not and would not continue to +reverence the office of the priesthood, when the priests were treated +as the paid officials of an earthly authority higher than their own. +He was not to be blamed if he took the people at their word; if he +believed that, in their doctrinal conservatism, they knew and meant +what they were saying; and the reaction which took place under Queen +Mary, when the Anglican system had been tried and failed, and the +alternative was seen to be absolute union with Rome, or a forfeiture +of Catholic orthodoxy, proves after all that he was wiser than in the +immediate event he seemed to be; that if his policy had succeeded, and +if, <a name="718">{718}</a> strengthened by success, he had introduced into the Church +those reforms which he had promised and desired, he would have +satisfied the substantial wishes of the majority of the nation." +</p> +<p> +From an introductory chapter on the social condition of England in the +early part of the sixteenth century, we extract the following graphic +passage, as an example of Mr. Froude's fascinating style. Doubtless +most of our readers will agree with us in wishing that so graceful a +pen had been more worthily employed: +</p> +<p class="cite"> + "The habits of all classes were open, free, and liberal. There are + two expressions, corresponding one to the other, which we frequently + meet with in old writings, and which are used as a kind of index, + marking whether the condition of things was or was not what it ought + to be. We read of 'merry England';—when England was not merry, + things were not going well with it. We hear of the 'glory of + hospitality,' England's pre-eminent boast,—by the rules of which all + tables, from the table of the twenty-shilling freeholder to the + table in the baron's hall and abbey refectory, were open at the + dinner hour to all comers, without stint or reserve, or question + asked: to every man, according to his degree, who chose to ask for + it, there was free fare and free lodging; bread, beef, and beer for + his dinner; for his lodging, perhaps, only a mat of rushes in a + spare corner of the hall, with a billet of wood for a pillow, but + freely offered and freely taken, the guest probably faring much as + his host fared, neither worse nor better. There was little fear of + an abuse of such licence, for suspicious characters had no leave to + wander at pleasure; and for any man found at large, and unable to + give a sufficient account of himself, there were the ever-ready + parish stocks or town gaol. The 'glory of hospitality' lasted far + down into Elizabeth's time; and then, as Camden says, 'came in great + bravery of building, to the great beautifying of the realm, but to + the decay' of what he valued more. +<br><br> + "In such frank style the people lived, hating three things with all + their hearts: idleness, want, and cowardice; and for the rest, + carrying their hearts high, and having their hands full. The hour of + rising, winter and summer, was four o'clock, with breakfast at five, + after which the laborers went to work, and the gentlemen to + business, of which they had no little. In the country every unknown + face was challenged and examined,—if the account given was + insufficient, he was brought before the justice; if the village + shopkeeper sold bad wares, if the village cobbler made 'unhonest' + shoes, if servants and masters quarrelled, all was to be looked to + by the justice; there was no fear lest time should hang heavy with + him. At twelve he dined; after dinner he went hunting, or to his + farm, or to do what be pleased. It was a life unrefined, perhaps, + but colored with a broad, rosy English health." +</p> +<br> +<p> +THE AMERICAN ANNUAL CYCLOPEDIA AND REGISTER OF +IMPORTANT EVENTS OF THE YEAR 1864.<br> +8vo., pp. 838. New York: D. Appleton & Company. +</p> +<p> +The Annual Cyclopedia grows more and more valuable and interesting +every year. The present volume is a great improvement upon all that +have gone before it. The course of events has been unusually varied +and startling, and the topics suggested by it appear to have been for +the most part selected with good judgment and treated by competent +writers. We have under the head of "Army Operations" an admirable +history of Sherman's great march and of Grant's campaign in the +wilderness, both illustrated with maps. The article on the "Army of +the United States" abounds in information respecting the number of +troops, organization, supplies, department and corps commanders, etc., +such as everybody wants to have, but nobody knows where to look for. +Under the titles of "Confederate" and "United States Congress" we have +a complete political history of our country during the last year, +while the condition and progress of the several foreign states are +treated in their proper places. A great deal of interesting matter is +given in the articles on the "Anglican" and "Greek" Churches, +"Commerce" and "Commercial Intercourse," "Diplomatic Correspondence +and Foreign Relations," "Finances of the United States," "Freedmen," +"Freedom of the Press," "Geographical Explorations and Discoveries," +"Literature and Literary Progress," "Military Surgery and Medicine" +(profusely illustrated), "Navy," "Ordnance," "Petroleum," etc., etc. +<a name="719">{719}</a> Under the head of "Public Documents" is the most correct +translation of the Pope's Encyclical and syllabus of errors condemned +that has yet appeared in this country. Biographical sketches are also +given of the most distinguished men who died during the course of the +year. +</p> +<br> +<p> +SONGS FOR ALL SEASONS. By Alfred Tennyson. With illustrations by D. +Maclise, T. Creswick, S. Eytinge, C. A. Barry, H. Fenn, and G. +Perkins. 16mo., pp. 84. Boston: Ticknor & Fields. +</p> +<br> +<p> +HOUSEHOLD POEMS. By Henry W. Longfellow. With illustrations by John +Gilbert, Birket Foster, and John Absolon. 16mo., pp. 96. Boston: +Ticknor & Fields. +</p> +<p> +The series of "Companion Poets for the People," of which these two +volumes are the first issues, deserves special commendation as an +example of the way in which cheapness and elegance may be combined. +For half a dollar Messrs. Ticknor & Fields offer us a neat little +book, printed in the best style of typography, on rich tinted paper, +with a clean broad margin, and some twelve or fifteen wood-cuts by +reputable artists. The selections appear to have been made with good +judgment, and include some late pieces of both Tennyson and Longfellow +which are not to be found in previous editions of their works. +</p> +<br> +<p> +THE HISTORY OF THE PROTESTANT REFORMATION IN GERMANY AND +SWITZERLAND, AND IN ENGLAND, IRELAND, SCOTLAND, THE NETHERLANDS, +FRANCE, AND NORTHERN EUROPE.<br> +IN A SERIES OF ESSAYS, REVIEWING D'AUBIGNÉ, MENZEL, HALLAM, +BISHOP SHORT, PRESCOTT, RANKE, FRYXELL, AND OTHERS.<br> +By M.J. Spalding, D.D., Archbishop Baltimore. Fourth revised edition, +Two volumes in one. 8vo., pp. 494 and 509. Baltimore: John Murphy & +Company. +</p> +<p> +We welcome this new and improved edition of the best antidote that has +yet been prepared for English readers to the common misrepresentations +of Protestant historians of the reformation. Archbishop Spalding's +book has been so long before the public, and has been received with +such general favor, that it would be superfluous at this late day to +enter upon a general examination of its merits. It will prove a +valuable guide to the student of English and continental history; he +will find here the chief points made against the Church, by the long +list of writers named in the title-page, taken up and answered by a +prelate of high reputation for sound and thorough scholarship. Dr. +Spalding of course does not deny that there were abuses in the 16th +century which ought to have been abolished; but he contends that the +gravity and extent of these disorders have been greatly exaggerated; +that they generally originated in the world and its princes, not in +the Church; most of them being due to the fact that bad men were +thrust into high ecclesiastical places by worldly-minded and +avaricious sovereigns; that there was a lawful and efficacious remedy +for all such evils, which consisted in giving to the popes their due +power and influence in the nomination of bishops and in the +deliberations of general councils; in a word, that "reformation within +the Church, and not revolution outside of it, was the only proper, +lawful, and efficacious remedy for existing evils;" and finally, "that +the fact of Christians having at length felt prepared to resort to the +desperate and totally wrong remedy of revolution was owing to a train +of circumstances which had caused faith to wane and grow cold, and +which now appealed more to the passions than to reason, more to human +considerations than to the principles of divine faith and the +interests of eternity." +</p> +<br> +<p> +THE YEAR OF MARY; OR, THE TRUE +SERVANT OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN.<br> +Translated from the French of Rev. M. d'Arville, Apostolic +Prothonotary. Edited, and in part translated, by Mrs. J. Sadlier. +12mo. Philadelphia: Peter F. Cunningham. +</p> +<p> +This is a work intended for the use either of private persons or of +confraternities, sodalities, and similar associations formed in honor +of the Blessed Virgin. The matter is distributed into exercises, the +number of which is fixed at seventy-two, because our Lady is supposed +to have lived seventy-two years on earth. One exercise is appropriated +to each of the Sundays and principal festivals of the year. +</p> +<a name="720">{720}</a> +<p> +The reverend author writes with simplicity and unction, and has given +us a really devout book. The translation seems to be very well done. +</p> +<br> +<p> +CEREMONIAL, FOR THE USE OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCHES +IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. Published by order of the First +Council of Baltimore, with the approbation of the Holy See. Third +edition, carefully revised and considerably enlarged. With +illustrations. 12mo., pp. 534. Baltimore: Kelly & Piet. +</p> +<p> +This book is almost indispensable to clergymen, and very convenient +for laymen who wish to understand the beautiful ceremonies which the +Church has appointed for the various festivals and services of the +ecclesiastical year. It was originally compiled by Bishop Rosati, of +St. Louis, and formally adopted by the council of Baltimore in 1852. +The extensive additions which are now published with it were made by +direction of the late Archbishop Kenrick, of Baltimore. They consist +of the ceremonies of low mass, low mass for the dead, and the manner +of giving holy communion within the mass or at other times; +instructions for the priest who is obliged to say two masses, from the +decrees of the sacred congregation of rites, approved under the +present pope; the manner of singing mass without deacon and +sub-deacon, and the vespers without cope-bearers, in accordance with +approved usages of the best-regulated churches in Italy; the mode of +giving benediction with the blessed sacrament, in which the ceremonial +of bishops and the various decrees of the sacred congregation of rites +are strictly followed; Gregorian notes to guide the celebrant and +sacred ministers in singing the prayers, gospel, epistle, confiteor, +etc. +</p> +<p> +The illustrations, intended to show the proper form of various church +utensils, church furniture, etc., constitute a valuable feature of the +book. +</p> +<br> +<p> +MEDITATIONS AND CONSIDERATIONS FOR A RETREAT OF +ONE DAY IN EACH MONTH.<br> +Compiled from the writings of Fathers of the Society of Jesus, by a +Religious. Published with the approbation of the Most Rev. Archbishop +of Baltimore. 18mo., pp. viii., 154. Baltimore: Kelly & Piet. +</p> +<p> +This little book is designed for the use not only of religious +communities, but of persons in the world who may feel disposed to +devote a day now and then exclusively to the affairs of their souls. +The exercises consist of three meditations and a "consideration," for +each month in the year, arranged after the manner of the exercises of +St. Ignatius. +</p> +<br> +<p> +STREET BALLADS, POPULAR POETRY, +AND HOUSEHOLD SONGS OF IRELAND.<br> +16mo., pp. 312. Boston: Patrick Donahoe. +</p> +<p> +The poems contained in this little volume are by a great number of +authors, and of course of very different degrees of merit. Most of +them are of a patriotic nature; a good many are amatory; and two or +three seem to have no business in the collection at all. For example, +Lieut-Colonel Halpine's "April 20, 1864," is a poem of the American +rebellion. Mr. John Savage's "At Niagara" is certainly neither a +street ballad nor a household song, nor is it part of the popular +poetry of Ireland any more than of our own country. We dare say, +however, that nobody will feel disposed to quarrel with the editor for +including these spirited pieces, as well as others we might mention, +which do not properly belong under the categories mentioned in the +title-page. +</p> +<p> +Among the best known writers whose names appear in the table of +contents are William Allinghain, Aubrey De Vere, Samuel Fergusson, +Lady Wilde, Gerald Griffin, and Clarence Mangan. +</p> +<br> +<p> +THE MONTH OF MARY, FOR THE USE OF ECCLESIASTICS.<br> +Translated from the French. 32mo., pp. 207. Baltimore: John Murphy & +Company. +</p> +<p> +This little manual is intended exclusively for ecclesiastics, +especially students in theological seminaries. It sets forth, for each +day of the month, some trait of the life of the Blessed Virgin, first +as an object of veneration and love, secondly, as a model of some +virtue of the clerical state, and finally, as a motive of confidence. +It is brief, suggestive, and practical. +</p> +<br> +<p> +<i>The Man without a Country</i> (Boston: Ticknor & Fields) is a reprint in +pamphlet form of a remarkable narrative which appeared originally in +<i>The Atlantic Monthly</i>. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="721">{721}</a> +<br> +<h1>THE CATHOLIC WORLD. +<br><br> +VOL. I., NO. 6. SEPTEMBER, 1865.</h1> +<br><br> +<h2>From The Dublin Review. +<br><br> +THE CHRISTIAN SCHOOLS OF ALEXANDRIA.—ORIGEN.</h2> +<br> +<p> +<i>Origenis Opera Omnia</i>. Ed. De la Rue, accurante J. P. MIGNE. Paris. +</p> +<p> +<i>Origenes</i>, Eine Darstellung seines Lebens und seiner Lehre, von Dr. +REDEPENNING. (Origen: A History of his Life and Doctrine. By Dr. +REDEPENNING). 1841. Bonn. +</p> +<p> +In a former article we have given some account of the labors and +teaching of Pantaenus and Clement in the twenty years after the death +of Marcus Aurelius (180-202), during which the Church enjoyed +comparative peace. Commodus was not a persecutor, like his philosophic +father. Personally, he was a signal instance of the total break-down +of philosophy as a training for a prince imperial; for whatever +advantages the most enlightened methods and the most complete +establishment of philosophic tutors could afford were his, probably to +his great disgust. But the Church has often found that an imperial +philosopher is something even worse than an imperial debauchee. +Pertinax and Didius Julianus, who succeeded Commodus, had little time +either for philosophy or pleasure, for they followed their +predecessor, after the violent fashion so popular with conspirators +and Praetorians, in less than a twelvemonth. Septimius Severus, the +first, and, with one exception, the only Roman emperor who was a +native African, during the earlier years of his reign protected the +Christians rather than otherwise. How and why he saw occasion to +change we shall have to consider further on. +</p> +<p> +During these twenty years of tranquillity the great Church of +Alexandria had been making no little progress. Her children had not +been entirely undisturbed. The populace, and sometimes the +magistrates, often did not wait for an imperial edict to set upon the +Christians, and the commotions that followed the death of Commodus +were the occasion of more than one martyr's crown. We learn from +Clement of Alexandria, speaking of this very time of comparative +quiet, that burnings, beheadings, and crucifixions took place "daily;" +whereby he seems to point to some particular local persecutions. But +the Alexandrian Church, on the whole, was left in peace, and was +rapidly extending herself among the student population of the city, +among the Greeks, but, above all, among the poorer classes of the +native Egyptians. Christianity seems to have spread in Egypt with a +<a name="722">{722}</a> rapidity almost unexampled elsewhere, and historians have taken +much pains to point out that this was the effect of the considerable +agreement there is between the asceticism of the early Church and that +of the native worship. Without discussing the point, we may note that +rapidity of extension was the rule, not the exception, when an apostle +was the missionary; and that the Alexandrian Church was founded by +direct commission from St. Peter, and, therefore, shared with Rome and +Antioch the distinction of being the mother-city of Christianity. +Moreover, the Nile valley, which above the Delta is nowhere more than +eleven miles in width, contained a teeming population, the whole of +which was thoroughly accessible by means of the river itself. For +nearly five hundred miles every city and town, every least village and +hamlet, stood right on the banks of the great water-way; and it is +probable that half the inhabitants of Upper Egypt and the Thebaid were +often floating on its bosom at one and the same time. The high road +that was so serviceable for traffic and pleasure could be made of +equal service to religion. How unweariedly the successors of St. Mark +must have traversed it from end to end may be read in the history of +those lauras and hermitages that at one time were to be found wherever +its rocky barriers were indented by a sandy valley, and wherever the +old builders of Thebes and Memphis had left a quarried opening in the +limestone. There was not a stronger contrast between these monastic +dwellings and the bosom of the gay river than there was between +Egyptians Christian and Egyptians pagan. If the Church's converts +rushed into the deserts and the caves, it was not especially because +they liked them, but because there was absolutely no other means of +getting out of a society not to be matched for immorality except, +perhaps, by pagan Rome at its very worst. Of the number of Christians +in Alexandria itself at the commencement of the third century we can +only form an approximate judgment. On the one hand, Eusebius tells us +that the Church had spread over the whole Thebaid. As the Thebaid was +the southern division of Egypt proper, and, therefore, the most +distant from Alexandria, we may safely say as much, at least, for the +Delta and Middle Egypt. On the other hand, we are told by Origen that +the Christians in the city were not so numerous as the pagans, or even +the Jews. This will not appear surprising if we recollect that the +Alexandrian Jews were more numerous, as well as richer and more +powerful, than any other Jewish community in the world. We know enough +to be quite sure that the Alexandrian Church was working quietly but +vigorously. From the heads of the Catechetical school down to the +humblest little child that was marked out by baptism in the great city +of sin, there was a great work going on. The impulse that Pantaenus +and Clement were giving was felt downward and around, and when Origen +begins to rise on the scene, we can mark what an advance there has +been even in the short twenty years since the death of Marcus +Aurelius. +</p> +<p> +Septimus Severus had reigned for ten years, as we said above, before +he began to persecute. He was undoubtedly an able and vigorous +emperor; he could meet his enemies and get rid of his friends, bribe +the Praetorians and slaughter his prisoners of war, with equal +coolness and generally with equal success. In the course of a reign of +twenty years he seems to have visited with hostile intent the greater +part of his extensive empire, from the Syrtes of Africa, where he was +born, to the banks of the Euphrates, and thence to Britain, where he +died, at York, A.D. 211. At the time we speak of (198) he had just +concluded a brilliant campaign against those pests of the Roman +soldiery, the Parthians; and having then engaged the Arabs, still in +arms for a chief whose head he had had the pleasure <a name="723">{723}</a> of sending +to Rome twelve months before, had got rather the worst of it in two +battles. It was between this and the year 202 that he visited +Alexandria. There can be no doubt he must have been received at +Alexandria with no little triumph by one class of its citizens. Some +six years before, he had restored to the Greek inhabitants their +senate and municipal privileges. The Greeks, who, as far as intellect +went, were the indisputable rulers of Alexandria, must have been +highly elated at being now restored to civil importance; for though +their senate was little more than an ornament, and their municipal +rights confined to holding certain assemblies for the discussion of +grievances, still, to have a recognized machinery of wards and tribes, +and to be called "men of Macedon," as of old, was not without +advantage, and was, indeed, all that their fathers had presumed to +seek for, even in the days of the lamented Ptolemies. We cannot doubt, +therefore, that by the Greeks Severus was received with much +enthusiasm, and he, on his part, seems to have been equally satisfied +with his reception, for we find that he enriched Alexandria with a +temple of Rhea, and with public baths which he named after himself. +But more came of this visit than compliments or temples. It was an +hour of favor for the Greeks; the chief among them were also the +chiefs and ruling spirits of the university; we know they must have +come across Christianity during the preceding twenty years in many +ways, but chiefly as a teaching that was gaining ground yearly among +their best men; as philosophers, we know they loathed it; as +worshippers of the immortal myths, they were burning to put it down. +Does it seem in any way connected with these facts that Severus at +this very time changes his policy of mildness, and issues a decree +forbidding, under severest penalties, all conversions to Christianity +or Judaism? There is something suggestive in the juxtaposition of +facts, and it is not at all impossible that the commencement of the +fifth persecution was a compliment to Clement of Alexandria. Severus, +indeed, must have frequently come into contact with Christianity +himself during the three or four years he spent in Syria and the East; +he could not have visited Antioch, Edessa, and Caesarea without being +obliged to notice the development of the Church. The Jews, too, had +given him a great deal of trouble, which may account for that part of +the edict which affected them, and perhaps the Montanist fanatics had +helped to irritate him against the name of Christian. However these +things may be, the prohibition, though apparently moderate in its +scope, was the signal for the outburst of a tremendous persecution. +Laetus, the prefect of Alexandria, was so zealous in his work, that it +is impossible not to suspect that he was acting under the very eye of +his imperial master. He was not content with torturing and slaying in +the city itself, but sent his emissaries up the Nile to the very +extremity of the Thebaid to hunt up the Christians and send them by +boatloads to the capital for judgment and punishment. Numbers of the +Alexandrian Christians fled to Palestine and elsewhere on the first +intimation of danger. Pantaenus, who had returned from his Indian +mission, had perhaps already left Alexandria; but Clement was at the +head of the Catechisms, and he was of the number of those who fled. +The great school was for a time broken up. The functions of the Church +were suspended for want of ministers, or prevented by the +impossibility of meeting in safety. It was taught in the Alexandrian +Church that if they were persecuted in one city, they should flee into +another; and, just at this time, the Motanist error, that it was +unlawful to flee from persecution, caused this teaching to be acted +upon with less hesitation than usual; and so, in the year 202, +Christians in Alexandria, from being a comparatively flourishing +community, became a proscribed and secret sect. +</p> +<a name="724">{724}</a> +<p> +It would be very far from the truth, however, to suppose that the +teachings of the Catechetical school had not been able to form +martyrs. We know that multitudes stood up for their faith and shed +their blood for it at Alexandria, during the first years of this +persecution, and this amidst horrors so unusual even with persecutors, +that it was thought they portended the coming of the last day. The +name of Potamiana alone will serve to raise associations sufficient to +picture both the heroism of the confessors and the enormities of the +tyrants. But there is another name with which we are more nearly +concerned at present. Leonides, the father of Origen, was one of those +Christians who had not fled from the persecution. He was an inhabitant +of Alexandria, a man of some position and substance, and when the +troubles began he was living in Alexandria with his wife and family. +It was not long before he was marked down by Laetus and dragged to +prison. The martyr's crown was now within his grasp; but he left +behind him in his desolate home another who was burning to share it by +his side. His son, Origen, was not yet seventeen when his father was +torn away by the Roman soldiers, and, in spite of the entreaties of +his mother, he insisted upon following him to prison. His mother +finally kept him beside her by a device which may raise a smile in +this generation. She "hid all his clothes," says Eusebius, and so +compelled him to stop at home. But his zeal was all aroused and on +fire, and, indeed, in this, the earliest incident known to us of his +life, we seem to read the zeal and fire of the man that was to be. He +sent a message to his father in these words, "Be sure not to waver on +<i>our</i> account." The exact words seem to have been handed down to us, +and Eusebius, who gives them, probably received them from Origen's own +disciples in Caesarea of Palestine. The boy well knew what would be +the martyr's chief and only anxiety in his prison. The thought of the +wife and seven young children whom he was leaving desolate would be a +far bitterer martyrdom than the Roman prisons. But Leonides gloriously +persevered, confessed the faith, and was beheaded, while the whole of +his property was confiscated to the emperor. +</p> +<p> +Origen, as we have said, was not quite seventeen years old at his +father's martyrdom, having been born about the year 185. Both his +father and mother were Christians, and apparently had dwelt a long +time in Alexandria. He had therefore been brought up from his infancy +in that careful Christian training which it is the pride and joy of a +good and earnest Christian father to bestow upon his son. The traces +of this training, as we find them in Eusebius, are touching in the +extreme. Leonides, to whom the teachings of Clement had made the Holy +Scriptures a very fountain of life and sweetness, made them the +principal means of the education of his son. Every day the child +repeated to his father a portion of the holy books, and was instructed +according to his capacity. Knowing what, in after life, was to be +Origen's connection with the Holy Scriptures, we are not surprised to +find that his father soon began to experience some difficulty in +answering his questions. The boy, with true Alexandrian instinct, was +not content with the bare letter of the book; he would know its hidden +meaning and prophetic sense. Leonides discouraged these questions and +speculations, not, it would seem, because he disapproved of them, but +because he sensibly thought them premature in so young a child. But in +the secret of his heart he was full of joy to see the ardor, +eagerness, and amazing quickness of his dear child, and often, when +the boy was asleep, would he uncover his breast and reverently kiss +it, as the temple of the Holy Spirit. It is of very great importance +for the right comprehension of the great Origen to bear in view this +picture of his tender youth, and to reflect that he was no convert +from heathenism, no <a name="725">{725}</a> Christianized philosopher, whose early +notions might from time to time be expected to crop up in the field of +his orthodoxy, but a Christian child, born and bred in the Church's +bosom, brought up by a father of unquestioned ability, who died a +martyr and is honored as a saint. Origen began to think rightly as +soon as he could think at all; his early education left him nothing to +forget. As he grew up and began to be familiar with Alexandria the +beautiful, he received that subtle education of the eye and +imagination that every Alexandrian, like every Athenian, succeeded to +as an heirloom. But with the heathen philosophers he had nothing to +do, and it may be questioned whether he ever entered the walls of the +Museum. His father had not neglected to teach him the ordinary +branches of Greek learning. He attended the lectures of Clement, those +brilliant and winning discourses, half apology, half exhortation, that +he himself was afterward to emulate so well. He heard Pantaenus, also, +after the venerable teacher had returned from his Indian mission. We +may be sure that he dreaded worse than poison the society of the pagan +youth of the university; this his subsequent conduct proves. But he +had his circle of friends, and among them was a young man, somewhat +older than himself, who was hereafter to leave an undying name as St. +Alexander of Jerusalem. Thus, by ear and eye, by master and by +fellow-student, by his father's labor, and by the workings of his own +wonderful intellect and indomitable will, he was formed into a man. +His education came to a premature end; but his father's martyrdom, +though to outward seeming it left him a destitute orphan, really +hardened the boy of seventeen into the man and the hero. +</p> +<p> +"When his father was martyred," continues Eusebius, writing, in all +probability, from the relation of those who had heard Origen's own +account, "he was left an orphan, with his mother and six young +brothers and sisters, being of the age of seventeen. All his father's +property was confiscated to the emperor's treasury, and they were in +the utmost destitution; but God's providence took care of Origen." A +rich and illustrious lady of Alexandria received him into her house. +Whether this lady was professedly a Christian, a pagan, or a heretic, +history does not say. She can hardly have been a pagan, though it is +not impossible that a philosophic and liberal pagan lady should have +taken a fancy to help such a youth as Origen. It is not likely that +she was a heretic, for in that case Origen would never have entered +her door. Thanks to the Gnostics, heretics in those days were looked +upon in Alexandria as more to be dreaded than pagans. She was +probably, by outward profession at least, a Christian, "illustrious," +says the historian, "for what she had done, and illustrious in every +other way." What she had done we are not permitted even to guess; but +one fact in her history we do know, and it is very significant. She +had living in her house, on the footing of an adopted son, one Paul, a +native of Antioch, and one of the chiefs of the Alexandrian heretics. +It is certain that Origen's patroness must have had either very +uncertain or very easy notions of Christianity, if she could lend her +house, her money, and her influence to an arch-heretic, who had come +from Syria to trouble the Church of Alexandria, as Basilides and +Valentine had come before him. Gnosticism had probably lost ground in +the city, under the eloquent attacks of St. Clement. This Paul was a +man of great eloquence, and his reputation attracted great numbers to +hear him, not only of heretics, but also of Christians. He came from +Antioch, the headquarters of an unknown number of Gnostic sects, and, +with the usual instinct of false teachers, he had "led captive" this +Alexandrian lady. Mark, of infamous memory, had already done the same +thing by others, and perhaps by her, and Paul had succeeded to his +position and was now <a name="726">{726}</a> the rival of the head of the Catechisms. +Such a state of things makes it easier to understand why St. Clement, +in his <i>Stromata</i>, calls those who lean to heresy "traitors to +Christ," and compares perverts to the companions of Ulysses in the sty +of Circe, and why he makes the very treating with heretics to be +nothing less than desertion in the soldier of Christ. It does seem a +little strange, at first sight, that the uncompromising Origen should +have consented to receive assistance from one whose orthodoxy must +have been in such bad odor. The difficulty grows less, however, if we +consider the circumstances. It was in the very heat of a terrible +persecution, when the canons of the Church must have been suspended. +Origen had lost his father, and had nowhere to turn for bare +subsistence. We can hardly wonder if, in such a strait as this, he +asked few questions when the charitable lady wished to take him in. +But when the grief and agitation of his orphaned state had somewhat +subsided, and when the persecutors had begun to slacken their fury, we +may suppose that he began to examine the harbor of his refuge, and +that it pleased him not. He was under the same roof as Paul of +Antioch, a heretic and a leader of heretics; but never, young as he +was, could he be induced to associate with him in prayer, or in any +way that could violate the canons of the Church, as far as it was +possible to keep them in such times. "From his childhood," says his +biographer, "he kept the canons, and execrated the teachings of +heretics;" and he tells us that this last phrase is Origen's own. And +it seems that he took the most energetic measures to get away from a +companionship that he must have loathed. He had been well instructed, +as we have said, by his father in the ordinary branches of education. +After his father's death he again applied himself to study with +greater ardor than before, for he had an object in view now. It was +not long before he was offering himself as a public teacher of those +sciences that are designated by the general term "<i>Grammatica</i>." It +was the first public step in a life that was afterward to be little +less than the entire history of the Eastern Church. He was not yet +eighteen, but there was no help for it. He must have bread, and he +could not eat of the loaf that was shared by Paul of Antioch. Early +writers lay much stress on this first exhibition of orthodox zeal in +him who was afterward to be the "hammer" of heretics, from Egypt to +Greece. Certain it is that his conduct as a boy was the same as his +sentiments when he was in his sixtieth year. "To err in morals," he +wrote in his commentary on Matthew, at Caesarea, forty years after his +first essay as a teacher of grammar,—"to err in morals is bad, but to +err in dogma and to contradict Holy Writ is much worse." If in after +life he was to be so singularly earnest and so unaffectedly devout, so +enthusiastic for the Gospel, so eager in exploring the depths of +sacred science, and so unwavering in his faith, all this was but the +growth and development of what was already springing in his soul in +those early years of his trials and zeal. The strong will was already +trying its first flights, the sensitive heart was being schooled to +throw all its motive power into duty, and the quick, clear +apprehension and the wonderful memory for which he was to be so +famous, were already beginning to show what they would one day be. +</p> +<p> +Origen was now a teacher of grammar and the sciences, but he had not +kept school for many months when his teachings took a turn that he can +hardly have anticipated. His text-books were the common pagan +historians, poets, and philosophers that have been thumbed by the +school-boy from that generation to this. It was no part of Origen's +character to leave his hearers in error when plain speaking would +prevent it; and so it happened that his exposition of his author often +took in hand not merely the parts of speech, but the doctrine. Though +he was only <a name="727">{727}</a> school-master by profession, his scholars soon found +out he was a Christian, and a Christian of uncommon power and +clear-sightedness. The Catechetical school was closed; masters and +scholars were scattered in flight or in concealment. It was not long, +therefore, before the young teacher found himself applied to by first +one heathen and then another, who, under other circumstances, would +have applied to the school of the Catechisms. Among these were +Plutarchus, who soon afterward showed how a young Alexandrian student +could die a glorious martyr; and Heraclas, his brother, who, after his +conversion, left everything to remain with his master, became his +assistant and successor in his catechetical work, and finally died +Patriarch of Alexandria. These were the first-fruits of his zeal for +souls. Many others followed; and as the persecution was somewhat +abating, Demetrius, bishop of Alexandria, looking round for men to +resume the work of the schools, saw no one better fitted to be +intrusted with its direction than Origen himself. He was accordingly, +though not yet eighteen, appointed the successor of Clement. +</p> +<p> +Laetus, prefect of Alexandria, who had exerted himself so strenuously +to please Severus when the persecution commenced, had now been +recalled; probably he had reaped the reward of his zeal, and was +promoted. His successor, Aquila, signalized his entering upon office +by an activity that outdid that of Laetus himself. The persecution +that had calmed down a little toward the end of the first year and +when Laetus was leaving, now raged with redoubled fury. We have +already said that the authoritative tradition, and, in great measure, +also the practice, of the Alexandrian Church was flight at a time like +this. Origen, however, was very far from fleeing; never at any time of +his life did he display such fearless baldness, such energetic +contempt for the enemy, as during these years of blood, from 204 to +211. There was no prison so well-guarded, no dungeon so deep, that he +could not hold communication with the confessors of Christ. He went up +to the tribunals with them, and stood beside them at the interrogatory +and at the torture. He went back with them in a sort of defiant +triumph, after sentence of death had been pronounced. He walked +undauntedly by their side up to the stake and the beheading block, and +kissed them and bade them adieu when it was time for them to die. It +is no wonder that Eusebius sets down his own safety to a miraculous +interposition of the right hand of God. Once, as he stood by a dying +martyr, embracing him as he expired, the Alexandrian mob set on him +with stones and nearly killed him; how he escaped none could tell. +Again and again the persecutors tried to seize him; as often ("it is +impossible," says the historian, "to tell how often") was he delivered +from their hands. He was nowhere safe: no sooner did the mob get a +suspicion of where he was than they surrounded the house, and hounded +in the soldiers to drag him out. He fled from house to house; perhaps +he was assisted to escape by some of his numerous friends; perhaps he +hid himself, as St. Athanasius in the next century did, in some of +those underground wells and cisterns with which every house in +Alexander's city was provided, and then sought other quarters when the +mob had gone off. But it was not long before he was again discovered. +The numbers that came to hear him soon let the infuriated pagans know +where their victim was, and he was again besieged and hunted out. +Once, St. Epiphanius relates, he was caught, apparently by a +street-mob, and some of the low Egyptian priests as their leaders. It +was near the Egyptian quarter of the city; perhaps, even, he was +visiting some poor native convert in the dirty streets of the Rhacôtis +itself. If so, the name of Origen would have been enough to empty the +whole quarter of its pariah race, and bring them yelling and cursing +into the <a name="728">{728}</a> Heptastadion. They showed him no mercy; they abused him +horribly; they beat him and bruised him; they dragged him along the +ground. But before killing him outright, the idea seized them that +they should make him deny his religion, and at the same time make a +shameful exhibition of himself. There must have been Greeks in the +crowd, for Egyptians would never have had patience to spare him so +long. The Serapeion, however, was at hand, and thither they dragged +him. As they hauled him along, "they shaved his head," says St. +Epiphanius—that is, they tried to make him look like the Egyptian +priests, who were distinguished by a womanish smoothness of face; and +we may imagine that they did it with no gentle hands. When at length +the rushing mob had surged up the steps of the great temple, their +victim in the midst of them, they set him on his feet, and gave him +some palm branches, telling him to act the priest and distribute them +to the votaries of Serapis. The palm, we know, was a favorite tree +with the Egyptian priests; it was sculptured and painted on the walls +of their huge temples, and it was borne in the hands of worshippers on +solemn festivals. On the present occasion there were, probably, +priests of one rank or another standing before the vestibule of the +Serapeion, ready to supply those who should enter. It was, therefore, +the work of a moment to seize the stock of one of these ministers, and +force Origen to take his place. If they anticipated the pleasure of +seeing the hated Christian teacher humiliated to the position of an +<i>ostiarius</i> of an idolatrous temple, they were never more mistaken in +their lives. Origen took the palms, and began without hesitation to +distribute them; but, as he did so, he cried out in a voice as loud +and steady as if neither suffering nor danger could affect him, "Take +the palms, good people!—not the palms of idols, but the palms of +Christ!" How he escaped after this piece of daring, we are only left +to conjecture. Perhaps the Roman troops came suddenly on the scene to +quell the riot; and as they hated the dwellers in the Rhacôtis almost +as much as the latter hated Origen, the neighborhood of the Serapeion +would have been speedily cleared of Egyptians. However it came about, +Origen was saved. +</p> +<p> +Meanwhile, he saw his own scholars daily going to death. The young +student Plutarchus fell among the first victims of Aquila's new vigor; +Origen was by his side when he was led to execution, was recognized by +the mob, and once more narrowly escaped with his life. Serenus, +another of his disciples, was burnt; Heraclides, a catechumen, and +Hero, who had just been baptized, were beheaded; a second Serenus, +after enduring many torments, suffered in the same way. A woman named +Heraeis, one of his converts, was burned before she could be baptized, +receiving the baptism of fire, as her instructor said. Another who is +numbered among his disciples is Basilides, the soldier who protected +St. Potamiana from the insults of the mob, and whom she converted by +appealing to him three nights afterward. We are told that the +brethren, and we know who would be foremost among the brethren in such +a case, visited him in prison as soon as they heard of his wonderful +and unexpected confession. He told them his vision, was baptized, and +the following day died a martyr. Probably it was Origen who addressed +to him the few hurried words of instruction there was time to say. +"All the martyrs," says Eusebius, "whether he knew them or knew them +not, he ministered to with the most eager affection." His reputation, +it may well be conceived, suffered no diminution as these things came +to be known. The horrors of the persecution could not keep scholars +away from him, nor prevent increasing numbers from coming to seek him. +Many of the unbelieving pagans, full of admiration for a holiness of +life and a heroism they could not comprehend, came to his <a name="729">{729}</a> +instructions; and even literary Greeks who had gone through the +curriculum of the Museum, and were deeply versed in Platonic myths and +Pythagorean theories of mortification, came to listen to this fearless +young philosopher, in whom they found a learning that could not be +gainsaid, combined with a practical contempt for the things of the +body that was quite unknown in their own schools. +</p> +<p> +The persecution seems to have died down and gone out toward the year +211, nine years after its commencement. Origen's labors became the +more extraordinary in proportion as he had freer scope for pursuing +them. The feature in his life at this time, which is most +characteristic of the time and the city, and which more than anything +else attracted the cultivated heathens to listen to him, was his +severe asceticism. Times of persecution may be considered to dispense +with asceticism; but Origen did not think so. It was a saying of his +master, St. Clement, and, indeed, appears to have been a common +proverb in that reformed school of heathen philosophy which resulted +in Neo-Platonism, "As your words, so be your life." A philosopher in +Alexandria at that time, if he would not be thought to belong to an +effete race of thinkers who had long been left behind, or who only +survived in the well-paid and well-fed professorships of the +university, was of necessity a man whose strict and sober living +corresponded to the high and serious truths which he considered it his +mission to utter. St. Clement did not forget this, either in principle +or in practice, when he undertook to win the heathen men of science to +Christ. Origen, born a Christian, made a teacher apparently by chance +and in the confusion of a persecution, cared little, in the first +instance, for what pagan philosophy would think of him. The fact that +all who pretended to be philosophers pretended also to asceticism may, +indeed, have caused him to embrace a life of denial more as a matter +of course. But the holy gospels and the teachings of Clement were the +reasons of his asceticism. It is amazing that Protestant writers, when +they write of the asceticism of the early Church, can see in it +nothing but the reflection of Buddhism, or Judaism, or of the tenets +of Pythagoras, and that they always seem nervously glad to prove by +the assistance of the Egyptian climate or the Platonic hatred of +matter, that it was not the carrying out of the law of Christ, but +merely a self-imposed burden. Climate, doubtless, has great influence +on food, and English dinners would no more suit an Egyptian sun than +would the two regulation <i>paximatia</i> of the Abbot Moses in Cassian be +enough for even the most willing of English Cistercians. But why go to +climate, to Plato, to Pythagoras, and to Buddha, to account for what +is one of the most striking recommendations of the gospels? We need +not stop to inquire the reason, but we may be sure that a child who +had been taught the Holy Scriptures by heart would not be unlikely to +know something of their teaching. His biographer tells us expressly, +with regard to several of his acts of mortification, that they were +done in the endeavor to carry out literally our Lord's commands. And +yet it is very remarkable, and a trait of the times, that Eusebius, in +describing his mode of life, uses the word philosophy three times +where we should use asceticism. Origen, soon after being appointed +head of the Catechetic school, found he could not do his duty by his +hearers as thoroughly as he could wish, on account of his other +occupation of teacher of grammar. He therefore resolved to give it up. +It was his only means of subsistence, but he might reasonably have +expected "to live by the gospel" as long as he was in such a post as +chief catechist. If he had expected this he would not have been +disappointed, for there would have been no lack of charity. But he had +an entirely different view of the matter. He would be a burden <a name="730">{730}</a> +to no one, and would live a life of the strictest poverty. Simple, +straightforward, and great, here as ever, we may conceive how he would +appreciate the fetters of a rich man's patronage. But, if we may trust +the utterances of his whole life, his love for holy poverty was such +that, while it makes some refer once more to Pythagoras, to a Catholic +it rather suggests St. Francis of Assisi. "I tremble," he said thirty +years afterward, "when I think how Jesus commands his children to +leave all they have. For my own part, I plead guilty to my accusers +and I pronounce my own sentence; I will not conceal my guiltiness lest +I become doubly guilty. I will preach the precepts of the Lord, though +I am conscious of not having followed them myself. Let us now at least +lose no time in becoming true priests of the Lord, whose inheritance +is not on earth but in heaven." Such language from one who can hardly +be said to have possessed anything during his whole life can only be +explained on one hypothesis. In order, therefore, at once to secure +his independence in God's work, and to oblige himself to practise +rigorous poverty, he made a sacrifice which none but a poor student +can appreciate. He sold his manuscripts, and secured to himself, from +the sale, a sum of four oboli a day, which was to be his whole income. +This sum, which was about the ordinary pay of a common sailor, who had +his food and lodging provided for him, was little enough to live upon; +but miserable as it was, Origen must have paid a dear premium to +obtain it. Those manuscripts of "ancient authors" were probably the +fruits and the assistance of his early studies; he must have written +many of them under the eye of his martyred father. He had "labored +with care and love to write them out fairly," we are told, and +doubtless he prized them at once as a scholar prizes his library and a +laborious worker the work of his hands. For many years, probably until +he went to Rome in 211, he continued to receive his twopence or +threepence every day from the person who had bought his books. But we +cease in great part to wonder how little he lived on when we know how +he lived. In obedience to our Lord's command, and in opposition to the +prevailing practice of all but the poorest classes, he wore the tunic +single, and as for the pallium, he seems either to have dispensed with +it altogether, or only to have worn it whilst teaching. For many years +he went entirely barefoot. He fasted continually from all that was not +absolutely necessary to keep him alive; he never touched wine; he +worked hard all day in teaching and visiting the poor; and after +studying what we should call theology the greater part of the night, +he did not go to bed, but took a little rest on the floor. This +"vehemently philosophic" life, as Eusebius calls it, reduced him in +time, as might have been expected, to a mere wreck; insufficient food +and scanty clothing brought on severe stomachic complaints, which +nearly caused his death. It is not to be supposed that his disciples +and the Church in general looked on with indifference whilst he +practised these austerities. On the contrary, he was solicited over +and over again to receive assistance and to take care of himself; and +many were even somewhat offended because he refused their well-meant +offers. But Origen had chosen to put his hand to the plough, and he +would not have been Origen if he had turned back. It is probable, +indeed, that he somewhat moderated his austerities when his health +began to give way seriously; but hard work and hard living were his +lot to the end, and the name of Adamantine, which he received at this +time, and which all ages and countries have confirmed to him, shows +what the popular impression was of what he actually went through. As +might have been expected, a man of such singleness and determination +had many imitators. We have seen that the very pagan philosophers came +to listen to him. <a name="731">{731}</a> The young scholars whom he instructed, and +many of whom he converted, did more than listen to him; they joined +him, and imitated as nearly as they could what Eusebius again calls +the "philosophy" of his life. It was no barren aping of externals, +such as might have been seen going on a little way off at the Museum; +he, on his part, taught them deep and earnest lessons in the deepest +and most earnest of all philosophies; they, on theirs, proved that his +words were power by the severest of all tests—they stood firm in the +horrors of a fearful persecution, and more than one of them witnessed +to them by a cruel death. +</p> +<p> +As long as the persecution lasted, anything like regularity and +completeness in a work like that of Origen was clearly impossible. But +a persecution at Alexandria, though generally furious as long as it +lasted, happily seldom lasted very long. Popular opinion was, no +doubt, very bitter against Christianity. But popular opinion was one +thing; the will of the prince-governor another. Moreover, the popular +opinion of the Greek philosophers was generally diametrically opposed +to that of their Roman masters, and the beliefs and traditions of the +Rhacôtis tended to the instant extermination of the Jews; and though +these four antagonistic elements could, upon occasion, so far forget +their differences as to unite in an onslaught against the Christians, +yet, before long, quarrels arose and riots ensued among the allied +parties to such an extent that the legionaries had no choice but to +clear the streets in the most impartial manner. Again, it is quite +certain that the Christian party included in it not a few men of rank; +and, what is more important, of power and authority. This we know from +the trouble St. Dionysius, one of Origen's scholars, afterward had +with many such persons who had "lapsed" in the Decian persecution. As +everything, therefore, depended on the humor of the governor, and as +the governor was, as other men, liable to be influenced by bribes +suggestions, and caprice, a furious persecution might suddenly die +out, and the Church begin to enjoy comparative peace at the very time +when things looked worst. Until the year 211, "Adamantius" taught, +studied, prayed, and fasted amidst disturbance, martyrdoms, and +fleeings from house to house; but that year wrought a change, not only +in Alexandria, but over the whole world. It was simply the year of the +death of Septimus Severus at York, and of the accession of Caracalla +and Geta; but this was an event which, if precedents were to be +trusted, invited all the nations that recognized the Roman eagle to be +ready for any change, however unreasonable, beginning with the senate, +and ending with the Christians. It was, probably, in this same year, +211, that Origen took advantage of the restoration of tranquillity to +visit the city and Church of Rome. It would seem that this episode of +his journey to Rome has not been sufficiently considered in the +greater part of the accounts of his life. Protestant writers, as may +be expected, pass it over quietly, either barely mentioning it, or, if +they do put a gloss upon it, confining themselves to generalities +about the interchange of ideas or the antiquity and renown of the +Roman Church. But there is evidently more in it than this. Origen was +just twenty-six years of age: though so young, he was already famous +as a teacher and a holy liver in the most learned of cities, and one +of the most ascetical of churches. His work was immense, and daily +increasing. On the cessation of the persecution, the great school was +to be reorganized, and put once more into that thorough working order +which had made it so effective under Pantaenus and Clement. Yet, just +at this busy crisis, he hurries off to Rome, stays there a short time, +and hurries back again. In the first place, why go at all? What could +Rome or any other church give him that he had not already at +Alexandria? Not scientific learning, certainly; not a systematic <a name="732">{732}</a> +organization of work; not reverence for Holy Scripture; not the method +of confuting learned philosophy. Again: why go specially to Rome? Was +there not a high road, easy and comparatively short, to Caesarea of +Palestine, and would he not find there facilities enough for the +"interchange of thought?" For there, about fifteen years before, had +assembled one of the first councils ever held since the council of +Jerusalem. Was there not Jerusalem, the cradle of the Church? It was +then, indeed, shorn of its glory, both spiritual and historical; for +it was subject, at least not superior, to Caesarea, and was known to +the empire by the name of Aelia Capitolina; but its aged bishop was a +worker of miracles. Was there not Antioch, the great central see of +busy, intellectual Syria, the see of St. Theophilus, wherein saintly +bishops on the one hand, and Marcionite heresy and Paschal schism on +the other, kept the traditions of the faith bright and polished? Were +there not the Seven Churches? Was there not many a "mother-city" +between the Mediterranean and the mountain ranges where apostolic +teachings were strong yet, and apostolic men yet ruled? Origen's +motive in going to "see Rome" is given us by himself, or, rather, by +his biographer in his words; but, unfortunately, in such an ambiguous +way that it is almost useless as an argument; he wished, says +Eusebius, "to see the very ancient Church of Rome." The word we have +translated "very ancient" +<span style="white-space:nowrap;"> +( +<span style="vertical-align:-25%"> +<img alt="" src="images/i732.jpg"> +</span>.) +</span> +may also mean, as we need not +say, "first in dignity." It is hardly worth while to argue upon it, +but it will not fail to strike the reader that Jerusalem and Antioch, +not to mention other sees, were both older than Rome, if age was the +only recommendation. Origen's visit to Rome, then, is a very +remarkable event in his life, for it shows undoubtedly that the chief +of the greatest school of the Church found he required something which +could only be obtained in Rome, and that something can only have been +an approach to the chief and supreme depositary of tradition. He was +at the very beginning of his career, and he could begin no better than +by invoking the blessing of that rock of the Church of whom his +master, Clement, had taught him to think so nobly and lovingly. We +shall see that, many a year after this, in the midst of troubles and +calumnies, when his great life was nearly closed, the same see of +Peter received the professions and obedience of his failing voice, as +it had witnessed and blessed the ardor of his youth. He was not, +indeed, the first who, though already great in his own country, had +been drawn toward a greatness which something told them was without a +rival. Three-quarters of a century before Rome had attracted from +far-off Jerusalem that great St. Hegesippus, the founder of church +history, whose works are lost, but whose fame remains. A convert from +Judaism, he left his native city, travelled to Rome, and sojourned +there for twenty years, busily learning and committing to writing +those practices and traditions of the Roman Church which he afterward +appears to have disseminated all over the East, and which he conveyed, +toward the end of his life, to his own Jerusalem, where he died. From +Assyria and beyond the Tigris the "perfume of Rome" had enticed the +great Tatian—happy if, on his return, he had still kept pure that +faith which, at Rome, he defended so well against Crescens the cynic. +A great mind and a widely cultivated genius found the sphere of its +rest in Rome, when St. Justin finished his wanderings there and sealed +the workings of his active intellect by shedding his blood at the +bidding of the ruling clique of Stoics—<i>"philosophus et martyr"</i> as +the old martyrologies call him. A famous name, too, is that of Rhodon, +of Asia, well known for his steady and able defence of the faith +against Marcionites and other heretics. These, and such as these, had +come from the world's ends to visit the great apostolic see before +Origen's day dawned. But there were others, and as great, whom <a name="733">{733}</a> +he may actually have met in the city, either on a visit like himself, +or because they were members of the Roman clergy. There was the great +Carthaginian, Tertullian, who, for many years, lived, learned, and +wrote in Rome; his works show how well he knew the Roman Church, and +how often afterward he had occasion, in his polemical battles, to +allude to the <i>"Ecclesia transmarina"</i> as Africa called Rome. A +meeting between Origen and Tertullian is a very suggestive idea; the +only misfortune is, that we have no warrant whatever for supposing it +beyond the bare possibility. But by naming Tertullian we suggest one +view, at least, of the ecclesiastical society which Origen would meet +when he visited Rome. Another celebrated man, whom there is more +likelihood that Origen did meet, is the convert Roman lawyer, Minucius +Felix, who employed his recognized talents and trained skill in +vigorous apologetic writings, one of which we still possess. A third +was the priest Caius, one of the Roman clergy, famed as the adversary +of Proclus the Montanist, unless he had already started on his +missionary career as regionary bishop. Finally, there was St. +Hippolytus, who, like Caius, was from the school of St. Irenaeus, and +had come from Lyons to Rome, where he seems to have been no unworthy +representative of his teacher's zeal against heretics. Nearly every +step of the life of St. Hippolytus is encumbered by the ruin of a +learned theory or the useless rubbish of an abandoned position; but he +as far as we can conjecture, the chief scientific adviser of the Roman +pontiffs in the measures they took at this time regarding Easter and +against the Noetians. Until scientific men have settled their disputes +as to who was the author of the <i>Philosophumena</i>, or Treatise <i>against +All Heresies</i>, little more can be said about St. Hippolytus. The +Treatise itself, however, whose recovery some twenty years ago excited +so much interest, must have had an author, and it is nearly certain +the author must have been one of the Roman clergy at this very time. +It is still more certain that the matters therein discussed must +represent very completely one view of Church matters at Rome in the +early part of the third century; and, therefore, even if Origen did +not meet the author in person, he must have met many who thought as he +did. Now it is rather interesting to read the <i>Philosophumena</i> in this +light, and to conjecture what Origen would think of some of its views. +The leading idea of the work, which is not even yet extant complete, +is to prove that all heresies have sprung from Greek philosophy. This +it attempts to do by detailing, first, the systems of the +philosophers, then those of the heretics, and showing their mutual +connection. The scandalous attack on St. Callistus, in the ninth book, +may or may not be an interpolation by a later hand; if not, the author +must have been much more ingenious than reputable. There is no denying +the historical and literary value of the Treatise; but where it +professes to draw deductions and to give philosophical analyses of +systems, it seems of comparatively moderate worth. For instance, the +author's analysis and appreciation of the philosophy of Aristotle is +little better than a libel on the great <i>"maestro di lor chi sanno;"</i> +and Basilides, though doubtless a clever personage in his way, can +hardly have taken the trouble to go so far for the small amount of +philosophy that seasons his fantastical speculations. But a general +opinion resembling the opinion maintained in the Treatise seems to +have been common in the West; and when Tertullian says of the +philosophy of Plato that it was <i>"haereticorum omnium +condimentarium,"</i> he was doubtless expressing the idea of many beside +himself. To Origen, fresh from the school of Clement and the +atmosphere of Alexandria, such language must have sounded startling, +to say the least, and we cannot help feeling he would be rather <a name="734">{734}</a> +sorry, if not indignant, to hear the great names he had been taught to +think of with so much admiration and compassion unfeelingly +caricatured into a relationship of paternity with such men as the +founders of Gnosticism. He does not appear to have been very familiar +yet with the Greek systems; they had not come specially in his way, +though he had heard of them in the Christian schools, and there is +little doubt that he had already seen the necessity of studying them +more closely, as he actually did on his return to Alexandria. What +effect the views of the Western Church had on his teaching, and how he +treated the philosophers, we shall have to consider in the sequel. +Meanwhile, his stay at Rome was over; he had studied the faith and +heresy, discipline and schism, church organization and sectarian +rebellion, in the most important centre of the whole Church, and his +school at Alexandria was awaiting him, to reap the benefit of his +journey. +</p> +<p> +On the return of Origen to Alexandria, it would almost appear +as if he had wished to decline, for a time, the office of chief of the +Catechisms. The historian tells us that he only resumed it at the +strongly expressed desire of his bishop, Demetrius, who was anxious +for the "profit and advantage of the brethren." Perhaps he wished for +greater leisure than such a post would permit of, in order to carry +into execution certain projects that were forming in his mind. But +neither the patriarch nor his scholars would hear of his giving up, +and so he had to settle to his work again; "which he did," says +Eusebius, "with the greatest zeal," as he did everything. From this +time, with one or two short interruptions, he lived and taught in +Alexandria for twenty years. His life as an authoritative teacher and +"master in Israel" may be said to commence from this point. It was an +epoch resembling in some degree that other epoch, thirty years before, +when Pantaenus had been called upon to take the charge of chief +teacher in the Alexandrian Church. Now, as then, the winter of a +persecution had passed, and the season was sunny and promising. Now, +as then, men were high in hope, and set to work with valiant hearts to +repair the breaches the straggle had left, and to restore to the +rock-built fortress that glory and comeliness that became her so well; +but with which, if need was, she could securely dispense. But there +was no slight difference between 180 and 211. The tide of Christianity +had risen perceptibly all over the Church; most of all on the shores +of its greatest scientific centre. The possibility of appealing to +those who had heard the apostles had long been past, but now even the +disciples of Polycarp, Simeon, and Ignatius had disappeared; instead +of Irenaeus there was Hippolytus, and Demetrius of Alexandria was the +eleventh successor of St. Mark. Heretics had multiplied, questions had +been asked, tradition was developing itself, dogma was being fixed. +The form of teaching was, therefore, in process of change as other +things changed. Greater precision, more "positive theology," a more +constant look-out for what authority had said or might say—these +necessities would make the teacher's office more difficult, even if +more definite. The position of the Church toward its enemies, also, +was sensibly changing. The "gain-sayers" were not of the same class as +had been addressed by St. Theophilus or St. Justin. The state of +things had grown more distinctly marked. Christianity was no longer an +idea that might, in a burst of noble rhetoric, be made to set on fire, +for a moment, even the camp of the enemy. It was now known to the +Gentile world as a stern and unyielding praxis; susceptible, perhaps, +of scientific and literary treatment, but quite distinct from both +science and letters. Enthusiastic but timid <i>dilettanti</i> had lost +their enthusiasm, and gave full scope to their fears. Amiable +philosophers took back the right hand of fellowship, and retreated +behind those who, by a <a name="735">{735}</a> special instinct, had always refused to +be amiable, and now thought themselves more justified than ever. On +the Christian side the war had lost much of the adventure which +accompanies the first dashing inroads into an enemy's country. +Surprises were not so easy, systematic opposition was frequent, and +their writers were obliged to fight by tactics, and in the prosaic +array of argument for argument. Documents, moral testimony, +institutions, were the objects of attack from without. The apostles +were vilified, faith was proved to be irrational, the Bible was ranked +with Syrian impostures and Jewish charm-books. And here, in the matter +of the Bible, was a mighty enterprise for the Christian teacher. The +canon had not yet been officially promulgated. A generation that would +despise an apocryphal book of Homer or a false Orphic hymn would not +be easily satisfied with the credentials of a religion. Great, then, +would be that Christian teacher who should at once teach the faithful, +and yet not "take away from" the faith; win the philosophers, and yet +fight them hand to hand; and give to the world a critical edition of +the Bible, yet hold fast to ancient tradition. Such was the work of +Origen. +</p> +<p> +He began by external organization; he divided the multitudes that +flocked to the Catechisms into two grand classes; one of those who +were commencing, another of those who were more advanced. The former +class he gave to his first convert, Heraclas; the latter he kept to +himself. Heraclas was "skilled in theology," and "in other respects a +very eloquent man;" and, moreover, he was "fairly conversant with +philosophy," three qualifications in an Alexandrian catechist none of +which could be dispensed with. In any case, the division was a matter +of absolute necessity, for these extraordinary Alexandrian scholars, +models and patterns that deserve to be imitated more extensively than +they have been, gave him no respite and kept no regular school-hours, +but crowded in and out "from morning till night;" "not even a +breathing-space did they afford him," says his biographer. In such +circumstances theological study and scriptural labors were out of the +question, even if he had been the man of adamant that his admirers, +with the true Alexandrian passion for nicknames, had already begun to +call him. He therefore looked about among "his familiars," those of +his disciples who had attached themselves to him and lived with him a +life of study and asceticism; and from them he chose out Heraclas, the +brother of the martyred Plutarchus, to be the chief associate of his +work. +</p> +<p> +It need not be again mentioned that Origen's work, as that of +Pantaenus and of Clement before him, had three classes of persons to +deal with—catechumens, heretics, and philosophers. His dealings with +the heretics and philosophers will be treated of more appropriately +when we come to consider his journeys, the most important of which +occurred after the expiration of the twenty years with which we are +now concerned. As the school of Alexandria was chiefly and primarily +connected with the catechumens, the account of the twenty years of his +presidency will naturally be concerned chiefly and primarily with the +latter, that is to say, with those whom that great school undertook to +instruct in faith and discipline. And here we approach and stand close +beneath one side of that monumental fane that bears upon it for all +generations the name of Origen. The neophytes of Alexandria were +chiefly taught out of one book; it was the custom handed from teacher +to teacher; each held up the book and explained it, according to the +"unvarying tradition of the ancients." For two hundred and ten years +the work had gone on; but time has destroyed nearly every trace of +what was written and spoken. For the first time since St. Mark wrote +the gospel, Alexandria speaks now in history with a voice that shall +commence a new era in the history of <a name="736">{736}</a> Holy Scripture. Pantaemus +had written "Commentaries" on the whole of the Bible; Clement had +left, in the <i>Hypotyposes</i>, a summary exposition of all the canonical +Scripture, not forgetting a glance at the "Contradictions" of +heretics. Both these writings have perished long ago. When Origen +came, in his turn, to take the same work in hand, a pressing want soon +forced itself upon his mind. There was no authentic version of the +sacred Word. The New Testament canon was still uncertain, one Church +upholding a greater number of books, another less. The Roman canon +was, indeed, from the first identical with the Tridentine (see +Perrone, <i>"De Locis Theologicis"</i>). But the Church of Antioch, <i>e.g.</i>, +ignored no less than five of the canonical books. Alexandria, well +supplied with learned expositors, and not a little influenced by the +native Alexandrian instinct for criticism and grammar, had got further +in the development of the canon than the majority of its sisters. Yet, +so far, there had hardly been any distinct interference on the part of +authority, and though, as we shall see, Origen's New Testament canon +was the same as that of the Council of Trent, yet there were not +wanting private writers who expressed doubts about the Epistle to the +Hebrews or the Apocalypse. One thing, however, is very clear in all +these somewhat troublesome disputes about the canon; whether we turn +to Tertullian in Africa, to St. Jerome in Italy, to St. Irenaeus in +the West, or to Clement and Origen in the East, we find one grand and +large criterion put forth as the test of all authenticity, viz., the +tradition of the ancients. "Go to the oldest churches," says St. +Irenaeus. "The truest," says Tertullian, "is the oldest; the oldest is +what always was; what always was is from the apostles; go therefore to +the churches of the apostles, and find what is there held sacred." "We +must not transgress the bounds set by our fathers," says Origen. It +took several centuries to complete this process; but the principle was +a strong and a living one, and its working out was only a matter of +time. It was worked out something in this fashion. A provincial +presbyter, we will say from Pelusium, or Syene, or Arsinoe, came up to +Alexandria (he may easily have done so, thanks to the police +arrangements and engineering enterprise of Ptolemy Philadelphus); +having much ecclesiastical news to communicate, and perhaps important +business to arrange on the part of his bishop, he would be thrown into +close contact with the presbytery of the metropolitan Church. Let us +suppose that, in order to support some point of practical morality, +touching the "lapsed" or the converts, he quoted Hermas' "Shepherd" as +canonical Scripture. The archdeacon with whom he was arguing would +demur to such an authority; let him quote Paul, or Jude, or Peter, or +John, but not Hernias; Hernias was not in the canon. The presbyter +from the provinces would be a little amazed and even ruffled; how +could he say it was not in the canon when he himself had heard it read +on the Lord's day before the sacred mysteries in the patriarchal +Church, in the presence of the very patriarch himself, seated on his +throne, and surrounded by the clergy? A canonical book meant a book +within the Church's general rule +<span style="white-space:nowrap;"> +( +<span style="vertical-align:-25%"> +<img alt="" src="images/i736.jpg"> +</span> +), +</span> +and the rule of the +Church was that a book read at such a time was thereby declared true +Scripture. The archdeacon would reply that the presbyter was right in +the main, both as to facts and principles; but would point out that at +Alexandria they had a set of books which were read at the solemn time +he mentioned, beside regular Scripture; and if he had known their +usages better, or if he had asked any of the clergy, or the patriarch, +he would be aware that such writings were only <i>read to the people</i> as +pious exhortations, not <i>defined</i> as the repository of the faith. The +presbyter would consider this inconvenient, and would doubtless be +right in thinking so. The practice was <a name="737">{737}</a> condemned by various +councils in the next century. But he would at once admit that if the +tradition were so, then the Alexandrian Church certainly appeared to +reject Hernias. But he would have another difficulty. Did not Clement, +of blessed memory, consider Hernias as authentic, or, at any rate, the +Epistle of Barnabas, which was quite a parallel case? And did not +Origen (whom we suppose to be then teaching) call the "Shepherd" +"divinely inspired?" It was true, the archdeacon would rejoin, that +both Clement in former years and Origen then spoke very highly of +several writings of this class; but he must refer him once more to the +authoritative tradition of the Alexandrian Church, to be learned, in +the last instance, from the lips of Demetrius himself: this would at +once show that Clement and Origen could not mean to put Hernias on a +level with Paul, and Origen himself would certainly admit so much, if +he were asked. The presbyter would inquire, during his stay, of the +heads of the Catechetical school, of the ancient priests, and of the +patriarch; he would be satisfied that what the archdeacon said was +true; and he would return to his city on the Red Sea, or at the +extremity of the Thebaid, or on the north-western coast of the +continent, with authentic intelligence that the Apostolic Church of +Alexandria rejected Hermas from the Scripture canon, and that, +therefore, it certainly ought to be rejected by his own Church. He +would, perhaps, in addition to this, bring the information that the +metropolitan Church, so he had found out in his researches, upheld the +Epistle to the Hebrews, or the Apocalypse of the Apostle John, to be +true and genuine Scripture; would it not, therefore, be well to +consider whether these also should not be admitted by themselves? In +this way, or in some way analogous, the Churches that lay within the +"circumscription" of a patriarchal or apostolic see would by degrees +be led to conform their canon to the canon of the principal Church. As +time went on, the great metropolitan sees themselves became grouped +round the three grand centres of Alexandria, Antioch, and Rome; and, +finally, in the process of the development of tradition, at least as +early as A.D. 800, the whole Church had adopted the canon as approved +by Rome in the decretal of Innocent I. It is, therefore, a remarkable +fact that Origen quotes the canon of the New Testament precisely as it +now stands in the Vulgate. It would hardly be true to say that he +formally states as exclusively authentic the complete list of the +Catholic canon; but that he does enumerate it is certain. Moreover, in +addition to the remarkable correctness of his investigations on the +canon, Origen did much, in other ways, for a book that was +emphatically the textbook of his school. The exemplars in general use +were in a most unsatisfactory state: there were hardly two alike. +Writers had been careless, audacious innovators had inserted their +interpolations, honest but mistaken bunglers had added and taken away +whenever the sense seemed to require it. It is Origen himself who +makes these complaints, and nobody had better occasion to know how +true they were. The manuscript used in the great Church probably +differed from that used by the chief catechist; his, again, differed +from every one of those brought to class by the wealthier of his +scholars. One would bring up a copy of St. Matthew's Gospel, which, on +investigation, would turn out to be full of Nazarite or Ebionite +"improvements"—another would have an Acts of the Apostles, which had +been bequeathed to him by some venerable Judaizant, and wherein St. +James of Jerusalem would be found to have assumed more importance than +St. Luke was generally supposed to have given him. A third would have +a copy so full of monstrous corruptions in the way of mutilation and +deliberate heretical glossing, that the orthodox ears of the <a name="738">{738}</a> +master would certainly have detected a quotation from it in two lines: +it would be one of Valentine's editions. A fourth, newly arrived from +some place where Tertullian had never been heard of, would appear with +a bulky set of <i>volumina</i>, which Origen would find to his great +disgust to be the New Testament "according to Marcion." That first and +chief of reckless falsifiers had "circumcised" the New Testament, as +St. Irenaeus calls it, to such an extent that he had to invent a +quantity of new Acts and Apocalypses to keep up appearances, and what +he retained he had freely cut and tortured into Marcionism; for he +said openly that the apostles were moderately well-informed, but that +his lights were far in advance of them. Such examples as these are, of +course, extremes; but even in orthodox copies there must have been a +bewildering number of <i>variantes</i>. Origen's position would bring him +into contact with exemplars from many distant churches. The work of +copying fresh ones for the "missions," or to supply the wants of the +provinces, would necessitate some choice of manuscripts; and in a +matter so important, we may be sure that his catechists, +fellow-townsmen of Aristarchus, rather enjoyed than otherwise the +vigorous critical disputes which the collation of MSS. has a special +tendency to engender. It is nearly established—indeed, we may say, it +is certain—that Origen wrote a copy of the New Testament with his own +hand. It was not a new edition, apparently, but a corrected copy of +the generally received version. He corrected the blunders of copyists; +he struck out of the text everything that was evidently a mere gloss; +he re-inserted what had clearly dropped out by mischance, and adopted +a few readings that were unmistakable improvements. But he made no +alteration of the text on mere conjecture. However faulty a reading +might seem, he never changed it without authority; he had too much +reverence for Holy Scripture, and probably, also, too bitter an +experience of conjectural emendations, to sanction such dangerous +proceedings by his own practice. This precious copy, the fruit of his +labors and study, the depositary of his wide experience, and the +record of his "adamantine" industry, was apparently the one from which +he himself always quoted, and, therefore, we may conclude, which he +always used. It lay, after his death, in the archives of Caesarea of +Palestine, with his other Biblical MSS. Pamphilus the Martyr is +related to have copied it; and in the time of Constantine, Eusebius +sent many transcripts of it to the imperial city. Eusebius himself +copied it with all the reverence he would necessarily feel for his +hero, Origen; and by means of his copy, or of copies made by his +direction, it became the basis of that recension of the New Testament +known as the Alexandrine. St. Jerome was well acquainted with the +library of Caesarea, and often mentions the <i>"Codices Adamantii"</i> +which he was privileged to consult there; and we need not remind the +reader of the well-known agreement of the Latin versions with those of +Palestine and Alexandria. Now Palestine meant—first, Jerusalem, where +was the celebrated library formed by St. Alexander, Origen's own +college friend and an Alexandria man, as we should say, and partly +under Origen's influence; and, secondly, Caesarea, which inherited +Origen's traditions and teaching, at least equally with Alexandria, as +we shall see later on, and in which the originals of his works were +preserved with religious veneration, until war and sack of Persian or +Moslem destroyed them. Thus the work of Origen on the New Testament, +begun and mainly carried out during those twenty years at Alexandria, +is living and active at this very day. +</p> +<p> +But if the New Testament needed setting to rights, it was correct and +accurate in comparison with the Old. How he treated the Septuagint, +and how the Hexapla and the Tetrapla grew under nimble hands and +learned heads, we must for the present defer to tell. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="739">{739}</a> +<br> +<h2>From The Fortnightly Review. +<br><br> +MARTIN'S PUZZLE.</h2> +<br> +<pre> +I. + + There she goes up the street with her book in her hand, + And her "Good morning, Martin!" "Ay, lass, how d'ye do?" + "Very well, thank you, Martin!" I can't understand; + I might just as well never have cobbled a shoe! + I can't understand it. She talks like a song: + Her voice takes your ear like the ring of a glass; + She seems to give gladness while limping along; + Yet sinner ne'er suffered like that little lass. + +II. + + Now, I'm a rough fellow—what's happen'd to me? + Since last I left Falmouth I've not had a fight + With a miner come down for a dip in the sea; + I cobble contented from morning to night. + The Lord gives me all that a man should require; + Protects me, and "cuddles me up," as it were. + But what have I done to be saved from the fire? + And why does his punishment fall upon her? + +III. + + First, a fool of a boy ran her down with a cart. + Then, her fool of a father—a blacksmith by trade— + Why the deuce does he tell us it hah broke his heart? + His heart!—where's the leg of the poor little maid! + Well, that's not enough; they must push her downstairs, + To make her go crooked: but why count the list? + If it's right to suppose that our human affairs + Are all order'd by heaven—there, bang goes my fist! + +IV. + + For if angels can look on such sights—never mind! + When you're next to blaspheming, it's best to be mum. + The parson declares that her woes weren't design'd; + But, then, with the parson it's all kingdom-come. + "Lose a leg, save a soul "—a convenient text; + I call it "Tea doctrine," not savoring of God. + When poor little Molly wants "chastening," why, next— + The Archangel Michael might taste of the rod. +</pre> +<a name="740">{740}</a> +<pre> +V. + + But, to see the poor darling go limping for miles + To read books to sick people!—and just of an age + When girls learn the meaning of ribbons and smiles,— + Makes me feel like a squirrel that turns in a cage. + The more I push thinking, the more I resolve: + I never get further:—and as to her face, + It starts up when near on my puzzle I solve, + And says, "This crush'd body seems such a sad case." + +VI. + + Not that she's for complaining: she reads to earn pence; + And from those who can't pay, simple thanks are enough. + Does she leave lamentation for chaps without sense? + Howsoever, she's made up of wonderful stuff. + Ay, the soul in her body must be a stout cord; + She sings little hymns at the close of the day, + Though she has but three fingers to lift to the Lord, + And only one leg to kneel down with to pray. + +VII. + + What I ask is, Why persecute such a poor dear, + If there's law above all? Answer that if you can! + Irreligious I'm not; but I look on this sphere + As a place where a man should just think like a man. + It isn't fair dealing! But, contrariwise, + Do bullets in battle the wicked select? + Why, then it's all chance-work! And yet, in her eyes, + She hold's a fixed something by which I am check'd. + +VIII. + + Yonder ribbon of sunshine aslope on the wall, + If you eye it a minute, 'll have the same look: + So kind! and so merciful! God of us all! + It's the very same lesson we get from thy book. + Then is life but a trial? Is that what is meant? + Some must toil, and some perish, for others below: + The injustice to each spreads a common content; + Ay! I've lost it again, for it can't be quite so. + +IX. + + She's the victim of fools: that seems nearer the mark. + On earth there are engines and numerous fools. + Why the Lord can permit them, we're still in the dark; + He does, and in some sort of way they're his tools. + It's a roundabout way, with respect let me add, + If Molly goes crippled that we may be taught: + But, perhaps, it's the only way, though it's so bad; + In that case we'll bow down our heads, as we ought. +</pre> +<a name="741">{741}</a> +<pre> +X. + + But the worst of <i>me</i> is, that when I bow my head, + I perceive a thought wriggling away in the dust, + And I follow its tracks, quite forgetful, instead + Of humble acceptance: for, question I must! + Here's a creature made carefully—carefully made + Put together with craft, and then stampt on, and why? + The answer seems nowhere: it's discord that's play'd. + The sky's a blue dish!—an implacable sky! + +XI. + + Stop a moment. I seize an idea from the pit. + They tell us that discord, though discord, alone, + Can be harmony when the notes properly fit: + Am I judging all things from a single false tone? + Is the universe one immense organ, that rolls + From devils to angels? I'm blind with the sight. + It pours such a splendor on heaps of poor souls! + Suppose I try kneeling with Molly to-night. + +GEORGE MEREDITH. +</pre> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>Translated from Der Katholik. +<br><br> +THE TWO SIDES OF CATHOLICISM. +<br><br> +[Third and concluding Article.]</h2> +<br> +<h2> +</h2>IV. THE HEART OF THE CHURCH. +<p> +Christ approves himself as the head of the Church inasmuch as her +individual members are subject to his guidance, and live and move in +him. [Footnote 151] This protracted influence of Christ is exercised +by means of an innate harmonizing and vivifying principle of the +Church. We have arrived at the heart of the Church. Our ancient +theology bestows this epithet on the Holy Ghost. [Footnote 152] The +Church receives the Holy Ghost through Christ. Such is the doctrine of +Scripture, clearly expressed. Jesus promises his disciples to send +them after his departure the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of truth, in whom +they will find a compensation for the Master. For it is the function +of the Spirit to testify of Christ, and to bring all things to the +remembrance of the Church, whatsoever Jesus has said. Thus are all +things taught unto the Church. This efficacy, which has the glory of +Christ for its aim, the Holy Ghost derives from the fulness of +Christ's Godhead, <i>de meo accipiet.</i> The Holy Ghost was not given +until after Jesus was glorified. Christ being exalted, and having +received the Holy Ghost promised of the Father, sheds forth the Spirit +upon the Church. Even the prior inspiration of the apostles was the +result of an act of Christ. Jesus breathed on them and said unto them, +Receive ye the Holy Ghost. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 151: St. Thomas, iii. 93, a. 6.] +<br><br> + [Footnote 152: <i>Ibid, a. 1, ad. S: Caput habet manifestam eminentiam + respectu caeterorum exteriorum membrorum; sed cor habet quandam + influentiam occultam. Et ideo cordi comparatur Spiritus sanctus, qui + invisibiliter ecclesiam viviflcat et unit.</i>] +</p> +<p> +The Spirit acts as the heart of the Church under the control and +influence of the head. The fundamental theological reason of this is +not difficult of demonstration. The external relations <a name="742">{742}</a> of the +several divine persons, or their relations to the works of God, such +as the one just described of the Holy Ghost to the Church, are +intimately connected with the intro-divine relations of the members of +the most Holy Trinity to each other. It is in this sense that Holy +Writ makes mention of a <i>mission</i> of the Son and of the Spirit. The +expression implies that the person concerning whom it is used, +occupies toward the remaining divine persons a position admitting of +the giving of a mission by them or one of them, that is to say, of a +particular work done by the one by the power and at the delegation of +the other. For one person of the Trinity to act in a mission, +therefore, it is requisite that the power and the will to act must +emanate from the person conferring the mission. Thus Jesus says that +his doctrine is not his own, but the doctrine of him by whom he was +sent. But one person of the Trinity can be a recipient from another in +so far only as the recipient issues from the giver for ever and ever, +or only in respect of the eternal procession. It follows that a divine +person can receive a mission only in emanating from another, that is +to say, none but the <i>personae productae</i>, the Son and the Holy Ghost, +can be sent; while, on the other hand, only the <i>personae +producentes</i>, the Father and the Son, can confer a mission. Hence the +fundamental reason why the sway of the Spirit in the Church is +exercised under the influence of Christ, is to be found in the manner +of the eternal procession, <i>i.e.</i>, in the coming of the Spirit from +the Father and the Son. +</p> +<p> +The essence of Christianity consists in spiritual intercourse and +spiritual influence. As distinguished from the old covenant, the +characteristic of the New Testament dispensation consists in this: +that it is done by the agency of the Holy Ghost, sent down from +heaven. The Spirit of Christ was in the prophets; but the same Spirit +manifests a new activity since the mission from heaven. When the +apostle desires to make the true foundation of faith clear to the +Galatians, he contents himself with asking them whence they had +received the Spirit? By its descent the blessing of Abraham came on +the Gentiles through Jesus Christ, in fulfilment of the prophecies. +The pouring out of the Holy Ghost is the crowning work of Christ's +mediation. +</p> +<p> +But what is the badge of this more profuse dispensation of the Spirit, +thus recognized in Scripture as the peculiar mark of Christianity? +Under the ancient covenant, answers St. Gregory of Naziance, the Holy +Ghost was present only by its efficacy +<span style="white-space:nowrap;"> +( +<span style="vertical-align:-25%"> +<img alt="" src="images/i742a.jpg"> +</span> +); +</span> +now it abides among us +<span style="vertical-align:-25%"> +<img alt="" src="images/i742b.jpg"> +</span> +<i>i.e.</i>, in its essence, or <i>substantialiter</i>, as +our theologians phrase it. The efficacy of the Spirit in the prophets +is described by St. Cyril of Alexandria as a mere irradiation +<span style="white-space:nowrap;"> +[<span style="vertical-align:-25%"> +<img alt="" src="images/i742c.jpg"> +</span>]; +</span> +they received only the effulgence of the light, as those who +follow a torch-bearer +<span style="white-space:nowrap;"> +[<span style="vertical-align:-25%"> +<img alt="" src="images/i742d.jpg"> +</span>]; +</span> +while the Spirit in proper +person enters into the souls of those who believe in Christ, and +dwells therein +<span style="white-space:nowrap;"> +[<span style="vertical-align:-25%"> +<img alt="" src="images/i742e.jpg"> +</span>]. +</span> +It is only since the ascension of Christ +that the inhabitation of the Spirit in the souls of men has reached +its completion as +<span style="vertical-align:-25%"> +<img alt="" src="images/i742f.jpg"> +</span>. +This is the reason assigned by St. +Cyril for the declaration of the Lord that he that is least in the +kingdom of heaven is greater than John the Baptist, than whom there +hath not risen a greater among them that are born of women. He +interprets the kingdom of heaven here referred to to be the impartment +<span style="white-space:nowrap;"> +[<span style="vertical-align:-25%"> +<img alt="" src="images/i742g.jpg"> +</span>] +</span> +of the Holy Ghost. From this interpretation he deduces +the reason wherefore the humblest citizen of the kingdom of heaven is +above the Baptist. For the latter is born of woman, the former of God. +In consequence of this regeneration we are partakers of the divine +nature, which St. Cyril interprets to mean neither more nor less than +the dwelling of the Holy Ghost in our souls. [Footnote 153 ] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 153: <i>Comment, in Joann. Evangel.</i>, lib. 5. <i>Oper Lutet</i>, + 1638, A. IV., p. 474 et seq. ] +</p> +<p> +As the head of the Church, the Son <a name="743">{743}</a> of man, being lifted up from +the earth, draws all men unto him. The Scripture concludes the +narration of the miraculous events of the first Christian Passover and +of their immediate results with the remark that the Lord added to the +Church daily such as should be saved. Therefore, immediately after the +outpouring of the Holy Ghost, began the daily increase of the Church +through the fructifying influence of the grace of its head. They were +multiplied in proportion as they walked in the comfort, the [Greek +text], of the Holy Ghost. By one Spirit the Church of Christ is +baptized into one body, which Spirit overflows it and saturates it +with its essence. In him we were sealed as the possession of Christ, +and we know that he abideth in us by the Spirit which he hath given +us. On being received into the Church the members are built into an +edifice, the foundation of which has its cornerstone in Christ. By +this incorporation they are united into a mansion of God in the +Spirit. In so far as we are joined unto the Lord we are one spirit +with him, and our bodies are temples of the Holy Ghost. +</p> +<p> +On account of its intimate relations with Christ, the Spirit is called +the Spirit of Christ. Even the Lord himself is directly called the +Spirit. By him, the Spirit of the Lord, we are transformed into his +image, the image the Lord. Thereby the Spirit evinces itself the +principle of our liberty. +</p> +<p> +The main result of the action of the Spirit in the Church is, +therefore, the union of the latter and of her individual members with +Christ, the Christ who is within us. The union between Christ and the +Church is effected by the Spirit, who acts as the connecting link, +while Christ himself is the efficient cause of the union, in so far as +he sends his Spirit to accomplish it. How, then, is the inhabitation +of the Spirit, which is identical with that of Christ, in the Church +brought about? The answer to this question involves results decisive +of the present investigation. +</p> +<p> +If the Church were an unattained ideal, according to the Protestant +acceptation, the promise of Christ to be with his followers even unto +the end of the world would admit of no more profound interpretation +than that, after his personal departure, the Lord would continue to +occupy the minds of his disciples, thus giving their thoughts a right +direction through all time. The presence of Christ in the visible +Church would no longer be vouchsafed by a <i>substantial</i> pledge, making +the repletion of the Church with Christ, which is the ideal of that +institution, a historical reality even at the present day, in so far +as the pledge is actually present. If, on the other hand, the latter +view is the only scriptural one, then the true Church is not to be +handed over exclusively to the future and to the realm of ideas. She +is herself within the sphere of reality, she belongs to the living +present, if the inmost principle of her being is even now actually at +work, as a gift coeval with her establishment, not the mere object of +search and speculation. +</p> +<p> +The idea of Catholicism presupposes one thing more. Such a principle +dwelling in the Church as a reality must necessarily exercise its +functions in a single individual image only. Both of these positions +are the necessary results of the teachings of Holy Writ. +</p> +<p> +The Scriptures describe the Holy Ghost, by whom the love of God is +shed abroad in our hearts, as something conferred upon us, <i>per +spiritum sanctum qui datus est nobis</i>. In the capacity of abiding in +our souls as something bestowed upon us, as <i>donum</i>, the fathers +distinguish a personal attribute of the Holy Ghost, having its +foundation in the peculiar manner of its eternal emanation from the +Father and Son. This emanation is wrought as a common infusion of +being from Father and Son, as an intro-divine overflowing of love. +[Footnote 154] Together <a name="744">{744}</a> with the Holy Ghost that is given unto +us, that is to say, by means of the love shed abroad in our hearts +through him, the two other persons of the Trinity likewise come and +take up their abode within our souls. The unity of the three divine +persons is not only the antetype of the unity of the Church, but is at +the same time its fundamental principle. In his high sacerdotal +invocation the Lord prays that all those who believe through the word +may be one, even as the Father is in him and he in the Father; and +that we may be one in the Father and the Son, <i>ut et ipsi eis nolis +unum sint</i>. The unity of the Father and the Son, who take up their +abode within us simultaneously with the Holy Ghost, is the foundation +of our own ecclesiastical unity. There is the fundamental, the +ultimate principle of Catholicism. In it, through the Holy Ghost, we +have a fellowship with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 154: <i>St. Augustinus, de Trinit.</i>, lib. v., cap. 14: + <i>Exiit enim non quomodo natus, sed quomodo datus; et ideo non + dicitur filius.</i> Cap. 15: <i>Quia sic procedebat ut esset donabile, + jam donum erat et antequam esset cui daretur</i>. Cap. 11: <i>Spiritus + sanctus ineffabilis est quaedam Patris Filiique communio. . . . hoc + ipse proprie dicitur, quod illi communiter: quia et Pater spiritus + et Filius spiritus et Pater sanctus et Filius sanctus. Ut ergo ex + nomine, quod utrique convenit, utriusque communio significetur, + vocatur donum amborum Spiritus sanctus.</i>] +</p> +<p> +The other functions ascribed to the Spirit by Holy Writ are also of +such a nature as to constrain us to assume that the essence of the +true Church is a reality even at this day. By the Holy Ghost we +receive even now an earnest of the inheritance in store for us. Its +testimony assures us that we are the children of God. We have become +such even now, and through him. We are born of the Spirit. The renewal +accomplished by him is a bath of regeneration, the putting on of a new +man. In the hearts of believers he is a well of water springing up +into everlasting life. In this sense our justification may be regarded +as a glorification in the germ. Christ has anointed the Church with a +chrism which abides and exerts itself in her as a permanent teacher. +</p> +<p> +It is an entire misapprehension of the creative power of Christianity +to ascribe to the Spirit of Christ which governs the Church no more +profitable efficacy than the barren, resultless chase of an ideal +which constantly eludes realization. The very idea that a law of +steady development is to be traced in Christianity itself, this very +favorite view of all the advocates of an ideal Church, ought to have +led to a more profound appreciation of the essence and history of the +Church. If the Church is to undergo a development, the realization of +her ideal should not be postponed to the end of time. What is its +course in history? This point is decisive of our position respecting +the ideal Church. +</p> +<p> +The doctrine relies upon Matt, xviii. 20. Here the Catholic +acceptation of a realization of the essence of the Church, +historically manifested, would appear to be directly excluded. The +passage adduced makes Christ abide among us, and accordingly makes the +true Church come into being simply in consequence of the casual +assemblage of two or three, so that it takes place in his name—a +condition the performance or breach of which is a matter by no means +patent to the senses. But these words are to be read in connection +with what precedes them. Verses 17 and 18 allude to the authority of' +the Church as historically manifest. The resolutions of that authority +are ratified in heaven, and are valid before God. For—such is the +logical thread of the discourse of Jesus—what the Church, as +historically manifested, ordains, is at the same time ordained by the +Holy Ghost dwelling within her. That such is actually the case, the +Lord then proceeds to show by the concluding illustration. The +agreement of two is alone sufficient to secure a fulfilment of the +prayer: for where two or three are assembled together in the name of +Christ, there is he in the midst of them: how much more amply then is +the presence and the countenance of Christ assured to the entire +Church, and to the organ intrusted with the execution of her <a name="745">{745}</a> +power! [Footnote 55] True, Christ is present even where only two or +three are assembled in his name; but the result of his presence +corresponds to the extent of the assembly. There Christ simply effects +the fulfilment of the common prayer. That the arbitrary concourse of a +few individuals in the name of Christ is the realization of the +essence of the Church, nowhere in the whole passage is there a word to +confirm such an interpretation. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 155: This is the interpretation of this passage by the + council of Chalcedon, in its missive to Pope Leo the Great. Compare + <i>Ballerini, op. S. Leonis</i> t. i., p. 1087.] +</p> +<p> +The advocates of the ideal Church also cite Eph. v. 27. [Footnote +156] There the Church is called holy and without blemish, not having +spot or wrinkle; a description supposed to be applicable exclusively +to the Church that is to be, and by no means to the Church as it is. +The remark is an idle one, and does not touch the real question. In +our view it is the work of the present to lay the foundation for the +future glory of the Church. This position is fully borne out by the +words of Scripture. For in verse 26 the apostle points out the +sanctification of the Church as the immediate object of the sacrifice +of Christ, and at the same time indicates the means by which the +Church is to be sanctified. This is done by the washing of water, +which owes its purifying efficacy to the simultaneous utterance of the +word. The presentation of the Church in unblemished holiness and +glory, the object of the sacrificial death of Christ, is therefore +gradually effected in the present world in proportion as the +purification by the sacrament, under the continued influence of +Christ, exerts its efficacy in he Church. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 156: Hase, <i>Handbuch der prot. Polemik</i> (Manual of + Protestant Polemics), p. 42. ] +</p> +<p> +If the apostle were here speaking simply of a remote future holiness +of the Church, his whole course of reasoning would lose its point. The +love of Christ is here presented to husbands and wives as a model for +their own connubial relations. As the self-sacrifice of Christ for the +Church has for its object the sanctification of the latter, so the +mutual self-devotion of husbands and wives is to invest their lives +with a higher grace. It is not the mere act of the self-sacrifice of +Christ which is to be emulated in marriage. No admonition would be +needed for such a purpose. Marriage is necessarily a type of this +relation. The discourse of the apostle tends, on the contrary, to +recommend the motive of the sacrifice of Christ, and its influence +upon the sanctification of the Church, to husbands and wives for +imitation. How feeble, how little calculated to fortify the admonition +of the apostle, would be their reference to the relation of Christ to +the Church, if the sanctification of the Church by Christ, thus held +up to husbands and wives for emulation, were something totally unreal, +a mere creature of reflection! If the purpose of the sacrifice of +Christ, the sanctification of the Church, were still unattained, how +could husbands and wives be expected to make their intercourse bear +those moral fruits by which it is to approve itself a type of the +relation of Christ to the Church? +</p> +<p> +The holiness of the Church, then, has its origin in the sacraments. +But that which makes the Church holy appertains to her essential +character. It follows that this character also is evolved by means of +the sacraments. This proves, finally, that this evolution of the +character of the true Church is only possible in a single, individual +historical manifestation, that is to say, only within, or at least by +the agency [Footnote 157] of, that visible body politic which is in +possession of the sacraments. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 157: The means of grace administered by the Church + sometimes exert their influence beyond the pale, <i>i.e.</i>, outside of, + her historical image. This is seen in the validity of the baptism of + heretics. ] +</p> +<p> +Protestantism is untrue to its own principle in representing the +administration of the sacraments according to their institution as an +index of the true Church. The whole force of this position lies in the +presumption of a <a name="746">{746}</a> distinct historical organization as the +necessary exponent of the inward essence of the true Church. A +contrary doctrine is in danger of bestowing the name of the true +Church on a society which may possibly be composed exclusively of +hypocrites. The inference is obvious. If the essence of the true +Church is only to be found in the domain of the mind, or if it even +remains a mere ideal, where is the guarantee that the mantle of the +sacramental organization covers that silent, invisible congregation of +spirits in which alone the Protestant looks for the essence of the +true Church? The reformer's idea of the Church is here entangled in a +contradiction in terms. On the principle of justification by faith +alone, the character of the true Church must be wholly expressed in +something incorporeal. And yet the true Church is to be recognized by +the use of the sacraments according to their institution. Where is the +connecting link between the external and the internal Church? The +congruence of the Spirit and the body of the Church, if it occurs, is +purely accidental. The visible Church, taken by itself, is a mere +external thing, possibly void of all substantial essence. The doctrine +of <i>sola fides</i> is incapable of a profound appreciation of the visible +Church. This, taken in connection with the old Protestant theory that +the phase of the Church manifested in preaching and in the sacraments +is of the essence of the Church, makes it clear that the attempt of +the reformers to spiritualize Christianity leads on the contrary to a +materialization of the idea of the Church. +</p> +<p> +The modern Protestant theology was far from being deterred by its +reverence for the reformers from laying bare this unsound portion of +their system. They attempted to make up for it by the well known +theory of the ideal Church, which begins by renouncing, in entire +consistency with the Protestant principle of justification by faith +alone, every outward manifestation of the essence of the Church. +</p> +<p> +The manifold forms in which Christianity becomes palpable as a power +in history are here treated as something purely accidental, easily +capable of severance from the essence of the true Church. How does +this explanation comport with the doctrine of Scripture just +expounded? +</p> +<p> +The Church of Christ, says Holy Writ, receives her unseen bridal +ornaments by means of the palpable sacraments. In consequence of their +efficacy she conceals the germs of her future glory under the guise of +her temporal image. The most profound and super-sensual characteristic +of the Church is, therefore, closely though mysteriously allied with +the palpable exterior. It is not our present task to show how this +alliance is formed. We simply inquire into the foundation of this +necessary combination of the spirit and the form of the Church. This +foundation we claim to discover in the sublimity of the principle +heretofore recognized by us as the marrow, the heart of the Church. +</p> +<p> +If that which constitutes the heart of the Church is supernatural, and +beyond the reach of the natural powers of the human mind, its +impartment and preservation necessarily presuppose a peculiar +influence of God upon man, different from the creative power. Under +these circumstances, the precise method of the divine influence +pervading the Church is only to be learned with certainty from +revelation. And here we find the most explicit teachings on this +subject. According to the testimony of Scripture, the Lord promotes +the growth of the Church by means palpable to the senses. This +suggests inquiry into the laws under which these means of grace find +their application. Those laws are derived from the object of their +institution. It consists in the adhibition of instrumentalities in the +production of a divine effect. Consequently the means employed, or the +sacraments, can manifest their efficacy only under certain conditions +divinely ordained. +</p> +<p> +The correct understanding of the <a name="747">{747}</a> mutual relations subsisting +between the spirit and the body of the Church is further assisted by +reference to another idea also derived from the Church. The regular +growth of the Church is made intelligible to us as a self-edification +in love. The means required for the attainment of this purpose have +been given into the hands of the Church herself. For this end Peter +received the keys of the kingdom of heaven. He is not only the thread +of the historical development of the Church, but the interior +organization also necessarily presupposes a union with Peter. The +organs of this organization are the sacraments. But they manifest +their saving efficacy on those only who have not knowingly interrupted +the chain of union between themselves and Peter, and their use is +totally void of effect if the party by whom they are administered is +not actuated by the desire of doing that which is done in sacramental +ceremonies by the Church, united with Peter (<i>intentio faciendi quod +facit ecclesia.</i>) +</p> +<p> +The inmost principle, the heart of the Church, is inseparably +connected with these visible actions, which are efficaciously +administered only according to the intention and in the name of the +visible Church, and in virtue of their efficacy the latter approves +herself as holy. Thus the present inquiry leads to the same result +already reached by other investigations. The spirit and the body of +Catholicism are not to be separated. The connecting link which binds +them together is Peter, the bearer of the keys of the kingdom of +heaven, who still lives in his successors. But the fountain-head of +this necessary relationship is in the vital principle of the Church, +in her supernatural principle. +</p> +<p> +The idea of a supernatural principle, and that of the papacy, together +constitute the principle of Catholicism. In the former we behold its +fundamental essence, in the latter the cement of its historical unity, +as well as the connecting link between the interior and the exterior +catholicity of the Church. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>From The Month. +<br><br> +SONNET. +<br><br> +UNSPIRITUAL CIVILIZATION.</h2> +<br> +<pre> + We have been piping, Lord; we have been singing; + Five hundred years have passed o'er lawn and lea, + Marked by the blowing bud and falling tree, + While all the ways with melody were ringing: + In tented lists, high-stationed and flower-flinging, + Beauty looked down on conquering chivalry; + Science made wise the nations; laws made free; + Art, like an angel ever onward winging, + Brightened the world. But, O great Lord and Father! + Have these, thy bounties, drawn to thee man's race, + That stood so far aloof? Have they not rather + His soul subjected? with a blind embrace + Gulfed it in sense? Prime blessings changed to curse + 'Twixt God and man can set God's universe. + +AUBREY DE VERE. +</pre> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="748">{748}</a> +<br> +<h2>From The Month +<br><br> +CONSTANCE SHERWOOD. +<br><br> +AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY. +<br><br> +BY LADY GEORGIANA FULLERTON. +<br><br> +CHAPTER XI.</h2> +<br> +<p> +During the two years which followed the Duke of Norfolk's death I did +only see my Lady Surrey once, which was when she came to Arundel +House, on a visit to her lord's grandfather; and her letters for a +while were both scanty and brief. She made no mention of religion, and +but little of her husband; and chiefly touched on such themes as Lady +Margaret's nuptials with Mr. Sackville (Lord Dorset's heir) and +Mistress Milicent's with Sir Hammond l'Estrange. She had great +contentment, she wrote, to see them both so well married according to +their degree; but that for herself she did very much miss her good +sister's company and her gentlewoman's affectionate services, who +would now reside all the year at her husband's seat in Norfolk; but +she looked when my lord and herself should be at Kenninghall, when he +left the university, that they might yet, being neighbors, spend some +happy days together, if it so pleased God. Once she wrote in exceeding +great joy, so that she said she hardly knew how to contain herself, +for that my lord was coming in a few days to spend the long vacation +at Lord Sussex's house at Bermondsey. But when she wrote again, +methought—albeit her letter was cheerful, and she did jest in it +somewhat more than was her wont—that there was a silence touching her +husband, and her own contentment in his society, which betokened a +reserve such as I had not noticed in her before. About that time it +was bruited in London that my Lord Surrey had received no small +detriment by the bad example he had at Cambridge, and the liberty +permitted him. +</p> +<p> +And now, forsaking for a while the theme of that noble pair, whose +mishaps and felicities have ever saddened and rejoiced mine heart +almost equally with mine own good or evil fortune, I here purpose to +set down such occurrences as should be worthy of note in the more +obscure sphere in which my lot was cast. +</p> +<p> +When I was about sixteen, my cousin Kate was married to Mr. Lacy; +first in a secret manner, in the night, by Mr. Plasden, a priest, in +her father's library, and the next day at the parish church at +Holborn. Methinks a fairer bride never rode to church than our Kate. +Her mother went with her, which was the first time she had been out of +doors for a long space of time, for she feared to catch cold if the +wind did blow from the north or the east; and if from the south she +feared it should bring noxious vapors from the river; and the west, +infection from the city, and so stayed at home for greater safety. But +on Kate's wedding day we did all protest the wind blew not at all, so +that from no quarter of the sky should mischief arise; and in a closed +litter, which she reckoned to be safer than a coach, she consented to +go to church. +</p> +<p> +"Marry, good wife," cried Mr. Congleton, when she had been magnifying +all the dangers she mostly feared, "thou dost forget the greatest of +all in these days, which doth hold us all by the neck, as it were. For +hearing mass, as we did in this room last night, we do all run the +risk of being hanged, which should be a greater peril methinks than a +breath of foul air." +</p> +<a name="749">{749}</a> +<p> +She, being in a merry mood, replied: "Twittle twattle, Mr. Congleton; +the one may be avoided, the other not. 'Tis no reason I should get a +cold to-day because I be like to be hanged to-morrow." +</p> +<p> +"I' faith," cried Polly, "my mother hath well parried your thrust, +sir; and methinks the holy Bishop of Rochester was of the same mind +with her." +</p> +<p> +"How so, Polly?" quoth her father; and she, "There happened a false +rumor to rise suddenly among the people when he was in the prison, so +I have heard Mr. Roper relate, that he should be brought to execution +on a certain day; wherefore his cook, that was wont to dress his +dinner and carry it daily unto him, hearing of his execution, dressed +him no dinner at all that day. Wherefore, at the cook's next repair +unto him, he demanded the cause why he brought him not his dinner. +'Sir,' said the cook, 'it was commonly talked all over the town that +you should have died to-day, and therefore I thought it but vain to +dress anything for you.' 'Well,' quoth the bishop merrily, 'for all +that report, thou seest me yet alive; and therefore, whatsoever news +thou shalt hear of me hereafter, prithee let me no more lack my +dinner, but make it ready; and if thou see me dead when thou comest, +then eat it thyself. But I promise thee, if I be alive, by God's +grace, to eat never a bit the less.'" +</p> +<p> +"And on the day he was verily executed," said Mistress Ward, "when the +lieutenant came to fetch him, he said to his man, 'Reach me my furred +tippet, to put about my neck.' 'O my lord!' said the lieutenant, 'what +need you be so careful of your health for this little time, being not +much above in hour?' 'I think no otherwise,' said this blessed father; +'but yet, in he mean time, I will keep myself as well as I can; for I +tell you truth, though I have, I thank our Lord, a very good desire +and a willing mind to die at this present, and so I trust of his +infinite mercy and goodness he will continue it, yet I will not +willingly hinder my health one minute of an hour, but still prolong +the same as long as I can by such reasonable ways as Almighty God hath +provided for me.'" Upon which my good aunt fastened her veil about her +head, and said the holy bishop was the most wise saint and +reasonablest martyr she had yet heard of. +</p> +<p> +Kate was dressed in a kirtle of white silk, her head attired with an +habiliment of gold, and her hair, brighter itself than gold, woven +about her face in cunningly wrought tresses. She was led to church +between two gentlemen—Mr. Tresham and Mr. Hogdson—friends of the +bridegroom, who had bride-laces and rosemary tied about their silken +sleeves. There was a fair cup of silver gilt carried before her, +wherein was a goodly branch of rosemary, gilded very fair, and hung +about with silken ribbons of all colors. Musicians came next; then a +group of maidens bearing garlands finely gilded; and thus we passed on +to the church. The common people at the door cheered the bride, whose +fair face was a passport to their favor; but as Muriel crept along, +leaning on my arm, I caught sound of murmured blessings. +</p> +<p> +"Sweet saint," quoth an aged man, leaning on his staff, near the +porch, "I ween thine espousals be not of earth." A woman, with a child +in her arms, whispered to her as she past, "He thou knowest of is +dead, and died praying for thee." A man, whose eyes had watched her +painfully ascending the steps, called her an angel; whereupon a beggar +with a crutch cried out, "Marry, a lame angel!" A sweet smile was on +her face as she turned toward him; and drawing a piece of silver from +her pocket, she bestowed it on him, with some such words as +these—that she prayed they might both be so happy, albeit lame, as to +hobble to heaven, and get there in good time, if it should please God. +Then he fell to blessing her so loud, that she hurried me into the +church, not content to be thanked in so public a manner. +</p> +<a name="750">{750}</a> +<p> +After the ceremony, we returned in the same order to Ely Place. The +banquet which followed, and the sports succeeding it, were conducted +in a private and somewhat quiet fashion, and not many guests invited, +by reason of the times, and Mr. Congleton misliking to draw notice to +his house, which had hitherto been but little molested, partly for +that Sir Francis Walsingham had a friendship for him, and also for his +sister, Lady Egerton of Ridley, which procured for them greater favor, +in the way of toleration, than is extended to others; and likewise the +Portuguese ambassador was his very good friend, and his chapel open to +us at all times; so that priests did not need to come to his house for +the performance of any religious actions, except that one of the +marriage, which had taken place the night before in his library. +Howsoever, he was very well known to be a recusant, for that neither +himself, nor any belonging to him, attended Protestant worship; and +Sir Francis sometimes told him that the clemency with which he was +treated was shown toward him with the hope that, by mild courses, he +might be soon brought to some better conformity. +</p> +<p> +Mr. Lacy's house was in Gray's Inn Lane, a few doors from Mr. Swithin +Wells's; and through this proximity an intimate acquaintanceship did +arise between that worthy gentleman and his wife and Kate's friends. +He was very good-natured, pleasant in conversation, courteous, and +generous; and Mrs. Wells a most virtuous gentlewoman. Although he (Mr. +Swithin) much delighted in hawking, hunting, and other suchlike +diversions, yet he so soberly governed his affections therein, as to +be content to deprive himself of a good part of those pleasures, and +retire to a more profitable employment of training up young gentlemen +in virtue and learning; and with such success that his house has been, +as it were, a fruitful seminary to many worthy members of the Catholic +Church. Among the young gentlemen who resided with him at that time +was Mr. Hubert Rookwood, the youngest of the two sons of Mr. Rookwood, +of Euston, whom I had seen at the inn at Bedford, when I was +journeying to London. We did speedily enter into a somewhat close +acquaintanceship, founded on a similarity of tastes and agreeable +interchange of civilities, touching the lending of books and likewise +pieces of music, which I did make fair copies of for him, and which we +sometimes practiced in the evening; for he had a pleasant voice and an +aptness to catch the trick of a song, albeit unlearned in the art, +wherein he styled me proficient; and I, nothing loth to impart my +knowledge, became his instructor, and did teach him both to sing and +play the lute. He was not much taller than when I had seen him before; +but his figure was changed, and his visage had grown pale, and his +hair thick and flowing, especially toward the back of the head, +discovering in front a high and thoughtful forehead. There was a great +deal of good young company at that time in Mr. Wells's house; for some +Catholics tabled there beside those that were his pupils, and others +resorted to it by reason of the pleasant entertainment they found in +the society of ingenuous persons, well qualified, and of their own +religion. I had most days opportunities of conversing with Hubert, +though we were never alone; and, by reason of the friendship which had +existed between his father and mine, I allowed him a kindness I did +not commonly afford to others. +</p> +<p> +Mr. Lacy had had his training in that house, and, albeit his natural +parts did not title him to the praise of an eminent scholar, he had +thence derived a great esteem for learning, a taste for books, of the +which he did possess a great store (many hundred volumes), and a +discreet manner of talking, though something tinctured with +affectation, inasmuch as he should seem to be rather enamored of the +words he uttered, than careful of the <a name="751">{751}</a> substance. Hubert was wont +to say that his speech was like to the drawing of a leaden sword out +of a gilded sheath. He was a very virtuous young man; and his wife had +never but one complaint to set forth, which was that his books took up +so much of his time that she was almost as jealous of them as if they +had been her rivals. She would have it he did kill himself with study; +and, in a particular manner, with the writing of the life of one +Thomas à Kempis, which was a work he had had a long time on hand. One +day she comes into his library, and salutes him thus: "Mr. Lacy, I +would I were a book; and then methinks you would a little more respect +me." Polly, who was by, cried out, "Madam, you must then be an +almanac, that he might change every year;" whereat she was not a +little displeased. And another time, when her husband was sick, she +said, if Mr. Lacy died, she would burn Thomas a Kempis for the killing +of her husband. I, hearing this, answered that to do so were a great +pity; to whom she replied, "Why, who was Thomas a Kempis?" to which I +answered, "One of the saintliest men of the age wherein he lived." +Wherewith she was so satisfied, that she said, then she would not do +it for all the world. +</p> +<p> +Methinks I read more in that one year than in all the rest of my life +beside. Mine aunt was more sick than usual, and Mistress Ward so taken +up with the nursing of her, that she did not often leave her room. +Polly was married in the winter to Sir Ralph Ingoldby, and went to +reside for some months in the country. Muriel prevailed on her father +to visit the prison with her, in Mistress Ward's stead, so that +sometimes they were abroad the whole of the day; by reason of which, I +was oftener in Gray's Inn Lane than at home, sometimes at Kate's +house, and sometimes at Mistress Wells's mansion, where I became +infected with a zeal for learning, which Hubert's example and +conversation did greatly invite me to. He had the most winning tongue, +and the aptest spirit in the world to divine the natural inclinations +of those he consorted with. The books he advised me to read were +mostly such as Mistress Ward, to whom I did faithfully recite their +titles, accounted to be not otherwise than good and profitable, having +learned so much from good men she consulted thereon, for she was +herself no scholar; but they bred in me a great thirst for knowledge, +a craving to converse with those who had more learning than myself, +and withal so keen a relish for Hubert's society, that I had no +contentment so welcome as to listen to his discourse, which was +seasoned with a rare kind of eloquence and a discursive fancy, to +which, also, the perfection of his carriage, his pronunciation of +speech, and the deportment of his body lent no mean lustre. Naught +arrogant or affected disfigured his conversation, in which did lie so +efficacious a power of persuasion, and at times, when the occasion +called for it, so great a vehemency of passion, as enforced admiration +of his great parts, if not approval of his arguments. I made him at +that time judge of the new thoughts which books, like so many keys +opening secret chambers in the mind, did unlock in mine; and I mind me +how eagerly I looked for his answers—how I hung on his lips when he +was speaking, not from any singular affection toward his person, but +by reason of the extraordinary fascination of his speech, and the +interest of the themes we discoursed upon; one time touching on the +histories of great men of past ages, at another on the changes wrought +in our own by the new art of printing books, which had produced such +great changes in the world, and yet greater to be expected. And as he +was well skilled in the Italian as well as the French language, I came +by his means to be acquainted with many great writers of those +nations. He translated for me sundry passages from the divine play of +Signor Dante Alighieri, in which <a name="752">{752}</a> hell and purgatory and heaven +are depicted, as it were by an eye-witness, with so much pregnancy of +meaning and force of genius, that it should almost appear as if some +special revelation had been vouchsafed to the poet beyond his natural +thoughts, to disclose to him the secrets of other spheres. He also +made me read a portion of that most fine and sweet poem on the +delivery of the holy city Jerusalem, composed by Signor Torquato +Tasso, a gentleman who resided at that time at the court of the Duke +of Ferrara, and which one Mr. Fairfax has since done into English +verse. The first four cantos thereof were given to Mr. Wells by a +young gentleman, who had for a while studied at the University of +Padua. This fair poem, and mostly the second book thereof, hath +remained imprinted in my memory with a singular fixity, by reason that +it proved the occasion of my discerning for the first time a special +inclination on Hubert's side toward myself, who thought nothing of +love, but was only glad to have acquired a friend endowed with so much +wit and superior knowledge, and willing to impart it. This book, I +say, did contain a narration which bred in me so great a resentment of +the author's merits, and so quick a sympathy with the feigned subjects +of his muse, that never before or since methinks has a fiction so +moved me as the story of Olindo and Sophronisba. +</p> +<p> +Methinks this was partly ascribable to a certain likeness between the +scenes described by the poet and some which take place at this time in +our country. In the maiden of high and noble thoughts, fair, but +heedless of her beauty, who stood in the presence of the soldan, once +a Christian, then a renegade, taking on herself the sole guilt,—O +virtuous guilt! O worthy crime!—of which all the Christians were +accused, to wit, of rescuing sacred Mary's image from the hands of the +infidels who did curse and blaspheme it, and, when all were to die for +the act of one unknown, offered herself a ransom for all, and with a +shamefaced courage, such as became a maid, and a bold modesty +befitting a saint—a bosom moved indeed, but not dismayed, a fair but +not pallid cheek—was content to perish for that the rest should +live;—in her, I say, I saw a likeness in spirit to those who suffer +nowadays for a like faith with hers, not at the hands of infidels, but +of such whose parents did for the most part hold that same belief +which they do now make out to be treason. +</p> +<p> +Hubert, observing me to be thus moved, smiled, and asked if, in the +like case, I should have willed to die as Sophronisba. +</p> +<p> +"Yes," I answered, "if God did give me grace;" and then, as I uttered +the words, I thought it should not be lawful to tell a lie, not for to +save all the lives in the world; which doubt I imparted to him, who +laughed and said he was of the poet's mind, who doth exclaim, touching +this lie, "O noble deceit! worthier than truth itself!" and that he +thought a soul should not suffer long in purgatory for such a sin. +"Maybe not," I answered; "yet, I ween, there should be more faith in a +sole commitment to God of the events than in doing the least evil so +that good should come of it." +</p> +<p> +He said, "I marvel, Mistress Constance, what should be your thoughts +thereon if the life of a priest was in your hands, and you able to +save him by a lie." +</p> +<p> +"Verily," I answered, "I know not, Master Rookwood; but I have so much +trust in Almighty God that he would, in such a case, put words into my +mouth which should be true, and yet mislead evil-purposed men, or that +he shall keep me from such fearful straits, or forgive me if, in the +stress of a great peril, I unwittingly should err." +</p> +<p> +"And I pray you," Hubert then said, as if not greatly caring to pursue +the theme, "what be your thought concerning the unhappy youth Olindo, +who did so dote on this maiden that, fearful of offending there where +above <a name="753">{753}</a> all he desired to please, had, greatly as he loved, little +hoped, nothing asked, and not so much as revealed his passion until a +common fate bound both to an equal death?" +</p> +<p> +"I thought not at all on him," I answered; "but only on Sophronisba." +</p> +<p> +At which he sighed and read further: "That all wept for her who, +albeit doomed to a cruel death, wept not for herself, but in this wise +secretly reproved the fond youth's weeping: 'Friend,' quoth she, +'other thoughts, other tears, other sighs, do beseem this hour. Think +of thy sins, and God's great recompense for the good. Suffer for his +sole sake, and torment shall be sweet. See how fair the heavens do +show, the sun how bright, as it were to cheer and lure us onward!'" +</p> +<p> +"Ah!" I exclaimed, "shame on him who did need to be so exhorted, who +should have been the most valiant, being a man!" To the which he +quickly replied: +</p> +<p> +"He willed to die of his own free will rather than to live without her +whom he jewelled more than life: but in the matter of grieving love +doth make cowards of those who should else have been brave." +</p> +<p> +"Me thinks, rather," I answered, "that in noble hearts love's effects +should be noble." +</p> +<p> +"Bethink you, Mistress Constance," he then asked, "that Sophronisba +did act commendably, insomuch that when an unlooked-for deliverance +came, she refused not to be united in life to him that had willed to +be united to her in death." +</p> +<p> +"You may think me ungrateful, sir," answered; "but other merits +methinks than fondness for herself should have won so great a heart." +</p> +<p> +"You be hard to content, Mistress Constance," he answered somewhat +resentfully. "To satisfy you, I perceive one should have a hard as +well as a great heart." +</p> +<p> +"Nay," I cried, "I praise not hardness, but love not softness either. +You that be so learned, I pray you find the word which doth express +what pleaseth me in a man." +</p> +<p> +"I know not the word," he answered; "I would I knew the substance of +your liking, that I might furnish myself with it." +</p> +<p> +Whereupon our discourse ended that day; but it ministered food to my +thoughts, and I fear me also to a vain content that one so gifted with +learning and great promise of future greatness should evince something +of regard beyond a mutual friendship for one as ignorant and young as +I then was. +</p> +<p> +Some months after Kate's marriage, matters became very troublesome, by +reason of the killing of a great store, as was reported, of French +Huguenots in Paris on St. Bartholomew's day, and afterward in many +cities of France, which did consternate the English Catholics for more +reasons than one, and awoke so much rage in the breasts of +Protestants, that the French ambassador told Lady Tregony, a friend, +of Mistress Wells, that he did scarce venture to show his face; and +none, save only the queen herself, who is always his very good friend, +would speak to him. I was one evening at the house of Lady Ingoldby, +Polly's mother-in-law, some time after this dismal news had been +bruited, and the company there assembled did for the most part +discourse on these events, not only as deploring what had taken place, +and condemning the authors thereof,—which, indeed, was what all good +persons must needs have done,—but took occasion thence to use such +vile terms and opprobrious language touching Catholic religion, and +the cruelty and wickedness of such as did profess it, without so much +as a thought of the miseries inflicted on them in England, that—albeit +I had been schooled in the hard lesson of silence—so strong a passion +overcame me then, that I had well nigh, as the Psalmist saith, spoken +with my tongue, yea, young as I was, uttered words rising hot from my +heart, in the midst of that adverse company, which I did know, them to +be, if one had not at <a name="754">{754}</a> that moment lifted up his voice, whose +presence I had already noted, though not acquainted with his name; a +man of reverent and exceedingly benevolent aspect; aged, but with an +eye so bright, and silvery hair crowning a noble forehead, that so +much excellence and dignity is seldom to be observed in any one as was +apparent in this gentleman. +</p> +<p> +"Good friends," he said, and at the sound of his voice the speakers +hushed their eager discoursing, "God defend I should in any way differ +with you touching the massacres in France; for verily it has been a +lamentable and horrible thing that so many persons should be killed, +and religion to be the pretence for it; but to hear some speak of it, +one should think none did suffer in this country for their faith, and +bloody laws did not exist, whereby Papists are put to death in a +legal, cold-blooded fashion, more terrible, if possible, than the +sudden bursts of wild passions and civil strife, which revenge for +late cruelties committed by the Huguenots, wherein many thousand +Catholics had perished, the destruction of churches, havoc of fierce +soldiery, and apprehension of the like attempts in Paris, had stirred +up to fury; so that when the word went forth to fall on the leaders of +the party, the savage work once begun, even as a fire in a city built +of wood, raged as a madness for one while, and men in a panic struck +at foes, whose gripe they did think to feel about their throats." +</p> +<p> +Here the speaker paused an instant. This so bold opening of his speech +did seem to take all present by surprise, and almost robbed me of my +breath; for it is well known that nowadays a word, yea a piece of a +word, or a nod of the head, whereby any suspicion may arise of a +favorable disposition toward Catholics, is often-times a sufficient +cause for a man to be accused and cast into prison; and I waited his +next words (which every one, peradventure from curiosity, did likewise +seem inclined to hear) with downcast eyes, which dared not to glance +at any one's face, and cheeks which burned like hot coals. +</p> +<p> +"It is well known," quoth he, "that the sufferings which be endured by +recusants at this time in our country are such, that many should +prefer to die at once than to be subjected to so constant a fear and +terror as doth beset them. I speak not now of the truth or the falsity +of their religion, which, if it be ever so damnable and wicked, is no +new invention of their own, but what all Christian people did agree +in, one hundred years ago; so that the aged do but abide by what they +were taught by undoubted authority in their youth, and the young have +received from their parents as true. But I do solely aver that Papists +are subjected to a thousand vexations, both of bonds, imprisonments, +and torments worse than death, yea and oftentimes to death itself; and +that so dreadful, that to be slain by the sword, or drowned, yea even +burned at the stake, is not so terrible; for they do hang a man and +then cut him down yet alive, and butcher him in such ways—plucking out +his heart and tearing his limbs asunder—that nothing more horrible can +be thought of." +</p> +<p> +"They be traitors who are so used," cried one gentleman, somewhat +recovering from the surprise which these bold words had caused. +</p> +<p> +"If to be of a different religion from the sovereign of the country be +a proof of treason," continued the venerable speaker, "then were the +Huguenots, which have perished in France, a whole mass and nest of +traitors." +</p> +<p> +A gentleman seated behind me, who had a trick of sleeping in his +chair, woke up and cried out, "Not half a one, sirs; not so much as +half a one is allowed," meaning the mass, which he did suppose to have +been spoken of. +</p> +<p> +"And if so, deserved all to die,' continued the speaker. +</p> +<p> +"Ay, and so they do, sir," quoth the sleeper. "I pray you let them all +be hanged." Upon which every one <a name="755">{755}</a> laughed, and the aged gentleman +also; and then he said, +</p> +<p> +"Good my friends, I ween 'tis a rash thing to speak in favor of +recusants nowadays, and what few could dare to do but such as cannot +be suspected of disloyalty to the queen and the country, and who, +having drunk of the cup of affliction in their youth, even to the +dregs, and held life for a long time as a burden which hath need to be +borne day by day, until the wished for hour of release doth come—and +the sooner, the more welcome—have no enemies to fear, and no object +to attain. And if so be that you will bear with me for a few moments, +yea, if ye procure me to be hanged to-morrow" (this he said with a +pleasant smile; and, "Marry, fear not, Mr. Roper," and "I' faith, +speak on, sir," was bruited round him by his astonished auditors), "I +will recite to you some small part of the miseries which have been +endured of late years by such as cannot be charged with the least +thought of treason, or so much as the least offence against the laws, +except in what touches the secret practice of their religion. Women +have, to my certain knowledge, been hung up by the hands in prisons +(which do overflow with recusants, so that at this time there +remaineth no room for common malefactors), and cruelly scourged, for +that they would not confess by which priest they had been reconciled +or absolved, or where they had heard mass. Priests are often tortured +to force them to declare what they hear in confession, who harbor +priests and Papists, where such and such recusants are to be found, +and the like questions; and in so strenuous a manner, that needles +have been thrust under their nails, and one man, not long since, died +of his racking. O sirs and gentle ladies, I have seen with mine own +eyes a youth, the son of one of my friends—young Mark Typper, born of +honest and rich parents, skilful in human learning, having left his +study for a time, and going home to see his friends—whipped through +the streets of London, and burnt in the ear, because, forsooth, a +forward judge, to whom he had been accused as a Papist, and finding no +proof thereof, condemned him as a vagabond. And what think you, good +people, of the death of Sir Robert Tyrwit's son, who was accused for +hearing of a mass at the marriage of his sister, and albeit at the +time of his arrest in a grievous fever, was pulled out of the house +and thrust into prison, even as he then was, feeble, faint, and +grievously sick? His afflicted parents entreat, make intercession, and +use all the means they can to move the justices to have consideration +of the sick; not to heap sorrow upon sorrow, nor affliction on the +afflicted; not to take away the life of so comely a young gentleman, +whom the physicians come and affirm will certainly die if he should be +removed. All this is nothing regarded. They lay hold on the sick man, +pull him away, shut him up in prison, and within two days next after +he dies. They bury him, and make no scruple or regard at all. O sirs, +bethink you what these parents do feel when they hear Englishmen speak +of the murders of Protestants in France as an unheard of crime. If, in +these days, one in a family of recusants doth covet the inheritance of +an elder brother—yea, of a father—he hath but to conform to the now +established religion (I leave you to think with how much of piety and +conscience), and denounce his parent as a Papist, and straightway he +doth procure him to be despoiled, and his lands given up to him. Thus +the seeds of strife and bitter enmity have been sown broadcast through +the land, the bands of love in families destroyed, the foundations of +honor and beneficence blown up, the veins and sinews of the common +society of men cut asunder, and a fiendly force of violence and a +deadly poison of suspicion used against such as are accused of no +other crime than their religion, which they yet adhere to; albeit +their fortunes be ruined by fines and their lives in <a name="756">{756}</a> constant +jeopardy from strenuous laws made yet more urgent by private malice. +My friends, I would that not one hair of the head of so much as one +Huguenot had been touched in France; that not one Protestant had +perished in the flames in the late queen's reign, or in that of her +present majesty; and also that the persecution now framed in this +country against Papists, and so handled as to blind men's eyes and +work in them a strange hypocrisy, yea and in some an innocent belief +that freedom of men's souls be the offspring of Protestant religion, +should pass away from this land. I care not how soon (as mine honored +father-in-law, and in God too, I verily might add, was wont to say),—I +care not how soon I be sewn up in a bag and cast into the Thames, if +so be I might first see religious differences at an end, and men of +one mind touching God's truth." +</p> +<p> +Here this noble and courageous speaker ceased, and various murmurs +rose among the company. One lady remarked to her neighbor: "A +marvellous preacher that of seditious doctrines, methinks." +</p> +<p> +And one gentleman said that if such talk were suffered to pass +unpunished in her majesty's subjects, he should look to see massing +and Popery to rear again their heads in the land. +</p> +<p> +And many loudly affirmed none could be Papists, or wish them well, and +be friends to the queen's government, and so it did stand to reason +that Papists were traitors. +</p> +<p> +And another said that, for his part, he should desire to see them less +mercifully dealt with; and that the great clemency shown to such as +did refuse to come to church, by only laying fines on them, and not +dealing so roundly as should compel them to obedience, did but +maintain them in their obstinacy; and he himself would as lief shoot +down a seminary priest as a wolf, or any other evil beast. +</p> +<p> +I noticed this last speaker to be one of those who had spoken with +most abhorrence of the massacres in France. +</p> +<p> +One lady called out in a loud voice that Papists, and such as take +their part, among which she did lament to see Mr. Roper, should be +ashamed so much as to speak of persecution; and began to relate the +cruelties practised upon Protestants twenty years back, and the +burning at Oxford of those excellent godly men, the bishops of London +and Worcester. +</p> +<p> +Mr. Roper listened to her with an attentive countenance, and then +said: +</p> +<p> +"I' faith, madam, I cannot choose but think Dr. Latimer, if it be he +you speak of, did somewhat approve of such a method of dealing with +persons obstinate touching religion, when others than himself and +those of his own way of thinking were the subjects of it, if we judge +by a letter he wrote in 1538 to his singular good friend the Lord +Privy Seal Cromwell, at the time he was appointed to preach at the +burning at Smithfield of Friar Forest of Greenwich, a learned divine I +often did converse with in my young years." +</p> +<p> +"What wrote the good bishop?" two or three persons asked; and the lady +who had spoken before said she should warrant it to be something +pious, for a more virtuous Protestant never did live than this holy +martyr. +</p> +<p> +Whereupon Mr. Roper: "This holy bishop did open his discourse right +merrily, for in a pleasant manner he thus begins his letter: 'And, +sir, if it be your pleasure, as it is, that I shall play the fool in +my customable manner when Forest shall suffer, I would wish my stage +stood near unto Forest; for I would endeavor myself so to content the +people that therewith I might also convert Forest, God so helping.' +And further on he doth greatly lament that the White Friars of +Doncaster had access to the prisoner, and through the fault of the +sheriff or jailers, or both, he should be allowed to hear mass and +receive the sacrament, by which he is rather comforted in his way than +discouraged. And <i>such is his foolishness</i>, this good <a name="757">{757}</a> doth +humbly say, that if Forest would abjure his religion, he should yet +(for all his past obstinacy) wish him pardoned. O sirs, think you that +when at Oxford this aged man, seventeen years after, did see the +flames gather round himself, that he did not call to mind what time he +preached, playing the fool, as he saith, before a man in like agonies, +and never urged so much as one word against his sentence?" +</p> +<p> +"Marry, if he did not," said one, whom I take to have been Sir +Christopher Wray, who had been a silent listener until then, "if his +conscience pricked him not thereon, it must needs have been by the +same rule as the lawyer used to the countryman, who did put to him +this question: 'Sir, if my cow should stray into your field and feed +there one whole day, what should be the law touching compensation +therefor?' 'Marry, friend, assuredly to pay the damage to the full, +which thou art bounden at once to do.' 'Ay,' quoth the countryman; +'but 'tis your cow hath strayed into my field.' Upon which, 'Go to, go +to,' cries the lawyer; 'for I warrant thee that doth altogether alter +the law.'" +</p> +<p> +Some smiled, and others murmured at this story; and meanwhile one of +the company, who from his dress I perceived to be a minister, and +moreover to hold some dignity in the Protestant Church, rose from his +place, and crossing the room, came up to Mr. Roper (for that bold +speaker was no other than Sir Thomas More's son-in—law, whose great +charity and goodness I had often heard of), and, shaking hands with +him, said: "I be of the same mind with you, friend Roper, in every +word you have uttered tonight. And I pray to God my soul may be with +yours after this life, and our end in heaven, albeit I should not sail +there in the same boat with thou." +</p> +<p> +"Good Mr. Dean," quoth Mr. Roper, "I do say amen to your prayer." and +then he added somewhat in a low voice, and methinks it was that there +is but one ship chartered for safety in such a voyage. +</p> +<p> +At the which the other shook his head and waved his hand, and then +calling to him a youth not more than twelve or thirteen years old, his +son, he did present him to Mr. Roper. I had observed this young +gentleman to listen, with an eagerness betokening more keenness for +information than is usually to be found in youths of his years, to the +discourses held that evening. His father told Mr. Roper that this his +son's parts and quick apprehension in learning did lead him to hope he +should be one day, if it pleased God, an ornament to the church. Mr. +Roper smiled as he saluted the youth, and said a few words to him, +which he answered very readily. I never saw again that father or that +son. The one was Dr. Mathews, whom the queen made Bishop of Durham; +and the other, Toby Mathews, his son, who was reconciled some years +ago, and, as I have heard from some, is now a Jesuit. +</p> +<p> +The venerable aspect of the good Mr. Roper so engaged my thoughts, +that I asked Lady Tregony, by whose side I was sitting, if she was +acquainted with him, and if his virtue was as great as his appearance +was noble. She smiled, and answered that his appearance, albeit +honorable and comely, was not one half so honorable as his life had +been, or so comely as his mind. That he had been the husband of Sir +Thomas More's never-to-be-forgotten daughter, Margaret, whose memory +he so reverently did cherish that he had never so much as thought of a +second marriage; and of late years, since he had resigned the office +of sub-notary in the Queen's Bench to his son, he did give his whole +substance and his time to the service of the poor, and especially to +prisoners, by reason of which he was called the staff of the +sorrowful, and sure refuge of the afflicted. Now, then, I looked on +the face of this good aged man with a deeper reverence than +heretofore. Now I longed to be favored with so <a name="758">{758}</a> much of his +notice as one passing word. Now I watched for an opportunity to +compass my desire, and I thank God not without effect; for I do count +it as a chief blessing to have been honored, during the remaining +years of this virtuous gentleman's life, with so much of his +condescending goodness, that if the word friendship may be used in +regard to such affectionate feelings as can exist between one verging +on four-score years of age and of such exalted merit, and a foolish +creature yet in her teens, whom he honored with his notice, it should +be so in this instance; wherein on the one side a singular reverence +and humble great affection did arise almost on first acquaintance, and +on the other so much benignity and goodness shown in the pains taken +to cultivate such good dispositions as had been implanted in this +young person's heart by careful parents, and to guard her mind against +the evils of the times, that nothing could be greater. +</p> +<p> +Mr. Roper chancing to come near us, Lady Tregony said somewhat, which +caused him to address me in this wise: +</p> +<p> +"And are there, then, maidens in these days not averse to the sight of +gray hairs, and who mislike not to converse with aged men?" +</p> +<p> +This was said with so kindly a smile that timidity vanished, and +confidence took its place. +</p> +<p> +"Oh, sir," I cried, "when I was not so much as five years old, my good +father showed me a picture of Sir Thomas More, and told me he was a +man of such angelic wit as England never had the like before, nor is +ever like to have again, and of a most famous and holy memory; and +methinks, sir, that you, being his son-in-law, who knew his doings and +his mind so well, and lived so long in his house, must needs in many +things resemble him." +</p> +<p> +"As to his doings and his mind," Mr. Roper replied, "no man living +knoweth them so well, and if my mean wit, memory, and knowledge could +serve me now, could declare so much thereof. But touching resemblance, +alas! there was but one in all the world that represented the likeness +of his virtues and perfections; one whom he loved in a particular +manner, and who was worthiest of that love more than any creature God +has made." +</p> +<p> +Here the good man's voice faltered a little, and he made a stop in his +discourse; but in a little while said that he had thought it behoved +him to set down in writing such matters concerning Sir Thomas's life +as he could then call to remembrance, and that he would lend me the +manuscript to read, which I did esteem an exceeding great favor, and +one I could not sufficiently thank him for. Then he spoke somewhat of +the times, which were waxing every day more troublesome, and told me +he often called to mind a conversation he once had with Sir Thomas, +walking along the side of the Thames at Chelsea, which he related in +these words: +</p> +<p> +"'Now would to God, my son Roper,' quoth Sir Thomas, 'I were put in a +sack, and presently cast into the Thames, upon condition that three +things were well established throughout Christendom.' 'And what mighty +things are those, sir?' I asked. Whereupon he: 'Wouldst thou know, son +Roper, what they be?' 'Yea, marry, sir, with a good will, if it please +you,' quoth I. 'I' faith, son, they be these,' he said: 'The first is +that, whereas the most part of Christian princes are at mortal wars, +they were all at peace; the second that, whereas the church of Christ +is at present sorely afflicted with so many heresies, it were settled +in perfect uniformity of religion; the third that, where the matter of +the king's marriage is now come in question, it were, to the glory of +God and the quietness of all parties, brought to a good conclusion.' +'Ay, sir,' quoth I, 'those were indeed three things greatly to be +desired; but'—I continued with a certain joy—'where shall one see a +happier state than in this realm, that has so Catholic a prince that +no heretic <a name="759">{759}</a> durst show his face; so virtuous and learned a +clergy; so grave and sound a nobility; and so loving, obedient +subjects, all in one faith agreeing together?' 'Truth it is indeed, +son Roper,' quoth he; and in all degrees and estates of the same went +far beyond me in commendation thereof. 'And yet, son Roper, I pray +God,' said he, 'that some of us, as high as we seem to sit on the +mountains, treading heretics under our feet like ants, live not the +day that we would gladly be at league and composition with them, to +let them have their churches quietly to themselves, so that they would +be contented to let us have ours quietly to ourselves.' After I had +told him many considerations why he had no cause to say so: 'Well,' +said he, 'I pray God, son Roper, some of us will live not to see that +day.' To whom I replied: 'By my troth, sir, it is very desperately +spoken.' These vile terms, I cry God mercy, did I give him, who, +perceiving me to be in a passion, said merrily unto me, 'It shall not +be so; it shall not be so.' In sixteen years and more, being in the +house conversing with him, I could not perceive him to be so much as +once out of temper." +</p> +<p> +This was the first of many conversations I held, during the years I +lived in Holborn, with this worthy gentleman, who was not more pleased +to relate, than I to hear, sundry anecdotes concerning Sir Thomas +More, his house, and his family. +</p> +<p> +Before he left me that day, I did make bold to ask him if he feared +not ill consequences from the courageous words he had used in a mixed, +yea rather, with few exceptions, wholly adverse, company. +</p> +<p> +"Not much," he answered. "Mine age; the knowledge that there are those +who would not willingly see me roughly handled, and have power to +prevent it; and withal no great concern, if it should be so, to have +my liberty constrained, yea, my life shortened by a few years, or +rather days,—doth move me to a greater freedom of speech than may +generally be used, and a notable indifference to the results of such +freedom." +</p> +<p> +Having whispered the like fears I had expressed to him to Lady +Tregony, she did assure me his confidence was well based, and that he +had connexions which would by no means suffer him to be thrown into +prison, which should be the fate of any one else in that room who had +spoken but one half, yea one tenth part, as boldly as he had ventured +on. +</p> +<br> + +<h2>CHAPTER XII.</h2> +<p> +It was some time before I could restore myself to my countenance, +after so much moving discourse, so as to join with spirit in the +sports and the dancing which did ensue among the young people that +evening. But sober thoughts and painful themes after a while gave +place to merriment; and the sound of music, gay tattle, and cheerful +steps lured me to such enjoyment as youth is wont to take in these +kinds of pastimes. It was too much my wont to pursue with eagerness +the present humor, and drink deeply of innocent pleasure wherein no +harm should exist if enjoyed with moderation. But like in a horse on +whose neck the bridle is cast, what began in a gentle ambling ends in +wild gallopping; so lawful merriment, if unrestrained, often ends in +what is unbeseeming, and in some sort blameable. So this time, when +dancing tired, a ring was formed for conversation, and the choice of +the night's pastime yielded to my discretion; alack, rather to my +imprudence and folly, methinks I might style it. I chose that +arguments should be held by two persons of the company, turn by turn, +and that a judge should be named to allot a reward to the worthiest, +and a penance to the worst. This liked them all exceedingly, and by +one consent they appointed me to be judge, and to summon such as +should dispute. <a name="760">{760}</a> There were there two young gentlemen which +haunted our house, and Lady Ingoldby's also. One was Martin Tregony, +Lady Tregony's nephew, an ill-favored young man, with manners worse +than his face, and so apish and foppish in his dress and behavior, +that no young woman could abide him, much less would receive his +addresses, or if she did entertain him in conversation, it was to make +sport of his so great conceit. He had an ill-natured kind of wit, more +sharp than keen, more biting than sarcastic. He studied the art of +giving pain, and oftentimes did cause shamefaced merit to blush. The +other was Mr. Thomas Sherwood, who, albeit not very near in blood to +my father, was, howsoever, of the same family as ourselves. He had +been to the English College in Douay, and had brought me tidings a +short time back of my father and Edmund Genings' safe arrival thither, +and afterward came often to see us, and much frequented Lady Tregony's +house. He had exceedingly good parts, but was somewhat diffident and +bashful. Martin Tregony was wont to make him a mark, as it were, of +his ill-natured wit, and did fancy himself to be greatly his superior +in sharpness, partly because Mr. Sherwood's disposition was retiring, +and partly that he had too much goodness and sense to bandy words with +so ill-mannered a young man. I pray you who read this, could aught be +more indiscreet than, in a thoughtless manner, to have summoned these +two to dispute? which nevertheless I did, thinking some sport should +arise out of it, to see Master Martin foisted in argument by one he +despised, and also from his extravagant gestures and affected +countenances. So I said: +</p> +<p> +"Master Tregony, your task shall be to dispute with Master Sherwood; +and this the theme of your argument, 'The Art of Tormenting.' He who +shall describe the nicest instances of such skill, when exercised by a +master toward his servant, a parent to his child, a husband to his +wife, a wife to her husband, a lover to his mistress, or a friend to +his friend, shall be proclaimed victorious; and his adversary submit +to such penance as the court shall inflict." +</p> +<p> +Master Sherwood shook his head for to decline to enter these lists; +but all the young gentlemen and ladies cried, he should not be +suffered to show contempt of the court, and forced him to stand up. +</p> +<p> +Master Martin was nothing loth, and in his ill-favored countenance +there appeared a made smile, which did indicate an assurance of +victory; so he began: +</p> +<p> +"The more wit a man hath, the better able he shall be at times to +torment another; so I do premise, and at the outset of this argument +declare, that to blame a man for the exercise of a talent he doth +possess is downright impiety, and that to wound another by the +pungency of home-thrusts in conversation is as just a liberty in an +ingenious man, as the use of his sword in a battle is to a soldier." +</p> +<p> +Mr. Sherwood upon this replied, that he did allow a public +disputation, appointed by meet judges, to come under the name of a +fair battle; but even in a battle (he said) generous combatants aim +not so much at wounding their adversaries, as to the disarming of +them; and that he who in private conversation doth make a weapon of +his tongue is like unto the man who provokes another to a single +combat, which for Christians is not lawful, and pierces him easily who +has less skill in wielding the sword than himself. +</p> +<p> +"Marry, sir," quoth Master Martin, "if you dobring piety into your +discourse, methinks the rules of just debate be not observed; for it +is an unfair thing for to overrule a man with arguments he doth not +dare to reply to under pain of spiritual censures." +</p> +<p> +"I cry you mercy, Master Martin," quoth the other; "you did bring in +<i>im</i>piety, and so methought piety should not be excluded." At the which +we all applauded, and Martin began to perceive his adversary to be +less <a name="761">{761}</a> contemptible than he had supposed. +</p> +<p> +"Now to the point," I cried; "for exordiums be tedious. I pray you, +gentlemen, begin, and point out some notable fashion wherewith a +master might torment his servant." +</p> +<p> +Upon which quoth Martin: "If a man hath a sick servant, and doth note +his fancy to be set on some indulgence not of strict necessity, and +should therefore deny it to him, methinks that should be a rare +opportunity to exercise his talent." +</p> +<p> +"Nay," cried Master Sherwood, "a nicer one, and ever at hand +afterward, should be to show kindness once to a dependent when sick, +and to use him ten times the worse for it when he is well, upbraiding +him for such past favors, as if one should say: 'Alack, be as kind as +you will, see what return you do meet with!'" +</p> +<p> +This last piece of ingenuity was allowed by the court to surpass the +first. "Now," I cried, "what should be the greatest torment a parent +could inflict on a child?" +</p> +<p> +Martin answered: "If it should be fond of public diversion, to confine +it in-doors. If retirement suits its temper, to compel it abroad. If +it should delight in the theatre, to take it to see a good play, and +at the moment when the plot shall wax most moving, to say it must be +tired, and procure to send it home. Or, in more weighty matters,—a +daughter's marriage, for instance,—to detect if the wench hath set her +heart on one lover, and if so, to keep from her the knowledge of this +gentleman's addresses; and when she hath accepted another, to let her +know the first had sued for her hand, and been dismissed." +</p> +<p> +Here all the young gentlewomen did exclaim that Master Sherwood could +by no means think of a more skilful torment than this should prove. He +thought for an instant, and then said: +</p> +<p> +"It should be a finer and more delicate torment to stir up in a young +gentlewoman's mind suspicions of one she loved, and so work on her +natural passions of jealousy and pride, that she should herself, in a +hasty mood, discard her lover; and ever after, when the act was not +recallable, remind her she herself had wrought her own unhappiness, +and wounded one she loved." +</p> +<p> +"Yea, that should be worse than the first torment," all but one young +lady cried out; who, for her part, could better endure, she said, to +have injured herself than to be deceived, as in the first case. +</p> +<p> +"Then do come husbands," quoth Mr. Martin; "and I vow," he cried, "I +know not how to credit there be such vile wretches in the world as +should wish to torment their wives; but if such there be, methinks the +surest method they may practise is, to loving wives to show +indifferency; to such as be jealous, secrecy; to such as be pious, +profaneness; and the like in all the points whereon their affections +are set." +</p> +<p> +"Alack!" cried Mistress Frances Bellamy, "what a study the man hath +made of this fine art! Gentlewomen should needs beware of such a one +for a husband. What doth Master Sherwood say?" +</p> +<p> +Whereupon he: "Methinks the greatest torment a husband might inflict +on a worthy wife should be to dishonor her love by his baseness; or if +he had injured her, to doubt her proneness to forgive." +</p> +<p> +"And wives," quoth Mistress Southwell,—"what of their skill therein, +gentlemen?" +</p> +<p> +"It be such," cried Martin, "as should exceed men's ability thereof to +speak. The greatest instance of talent of this sort I have witnessed +is in a young married lady, whose husband is very willing to stay in +his house or go abroad, or reside in town, or at his seat in the +country, as should most please her, so she would let him know her +wishes. But she is so artful in concealing them, that the poor man can +never learn so much as should cause him to guess what they may be; but +with a meek voice she doth reply to his asking, 'An it please you, +sir, let it <a name="762">{762}</a> be as you choose, for you very well know I never do +oppose your will.' Then if he resolve to leave town, she maketh not +much ado till they have rode twenty or thirty miles out of London. +Then she doth begin to sigh and weep, for that she should be a most +ill-used creature, and her heart almost broken for to leave her +friends, and be shut up for six months in a swamp, for such she doth +term his estate; and if she should not have left London that same day, +she should have been at the Lord Mayor's banquet, and seen the French +princes, which, above all things, she had desired. But some husbands +be so hard-hearted, if they can hunt and hawk, 'tis little count they +make of their wives' pleasures. Then when she hath almost provoked the +good man to swear, she hangeth down her head and saith, 'Content you, +sir—content you; 'tis your good fortune to have an obedient wife.' +And so mopes all the time of the journey." +</p> +<p> +Whilst Martin was speaking, I noted a young gentlewoman who did deeply +blush whilst he spoke, and tears came into her eyes. I heard afterward +she had been lately married, and that he counterfeited her voice in so +precise a manner, so that all such as knew her must needs believe her +to be the wife he spoke of; and that there was so much of truth in the +picture he had drawn, as to make it seem a likeness, albeit most +unjust toward one who, though apt to boast of her obedience, and to +utter sundry trifling complaints, was a fond wife and toward lady to +her dear husband; and that this malice in Mr. Tregony, over and above +his wonted spite, was due to her rejection of his hand some short time +before her marriage. Master Sherwood, seeing the ungracious +gentleman's ill-nature and the lady's confusion, stood up the more +speedily to reply, and so cut him short. "I will relate," he said, "a +yet more ingenious practice of tormenting, which should seem the +highest proof of skill in a wife, albeit also practised by husbands, +only not so aptly, or peradventure so often. And this is when one hath +offered to another a notable insult or affront, so to turn the tables, +even as a conjuror the cards he doth handle, that straightway the +offended party shall seem to be the offender, and be obliged to sue +forgiveness for that wherein he himself is hurt. I pray you, gentlemen +and ladies, can anything more ingenious than this practice be thought +on?" +</p> +<p> +All did admit it to be a rare example of ability in tormenting; but +some objected it was not solely exercised by wives and husbands, but +that friends, lovers, and all sorts of persons might use it. Then one +gentleman called for some special instance of the art in lovers. But +another said it was a natural instinct, and not an art, in such to +torment one another, and likewise their own selves, and proposed the +behavior of friends in that respect as a more new and admirable theme. +</p> +<p> +"Ah," quoth Master Martin, with an affected wave of his hand, "first +show me an instance of a true friendship betwixt ladies, or a sincere +affection betwixt gentlemen; and then it will be time for to describe +the arts whereby they do plague and torment each other." +</p> +<p> +Mr. Sherwood answered, "A French gentleman said, a short time since, +that it should be a piece of commendable prudence to live with your +friend as looking that he should one day be your enemy. Now we be +warranted, by Master Tregony's speech, to conclude his friendships to +be enmities in fair disguise; and the practices wherewith friends +torment each other no doubt should apply to this case also; and so his +exceptions need in no wise alter the theme of our argument. I pray +you, sir, begin, and name some notable instance in which, without any +apparent breach of friendship, the appearance of which is in both +instances supposed, one may best wound his friend, or, as Mr. Tregony +hath it, the disguised object of his hatred." +</p> +<p> +I noticed that Master Martin glanced <a name="763">{763}</a> maliciously at his +adversary, and then answered, "The highest exercise of such ability +should be, methinks, to get possession of a secret which your friend, +<i>or disguised enemy</i>, has been at great pains to conceal, and to let +him know, by such means as shall hold him in perpetual fear, but never +in full assurance of the same, that you have it in your power to +accuse him at any time of that which should procure him to be thrown +into prison, or maybe hanged on a gibbet." +</p> +<p> +A paleness spread over Master Sherwood's face, not caused, I ween, by +fear so much as by anger at the meanness of one who, from envy and +spite, even in the freedom of social hours, should hint at secrets so +weighty as would touch the liberty, yea, the life, of one he called +his friend; and standing up, he answered, whilst I, now too late +discerning mine own folly in the proposing of a dangerous pastime, +trembled in every limb. +</p> +<p> +"I know," quoth he,—"I know a yet more ingenious instance of the +skill of a malicious heart. To hang a sword over a friend's head, and +cause him to apprehend its fall, must needs be a well-practised +device; but if it be done in so skilful a manner that the weapon shall +threaten not himself alone, but make him, as it were, the instrument +of ruin to others dearer to him than his own life,—if, by the +appearance of friendship, the reality of which such a heart knoweth +not, he hath been to such confidence as shall be the means of sorrow +to those who have befriended him in another manner than this false +friend, this true foe,—the triumph is then complete. Malice and hatred +can devise naught beyond it." +</p> +<p> +Martin's eyes glared so fearfully, and his voice sounded so hoarse, as +he hesitated in answering, that, in a sort of desperation, I stood up, +and cried, "Long enough have these two gentlemen had the talk to +themselves. Verily, methinks there be no conqueror, but a drawn game +in this instance." +</p> +<p> +But a murmur rose among the company that Master Sherwood was +victorious, and Master Tregony should do penance. +</p> +<p> +"What shall it be?" was asked; and all with one voice did opine Master +Sherwood should name it, for he was as much beloved as Master Tregony +was misliked. He (Sherwood), albeit somewhat inwardly moved, I ween, +had restrained his indignation, and cried out merrily, "Marry, so will +I! Look me in the face, Martin, and give me thy hand. This shall be +thy penance." +</p> +<p> +The other did so; but a fiendly look of resentment was in his eyes; +and methinks Thomas Sherwood must needs have remembered the grasp of +his hand to forgive it, I doubt not, even at the foot of the scaffold. +</p> +<p> +From that day Martin Tregony conceived an implacable hatred for Master +Sherwood, whom he had feigned a great friendship for on his first +arrival in London, because he hoped, by his means and influence with +his aunt, to procure her to pay his debts. But after he had thrown off +the mask, he only waited for an opportunity to denounce him, being +privy to his having brought a priest to Lady Tregony's house, who had +also said mass in her chapel. So one day meeting him in the streets, +he cried out, "Stop the traitor! stop the traitor!" and so causing him +to be apprehended, had him before the next justice of the peace; +where, when they were come, he could allege nothing against him, but +that he suspected him to be a Papist. Upon which he was examined +concerning his religion, and, refusing to admit the queen's +church-headship, he was cast into a dungeon in the Tower. His lodgings +were plundered, and £25, which he had amassed, as I knew, who had +assisted him to procure it, for the use of his aged and sick father, +who had been lately cast into prison in Lancaster, was carried off +with the rest. He was cruelly racked, we heard, for that he would not +reveal where he had heard mass; and kept <a name="764">{764}</a> in a dark filthy hole, +where he endured very much from hunger, stench, and cold. No one being +allowed to visit him—for the Tower was not like some other prisons +where Mistress Ward and others could sometimes penetrate—or afford +him any comfort, Mr. Roper had, by means of another prisoner, conveyed +to his keeper some money for his use; but the keeper returned it the +next day, because the lieutenant of the Tower would not suffer him to +have the benefit of it. All he could be prevailed upon to do was to +lay out one poor sixpence for a little fresh straw for him to lie on. +About six months after, he was brought to trial, and condemned to die, +for denying the queen's supremacy, and was executed at Tyburn, +according to sentence, being cut down whilst he was yet alive, +dismembered, bowelled, and quartered. +</p> +<p> +Poor Lady Tregony's heart did almost break at this his end and her +kinsman's part in it; and during those six months—for she would not +leave London whilst Thomas Sherwood was yet alive—I did constantly +visit her, almost every day, and betwixt us there did exist a sort of +fellowship in our sorrow for this worthy young man's sufferings; for +that she did reproach herself for lack of prudence in not sufficient +distrust of her own nephew, whom now she refused to see, at least, she +said, until he had repented of his sin, which he, glorying in, had +told her, the only time they had met, he should serve her in the same +manner, and if he could ever find out she heard mass, should get her a +lodging in the Tower, and for himself her estate in Norfolk, whither +she was then purposing to retire, and did do so after Master +Sherwood's execution. For mine own part, as once before my father's +apprehended danger had diverted my mind from childish folly, so did +the tragical result of an entertainment, wherein I had been carried +away by thoughtless mirth, somewhat sicken me of company and sports. I +went abroad not much the next year; only was often at Mr. Wells's +house, and in Hubert's society, which had become so habitual to me +that I was almost persuaded the pleasure I took therein proceeded from +a mutual inclination, and I could observe with what jealousy he +watched any whom I did seem to speak with or allow of any civility at +their hands. Even Master Sherwood he would jalouse, if he found me +weeping over his fate; and said he was happier in prison, for whom +such tears did flow, than he at liberty, for whom I showed no like +regard. "Oh," I would answer, "he is happy because, Master Rookwood, +his sufferings are for his God and his conscience' sake, and not such +as arise from a poor human love. Envy him his faith, his patience, his +hope, which make him cry out, as I know he doth, 'O my Lord Jesu! I am +not worthy that I should suffer these things for thee;' and not the +compassionate tears of a paltry wench that in some sort was the means +to plunge him in these straits." +</p> +<p> +In the spring of the year which did follow, I heard from my father, +who had been ordained at the English College at Rheims, and was on the +watch, he advertised me, for an opportunity to return to England, for +to exercise the sacred ministry amongst his poor Catholic brethren. +But at which port he should land, or whither direct his steps, if he +effected a safe landing, he dared not for to commit to paper. He said +Edmund Genings had fallen into a most dangerous consumption, partly by +the extraordinary pains he took in his studies, and partly in his +spiritual exercises, insomuch that the physicians had almost despaired +of his recovery, and that the president had in consequence resolved to +send him into England, to try change of air. That he had left Rheims +with great regret, and went on his journey, as far as Havre de Grace, +and, after a fortnight's stay in that place, having prayed to God very +heartily for the recovery of his health, so that he might return, and, +without further <a name="765">{765}</a> delay, continue his studies for the priesthood, +he felt himself very much better, almost as well as ever he was in his +life; upon which he returned to his college, and took up again, with +exceeding great fervor, his former manner of life; "and," my father +added, "his common expression, as often as talk is ministered of +England and martyrdom there, is this: <i>'Vivamus in spe! Vivamus in +spe!</i>'" +</p> +<p> +This letter did throw me into an exceeding great apprehension that my +father might fall into the hands of the queen's officers at any time +he should land, and the first news I should hear of him to be that he +was cast into prison. And as I knew no Catholic priest could dwell in +England with out he did assume a feigned name, and mostly so one of +his station, and at one time well noted as a gentleman and a recusant, +I now never heard of any priest arrested in any part of England but I +feared it should be him. +</p> +<p> +Hubert Rookwood was now more than ever at Mr. Lacy's house, and in his +library, for they did both affection the same pursuits, albeit with +very different abilities; and I was used to transcribe for them divers +passages from manuscripts and books, taking greater pleasure, so to +spend time, than to embroider in Kate's room, the compass of whose +thoughts became each day more narrow, and her manner of talk more +tasteless. Hubert seemed not well pleased when I told him my father +had been ordained abroad. I gathered this from a troubled look in his +eyes, and an increasing paleness, which betokened, to my now observant +eyes, emotions which he gave not vent to in words at all, or leastways +in any that should express strong resentment. His silence always +frighted me more than anger in others. He had acquired a great +influence over me, and, albeit I was often ill at ease in his company, +I ill brooked his absence. He was a zealous Catholic, and did adduce +arguments and proofs in behalf of his religion with rare ability. Some +of his writings which I copied at that time had a cogency and +clearness in their reasons and style, which in my poor judgment +betokened a singular sharp understanding and ingenuity of learning; +but in his conversation, and writings also, was lacking the fervency +of spirit, the warmth of devout aims, the indifferency to worldly +regards, which should belong to a truly Christian soul, or else the +nobleness and freedom of speech which some do possess from natural +temper. But his attainments were far superior to those of the young +men I used to see at Mr. Wells's, and such as gave him an +extraordinary reputation amongst the persons I was wont to associate +with, which contributed not a little to the value I did set on his +preference, of which no proofs were wanting, save an open paying of +his addresses to me, which by reason of his young age and mine, and +the poorness of his prospects, being but a younger son of a country +gentleman, was easy of account. He had a great desire for wealth and +for all kind of greatness, and used to speak of learning as a road to +it. +</p> +<p> +In the spring of that year, my Lord Surrey left Cambridge, and came to +live at Howard House with his lady. They were then both in their +eighteenth years, and a more comely pair could not be seen. The years +that had passed since she had left London had greatly matured her +beauty. She was taller of stature than the common sort, and very fair +and graceful. The earl was likewise tall, very straight, long-visaged, +but of a pleasant and noble countenance. I could not choose but admire +her perfect carriage, toward her lord, her relatives, and her +servants; the good order she established in her house; the care she +took of her sister's education, who in two years was to be married to +Lord William Howard; and her great charity to the poor, which she then +began to visit herself, and to relieve in all sorts of ways, and was +wont to say the angels of that old house where God had been served by +so many prayers and alms must needs assist her in her care for <a name="766">{766}</a> +those in trouble. My lord appeared exceedingly fond of her then. One +day when I was visiting her ladyship, he asked me if I had read the +life of that sweet holy Queen Elizabeth of Hungary; and as I said I +had not met with it, he gifted me with a copy fairly printed and well +ornamented, which Mr. Martin had left behind him when he went beyond +seas, and said: +</p> +<p> +"Mistress Sherwood, see if in this book you find not the likeness of a +lady which you mislike not any more than I do. Beshrew me, but I fear +I may find some day strange guests in mine house if she do copy the +pattern herein set down; and so I will e'en send the book out of the +house, for my lady is too good for me already, and I be no fitting +husband for a saint, which a very little more of virtue should make +her." +</p> +<p> +And so he laughing, and she prettily checking his wanton speech, and +such sweet loving looks and playful words passing between them as +gladdened my heart to see. +</p> +<p> +Some time after, I found one day my Lady Surrey looking somewhat grave +and thoughtful. She greeted me with an affectionate kiss, and said, +</p> +<p> +"Ah, sweet Constance, I be glad thou art come; for methinks we shall +soon leave London." +</p> +<p> +"So soon?" I answered. +</p> +<p> +"Not <i>too</i> soon, dear Constance," she said somewhat sadly. +</p> +<p> +I did look wistfully in her sweet face. Methought there was trouble in +it, and doubt if she should further speak or not; for she rested her +head on her hand, and her dark eyes did fix themselves wistfully on +mine, as if asking somewhat of me, but what I knew not. "Constance," +she said at last, "I have no mother, no sister of mine own age, no +brother, no ghostly father, to speak my mind to. Methinks it should +not be wrong to unbosom my cares to thee, who, albeit young, hast a +thoughtful spirit, and, as I have often observed, an aptness to give +good counsel. And then thou art of that way of thinking wherein I was +brought up, and though in outward show we now do differ, I am not +greatly changed therein, as thou well knowest." +</p> +<p> +"Alack!" I cried, "too well I do know it, dear lady; and, albeit my +tongue is silent thereon, my heart doth grieve to see you comfortless +of that which is the sole source of true comfort." +</p> +<p> +"Tis not that troubles me," she answered, a little impatiently. "Thou +art unreasonable, Constance. My duty to my lord shapes my outward +behavior; but I have weighty cares, nevertheless. Dost thou mind that +passage in the late duke our father's letter to his son and me?—that +we should live in a lower degree, and out of London and from the +court. Methinks a prophetic spirit did move him thus to write. My lord +has a great heart and a generous temper, and loves to spend money in +all sorts of ways, profitable and unprofitable, as I too well observe +since we have been in London. And the queen sent him a store of +messages by my Lord Essex, and others of his friends, that she was +surprised not to see him at court; and that it was her highness's +pleasure he should wait upon her, and she shall show him so much favor +as he deserves, and such like inducements." +</p> +<p> +"And hath my lord been to court?" I asked. +</p> +<p> +"Yea, he hath been," she answered, sighing deeply. "He hath been +forced to kiss the hand which signed his father's death-warrant. +Constance, it is this which doth so pain me, that her majesty should +think he hath in his heart no resentment of that mishap. She said to +my Lady Berkeley some days since, when she sued for some favor at her +hands, 'No, no, my Lady Berkeley; you love us not, and never will. You +cannot forgive us your brother's death.' Why should her grace think a +son hath less resentment of a father's loss than a sister?" +</p> +<p> +Willing to minister comfort to her touching that on which I did, +nevertheless, but too much consent to her thinking, I said, "In my +lord's case, he must have needs appeared to mislike <a name="767">{767}</a> the queen +and her government if he stayed away from court, and his duty to his +sovereign compelleth him to render her so much homage as is due to her +majesty." +</p> +<p> +"Yea," cried my lady, "I be of the same mind with thee, that if my +lord do live in London he is in a manner forced to swim with the tide, +and God only knoweth into what a flood of troubles he may thus be led. +But I have prevailed on him to go to Kenninghall, and there to enjoy +that retired life his father passionately wished him to be contented +with. So I do look, if it please God, to happy days when we leave this +great city, where so many and great dangers beset us." +</p> +<p> +"Have you been to court likewise, dear lady?" I asked; and she +answered, +</p> +<p> +"No; her majesty doth deny me that privilege which the wife of a +nobleman should enjoy without so much as the asking for it. My Lord +Arundel and my Lord Sussex are mad thereon, and swear 'tis the gipsy's +doing, as they do always title Lord Leicester, and a sign of his +hatred to my lord. But I be not of their mind; for methinks he doth +but aid my lord to win the queen's favor by the slights which are put +on his wife, which, if he doth take patiently, must needs secure for +him such favor as my Lord Leicester should wish, if report speaks +truly, none should enjoy but himself." +</p> +<p> +"But surely," I cried, "my lord's spirit is too noble to stomach so +mean a treatment of his lady?" +</p> +<p> +A burning blush spread over the countess's face, and she answered, +</p> +<p> +"Constance, nobility of soul is shaped into action by divers motives +and influences. And, I pray thee, since his father's death and the +loss of his first tutor, who hath my lord had to fashion the aims of +his eager spirit to a worthy ambition, and teach him virtuous +contentment with a meaner rank and lower fortunes than his birth do +entitle him to? He chafes to be degraded, and would fain rise to the +heights his ancestors occupied; and, alas! the ladder which those who +beset him—for that they would climb after him—do ever set before his +eyes is the queen's majesty's favor. 'Tis the breath of their +nostrils, the perpetual theme of their discourse. Mine ears sometimes +ache with the sound of their oft-repeated words." +</p> +<p> +Then she broke off her speech for an instant, but soon asked me if to +consult fortune-tellers was not a sin. +</p> +<p> +"Yea," I answered, "the Church doth hold it to be unlawful." +</p> +<p> +"Ah!" she replied, "I would to God my lord had never resorted to a +person of that sort, which hath filled his mind with an apprehension +which will work us great evil, if I do mistake not." +</p> +<p> +"Alas!" I said, "hath my lord been so deluded?" +</p> +<p> +"Thou hast heard, I ween," my lady continued, "of one Dr. Dee, whom +the queen doth greatly favor, and often charge him to cast her +horoscope. Some time ago my lord was riding with her majesty and the +most part of her court near unto this learned gentleman's house at +Mortlake, which her highness, taking notice of, she must needs propose +to visit him with all her retinue, in order, she said, to examine his +library and hold conference with him. But learning that his wife had +been buried only four hours, her majesty would not enter, but desired +my Lord Leicester to take her down from her horse at the church-wall +at Mortlake and to fetch the doctor unto her, who did bring out for +her grace's inspection his magic-glass, of which she and all those +with her did see some of the properties. Several of the noblemen +thereunto present were greatly contented and delighted with this +cunning witchery, and did agree to visit again, in a private manner, +this learned man, for to have their nativities calculated; and my +lord, I grieve to say, went with them. And this cheat or wizard, for +methinks one or other of those names must needs belong to him, +predicted to my lord that he should be in great danger to be +overthrown by a woman. And, I <a name="768">{768}</a> ween, good Constance, there was a +craft in this most deep and deceptive, for doth it not tend, whichever +way it be understood, to draw and urge onward my lord to a careful +seeking to avoid this danger by a diligent serving and waiting on her +majesty, if she be the woman like to undo him, or else to move him to +the thought that his marriage—as I doubt not many endeavor to +insinuate into his mind—should be an obstacle to her favor such as +must needs mar his fortunes? Not that my lord hath breathed so much as +one such painful word in my hearing, or abated in his kind behavior; +but there are others who be not slow to hint so much to myself; and, I +pray you, shall they not then deal with him in the same manner, albeit +he is too noble and gentle to let me hear of it? But since that day he +is often thoughtful when we are alone, and his mind ever running on +means to propitiate her majesty, and doth send her many presents, the +value of which should rather mark them as gifts from one royal person +to another than from a subject to his prince. O Constance, I would +Kenninghall were a thousand miles from London, and a wild sea to run +between it and the court, such as could with difficulty be crossed; +but 'tis vain wishing; and I thank God my lord should be willing to +remove there, and so we shall be in quiet." +</p> +<p> +"God send it!" I answered; "and that you, my sweet lady, may find +there all manner of contentment." Then I asked her ladyship if she had +tidings of my Lady l'Estrange. +</p> +<p> +"Yea," she answered; "excellent good tidings, for that she was a +contented wife to a loving husband. Sir Hammond," she said, "hath a +most imperious temper, and, as I hear, doth not brook the least +contradiction; so that a woman less mild and affectionate than +Milicent should not, I ween, live at peace with him. But her sweet +temper doth move her to such strict condescension to his humors, that +she doth style herself most fortunate in marriage and a singular happy +wife. Dost mind Master Chaucer's tale of the patient Grizzel, which +Phil read to me some years back, soon after our first marriage, for to +give me a lesson on wifely duty, and which I did then write to thee +the story of?" +</p> +<p> +"Yea, well," I cried; "and that I was so angered at her patience, +which methought was foolish, yea, wicked in its excess, that it did +throw me into a passion." +</p> +<p> +My lady laughed and said, indeed she thought so too; but Milicent, in +her behavior and the style of her letters, did mind her so much of +that singular obedient wife, that she did sometimes call her Grizzel +to her face. "She is now gone to reside with her husband," she said, +"at a seat of his not very far from Lynn. 'Tis a poor and wild +district; and the people, I hear, do resort to her in great numbers +for assistance in the way of medicine and surgery, and for much help +of various sorts. She is greatly contented that her husband doth in +nowise impede her in these charitable duties, but rather the contrary. +She is a creature of such natural good impulses and compassionate +spirit that must needs show kindness to all who do come in her way." +</p> +<p> +Then my lady questioned me touching Muriel and Mistress Ward, and Kate +and Polly, who were now both married; and I told her Kate had a fair +son and Polly a little daughter, like to prove as sharp as her mother +if her infant vivacity did not belie her. As to Muriel and her guide +and friend, I told her ladyship that few were like to have speech with +them, save such as were in so destitute a condition that nothing could +exceed it. Now that my two elder cousins had left home, mine uncle's +house was become a sort of refuge for the poor, and an hospital for +distressed Catholics. +</p> +<p> +"And thou, Constance," my lady said, "dost thou not think on +marriage?" +</p> +<p> +I smiled and answered I did sometimes; but had not yet met with any +one altogether conformable to my liking. +</p> +<a name="769">{769}</a> +<p> +"Not Mr. Hubert Rookwood?" she said smiling; "I have been told he +haunts Mrs. Lacy's house, and would fain be admitted as Mistress +Sherwood's suitor." +</p> +<p> +"I will not deny," I answered, "but that he doth testify a vast regard +for me, or that he is a gentleman of such great parts and exceedingly +winning speech that a gentlewoman should be flattered to be addressed +by him; but, dear lady," I continued, opening my heart to her, "albeit +I relish greatly his society, mine heart doth not altogether incline +to his suit; and Mr. Congleton hath lately warned me to be less free +in allowing of his attentions than hath hitherto been my wont; for, he +said, his means be so scanty, that it behoveth him not to think of +marriage until his fortunes do improve; and that his father would not +be competent to make such settlements as should be needful in such a +case, or without which he should suffer us to marry. As Hubert had +never opened to me himself thereon in so pointed a fashion as to +demand an answer from me, I was somewhat surprised at mine uncle's +speech; but I found he had often ministered talk of his passion for +me—for so he termed it—to Kate and her husband." +</p> +<p> +"And did it work in thee, sweet one, no regrets," my lady asked, "that +the course of this poor gentleman's true love should be marred by his +lack of wealth?" +</p> +<p> +"In truth no, dear lady," I replied; "except that I did notice, with +so much of pain as a good heart must needs feel in the sufferings of +another, that he was both sad and wroth at the change in my manner. +And indeed I had always seen—and methinks this was the reason that my +heart inclined not warmly toward his suit—that his affection was of +that sort that doth readily breed anger; and that if he had occasion +to misdoubt a return from me of such-like regard as he professed, his +looks of love sometimes changed into a scowl, or something nearly +resembling one. Yet I had a kindness toward him, yea, more than a +kindness, an attachment, which methinks should have led me to +correspond to his affection so far as to be willing to marry him, if +mine uncle had not forbade me to think on it; but since he hath laid +his commands upon me on that point, methinks I have experienced a +freedom of soul and a greater peace than I had known for some time +past." +</p> +<p> +"'Tis well then as it is," my lady said; and after some further +discourse we parted that day. +</p> +<p> +It had been with me even as I had said to her. My mind had been more +at ease since the contending would and would not, the desire to please +Hubert and the fear to be false in so doing, had been stayed,—and +mostly since he had urged me to entertain him as a friend, albeit +defended to receive him as a lover. And that peace lasted until a +day—ay, a day which began like other days with no perceptible +presentiment of joy or sorrow, the sun shining as brightly, and no +more, at its rise than on any other morning in June; and the +thunder-clouds toward noon overshadowing its glory not more darkly +than a storm is wont to do the clear sky it doth invade; nor yet +evening smiling again more brightly and peacefully than is usually +seen when nature's commotion is hushed, and the brilliant orb of day +doth sink to rest in a bed of purple glory; and yet that day did +herald the greatest joys, presage the greatest anguish, mark the most +mighty beginnings of most varied endings that can be thought of in the +life of a creature not altogether untried by sorrow, but on the brink +of deeper waters than she had yet sounded, on the verge of such +passages as to have looked forward to had caused her to tremble with a +two-fold resentment of hope and of fear, and to look back to doth +constrain her to lay down her pen awhile for to crave strength to +recount the same. +</p> +<p> +[TO BE CONTINUED in Volume II] +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="770">{770}</a> +<br> +<h2>From Chambers's Journal. +<br><br> +TERRENE PHOSPHORESCENCE.</h2> +<p> +It has been suggested that light, heat, magnetism, and electricity are +only the effects of motion among the molecules of matter. Our earth is +but an aggregation of atoms, and every substance upon which we lay our +hands is in like manner formed of infinitesimal particles, so small as +to baffle microscopic investigation. When we consider that animalcula +have been discovered so minute that it would take a million of them to +form a grain of sand, it is evident that motion <i>as</i> motion among the +ultimate particles of matter is beyond man's powers of observation. +Physical investigations have led us to believe that these atoms have +an action or circulation of their own, and as this action of necessity +escapes our eye, it is not irrational, when looking for some evidence +of this disturbance, to attribute to it physical forces for which we +cannot satisfactorily account, yet which appertain to the earth. Thus +has arisen the hypothesis above stated; and intimately connected with +those forces (heat, electricity, etc.) is phosphorescence, a power on +which the examinations of twenty years have thrown little light, and +which still remains of doubtful origin. +</p> +<p> +The power in minerals, plants, and animals of producing light is +apparently a consequence of these objects being under the direct +influence, permanently, or for a time, of heat, light, or electricity, +as some substances become phosphorescent after insolation, or exposure +to the sun's rays; others, from heat: others, by having an electric +current passed through them; and lastly, some give forth a phosphoric +light of their own, without any appreciable warmth. Whatever may be +the cause of this property, it is found to pervade all parts of +creation: the atmosphere, the common stones by the wayside, the +flowers in cottage gardens, and the humble insects or worms crawling +at our feet, can shed around a faint glimmer of light. The earth +itself is occasionally, if not always, self-luminous, as are other of +the heavenly bodies. Venus, Jupiter, the moon, and comets, are +conjectured to have a certain portion of phosphoric light, which is +independent of and unborrowed from the sun. The luminosity of the +earth is made evident to us on starless, moonless nights. We may not +have thought of it, but still it is certain that light surrounds us +from some source or other in varying quantities, on such nights as are +above described; for our movements are very different, even when +walking in the open air on the darkest nights, from what they would be +in a cave, or when groping in a room with closed shutters. This phase +of phosphorescence, and also that of faint flickering clouds against +the horizon, is distinct from meteorological phosphorescence, which +branch of the subject includes luminous rain, fog, dust, +<i>ignis-fatuus</i>, northern and southern lights. A shower of dust which +fell during an eruption of Vesuvius in 1794, had a faint luminosity in +the dark, distinctly visible on the sails of vessels on which it had +fallen. Many instances are recorded of rain producing sparks as it +touched the ground, and Arago collected the authentic accounts of this +phenomenon. In June, 1731, an ecclesiastic near Constance described +the rain during a thunder-storm as falling like drops of red-hot +liquid metal; and it is observable that most of these sparkling +showers seem to have occurred during thunder-storms, or when the air +was highly charged with electricity. +</p> +<p> +But complete mystery still surrounds the cause of luminous fogs and +mists, <a name="771">{771}</a> which are of rare occurrence. Of these there are few well +founded accounts, and the most recent instance of one was, we believe, +in 1859, continuing for a succession of nights. It lasted from then +18th to the 26th of November, and, in the absence of any moon, so +illuminated the heavens as to render small objects distinctly visible +in the sitting room of M. Wartenan of Geneva, whose description of it +will be found in the <i>Comptes Rendus</i> of the Academy of Sciences, +Paris, for December, 1859. It was not a wet fog, but a sort of dry +mist, so impenetrable as to render invisible the banks of the river +Leman, but at the same time diffusing sufficient phosphoric light to +make small objects clear as on a moonlight night. This was also +testified by persons travelling on foot from Geneva to Annemasse, +between the hours of 10 and 12 P.M. Another famous instance was in +1783, when a dry fog, lasting for a month, covered the northern parts +of America, and Europe from Sweden to Africa. It resembled moonlight +through a veil of clouds, and was equally diffused on all sides, +making objects visible at a distance of six hundred yards. Being, as +it were, a deep mass of phosphoric vapor, reaching to the summit of +the highest mountains, no storms of rain or wind seemed to affect it; +but in Europe it was thought to emit an unpleasant sulphurous smell. +</p> +<p> +Another feature of meteorological phosphorescence is that of luminous +appearances at sea, quite distinct from the luminosity of the ocean +itself as produced by marine animalcula. Mrs. Somerville gives the +following interesting description of one of these phosphoric +phenomena: "Captain Bonnycastle, coming up the Gulf of St. Lawrence on +the 7th of September, 1826, was roused by the mate of the vessel in +great alarm from an unusual appearance. It was a starlight night, when +suddenly the sky became overcast in the direction of the highland of +Cornwallis country, and an instantaneous and intensely vivid light, +resembling the aurora, shot out of the hitherto gloomy and dark sea on +the lee-bow, which was so brilliant that it lighted every thing +distinctly, even to the mast-head. The light spread over the whole sea +between the two shores, and the waves, which before had been tranquil, +now began to be agitated. Captain Bonnycastle describes the scene as +that of a blazing sheet of awful and most brilliant light. A long and +vivid line of light, superior in brightness to the parts of the sea +not immediately near the vessel, showed the base of the high, +frowning, and dark land abreast; the sky became lowering and more +intensely obscure. Long tortuous lines of light showed immense numbers +of very large fish darting about, as if in consternation. The +sprit-sail-yard and mizzen-boom were lighted by the glare, as if +gas-lights had been burning directly below them; and until just before +daybreak, at four o'clock, the most minute objects were distinctly +visible. Day broke very slowly, and the sun rose of a fiery and +threatening aspect. Rain followed. Captain Bonnycastle caused a bucket +of this fiery water to be drawn up: it was one mass of light when +stirred by the hand, and not in sparks, as usual, but in actual +coruscations. A portion of the water preserved its luminosity for +seven nights. On the third night, scintillations of the sea +reappeared; in the evening the sun went down very singularly, +exhibiting in its descent a double sun; and when only a few degrees +high, its spherical figure changed into that of a long cylinder, which +reached the horizon. In the night the sea became nearly as luminous as +before; but on the fifth night the appearance entirely ceased. Captain +Bonnycastle does not think it proceeded from animalcula, but imagines +it might be some compound of phosphorus, suddenly evolved, and +disposed over the surface of the sea; perhaps from the exuviae or +secretions of fish connected with the oceanic salts, muriate of soda +and sulphate of magnesia." +</p> +<a name="772">{772}</a> +<p> +Quite distinct from luminous mists is another species of phosphoric +phenomenon in the shape of luminous bodies of considerable size and +brilliancy. We find Arago saying, in 1838, "that great luminous +meteors, similar to lightning in their nature, show themselves +sometimes at the surface of the globe, even when the sky does not +appear stormy." An instance of this is given by a Mr. Edwards, as +having been seen by him when crossing Loch Scavig in a boat at night. +In this instance, a light swept rapidly over the face of the water, +resembling the light in a cabin window, but moving with great +rapidity. It passed near the boat, and caused much consternation among +the boatmen, who viewed it as something supernatural; but it was soon +out of sight, following a curved course. A far more startling +occurrence was seen by the ship <i>Montague</i> when "a few minutes before +mid-day, and in perfectly serene weather, a large bluish globe of fire +rolled up to the ship, the <i>Montague</i>, and exploded, shattering one of +the masts. This globe of fire appeared as large as a millstone." This +appearance does not seem to have had the swiftness of motion we should +expect if it had been a species of globular lightning, but rather +resembled a gigantic <i>ignis-fatuus</i>, which sometimes takes a globular +form, and although generally attributed to the combustion of +phosphuretted hydrogen gas, may and does arise from certain electrical +conditions of the atmosphere. A remarkable <i>ignis-fatuus</i> is described +by Dr. Shaw in his travels in the Holy Land. He observed it on Mount +Ephraim, and it followed him for more than an hour. "Sometimes it +appeared globular, at others it spread itself to such a degree as to +involve the whole company in a pale inoffensive light; then it +contracted itself, and suddenly disappeared, but in less than a minute +would appear again; sometimes running swiftly along, it would expand +itself over two or three acres of the adjacent mountains." +</p> +<p> +We will not dwell on other instances of <i>ignis-fatuus</i>, a phenomenon +so common as to be known to all. But although this form of +gas—phosphuretted hydrogen—has been long known as luminous, it is +only since 1859 that gases in general have been discovered to possess +phosphoric qualities when exposed to the sun's light. It is a +remarkable fact, but one which has been proved, that, with the +exception of metals, nearly all terrestrial bodies appear luminous +when taken into the dark after insolation or exposure to the sun. They +absorb so much light as to give it back again when removed from its +influence, and this property is opposed to electricity, for we find +that good conductors of that fluid are not liable to insolated +phosphorescence. The first discovery of this property was made by +Viscenzo Cascariolo, a shoemaker of Bologna, who, loving alchemy, and +seeking gold, found in his ramble a heavy stone, from which he hoped +and longed to produce the precious metal. Failing in this, he found +what till then was unknown, that sulphuret of baryta would "absorb the +sun's rays by day, to emit them by night." From him this substance has +received the name of Bologna stone; and this first discovery has been +followed by others, which prove that phosphoric light may be produced +by heat, friction, cleavage, and many other forces beside insolation. +Some diamonds shine in the dark after a few minutes' exposure to the +sun; others cannot be made phosphorescent by heat if uncut, but when +polished, or submitted to two or three electric discharges, easily +become luminous. So slight a heat is required to call forth this +light-giving property in some substances, that rare kinds of +clorophane shine in a dark room from the mere warmth of the hand; and +other substances are phosphorized by the slightest friction. Thus Dana +says: "Merely the rapid motion of a feather across some specimens of +sulphuret of zinc will often elicit light more or less intense from +this metal." +</p> +<p> +Several simple and amusing experiments may be made to show the <a name="773">{773}</a> +phosphorescence of minerals. The power of cleavage to produce light is +seen when sugar is broken in a mortar. If a sufficient quantity is +ground rapidly in the dark, the whole will appear a mass of fire. If +phosphuretted hydrogen is evolved by throwing phosphuret of calcium +into water, each bubble as if rises will fire spontaneously on +combining with the air. But the most elegant production of light is +the result of an experiment by Professor Pontus in 1833: "He showed +that a vivid spark is produced when water is made to freeze rapidly. A +small glass, terminating in a short tube, is filled with water; the +whole is covered with a sponge or cotton-wool imbibed with ether, and +placed in an air pump. As soon as the experimenter begins to produce a +vacuum, the ether evaporates, and the sponge or cotton-wool descends, +the temperature of the water rises rapidly. But some instants before +congelation takes place, a brilliant spark, perfectly visible in the +daytime, is suddenly shot out of the little tube that terminates the +glass globe." +</p> +<p> +Before passing on to the consideration of animal phosphorescence, let +us glance at the luminosity of plants. This is found in many +phanerogams and cryptogams. In the latter, it is well known, from +being found frequently in mines, where the fungus <i>mycelium</i> is seen +spreading its web-like growth, and diffusing a tranquil light, +sufficiently strong to read by, as some have affirmed. The most +beautiful instance of this is found in the mines in Hesse, where the +galleries for supplying air are illumined with this soft phosphoric +light. No example of phosphorescence among sea-weed has been known, +but the delicate little moss <i>Schistostega osmundacea</i> is luminous. +Among phanerogams, or ordinary plants, are many examples of +phosphorescence. Several kinds of garden nasturtiums, sun-flowers, +French and African marigolds, yellow lilies, and poppies, have been +seen to emit either sparks or a steady light. By some it is thought +that it is produced when the pollen flies off and is scattered over +the petals, but it is invariably noticed on warm tranquil evenings, +when there is electricity in the atmosphere. It is observed that +nearly all the flowers proved to be phosphoric are of a yellow color, +but the cause of this has not been ascertained. The leaves of an +American plant (<i>OEnothera macrocapa</i>) have been seen, during a severe +storm of thunder and lightning, to emit brilliant flashes of light, +and this is, we believe, the only plant as yet discovered with +phosphoric foliage. M. Martins of Montpellier has noticed that the +juice of the <i>Euphorbia phosphorea</i>, when rubbed on paper, appears +luminous in the dark, or when heated. But the most remarkable instance +is that of the common potato emitting a brilliant light: Mr. Phipson +states that a soldier of Strasburg thought that the barracks were, on +one occasion, on fire, from the light which was found to proceed from +a cellar full of potatoes. It is a question whether they were in a +state of decomposition, and if so, it differs slightly from the +luminosity of decaying wood, which is usually caused by the presence +of phosphoric fungi. +</p> +<p> +To attempt to enumerate the animals of inferior organism which are +phosphoric would be impossible, as almost every known zoophyte is +possessed of this light-giving quality; and perhaps no branch of the +subject has received so much attention as that which concerns animals, +from the fact of the phosphorescence of dead animal matter and insects +being phenomena of daily occurrence. On the former, very early +observations were made. In 1592, Fabricius d'Acquapendente relates the +astonishment of three Roman youths who found the remains of their +Easter lamb shining like candles in the dark. Nearly a century later, +Robert Boyle described the phosphorescence of a neck of veal "as a +very splendid show," and in a paper in the <i>Philosophical +Transactions</i> tried to <a name="774">{774}</a> account for it. It is found that flesh +will continue luminous about four days. +</p> +<p> +Among the insect-world there are numerous light-giving members. The +common glowworm needs no description, and the <i>lantern</i> flies of the +tropics are almost as well known. Tropical regions abound with these +fire-flies, seventy kinds of which are found in South America and the +southern states of the northern continent. Some of them emit the light +from the abdomen, others from the head. The famous <i>Fulgora +lanternaria</i>, or lantern-fly of Linnaeus, produces the light from the +long transparent horn or proboscis curving upward from the head. The +light of one of these is sufficiently bright to read a newspaper by, +and two or three of them in a bottle is the common form of lamp. The +natives also light their way on a dark night by tying one or two at +the end of a stick. The <i>Noctua psi</i>, a little gray night-flying moth, +is luminous, as also are some kinds of caterpillars; and the cricket +and "daddy long-legs" have the same property attributed to them by +some naturalists. The reader cannot fail to have noticed that there is +no instance recorded of any larger animal producing phosphoric light. +Invisible animalcula and insects are numerous, and of late years the +common earthworm, or <i>Lambricus</i>, has been proved beyond doubt to have +a phosphoric power; but beyond this, and the crawling centipede +(<i>Scolopendra</i>), there is no animal with light-giving power. The +gleaming light seen in the eyes of cats, dogs, and wild animals has +been called phosphoric; but this is doubtful, and more nearly +resembles some phase of reflected light. Humboldt, and later the +natural historian, Reuger, speak of a monkey, <i>Nyctipithecus +trivirgatus</i> as having eyes so brilliant as to illumine objects some +inches off. +</p> +<p> +But this is the only case of at all probable phosphoric light. +Perhaps, in this very instance, it arose from some peculiar physical +condition of the animal; in the same way as the scintillation in the +eyes of one or two human beings was found connected with extreme +delicacy of constitution. The phenomenon of brilliant colors being +perceived on a person pressing his eye, or on the injury of the optic +nerve, is called by Mr. Phipson <i>subjective</i> phosphorescence, but this +is only an undeveloped hypothesis. +</p> +<p> +Old dames and superstitious northerners speak of <i>Elf-candles</i> as +preceding death; and of the fact of human bodies during life +exhibiting phosphoric light there is no doubt, but it also depends on +the state of the body, and does not signify the sure approach of +death. A lady in Italy is described by Bartholin as producing +phosphoric radiation when her body was gently rubbed with dry linen, +and more than one instance of pale light surrounding sick persons is +recorded on good authority. This portion of the science of +phosphorescence is involved in the same mystery as the previously +described branches; theories are suggested; but no real satisfactory +explanation is found for the different kinds of luminosity. We will +close this article with an account given by Dr. Kane of an +extraordinary case of phosphorescence on the human body which occurred +in the polar regions. It was on the night of January 2, 1854, that the +party sought shelter from an icy death-dealing wind in an Esquimaux +hut. Exhaustion, added to the intense cold, induced sleep, but as the +doctor was composing himself for the night, he was aroused by an +exclamation that the fire was out. To try and relight it was the +instant endeavor of Dr. Kane and his man. The latter failing, the +doctor, in despair, sought to do so himself. "It was so intensely +dark," says he, "that I had to grope for it (the pistol with which +they strove to produce a spark), and in doing so touched his hand. At +that instant, the pistol became distinctly visible. A pale bluish +light, slightly tremulous, but not broken, covered the metallic parts +of it—the barrel, lock, and trigger. The <a name="775">{775}</a> stock, too, was +clearly discernible, as if by the reflected light, and to the +amazement of both of us, the thumb and two fingers with which Petersen +was holding it, the creases, wrinkles, and circuit of the nails +clearly defined upon the skin. The phosphorescence was not unlike the +ineffectual fire of the glowworm. As I took the pistol, my hand became +illuminated also, and so did the powder-rubbed paper when I raised it +against the muzzle. The paper did not ignite at the first trial; but +the light from it continuing, I was able to charge the pistol without +difficulty." +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>From The Month. +<br><br> +CIVILIZATION IN THE FIFTH CENTURY.</h2> +<br> +<p> +The name of Ozanam was already celebrated in the world of letters, and +he had published some portions of his historical course, when he died, +in the midst of his unfinished labors. His early death is a fresh +proof of the truth of the old adage, <i>Ars longa, vita brevis</i>, and the +interest of his short autobiography is intense. He tells us of +himself: "In the midst of an age of scepticism God gave me the +blessing of having a Christian father and a religious mother; and he +gave me for my first instructress a sister full of intelligence, and +devout, like the angels whom she has gone to join. But, in the course +of time, the rumors of an infidel world reached even to me, and I knew +all the horror of those doubts which weigh down the heart during the +day, and which return at night upon the pillow moistened with tears. +The uncertainty of my eternal destiny left me no repose. I clung with +despair to the sacred dogmas, and I thought I felt them give way in my +grasp. It was then that I was saved by the teaching of a priest well +versed in philosophy. He arranged and cleared up my ideas. I believed +from that time with a firm faith, and, penetrated with the sense of so +rare a blessing, I vowed to God that I would devote my life to the +service of that truth which had given me peace. Twenty years have +passed away since that time. Providence has done everything to snatch +me from business and to fix me in intellectual labors. The combination +of circumstances has led me to study chiefly religion, law, and +letters. I have visited the places which could afford me information. +The historian Gibbon, as he wandered on the capitol, beheld issuing +from the gates of the basilica of Ara Coeli a long procession of +Franciscans, who marked with their sandals the pavement trodden by so +many triumphs. It was then that, inspired by indignation, he formed +the design of avenging antiquity thus outraged by Christian barbarism, +and he conceived the plan of a History of the Fall of the Roman +Empire. I too have seen the monks of Ara Coeli tread the ancient +pavement of Jupiter Capitolinus, and I rejoiced at it, as the victory +of love over strength; and I resolved to write the history of progress +in those ages where philosophy finds only decadence; the history of +civilization in barbarous times, the history of thought escaping the +shipwreck of letters, <i>forti tegente brachio</i>" (Pref., pp. 2, 5.) +</p> +<p> +The professor relates himself, with all the vigor of his intellect, +the great and glorious plan of history which was the object of his +life, in a letter dated Jan. 25, 1848: "This will be the literary +history of barbarous times, the history of letters, and consequently +<a name="776">{776}</a> of civilization, from the Latin decadence, and the first +beginning of Christian genius, to the end of the thirteenth century. I +shall make it the subject of my lectures during ten years, if it is +necessary, and if God prolongs my life. The subject would be +admirable, for it would consist in making known this long and +laborious education which the Church bestowed on modern nations." He +then marks the salient points of his picture—the intellectual state +of the world at the commencement of Christianity—the <i>monde barbare</i> +and its irruption into civilized society, and met by the labors of +Boethius, Isidore of Seville, Ven. Bede, and St. Boniface, who carried +the torch of learning from one country to another, and handed it down +to Charlemagne. Then follow the crusades, and then the three glorious +centuries of the middle ages, when St. Anselm, St. Bernard, Peter +Lombard, Albert the Great, St. Thomas, and St. Bonaventure achieved +for the world of intellect all that the Church and state acquired from +Gregory VII., Alexander III., Innocent III. and IV., Frederic II., St. +Louis, and Alfonso X. He gives a <i>résumé</i> of the events which +influenced modern history, and ends by saying, "My labors would be +completed by <i>la Divina Commedia</i>, the greatest monument of a period, +of which it may be called an abridgment, and of which it is the +glory." "This is proposed to himself by a man who was near dying, a +year and a half ago, and who is not yet wholly recovered. But I depend +entirely on the goodness of God, in case he is pleased to restore my +health and preserve to me the love for these noble studies with which +he has inspired me." (Pref., pp. 3-6.) +</p> +<p> +Such was the object and occupation of his life from the age of +eighteen, when he was an obscure student, to the time when he +pronounced, as professor, the lectures which contained the labors of +twenty years. Happily for himself, he had learnt early the result of +labor. When he was twenty years of age, he wrote, "We exist on earth +only to accomplish the will of God. This will is fulfilled day by day; +and he who dies, leaving his task unfinished, is, in the sight of the +divine maker, as far advanced as he who has had time to bring his to +completion." +</p> +<p> +It was at Pisa, April 23, 1853, that M. Ozanam wrote a prayer so +solemn, as well as so touching, that his friend, Father Ampère, seems +to hesitate whether it ought to be laid before the public. His +hesitation was conquered by the desire of making what is so excellent +known, and he publishes the soliloquy of the dying man: +</p> +<p> +"I have said, 'In the midst of my days I shall go down to the gates of +death,' etc. (Canticle Ezek.) +</p> +<p> +"This day is completed my fortieth year: more than half the ordinary +span of life. I am, however, dangerously ill. Must I, then, quit all +these possessions which thou thyself hast given me, my God? Wilt thou +not, O Lord, accept a part of the sacrifice? Which of my ill-regulated +affections shall I offer up to thee? Wilt not thou accept the +holocaust of my literary self-love, my academical ambition, my +prospects for study, in which, perhaps, there is mingled more pride +than zeal for truth? If I sold the half of my books and gave the price +of them to the poor, and if I restricted myself to fulfilling the +duties of my office, and consecrated the rest of my life to visiting +the poor and instructing apprentices and soldiers, Lord, would this be +a sufficient satisfaction, and wouldst thou leave me the happiness of +living to old age with my wife, and completing the education of my +child? Perhaps, O my God, this is not thy will. Thou wilt not accept +these selfish offerings. Thou rejectest my holocaust and my +sacrifices. It is myself whom thou requirest. It is written in the +commencement of the book that I must do thy will, and I have said, O +Lord, I come." +</p> +<p> +It is with a solemn interest that we turn to the fragments of that +work to which Ozanam devoted his life and <a name="777">{777}</a> energies, and we find +it to be the history of modern Europe. He himself lays down the three +elements of history. "First, chronology, which preserves the general +succession of events; then legend, which gives them life and color; +and then philosophy, which fills them, as it were, with soul and +intelligence." +</p> +<p> +In the childhood of the world, when the desire of knowledge was fresh +and strong, all pagan histories began with the siege of Troy, and all +Christian histories from Adam and Eve. Authors gained fame by +chronicles of all past events, because it satisfied the natural +curiosity of man to know the antecedents of his country or race. As +time went on, history became the expression of popular feelings; and +what took place generally may be inferred from what we know of our own +country. The British monk, Geoffrey of Monmouth, wrote of Arthur, the +champion of the faith and the model of chivalry; and the Venerable +Bede wrote of the saints among his own Saxon countrymen; then came, +with the evils of the reformation, a reverence for what was ancient, +and Stow wrote of Catholic England with a fidelity which ranked him +among the benefactors of his country. But then also egotism began. +Each must think for himself, and appropriate the results of former +labors; each must analyze, or generalize, or criticise; and perhaps it +is true that the original writer is he who gives to the world his own +view of things, and not the things themselves. If he is unselfish and +loves truth for itself, he is a poet; if he subjects truth to his own +views, he writes of history, but he does not write history; facts +become subservient to theories, and he mentions only a few, as +necessary illustrations of his own system. The reader yawns over the +succession of kings and events, and chooses for his guide the infidel +Hume, the philanthropic Mackintosh, or the Hanoverian Macaulay. The +fashion of the present day is the idolization of nature. This has made +art pre-Raphaelite, and poetry euphuistic. History, too, is perhaps +becoming a laborious restoration of the past. With a taste for detail +which is truly Gothic, the popular historian must reproduce his +characters with their own features, costume, and <i>entourage</i>, and the +long forgotten personages, as if restored to life by the genius of Sir +Walter Scott, must walk about the stage in mediaeval garb. History has +gone through nearly the same phases on the continent until the period +of the reformation. Then in Catholic countries—as France, Spain, and +Italy—arose a more reasoning but a grave and instructive school of +history, which preserved past events as a deposit of the ages of +faith; and latterly, since excitement is become necessary to all, and +the speculations of German literature have taught almost all to think, +the French and German historians have adopted the philosophy of +history. The German school takes a naked problem and proves it by a +series of abstractions. We read Schlegel and Guizot, and we find, +instead of facts or dates or persons, a sort of allegorical +personification of civilization, liberty, progress, etc. This is +rather declamation than narration, and those among the learned who +value antiquity have found the art of realizing not the externals but +the spirit of the past. Thus when Ozanam, as the professor of foreign +literature at Paris, writes of the middle ages, the persons whom he +names are, for the moment, living, not petrified, as in the +stereoscope, but thinking, speaking, and acting, as if the writer +could open a bright glimpse into the eternal world, where St. Denys, +St. Bernard, St. Bonaventure, and St. Thomas still contemplate the +author and giver of all they knew. And when he speaks of the +succession of events, it seems as if we passed from the midst of a +crowded procession, jostling along the dusty highway, to an eminence +from which we see the points of its departure and arrival, the +distinguished persons, the great objects, and the direction of the +march, and that we <a name="778">{778}</a> not only see but understand and sympathize +with the spirit of the undertaking. The thought is from above, but it +becomes our own. For he not only classifies and generalizes, but he +christianizes his glimpses into history. His pictures are indeed only +illustrative of his principles; but when he introduces a person or a +fact, he speaks of them with such intimacy of knowledge that it +creates a keen curiosity as well as a consciousness of ignorance in +the reader. But the reader of Ozanam must be already a historian +before he can appreciate the benefit of having his knowledge +classified and animated by a living principle, as well as vivified and +rendered distinct, as the objects in a dull landscape by a beam of +sunshine. +</p> +<p> +The mission of Ozanam seems to be the destruction of those errors as +to the value of the knowledge possessed in the middle ages, which have +existed since the renaissance. +</p> +<p> +It was natural that when the calamities of Europe were so far past as +to permit the development of the intellectual faculties, men should be +elated by their new powers, and undervalue the painful labors of men +interrupted by violence and crime. Maitland, by the evidence of his +own reading, saw the injustice of this, and said wittily, that "by the +dark ages were meant the ages about which we are in the dark." But he +could see only the outward face of mediaeval knowledge, and missed its +vivifying spirit—the faith of the Church. Ozanam had the gift of +faith, and traces with a firm hand the progress of human intellect, +often concealed and limited, but always advancing, and often breaking +out in power and glory when some sainted pope or doctor of the Church +explained the principles of religion and philosophy. +</p> +<p> +But it would be presumptuous to anticipate Ozanam himself, whose own +words as well as his very life itself have given a <i>résumé</i> of his +great object. It is at the conclusion of a lecture that he thus +addresses the students: +</p> +<p> +"It is not my intention to follow out into its minor details the +literary history of the fifth century. I only seek in it that light +which will clear up the obscurity of the following ages. Travellers +tell us of rivers which flow underneath rocks, and which reappear at a +distance from the place where they were lost to the view. I trace up +the stream of these traditions above the point where it seems to be +lost, and I shall endeavor to descend with the stream into the abyss, +in order to assure myself that I really behold the same waters at +their outlet. Historians have opened a chasm between antiquity and +barbarism. I have attempted to replace the connections which +Providence has never suffered to fail in time any more than in space, +etc. I should not brave the difficulties of such a study, gentlemen, +if I were not supported, nay, urged onwards, by you. I call to witness +these walls, that if ever, at rare intervals, I have been visited by +inspiration, it was within their circuit; whether they have given back +some of the glorious echoes with which they have formerly rung, or +whether I have felt myself carried away by your ardent sympathies. +Perhaps my design is rash; but you must share the responsibility. You +will make up the deficiency of my strength. I shall grow old and +gray-haired in the labor, if God permits; but the coldness of age +shall not gain upon me so far as that I shall not be able to return, +as this day, in order to renew the young vigor of my heart in the +warmth of your youthful days." +</p> +<p> +It is in his lecture on pagan empires that Ozanam lays down the +principle on which his views of mediaeval history are based: "Each +epoch has a ruin and a conquest—a decadence and a renaissance." The +greatest epoch of the world's history is that when all that was given +to man at his creation was exchanged for a better nature at his +redemption. This truth of destruction and regeneration is repeated +over and over again through all created things—the seed must die +before the <a name="779">{779}</a> new grain can live. As each individual must be +changed from the excellence of what he is still by nature to a +heavenly model, so nations must be changed, and institutions perish +and revive, and the great republic of letters, founded before the +flood and perfected in Greece and Rome, must die and be regenerated in +the Christian Church. The first decadence is that of pagan Rome. +</p> +<p> +It is impossible to represent by quotations the grand but terrible +picture which Ozanam draws of paganism, in its glory, its worldly +splendor, and its spiritual darkness. He does full justice to the +excellence of every art and science which the heathens attained; but +he shows that while the court of Augustus was the model of refinement +and civilization, the altars were smoking with incense to devils, who +were the personifications of every vice, and the rites of the temples +were incantations and abominations. An audience of Christian students +could not bear the too revolting details. +</p> +<p> +His object was the same as that of the great author of +"<i>Callista</i>"—to destroy the prestige which still invests all that is +classical. Rome was in truth a majestic empire, and even St. Jerome +trembled at its fall: <i>"Elle est captive la cité qui mit en captivité +le monde."</i> +</p> +<p> +St. Augustin was not a Roman, and was less overpowered by the terror +of its fall. In the midst of the outcries which accused Christianity +as the cause of the ruin which involved the world by the evident +vengeance of heaven, the saint wrote his "City of God," and developed +from the creation of the world to the times in which he lived the +great Christian law of <i>progress</i>. A new empire—that of +conscience—was to rule all nations. In this new empire strength and +courage were of no avail, and women were as powerful as men in +converting the world. Clotilde converted the heathen Franks, and +Theodolind the Arian Lombards. The holy bishop St. Patrick converted +in his lifetime the whole Irish nation; and the holy monk St. Benedict +founded in the desert of Cassino the monastic armies of the Church; +while St. Gregory, from his bed of sickness, headed the battle of +civilization against barbarism. The victory was complete, and every +converted country sent forth its missionaries to form Christian +colonies. +</p> +<p> +Thus fell the <i>power</i> of Rome, but not her <i>influence</i>, for the great +influence of paganism was the excellence of its literature. Though the +Augustan writers were no more, yet Ammianus Marcellinus wrote history +with the spirit of a soldier, and Vegetius wrote the precepts of the +art of conquering. Symmachus was thought to rival Pliny in his +letters; and, at the same time, Claudian, the last and not the least +of Latin poets, succeeded Lucan in those historical epics so popular +at Rome. He celebrated the war of Gildo and the victories of Stilicho +over the Goths in verses equal to the "<i>Pharsalia;</i>" and his +invectives against Eutropius and Rufinus, in defense of Stilicho his +patron, are still considered masterpieces. He ignored not only +Christianity but Christian writers, though St. Ambrose was at Milan +and St. Augustin at Carthage, and wrote gravely of mythology in an age +when few pagans believed its fables. He was an Egyptian by birth, and +trained in the schools of Alexandria, and was patronized by the +Christian emperor Honorius, who erected to him—as to the best of poets— +a statue in Trajan's Forum. Yet Claudian had truly pagan morals; he +praised the vices of his patron Stilicho, and when he was murdered he +wrote a poem to his enemy; "he misused both panegyric and satire, the +powers of a good understanding and a rich fancy and flowing +versification, which place him, after an interval of three hundred +years, among the poets of ancient Rome." But while Claudian celebrated +the conflict of Rome with the barbarians, he perceived not the mighty +war between Christianity and paganism; and while our Lord and his +blessed Mother <a name="780">{780}</a> triumphed over the idols and their temples, he +wasted his poetry in their praise; and when he recited a poem in the +presence of Honorius and the senate, he spoke to them as if they +believed in mythology. Ozanam gives one remarkable proof of the hold +over men's minds retained by paganism. When Honorius took possession +of the palace of Augustus on Mount Palatine, he assembled the senate, +and in the presence of all these great persons, many of whom were +Christian, Claudian unrolled the parchment whereon his verses were +written in letters of gold, and addressed Honorius as resembling +Jupiter conquering the giants. And again, when he had the office of +showing the splendors of Rome to Honorius, when he visited it for the +first time (404), he spoke of the city as a pagan in the language of +idolatry. And the poet Rutilius, though born in Gaul, idolized Rome. +"Rome was the last divinity of the ancients. Mother of men and gods" +(he calls her, as he wrote his "Itinerary to Gaul"), "the sun rises +and sets in thy dominions; thou hast made one country of many +nations—one city of the world. Thy year is an eternal spring; the +winter dares not stay thy joy." So powerful was the influence of pagan +Rome over a foreigner; and that influence may be yet better perceived +in the Christian poet Sidonius Apollinaris, who, though brought up, +like Ausonius, in the Gallic schools, and sound in faith, could not +write hexameters without mythology. The only language of poetry was +pagan; and when he wrote to St. Patient, bishop of Lyons (who fed his +people in famine), he compared him to Triptolemus. +</p> +<p> +The first antagonist of the Church, in her task of regenerating +society, was paganism; the second, barbarism. Charlemagne constructed, +on the ruins of the Roman empire, an empire of enlightened +Christianity; but another decadence followed. The Normans sacked +monasteries, and burned the Holy Scriptures, together with Aristotle +and Virgil. The Huns destroyed the very grass of the fields. The +Lombards seemed to be sent for the destruction of all that was left of +human kind. Ozanam says, "Providence loves to surprise." The monks who +escaped the Norman pirates preached to them amidst the ashes of their +monasteries, and the Normans became Christians. Then arose the +basilicas of Palermo and Monreale in Sicily, and the churches of +Italy, Normandy, and England. St. Adalbert converted the Huns, and +they defended Christendom against the vices of Byzantium and the +invasions of Mohammedans. On the ruins of the Roman empire arose the +kingdoms of France, Germany, and Italy. Of this new empire, feudality +and chivalry were the opposite elements. Feudality was the principle +of division, chivalry that of fraternity; and these remodelled +society. +</p> +<p> +The calamities attending this final disruption of the empire +interrupted study, and learning was confined to the islands of Great +Britain and Ireland, from whence missionaries carried not only +religion but learning into the countries where they were almost +extinguished by the Goths. Germany had three great +monasteries—Nouvelle Corbie, Fulda, and St. Gall. At this last +monastery was preserved the classic literature. Monks studied grammar +and wrote AEneids. The royal Hedwige introduced the study of Greek at +St. Gull; and Ozanam relates it in one of those graphic incidents +which are worth volumes. A new period began with Gregory VII. When he +said, "Lord, I have loved justice, and hated iniquity; wherefore I die +in exile," a bishop replied, "You cannot die in exile, because God has +given you the earth for your jurisdiction, and the nations for your +inheritance." Then followed the crusades, that wonderful and +providential means by which the civilization of the East was brought +into the service of the Western Church. They destroyed feudalism; for +all who fought gained glory, whether serf or noble. <a name="781">{781}</a> Chivalric +poetry arose. Germany had its Niebelungen, Spain its Cid. Then arose +the arts around Giotto and the tomb of St. Francis. Christian +architecture was not Roman. The small temples and large amphitheatres, +etc., were replaced by large churches, public halls, schools and +hospitals, a small town round a large cathedral. There were three +capitals: Rome, the seat of the Papacy; Aix-la-Chapelle, the seat of +empire; and Paris, of the schools. +</p> +<p> +How paganism perished is perhaps one of the most useful lectures in +the course, as it bears upon the doubts which are still felt by some +as to the use of pagan books in Christian education. Ozanam shows that +the monks preserved by transcribing the works of Seneca and Cicero, +and that St. Augustin brought Plato and Aristotle into Christian +schools; that St. Augustin, St. Jerome, and St. Basil preserved the +heathen poets till Christian poets had learnt their art; nay, how the +Church protected the Gallic bards and German scalds, and taught them +to sing the praises of God. St. Gregory preserved the Saxon temples, +and even adapted their rites and festivals to be used in Christian +worship, that what had been perverted to the service of devils might +be restored to God. +</p> +<p> +The contrast—the abyss—between the middle ages and the renaissance +has been exaggerated. There was literary paganism in the ages of +faith. The troubadours sang of mythology, and the language of idolatry +was purified by its application to the praises of the martyrs, as is +shown in the poems of St. Paulinus. When the Church emerged from +persecution, the Roman schools became Christian; and when the Lombards +threatened to plunge Christendom in darkness, there were two lamps +still burning in the night—episcopal and monastic teaching; and in +these, by degrees, the pagan books and pagan literature were replaced +by Christian works, in which, however, there were still abundant +traces of their pagan masters. +</p> +<p> +It is in a fragment that Ozanam speaks of the way in which the +valuable part of antiquity was preserved. "When winter begins, it +seems as if vegetation would perish. The wind sweeps away the flowers +and leaves; but the seeds remain. The providence of God watches over +them. They are defended by a husk against the cold, and have wings +which bear them to congenial places, where they spring again. So, when +the ages of barbarism came, the winter of human nature, it seems as if +poetry and all the vegetation of thought would perish; but it was +preserved in the dry questions of the schools through three or four +centuries; and when the time and place came, the man of genius was +raised up, and in his hands they grew again. Such was St. Thomas of +Aquin, the champion of dogmatism; and St. Bonaventure, of mysticism; +and Christendom had its own philosophy." Perhaps we do not realize +sufficiently the despair which was the lot of reflecting heathens. +They sought the aid of philosophy to console them "for hopeless +deterioration from a golden to an iron age; but philosophy could only +teach that the world was perishing, and that the pride of man must +preserve him from erring and perishing with its possessions. The +heathens knew not the idea of progress; but the gospel teaches and +commands human perfectibility, and says to each, Be ye perfect; and to +all, Let the Church grow into the fulness of Christ." It was faith, +hope, and charity which produced progress. +</p> +<p> +And, first, faith set free the human mind from the ignorance of God. +Idolatry was not only that men gave to devils the worship which they +owed to God; it was the love of what is mortal and perishable, instead +of what is spiritual and eternal; it sunk mankind into materialism and +sensuality. "Painters and sculptors represented only corporeal beauty: +there was no expression in the figures of Phidias or Parrhasius." +Ozanam shows how Christian art used what is material <a name="782">{782}</a> only as +symbolism, and expressed by form and color what is invisible and +celestial; while poetry was rescued from degradation, and became what +it really is, the noblest aspiration after truth of which man in his +present state is capable. Philosophy was freed from the trammels of +false systems, and speculated securely and deeply on the divine and +human nature. "Origen formed in the Catechetical schools of Alexandria +the science of theology," and in "the golden age of this new science +St. Jerome taught exegesis, St. Augustin dogmatic, and St. Ambrose +moral theology. St. Anselm was tormented by the desire of finding a +short proof that God exists, and with him began metaphysics." These +were the rich treasures which lay concealed in the scholastic teaching +of the middle ages. +</p> +<p> +As theology and Christian philosophy had sprung from faith, so hope +extended knowledge, because men labored with fresh vigor in improving +science. "The course of ages offers no grander spectacle than that of +man taking possession of nature by knowledge." In the seventh century +the Byzantine monks pierced the steppes of Central Asia, and passed +the wall of China; monks took the message of the Pope to the Khan +before Marco Polo visited the East; and monks, in the eighth century, +visited Iceland and even America. It was the calculations of the +middle ages which emboldened Columbus to discover a new world and new +creation; and when Magellan sailed round the globe, "man was master of +his abode." He goes on: "When man had conquered the earth, he could +not rest; Copernicus burst through the false heavens of Ptolemy; the +telescope discovered the secrets of the stars, and calculation +numbered their laws and orbits in the abyss of heaven. Woe be to those +who are led away by such a sight from God! The stars told his glory to +David, and so they did also to Kepler and to Newton." +</p> +<p> +It was by the third and greatest of the theological virtues, charity, +that the moral as well as the intellectual nature of man was +regenerated, though the change was wrought, perhaps, by slower +degrees. Slavery of the most revolting kind—that slavery which +ignores the soul and the reason, as well as the social rights of the +slave, was replaced by liberty, oppression and injustice by laws which +are still based upon the letter of the Roman laws; but administered +with the equity of the Christian code. Cruelty and indifference to +human life, as shown in the national passion for gladiatorial games, +was replaced by gentleness and all good works; and the luxury of +palaces, baths, etc., was replaced by gorgeous churches and hospitals. +Education, which had been restricted to the few, was thrown open to +all by free schools and by Christian preaching. Above all, the +daughters of Eve, who were degraded below the condition of the very +slaves, were raised to be helps-meet for Christians, either by the +sacrament of marriage or by the holiness of virginity. +</p> +<p> +In speaking of the reconstruction of intellectual action in the +civilization of Western Christendom, Ozanam has a grand and striking +thought, that the first step to this was uniformity of language. The +confusion of tongues which began at Babel was silenced throughout the +world by the universal use of the Latin language, which was adopted by +the Church; and that language, which was formed to express all the +passions and vices, as well as the strength and intelligence of man, +conveyed, by the words of St. Gelasius and St. Gregory, the most +sublime devotion; by those of St. Jerome, the deep senses of the Holy +Scriptures; and when the Christian intellect was free to develop +itself, there arose that Christian eloquence in preaching the gospel +which influenced, for the first time, all ranks and all dispositions +of men. +</p> +<p> +The present edition of the author's works is conducted by friends who +understood and valued his object, and <a name="783">{783}</a> who were able to fill up, +without blemishing, the unfinished parts of his lectures. Nothing can +be done more faithfully, or in better taste; but there are many blanks +too wide to be filled even by such skilful hands. Ozanam says himself, +that the two poles of his work are the "Essays on the Germans before +Christianity," and that on Dante. These form the third and fourth +volumes. In the fifth volume is his "Essay on the Franciscan Poets;" +and that on Dante closes the series. We have confined ourselves to the +subject-matter of the first and second volumes, which contain the +lectures on the civilization of the fifth century, and which suffice +to show the lofty Christian philosophy with which Ozanam beholds the +course of modern history. More than this it would be difficult to +show. The lectures themselves are fragments; ideas snatched from the +rapid flow of his eloquence, and that eloquence itself could feebly +express the thoughts which visited his mind, and the impressions of +glory which left no trace but sensation. There is no chronology, no +succession. He fixes his eyes on the fifth century—he penetrates its +mysteries, and the secret influences which it sends forth to after +times. He speaks of what he sees; and we learn that the world of +Christendom has had its decadence and renaissance, yet that progress +continues. The crimes of the middle ages conceal that progress, and so +do the troubles of the present time. <i>O passi graviora, dabit Deus hic +quoque finem</i>. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>From Chambers's Journal. +<br><br> +THE BELLS OF AVIGNON.</h2> +<br> +<pre> + Avignon was a joyous city, + A joyous town with many a steeple, + Towers and tourelles, roofs and turrets, + Sheltering a merry people. + In each tower, the bells of silver, + Bronze or iron, swayed so proudly, + Tolling deep and swinging cheerly, + Beating fast and beating loudly. + + One! Two! Three! Four! ever sounding; + Two! Four! One! Three! still repeating; + Five! Seven! Six! Eight! hurrying, chasing; + Bim-bom-bing-bang merry beating. + All the day the dancing sextons + Dragged at bell-ropes, rising, falling; + Clanging bells, inquiring, answering, + From the towers were ever calling. + + Cardinals, in crimson garments, + Stood and listened to the chiming; + And within his lofty chateau + Sate the pope, and beat the timing. + Minstrels, soldiers, monks, and jesters + Laughed to hear the merry clamor, + As above them in the turrets + Music clashed from many a hammer. +</pre> +<a name="784">{784}</a> +<pre> + Avignon was a joyous city: + Far away across the bridges, + 'Mong the vine-slopes, upward lessening, + To the brown cliffs' highest ridges, + Clamored those sonorous bells; + In the summer's noontide wrangling, + In one silver knot of music + All their chimes together tangling. + + Showering music on the people + Round the town-house in the mornings; + Scattering joy and jubilations, + Hope and welcome, wrath and scornings; + Ushering kings, or mourning pontiffs; + Clanging in the times of thunder, + And on nights when conflagrations + Clove the city half asunder. + + Nights and nights across the river, + Through the darkness starry-dotted, + Far across the bridge so stately. + Now by lichens blurred and blotted, + Came that floating, mournful music, + As from bands of angels flying, + With the loud blasts of the tempest + Still victoriously vieing. + + Who could tell why Avignon + All its bells was ever pealing? + Whether to scare evil spirits, + Still round holy cities stealing. + Yet, perhaps, that ceaseless chiming, + And that pleasant silver beating, + Was but as of children playing, + And their mother's name repeating. + + One! Two! Three! the bells went prattling, + With a music so untiring; + One! Two! Three! in merry cadence, + Rolling, crashing, clanging, firing. + Hence it was that in past ages, + When 'mid war those sounds seemed sweeter, + <i>La Ville Sonnante</i> people called it, + City sacred to Saint Peter. + + Years ago! but now all silent, + Lone and sad, the grass-grown city, + Has its bell-towers all deserted + By those ringers—more's the pity. + Pope and cardinal are vanished, + And no music fills the night-air; + Gone the red robes and the sable; + Gone the crosier and the mitre. +</pre> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="785">{785}</a> +<br> +<h2>From The Lamp. +<br><br> +ALL-HALLOW EVE; OR, THE TEST OF FUTURITY. +<br><br> +BY ROBERT CURTIS. +<br><br> +CHAPTER X.</h2> +<br> +<p> +It is not to be wondered at that two persons, equally clever in all +respects, and having a similar though not identical object in view, +should have pretty much the same thoughts respecting the manner of +carrying it out, and finally pursue the same course to effect their +purpose. But the matter involves some nicety, if not difficulty, when +it so happens that those two persons have to work upon each other in a +double case. It is then a matter of diamond cut diamond; and if, as I +have suggested, both are equally clever, the discussion of the subject +between them would make no bad scene in a play. Winny wanted to find +out something from Kate Mulvey, and at the same time to hide something +from her. Kate Mulvey was on precisely the same intent with Winny +Cavana in both ways; so that some such tournament must come off +between them the first time they met, with sufficient opportunity to +"have it out" without interruption. +</p> +<p> +You have seen that Winny had determined to sound her friend Kate, as +to how her land lay between these two young men. If Kate had not made +a like determination as to sounding Winny, she was, at all events, +ready for the encounter at any moment, and had discussed the matter +over and over in her own mind. Their mutual object, then, was to find +out which of the young men was the real object of the other's +affections; and up to the present moment each believed the other to be +a formidable rival to her own hopes. +</p> +<p> +Winny was not one who hesitated about any matter which she felt to +require immediate performance; and as she knew that some indefinite +time might elapse before an opportunity could occur to have her chat +out with Kate Mulvey, she was resolved to make one. +</p> +<p> +Her father's house, as the reader has seen in the commencement, was +not on the roadside. There was no general pass that way; and except +persons had business to old Cavana's or Mick Murdock's, they never +went up the lane, which was common to both the houses of these rich +farmers. It was not so with the house where Kate Mulvey resided. Its +full front was to the high-road, with a space not more than three +perches between. This space had been originally what is termed in that +rank of life "a bawn," but was now wisely converted into a +cabbage-garden, with a broad clean gravel-walk running through the +centre of the plot, from the road to the door. It was about half a +mile from Cavana's, and there was a full view of the road, for a long +stretch, from the door or window of the house—that is, of Mulvey's. +</p> +<p> +It was now a fine mild day toward the end of November. Old Mick +Murdock's party had ceased to be spoken of, and perhaps forgotten, +except by the few with whom we have to do. Winny Cavana put on her +everyday bonnet and her everyday cloak, and started for a walk. +Bully-dhu capered round her in an awkward playful manner, with a +deep-toned howl of joy when he saw these preparations, and trotted +down the lane before her. As may be anticipated, she bent her steps +down the road toward Mulvey's house. She knew she could be seen coming +for some distance, and hoped that Kate might greet her from the door +as she passed. She <a name="786">{786}</a> was not mistaken; Kate had seen her from the +first turn in the road toward the house, and was all alive on her own +account. She had tact and vanity enough, however,—for she had plenty +of time before Winny came alongside of the house,—to slip in and put +on a decent gown, and brush her beautiful and abundant hair; and she +came to the door, as if by mere accident, but looking her very best, +as Winny approached. Kate knew that she was looking very handsome, and +Winny Cavana, at the very first glance, felt the same fact. +</p> +<p> +"Good morrow, Kate," said Winny; "that's a fine day." +</p> +<p> +"Good morrow kindly, Winny; won't you come in and sit down awhile?" +</p> +<p> +"No, thank you; the day is so fine, I'm out for a walk. You may as +well put on your bonnet, and come along with me; it will do you good, +Kitty." +</p> +<p> +"With all my heart; step up to the house, and I'll be ready in two +twos." But she was not so sure that it would do her good. +</p> +<p> +The girls then turned up to the house, for Kate had run down in her +hair to shake hands with her friend. Winny would not go in, but stood +at the door, ordering Bully-dhu not to growl at Captain, and begging +of Captain not to growl at Bully-dhu. Kate was scarcely the "two twos" +she gave herself until she came out ready for the road; and the two +friends, and the two dogs, having at once entered into most amicable +relations with each other, went off together. +</p> +<p> +Winny was resolved that no "awkward pause" on her part should give +Kate reason to suppose there was anything unusual upon her mind, and +went on at once, as if from where she had left off. +</p> +<p> +"The day was so fine, Kate," she continued, "that I was anxious to get +some fresh air. I have been churning, and packing butter, every day +since Monday, and could not get out. Biddy Murtagh is very clean and +honest, but she is very slow, and I could not leave her." +</p> +<p> +"It is well for you, Winny, that has the butter to pack." +</p> +<p> +"Yes, Kate, I suppose it will be well for me some day or other; but as +long as my poor father lives—God between him and harm!—I don't feel +the want of anything." +</p> +<p> +"God spare him to you, Winny <i>mavourneen!</i> He's a fine hale old man, +and I hope he'll live to be at the christening of many a grandchild. +If report speaks thrue, Winny dear, that same is not unlikely to come +round." +</p> +<p> +"Report does not always speak the truth, Kate; don't you know that?" +</p> +<p> +"I do; but I also know that there's seldom smoke without fire, and +that it sometimes makes a good hit. And sure, nothin's more reasonable +than that it's right this time. Tom's a fine young fellow; an' like +yourself, sure, he's an only child. There wasn't such a weddin' this +hundred years—no, nor never—in the parish of Rathcash, as it will +be—come now!" +</p> +<p> +"Tom is a fine young man, Kate; I don't deny it—" +</p> +<p> +"You couldn't—you couldn't, Winny Cavana! you'd belie yoursel' if you +did," said Kate, with a little more warmth of manner than was quite +politic under the circumstances. +</p> +<p> +"But I don't, Kate; and I can't see why <i>you</i> need fly at me in that +way." +</p> +<p> +"I beg your pardon, Winny dear; but sure everybody sees an' knows that +you're on for one another; an' why not?—wasn't he as cross as a bag of +cats at his father's party because he let 'that whelp' (as he called +him) Edward Lennon take you out for the first dance?" +</p> +<p> +"Emon-a-knock is no whelp; he couldn't call him a whelp. Did he call +him one?" +</p> +<p> +"Didn't you hear him? for if you didn't you might; it wasn't but he +spoke loud enough." +</p> +<p> +"It is well for him, Kate, that Emon did not hear him. He's as good a +man as Tom Murdock at any rate. <a name="787">{787}</a> He didn't fall over the poker +and tongs as Tom did." +</p> +<p> +"That was a mere accident, Winny. I seen the fung of his pump loose +myself; didn't I help to shut it for him, afther he fell?" +</p> +<p> +"You were well employed indeed, Kate," said Winny sneeringly. +</p> +<p> +"You would have done it yourself if he axed you as he did me," replied +Kate. +</p> +<p> +"Certainly not," said Winny. +</p> +<p> +So far they seemed both to have the worst of it, in spite of all their +caution. What they wanted was to find out how the other's heart stood +between these two young men, without betraying their own—which latter +they had both nearly done. +</p> +<p> +There was a pause, and Kate was the next to speak. +</p> +<p> +"Not but I must admit that Emon-a-knock is a milder, better boy in +some respects than Tom. He has a nicer way with him, Winny, and I +think it is easier somehow to like him than to like Tom." +</p> +<p> +"Report says you do, Kate dear." +</p> +<p> +"But you know, Winny, report does not always spake thrue, as you say +yourself." +</p> +<p> +"Ay, but as you said just now, Kate, it sometimes makes a good hit." +</p> +<p> +"Well, Winny, I wish you joy at all events, with all my heart. Both +your fathers is anxious for your match; an' sure, when the two farms +is joined in one, with you an' Tom, you can live like a lady. I +suppose you'll hould your head too high for poor Kate an' Emon-a-knock +then." +</p> +<p> +There was a sadness in Kate's tone as she said this, which, from +ignorance of how matters really stood, was partly genuine, and, from +anxiety to find it out, was partly assumed. +</p> +<p> +But she had turned the key and the door flew open. Winny could fence +with her feelings no longer. +</p> +<p> +"Kate Mulvey," she exclaimed, "do not believe the reports you hear +about me and Tom Murdock. I'm aware of what you say about his father +and mine being anxious to unite the farms by our marriage. I don't +want to say anything against Tom Murdock; but he'll never call me +wife. There now, Kate jewel, you have the truth. I'll be well enough +off, Kitty, without Tom Murdock's money or land; and when I really +don't care for him, don't you think it would be much better and +handsomer of him to bestow himself and it upon some nice girl without +a penny" (and she glanced slyly at Kate, whose cheeks got rosy red), +"than to be striving to force it upon one that doesn't want it—nor +wish for it? And don't you think it would be much better and handsomer +for me, who has a nice little fodeen, and must come in for my father's +land,—God between him and harm!—to do the same, if I could meet with +a nice boy that really cared for myself, and not for my money? Answer +me them questions, Kate." +</p> +<p> +Kate was silent; but her eyes had assumed quite a different +expression, if they had not altogether turned almost a different +color. The weight of Winny's rich rivalry had been lifted from her +heart, and so far as that obstacle had been dreaded, the coast was now +clear. Of course she secretly agreed in the propriety of Winny's +views, and it was only necessary that she should now do so openly. +</p> +<p> +"You didn't answer me them questions yet, Kate." +</p> +<p> +"Well I could, Winny, if I liked it; but I don't wish to have act, +hand, or part in setting you against your father's wishes." +</p> +<p> +"You need not fear that, Kitty; my father won't force me to do what I +really do not wish to do. He never put the matter to me plainly yet, +but I expect it every day. He's always praising Tom Murdock, and +hinting at the business, by saying he wishes he could see me +comfortably settled; that he is growing old and is not the man he used +to be; and all that. I know very well, Kate, what he means, both ways; +and, God between him and harm! I say again; but he'll never see me Tom +Murdock's wife. <a name="788">{788}</a> I have my answer ready for them both." +</p> +<p> +"Well, Winny, as you seem determined, I suppose I may spake; and, to +tell you the truth, I always thought it would be a pity to put them +two farms into one, and so spoil two good establishments; for sure any +one of them is lashings, Winny, for any decent boy and girl in the +parish; an' what's more, if they were joined together tomorrow, there +is not a gentleman in the county would think a bit the better of them +that had them." +</p> +<p> +"Never, Kitty, except it was some poor broken-down fellow that wanted +to borrow a couple of hundred pounds, and rob them in the end. And +now, Kitty, let us be plain and free with one another. My opinion is +that Tom could raise you—I won't say out of poverty, Kate; for, +thanks be to God, it is not come to that with you, and that it never +may—but into comfort and plenty; and that I could, some day, do the +same, if I could meet with a nice boy that, as I said, would care for +myself and not for my money. If Tom took a liking to you, Kitty, you +might know he was in earnest for yourself; I <i>know</i> he's only put up +to his make-belief liking for me by his own father and mine. But, +Kitty dear, I'm afraid, like myself, you have no fancy for him." +</p> +<p> +"Well, Winny, to tell you the truth, I always believed what the +neighbors said about you an' him; an' I tried not to think of him for +that same reason. There's no doubt, Winny dear, but it would be a fine +match for me; but I know he's out an' out for you: only for that, +Winny, I could love every bone in his body—there now! you have it +out." +</p> +<p> +"He'll soon find his mistake, Kate dear, about me. I'm sure the thing +will be brought to a point before long between us, and between my +father and me too. When Tom finds I'm positive, he can't be blind to +your merits and beauty, Kitty—yes, I will say it out, your +beauty!—you needn't be putting your hand to my mouth that way; +there's no mistake about it." +</p> +<p> +"Ah, Winny, Winny dear, you're too lenient to me entirely; sure I +couldn't sit or stand beside you in that respect at all, an' with your +money; sure they'll settle it all between themselves." +</p> +<p> +"They may settle what they like, Kitty; but they can't make me do what +I am determined not to do; so as far as that goes, you have nothing to +fear." +</p> +<p> +"Well, Winny dear, I'm glad I know the truth; for now I won't be +afeard of crossing you, at any rate; and I know another that wouldn't +be sorry to know as much as I do." +</p> +<p> +"Who, Kitty? tell us." +</p> +<p> +"Ah, then now, Winny, can't you guess? or maybe it's what you know +better than I do myself." +</p> +<p> +"Well, I suppose you mean Emon-a-knock; for indeed, Kitty, he's always +on the top of your tongue, and the parish has it that you and he are +promised. Come now, Kitty, tell us the truth. I told you how there was +no truth in the report about me and Tom Murdock, and how there never +could be." +</p> +<p> +If this was not leading Kate Mulvey to the answer most devoutly wished +for, I do not know what the meaning of the latter part of the sentence +could be. It was what the lawyers would call a "leading question." The +excitement too of Winny, during the pause which ensued, showed very +plainly the object with which she spoke, and the anxiety she felt for +the result. +</p> +<p> +Kate did not in the least misunderstand her. Perhaps she knew more of +her thoughts than Winny was aware of, and that it was not then she +found them out for the first time; for Kate was a shrewd observer. She +had gained her own object, and it was only fair she should now permit +Winny to gain hers. +</p> +<p> +"Ah, Winny dear," she said, after a contemplative pause, "there never +was a word of the kind between us. <a name="789">{789}</a> You know, Winny, in the first +place, it wouldn't do at all—two empty sacks could never stand; and +in the next place, neither his heart was on me, nor mine on him. It +was all idle talk of the neighbors. Not but Emon is a nice boy as +there is to be found in this or any other parish, and you know that, +Winny; don't you, now?" +</p> +<p> +"Kitty dear, there's nobody can deny what you say, and for that +self-same reason I believed what the neighbors said regarding you and +him." +</p> +<p> +"Tell me this now, Winny,—you know we were reared, I may say, at the +door with one another, and have been fast friends since we were that +height" (and she held her hand within about two feet of the ground, at +the same time looking fully and very kindly into her friend's face),— +"tell me now, Winny dear, did it fret you to believe what you heard? +Come now." +</p> +<p> +"For your sake, and for his, Kitty, it could not fret me; but for my +own sake—there now, don't ask me." +</p> +<p> +"No, <i>avourneen</i>, I won't; what need have I, Winny, when I see them +cheeks of yours,—or is it the sun that cum suddenly out upon you, +Winny <i>asthore?</i>" +</p> +<p> +"Kate Mulvey, I'll tell you the truth, as I believe you have told it +to me. For many a long day I'm striving to keep myself from liking +that boy on your account. I think, Kate, if I hadn't a penny-piece in +the world no more than yourself, I would have done my very best to +take him from you; it would have been a fair fight then, Kitty; but I +didn't like to use any odds against you, Kitty dear; and I never gave +him so much as one word to go upon." +</p> +<p> +"I'm very thankful to you, Winny dear; an' signs on the boy, he +thought you were for a high match with rich Tom Murdock; an' any +private chat Emon an' I ever had was about that same thing." +</p> +<p> +"Then he has spoken to you about me! O Kitty, dear Kitty, what used he +to be saying of me? do tell me." +</p> +<p> +"The never a word I'll tell you, Winny dear. Let him spake to +yourself; which maybe he'll do when he finds you give Tom the go-by; +but I'm book-sworn; so don't ask me." +</p> +<p> +"Well, Kitty, I'm glad I happened to come across you this morning; for +now we understand each other, and there's no fear of our interrupting +one another in our thoughts any more." +</p> +<p> +"None, thank God," said Kitty. +</p> +<p> +By this time the girls had wandered along the road to nearly a mile +from home. They had both gained their object, though not in the +roundabout <i>sounding</i> manner which we had anticipated, and they were +now both happy. They were no longer even the imaginary rivals which it +appears was all they had ever been; and as this light broke upon them +the endearing epithets of "dear" and "jewel" became more frequent and +emphatic than was usual in a conversation of the same length. +</p> +<p> +Their mutual confidences, as they retraced their steps, were imparted +to the fullest extent. They now perfectly "understood each other," as +Winny had said; and to their cordial shake-hands at the turn up to +Kate Mulvey's house was added an affectionate kiss, as good as if they +swore never to interfere with each other in love-affairs. +</p> +<br> + +<h2>CHAPTER XI.</h2> +<p> +Winny Cavana, as far as her own feelings and belief were concerned, +had not made a bad morning's work of it. Hitherto she had supposed +that Kate Mulvey had forestalled her in the affections of +Emon-a-knock. The neighbors had given them to each other, and she +feared that Emon was not free from the power of her charms. With these +doubts, or almost with this belief, upon her mind, she could not have +met her father's <a name="790">{790}</a> importunities about Tom Murdock with the same +careless and happy determination which matters, as they now stood, +would enable her to do. Being assured, from her conversation with +Kate, that there was nothing between her and Emon, she could "riddle" +more easily some circumstances and expressions which, to say the least +of it, were puzzling, with a belief that these two persons were +mutually attached. Winny knew now how to reconcile them; and the view +she took of them was anything but favorable to her father's wishes or +Tom Murdock's hopes. +</p> +<p> +She could not hope, however,—perhaps she did not wish,—for any +interview with Emon just then, when her change of manner, emanating +from her knowledge of facts, might draw him out, for her heart now +told her that this would surely come. She had some fears that her +father might sound her about Emon, and she wished to be able to say +with a clear conscience that he had never spoken, or even hinted at +the subject, to her; but she was determined, nevertheless, to act +toward her father, and subsequently toward Tom Murdock, as if her +troth and Emon's had been already irrevocably plighted. She was in +hopes that if she had an interview with her father upon the subject of +Tom Murdock in the first instance, the unalterable dislike which she +would exhibit to the match might save her the horrible necessity of +going through the business with the man himself. But poor Winny had +settled matters in her own mind in an order in which they did not +occur; and it so happened that, although she thought her heart had +gone through enough excitement for one day, and that she would, for +the rest of that evening, hide beneath the happiness which was +creeping over her, yet she was mistaken. +</p> +<p> +Tom Murdock had seen her pass down the road; and hastily putting on +one of his best coats and his very best hat, he followed her, +determined to have good news in return for his father's advice; but he +was disappointed. Before he could overtake her, he perceived that she +had been joined by Kate Mulvey, and that they went coshering away +together. Of course he saw that it was "no go," as he said, for that +time; but he would watch her returning, when he could not fail to meet +her alone. +</p> +<p> +"Hang me," said he, as he saw them walking away, "if I don't think +Kate Mulvey is the finest girl of the two, and very nearly as handsome +as ever she was—some people say handsomer. If it was not for her +money, and that grand farm she'll have, I'd let her see how soon I +could get a girl in every other respect as good, if not better, than +she is. Look at the two of them: upon my faith, I think Kate is the +lightest stepper of the two." +</p> +<p> +Tom paused for a few moments, if not in his thoughts, at least in the +expression of them; for all the above had been uttered aloud. Then, as +if they had received a sudden spur which made him start, he muttered +with his usual scowl, "No, no; I'll follow it up to the death if +necessary. That whelp shall never have it to say that Tom Murdock +failed, and perhaps add, where he did not. I'll have her, by fair +means if I can; but if not, by them five crosses," and he clasped his +hands together, "she shall be mine by foul. Sure it is not possible +they are going to meet that whelp this blessed moment!" And he dogged +them at so long a distance behind that, even if their conversation had +been less interesting, they would not have been aware of his stealthy +espionage. +</p> +<p> +When they turned to return, he turned also, and was then so far before +them that, with the bushes and the bends in the road, he could not be +perceived. Thus he watched and watched, until, to his great +satisfaction, he saw them part company at Kate's house. Winny Cavana, +as we have seen, had still some distance to walk ere she reached the +lane turning up to her father's; and Kate having gone in and shut the +<a name="791">{791}</a> door, Tom strolled on, as if by mere accident, until he met +Winny on the road. +</p> +<p> +Tom was determined to be as mild and as bland, as cordial and +good-natured, as possible. He felt there had always been a sort of +undefined snappish battle between him and Winny; and he had the +honesty of mind, as well as the vanity, to blame his own harsh and +abrupt manner for this. Perhaps it arose no less from a consciousness +of his personal advantages than from a belief that in his position as +an only son, and heir to his father's interest in a rich and +profitable farm, he had no great need of those blandishments of +expression so generally requisite in making way to a young and +unhackneyed heart. He resolved, therefore, upon this occasion to give +Winny no cause to accuse him of uncouthness of manner; neither was he +inclined to be uncouth when he beheld the glowing beauty of her face, +heightened, as he thought, solely by the exercise of her walk; but not +a little increased, without his knowledge of the fact, by the new +light which had just dawned upon the horizon of her hopes. +</p> +<p> +Her heart bounced in her bosom as she saw him approach. +</p> +<p> +"Good morning, Winny," he said, holding out his hand. +</p> +<p> +"Good morrow kindly, Tom," she replied, wishing to be civil, and +taking it. She knew she was "in for it," as she expressed it to +herself; but encouraged "by the hope within her springing," and +softened by the anticipation of its fulfilment, she was determined to +be kind but firm. +</p> +<p> +"Have you been walking far, Winny? Upon my life, it seems to agree +with you. It has improved your beauty, Winny, if that was possible." +</p> +<p> +"Tom, don't flatter me; you're always paying me compliments, and I +often told you that I did not like it. Beside, you did not let me +answer your question until you begin at your old work. I walked about +a mile of the road with Kate Mulvey." +</p> +<p> +"Kate Mulvey is a complete nice girl. You are not tired, Winny, are +you?" +</p> +<p> +"Ah, then, what would tire me? is it a mile of a walk, and the road +under my feet? I could walk to <i>Boher-na-Milthiogue</i> and back this +minute." +</p> +<p> +By this time they had come to the end of the lane turning up to +Rathcash House. +</p> +<p> +"I'm glad to find you are not tired, Winny. You may as well come on +toward the cross; I have something to say to you." +</p> +<p> +"And welcome, Tom; what is it?" +</p> +<p> +Winny felt that the thing was coming, and she wished to appear as +careless and unconscious as possible. When she recollected all Kate +Mulvey had said to her, she was just in the humor to have it over. +Upon reflection, too, she was not sorry that it should so happen +before the grand passage between her and her father upon the same +subject. She could the more easily dispose of the case with him, +having already disposed of it with Tom himself. She therefore went on, +past the end of her own lane; and Tom, taking this for an unequivocal +token in his favor, was beginning to get really fond of her—at least +he thought so. +</p> +<p> +"Well, Winny, I'm very glad I happened to meet you, and that you seem +inclined to take a walk with me; for to tell you the truth, Winny, I +can't help thinking of you." +</p> +<p> +"Perhaps you don't try, Tom." +</p> +<p> +"True for you, Winny dear; I wouldn't help thinking of you if I could, +and I couldn't if I would." +</p> +<p> +"Is that the way with you, Tom?" +</p> +<p> +But Winny did not smile or look at him, as he had hoped she would have +done. +</p> +<p> +"You know it is, Winny dear; but I can keep the truth, in plain +English, from you no longer." +</p> +<p> +"See that now! Ah, then, Tom, I pity you." +</p> +<p> +And Tom could not tell from her manner, or from the tone of her voice, +whether she was in earnest or <a name="792">{792}</a> only joking. He preferred the +former. +</p> +<p> +"Well, Winny Cavana, if you knew how much I love you, you would surely +take pity on me, my own <i>colleen dhass</i>." +</p> +<p> +"Faith, Tom, I believe it's in earnest you are, sure enough." +</p> +<p> +"In earnest! Yes, Winny, by the bright sky over me—and it is not +brighter than your own eyes—I am in earnest! It is a long day now +since I first took to loving you, though it was only of late you might +have picked it out of my looks. Ah, Winny dear, if you hadn't a +penny-piece but yourself, I would have spoken to you long ago. But +there was a great deal of talk among the neighbors about the joining +of them two farms together, and I was afraid you might think—" +</p> +<p> +"I understand. You were afraid I might think it was my money and the +farm you were after, and not myself. Was not that it, Tom?" +</p> +<p> +"Just so, Winny. But I am indeed in earnest, and for yourself alone, +Winny dear; and I'm willing to prove my words by making you my wife, +and mistress of all I have coming Shraftide, God willing." And he took +her by the hand. +</p> +<p> +She withdrew it at once, after a slight struggle, and replied, "Tom +Murdock, put such a thing totally out of your head, for it can never +be—never, by the same oath you swore just now, and that is the blue +heaven above me!" And she turned back toward the lane. +</p> +<p> +"I cross, Winny. Don't say that. I know that your father and mine +would both be willing for the match. As to what your father would do +for you, Winny <i>mavourneen</i>, I don't care a <i>boughalawn lui</i>; for I'm +rich enough without a cross of his money or his land. My own father +will make over to me by lawful deed, the day you become my wife, his +house and furniture, together with the whole of his land and cattle. +Your father, I know, Winny, would do the same for you, for he has but +yourself belonging to him; and although your fortune or your land has +nothing to say to my love, yet, Winny, dear, between us, if you will +consent to my prayer, for it is nothing less, there's few grandees in +the country could compare to you,—I'll say nothing for myself, Winny +dear, only say the word." +</p> +<p> +"No, Tom, I'll say no word but what I'm after saying; and you are only +making matters worse, talking of grandeur and riches that way. You +would only be striving at what you would not be able for, nor allowed +to keep up, Tom, and as for myself, I'd look well, wouldn't I? stuck +up on a new sidecar, and a drawn bonnet and feathers, coming down the +lane of a Sunday, and the neighbors thronging to mass,—aping my +betters, and getting myself and yourself laughed at. Devil a one, Tom, +but they'd call you Lord <i>Boher-na-Milthiogue</i>. No, Tom; put it out of +your head; that is my first and last word to you." And she hastened +her step. +</p> +<p> +"No, Winny, you won't leave me that way, will you? By all the books +that were ever shut and opened, you may make what you please of me. +I'll never ask to put yourself or myself a pin's-point beyond what we +always were, either in grandeur or anything else. But wouldn't it be a +fine thing, Winny dear, to have our children able to hold up their +heads with the best in the county, in a manner?" +</p> +<p> +"Ay, in a manner, indeed. No, Tom; they would never be anything but +the Murdocks of Rathcashmore—grandchildren of ould Mick Murdock and +ould Ned Cavana, the common farmers." +</p> +<p> +"And what have you to say against old Mick Murdock?" exclaimed Tom, +beginning to feel that his suit was hopeless, and flaming up inwardly +in the spirit which was most natural to him. +</p> +<p> +"Nothing indeed, Tom; you need not be so angry, I meant no offence; I +said as much against my own father as against yours, if there was +anything against either. But we must soon <a name="793">{793}</a> part now, Tom, and let +us part friends at all events, living as we do within a stone's-throw +of each other." She held out her hand, but he took it coldly and +loosely. He felt that his game was up. +</p> +<p> +"Take my advice, Tom Murdock"—this was the second time she had found +it necessary to overcome her antipathy to pronounce the name—"take +my advice, and never speak to me again upon the subject. Sure, there's +many a fine handsome girl would be glad to listen to you; and I'll now +ask you one question before we part. Wouldn't it be better and fitter +for you to bestow yourself and your land upon some handsome young girl +who has nothing of her own, and was, maybe, well inclined for you, and +to rise her up to be independent, than to be striving to force +yourself and it upon them that doesn't want your land, and cannot care +for yourself? Why don't you look about you? There's many a girl in the +parish as handsome, and handsomer, than I am, that would just jump at +you." +</p> +<p> +Winny had no sooner uttered these latter words than she regretted +them. She did not wish Tom Murdock to know that she had overheard him. +She was glad however to perceive that, in his anger, he had not +recognized them as a quotation from his conversation with his father +at the gate. +</p> +<p> +There was a silence now for a minute or two. Tom's blood was 'up; his +hopes of success were over, and he was determined to speak his mind in +an opposite direction. +</p> +<p> +"Have I set you thinking, Tom?" said Winny, half timidly. +</p> +<p> +"I'm d—d but you have, Winny Cavana; and I'll answer your question +with one much like it. And would not it be better and fitter for +<i>you</i>—of course it would—to bestow yourself and your fortune and your +land upon some handsome young fellow that has nothing but his day's +wages, and was well inclined for you, and to rise him up out of +poverty, than to spoil a good chance for a friend by joining yours to +them that has enough without it? Why didn't you follow up your first +question with that, Winny Cavana?" And he stopped short, enjoying the +evident confusion he had caused. +</p> +<p> +Winny thought, too, for a few moments in silence. She was considering +the probability of Tom Murdock's having overheard her conversation +with Kate Mulvey from behind some hedge. But the result of her +calculations was that it was impossible. +</p> +<p> +She was right. It was a mere paraphrase of her own question to him, +and only shows how two clever people may hit upon the same idea, and +express it in nearly the same language. And the question was prompted +by his suspicions in the quarter already intimated. +</p> +<p> +"Yes, I see how it is," he exclaimed, breaking the silence, and giving +way to his ungovernable temper. "But, by the hatred I bear to that +whelp, that shall never be, at all events. I'll go to your father this +moment, and let him know what's going on—" +</p> +<p> +"And who do you dare to call 'a whelp,' Tom Murdock? If it be Edward +Lennon, let me tell you that his little finger is worth your whole +head and heart—body and bones together." +</p> +<p> +"There, there—she acknowledges it. But I'll put a spoke in that +whelp's wheel,—for it was him I called a whelp, since you must +know,—see if I don't; so let him look out, that's all." +</p> +<p> +"I have acknowledged nothing, Tom Murdock. A word beyond common +civility never passed between Edward Lennon and myself; and take care +how you venture to interfere between my father and me. You have got +your answer, and I have sworn to it. You have no right to interfere +further." +</p> +<p> +By this time they had reached the end of the lane again; and Winny, +with her heart on fire, and her face in a flame, hurried to the house. +Fortunately, her father had not returned <a name="794">{794}</a> from the fields, and +rushing to her own room, she locked the door, took off her bonnet and +cloak, and "threw herself" (I believe that is the proper expression) +upon the bed. Perhaps a sensation novelist would add that she "burst +into an agony of tears." +</p> +<br> + +<h2>CHAPTER XII.</h2> +<p> +Winny lay for nearly an hour meditating upon the past, the present, +and the future. Upon the whole she did not regret what had occurred, +either before or after she had met Tom Murdock, and she cooled down +into her accustomed self-possession sooner than she had supposed +possible. +</p> +<p> +One grand object had been attained. Tom Murdock had come to the point, +and she had given him his final and irrevocable answer, if she had +twenty fathers thundering parental authority in her ears. A spot of +blue sky had appeared too in the east, above the outline of Shanvilla +mountain, in which the morning-star of her young life might soon +arise, and shine brightly through the flimsy clouds—or she could call +them nothing but flimsy now—which had hitherto darkened her hopes. +What if Tom Murdock was a villain?—and she believed he was: what +dared he—what could he do? Pshaw, nothing! But, oh that the +passage-of-arms between herself and her father was over! "Then," +thought she, "all might be plain sailing before me." +</p> +<p> +But, Winny, supposing all these matters fairly over,—and the battle +with your father is likely to be as cranky and tough upon his part as +it is certain to be straightforward and determined upon yours,—there +will still be a doubtful blank upon your mind and in your heart, and +one the solution of which you cannot, even with Kate Mulvey's +assistance, seek an occasion to fill up. Ah, no, you must trust to +chance for time and opportunity for that most important of all your +interviews. And what if you be mistaken after all, and, if mistaken, +crushed for ever by the result? +</p> +<p> +Let Winny alone for that. Women seldom make a bad guess in such a +case. +</p> +<p> +Winny's mental and nervous system having both regained their ordinary +degree of composure, she left her room, and proceeded through the +house upon her usual occupations. She was not, however, quite free +from a certain degree of anxiety at the anticipated interview with her +father. He had not in any way intimated his intention to ask certain +questions touching any communication she might have received from Tom +Murdock, together with her answers thereto; and yet she felt certain +that on the first favorable occasion he would ask the questions, +without any notice whatever. She had subsided for the day, after a +very exciting morning upon two very different subjects. Yes; she +called them different, though they were pretty much akin; and she +would now prefer a cessation of her anxiety for the remainder of that +afternoon at least. +</p> +<p> +So far she was fortunate. Her father did not come in until it was very +late; and being much fatigued by his stewardship of the day, he did +not appear inclined to enter upon any important subject, but fell +asleep in his arm-chair after a hasty and (Winny observed) +scarcely-touched dinner. +</p> +<p> +Winny was an affectionate good child. She was devotedly fond of her +father, with whose image were associated all her thoughts of happiness +and love since she was able to clasp his knees and clamber to his lap. +Even yet no absolute allegiance of a decided nature claimed the +disloyalty of her heart; but she felt that the time was not far +distant when either he must abdicate his royalty, or she must rebel. +</p> +<a name="795">{795}</a> +<p> +"It is clearly my duty now," she said to herself, "not to delay this +business about Tom, upon the chance of his being the first to speak of +it: to-morrow, before the cares and labors of the day occupy his mind, +and perhaps make him ever so little a bit cross, I will tell him what +has happened. I am afraid he will be very angry with me for refusing +that man; but it cannot be helped: not for all the gold they both +possess would I marry Tom Murdock. I shall not betray his sordid +villany, however, until all other resources fail; but I know my father +will scorn the fellow as I do when he knows the whole truth—but ah, I +have no witness," thought she, "and they will make a liar of me." +</p> +<p> +If the old man could have ever perceived any difference in the kind +and affectionate attention so uniformly bestowed upon him by his fond +daughter, perhaps it might have been upon that night after he awoke +from a rather lengthened nap in his easy chair. +</p> +<p> +Winny had sat during the whole time gazing upon the loved features of +the sleeping old man. She could not call to mind, from the day upon +which her memory first became conscious, a single unkind or even a +harsh word which he had uttered to her. That he could be more than +harsh to others she knew, and she was now in her nineteenth year; +fifteen clear years, she might say, of unbroken memory. She could +remember her fifth birthday quite well, and so much as a snappish word +or a commanding look she had never received from him; not, God knows, +but he had good reason, many's the time, for more than either. And +there he lay now, calm, and fast asleep, the only one belonging to her +on the wide earth, and she meditating an opposition in her heart to +his plans respecting her—all, she knew, arising from the great love +he had for her, and the frustration of which, she was aware, would vex +him sore. "Oh, Tom Murdock, Tom Murdock, why are you Tom Murdock? or +Emon-a-knock, why did I ever see you?" was the conclusion to this +train of thought, as she sat still, gazing on her sleeping father. +</p> +<p> +Then a happier train succeeded, and a fond smile lit up her handsome +face. "Ah no, no! I am the only being belonging to him, the only one +he loves. The father who for nearly twenty years never spoke an unkind +word—and if he had reason to reprove me did so by example and +request, and not the rod—has only to know that a marriage with Tom +Murdock would make me miserable to make him spurn him, as I did +myself. As to the other boy, I know nothing for certain myself about +him, and I can fairly deny any accusation he may make; and I am +certain he has been put up to it by old Murdock through his son. Yet +even on this score I'll deny as little as I can." +</p> +<p> +Here it was her father awakened; and Winny had only time to conclude +her thoughts by wondering how that fellow dare call Emon "a whelp." +</p> +<p> +"Well, father dear," she said, "you have had a nice nap; you must have +been very tired. I wish I was a man, that I might help you on the +farm." +</p> +<p> +"Winny darlin', I wouldn't have you anything but what you are for the +world. I have not much to do at all on the farm but to poke about, and +see that the men I have at work don't rob me by idling; and I must say +I never saw honester work than what they leave after them. But, Winny, +I came across old Murdock shortly after I went out, and he came over +my land with me, and I went over his with him, so that we had rather a +long walk. I'll engage he's as tired as what I am. I did not think his +farm was so extensive as it is, or that the land was so good, or in +such to-au-op caun-di-shon." And poor old Ned yawned and stretched +himself. +</p> +<p> +Winny saw through the whole thing at once. The matter of a marriage +between herself and Tom Murdock, and a union of the farms, had +doubtless been discussed between her father and old Mick Murdock, and +a final arrangement, so far as they were concerned, had been arrived +at. A hitch upon her part she was certain neither <a name="796">{796}</a> of them had +ever dreamt of; and yet "hitch" was a slight word to express the +opposition she was determined to give to their wishes. +</p> +<p> +She knew that if her father had got so far as where he had been +interrupted by the yawn when he was fresh after breakfast, the whole +thing would have come out. She was, however, a considerate girl; and +although she knew there was at that moment a good opening, where a +word would have brought the matter on, she knew that the result would +have completely driven rest and sleep from the poor old man's pillow +for the night, tired and fatigued as he was. She therefore adroitly +changed the conversation to his own comforts in a cup of tea before he +went to bed. +</p> +<p> +"Yes, <i>mavourneen</i>" he said, "I fell asleep before I mixed a tumbler +of punch, and I'll take the tea now instead; for, Winny, my love, you +can join me at that. Do you know, Winny, I'm very thirsty?" +</p> +<p> +"Well, father dear, I'll soon give you what will refresh you." +</p> +<p> +While Winny was busying herself for the tea, putting down a huge +kettle of water in the kitchen, and rattling the cups and saucers +until you'd think she was trying to break them, the old man wakened up +into a train of thought not altogether dissimilar to that which Winny +herself had indulged in over his sleeping form. +</p> +<p> +Winny was quite right. The whole matter had been discussed on that day +between the old men during their perambulations round the two farms; +the respective value and condition of the land forming a minute +calculation not unconnected with the other portion of their +discourse—settlements, deeds of conveyance, etc., etc., had all been +touched upon. +</p> +<p> +Winny was right in another of her surmises, although at the time she +scarcely believed so herself. Old Murdock, taking his cue from Tom, +told old Ned that if he found Winny at all averse to marrying Tom, he +was certain young Lennon would be at the bottom of it—at least Tom +had more than hinted such to him. +</p> +<p> +Old Ned was furious at this, declaring that if Tom Murdock was never +to the fore, his daughter should never bestow his long and hard +earnings upon a pauper like that, looking for a day's wages here and +there, and as often without it as with it; how dare the likes of him +lift his eyes to his little girl! But he'd soon put a stop to that, if +there was anything in it, let what would turn up. Every penny-piece he +was worth in the world was in his own power, and there was a very easy +way of bringing Miss Winny to her senses, if she had that wild notion +in her head. +</p> +<p> +Poor old Ned, in his indignation for what he thought Winny's welfare, +forgot that she was the only being belonging to him in the world, and +that when it came to the point he would find it impossible to put this +threat of "cutting her off" into execution. +</p> +<p> +Old Murdock was delighted with this tirade against young Lennon, whom +he looked upon as the only real obstacle to Tom's acquisition of land +and money, to say nothing of a handsome wife. +</p> +<p> +"Be studdy with her, Ned," said he, "she has a very floostherin' way +wid her where you're concerned; I often remarked it. Don't let her +come round you, Ned, wid her pillaverin' about that 'whelp,' as Tom +calls him." +</p> +<p> +"An' he calls him quite right. If he daars to look up to my little +girl, he'll soon find out his mistake, I can tell him." +</p> +<p> +"Nothin' would show him his mistake so much as to have Tom's business +an' hers settled at Shraft, Ned." +</p> +<p> +"I know that, Mick; an' with the blessing I'll spake to her in the +mornin' upon the subjict. I dunna did Tom ever spake to herself, +Mick?" +</p> +<p> +"If he didn't he will afore to-morrow night; he's on the watch to meet +with her by accident; he says it's betther nor to go straight up to +her, an' maybe frighten her." +</p> +<p> +"Very well, Mick; I'll have an eye to them; maybe it would be betther +<a name="797">{797}</a> let Tom himself spake first. These girls are so dam' proud; an' +I can tell you it is betther not vex Winny." +</p> +<p> +Of course these two old men said a great deal more; but the above is +the pith of what set old Ned Cavana thinking the greater part of the +night; for the tea Winny made was very strong, and, as he said, he was +thirsty, having missed his tumbler of punch after dinner. He fell +asleep, however, much sooner than he would have done had the sequel to +his plans become known to him before he went to bed. +</p> +<p> +[TO BE CONTINUED in Volume II] +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>From The Book of Days. +<br><br> +YOUNG'S NARCISSA.</h2> +<br> +<p> +The Third Night of Young's Complaint is entitled Narcissa, from its +being dedicated to the sad history of the early death of a beautiful +lady, thus poetically designated by the author. Whatever doubts may +exist with respect to the reality or personal identity of the other +characters noticed in the "Night Thoughts," there can be none whatever +as regards Narcissa. She was the daughter of Young's wife, by her +first husband, Colonel Lee. When scarcely seventeen years of age she +was married to Mr. Henry Temple, son of the then Lord Palmerston. +[Footnote 158] Soon afterward, being attacked by consumption, she was +taken by Young to the south of France in hopes of a change for the +better; but she died there about a year after her marriage, and Dr. +Johnson tells us, in his "Lives of the Poets," that "her funeral was +attended with the difficulties painted in such animated colors in +Night the Third." Young's words in relation to the burial of Narcissa, +eliminating, for brevity's sake, some extraneous and redundant lines, +are as follows: +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 158: By a second wife, grandfather of the present + Premier.] +</p> +<pre> + "While nature melted, superstition raved; + That mourned the dead; and this denied a grave. + For oh! the curst ungodliness of zeal! + While sinful flesh retarded, spirit nursed + In blind infallibility's embrace, + Denied the charity of dust to spread + O'er dust! a charity their dogs enjoy. + What could I do? what succor? what resource? + With pious sacrilege a grave I stole; + With impious piety that grave I wronged; + Short in my duty: coward in my grief! + More like her murderer than friend, I crept + With soft suspended step, and muffled deep + In midnight darkness, whispered my last sigh. + I whispered what should echo through their realms, + Nor writ her name whose tomb should pierce the skies." +</pre> +<p> +All Young's biographers have told the same story from Johnson down to +the last edition of the "Night Thoughts," edited by Mr. Gilfillan, +who, speaking of Narcissa, says "her remains were brutally denied +sepulture as the dust of a Protestant." Le Tourneure translated the +"Night Thoughts" into French in 1770, and, strange to say, the work +soon became exceedingly popular in France, more so probably than ever +it has been in England. Naturally enough, then, curiosity became +excited as to where the unfortunate Narcissa was buried, and it was +soon discovered that she had been interred in the Botanic Garden of +Montpellier. An old gate-keeper of the garden, named Mercier, +confessed that many years previously he had assisted to bury an +English lady in a hollow, waste spot of the garden. As he told the +story, an English clergyman came to him and begged that he would bury +a lady; but he refused, until the Englishman, with tears in his eyes, +said that she was his only daughter; on hearing this, he (the +gate-keeper), being a father himself, consented. Accordingly the +Englishman brought the dead <a name="798">{798}</a> body on his shoulders, his eyes +raining tears, to the garden at midnight, and he there and then buried +the corpse. About the time this confession was made, Professor Gouan, +an eminent botanist, was writing a work on the plants in the garden, +into which he introduced the above story, thus giving it a sort of +scientific authority; and consequently the grave of Narcissa became +one of the treasures of the garden, and one of the leading lions of +Montpellier. A writer in the "Evangelical Magazine" of 1797 gives an +account of a visit to the garden, and a conversation with one Bannal, +who had succeeded Mercier in his office, and who had often heard the +sad story of the burial of Narcissa from Mercier's lips. Subsequently, +Talma, the tragedian, was so profoundly impressed with the story that +he commenced a subscription to erect a magnificent tomb to the memory +of Narcissa; but as the days of bigotry in matters of sepulture had +nearly passed away, it was thought better to erect a simple monument, +inscribed, as we learn from "Murray's Handbook," with the words: +</p> +<p class="cite"> + "Placandis Narcissae manibus," +</p> +<p> +the "Handbook" adding, "She was buried here at a time when the +atrocious laws which accompanied the Revocation of Nantes, backed by +the superstition of a fanatic populace, denied Christian burial to +Protestants." +</p> +<p> +Strange to say, this striking story is almost wholly devoid of truth. +Narcissa never was at Montpellier. That she died at Lyons we know from +Mr. Herbert Crofts's account of Young, published by Dr. Johnson; that +she was buried there we know by her burial registry and her tombstone, +both of which are yet in existence. And by these we also learn that +Young's "animated" account of her funeral in the "Night Thoughts" is +simply untrue. She was not denied a grave: +</p> +<pre> + "Denied the charity of dust to spread + O'er dust," +</pre> +<p> +nor did he steal a grave, as he asserts, but bought and paid for it. +</p> +<p> +Her name was not unwrit, as her tombstone still testifies. The central +square of the Hotel de Dieu at Lyons was long used as a burial place +for Protestants; but the alteration in the laws at the time of the +great Revolution doing away with the necessity of having separate +burial places for different religions, the central garden was +converted into a medical garden for the use of the hospital. The +Protestants of Lyons being of the poorer class, there were few +memorials to move when the ancient burying place was made into a +garden. The principal one, however, consisting of a large slab of +black marble, was set up against a wall, close beside an old Spanish +mulberry-tree. About twenty years ago the increasing growth of this +tree necessitated the removal of the slab, when it was found that the +side which had been placed against the wall contained a Latin +inscription to the memory of Narcissa. The inscription, which is too +long to be quoted here, leaves no doubt upon the matter. It mentions +the names of her father and mother, her connection with the noble +family of Lichfield, her descent from Charles II., and concludes by +stating that she died on the 8th of Oct., 1736, aged 18 years. On +discovering this inscription M. Ozanam, the director of the Hotel de +Dieu, searched the registry of the Protestant burial, still preserved +in the Hotel de Ville at Lyons, and found an entry, of which the +following is a correct translation: "Madam Lee, daughter of Col. Lee, +aged about eighteen years, wife of Henry Temple, English by birth, was +buried at the Hotel de Dieu at Lyons, in the cemetery of persons of +the Reformed religion of the Swiss nation, the 12th of Oct., 1736, at +eleven o'clock at night, by order of the Prévôt of merchants." +"Received 729 livres 12 sols. Signed, Para, priest and treasurer." +From this document, the authenticity of which is indisputable, we +learn the utter untruthfulness of Young's recital. True, Narcissa was +buried at night, and most probably <a name="799">{799}</a> without any religious +service, and a considerable sum charged for the privilege of +interment, but she was not denied the "charity their dogs enjoy." +Calculating according to the average rate of exchange at the period, +729 livres would amount to thirty-five pounds sterling. Was it this +sum that excited a poetical imagination so strong as to overstep the +bounds of veracity? We could grant the excuse of poetical license had +not Young declared in his preface that the poem was "real, not +fictitious." The subject is not a pleasing one, and we need not carry +it any further; but may conclude, in the words of Mr. Cecil, who, +alluding to Young's renunciation of the world in his writings when he +was eagerly hunting for church preferment, says: "Young is, of all +other men, one of the most striking examples of the sad disunion of +piety from truth." +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>From The Dublin Review. +<br><br> +MADAME DE MAINTENON.</h2> +<br> +<p> +<i>Madame de Maintenon et sa Famille. Lettres et Documents inédits.</i> Par +HONORÉ BONHOMME. Paris: Didier. 1863. +</p> +<br> +<p> +<i>Histoire de Madame de Maintenon, et des principaux Evénements du Règne +de Louis XIV.</i> Par M. le DUC DE NOAILLES, de l'Académie Française. +Tomes 4. Paris: Comon. 1849-1858. +</p> +<br> +<p> +<i>The Life of Madame de Maintenon.</i> Translated from the French. London: +Lockyer Davis. 1772. +</p> +<br> +<p> +<i>The Secret Correspondence of Madame de Maintenon with the Princess des +Ursins, from the original manuscripts in the possession of the Duke of +Choiseul</i>. Translated from the French. 3 vols. London: Whittaker. 1827. +</p> +<br> +<p> +Mémorial de Saint-Cyr. Paris: Fulgence. 1846. +</p> +<br> +<p> +Female characters have, for good or ill, played a larger part on the +stage of French history than of English. We have no names which +correspond in extensive influence to those of Mesdames de Sévigné, de +Maintenon, de Genlis, and Récamier; while the extraordinary power, +both political and social, exercised by royal mistresses in France, +finds no parallel in England, even in the worst days of courtly +profligacy. Nor is it easy to say to what cause this difference +between the two countries is to be ascribed. It may be that public +opinion has been brought to bear more fully on individual action here +than in France, and acts as a more powerful restraint; and it may be +also that extreme prominence in society is repugnant to the more +modest and retiring habits of Englishwomen. There is no lady in our +annals who has occupied a position similar to that of Madame de +Maintenon in relation to royalty except Mrs. Fitzherbert; but she, +though highly distinguished for her virtues, was altogether wanting in +those intellectual endowments which adorned that gifted woman who won +the esteem and fixed the affections of Louis XIV. Many circumstances +combined to make her the most striking example of female ascendency in +France; and the object of this paper will be to trace the causes which +led to it, as well as to her being, to this day, an object of +never-failing interest to the French people. Like all great women, she +has had many virulent detractors and many ardent eulogists; but we +shall endeavor to avoid the <a name="800">{800}</a> extremes of both, more especially as +M. Bonhomme is of opinion that her biography has still to be written. +If there were no higher consideration, self-respect alone would demand +scrupulous impartiality in a historical inquiry; and we are the less +tempted to depart from this rule in the present instance because we +are convinced that in Madame de Maintenon's history there is ample +scope for the most chivalrous vindication of her fame, and that, as +time goes on, and the materials relative to her contemporaries are +collated, her apparent defects will lessen in importance, and her +character stand out in fairer proportions and clearer light. It needs +only to compare recent memoirs of her with the jejune attempts of the +last century, to perceive how much her cause gains from fuller and +closer investigation. The Due de Noailles has rendered good service to +the literature of his country by his voluminous history of this lady, +conducted as it is on the sound and admirable principle of making the +subject of the biography speak for herself. There is no historical +personage about whom more untruths have been circulated; and, after +all that has been said and written, the only way to know her is to +read her correspondence. +</p> +<p> +Lord Macaulay speaks of Franchise de Maintenon in terms so pointed, +that they well deserve to be quoted at the outset: +</p> +<p> +"It would be hard to name any woman who, with so little romance in her +temper, has had so much in her life. Her early years had been passed +in poverty and obscurity. Her first husband had supported himself by +writing burlesques, farces, and poems. When she attracted the notice +of her sovereign, she could no longer boast of youth or beauty; but +she possessed in an extraordinary degree those more lasting charms, +which men of sense, whose passions age has tamed, and whose life is a +life of business and care, prize most highly in a female companion. +Her character was such as has well been compared to that soft green on +which the eye, wearied by warm tints and glaring lights, reposes with +pleasure. A just understanding; an inexhaustible yet never redundant +flow of rational, gentle, and sprightly conversation; a temper of +which the serenity was never for a moment ruffled; a tact which +surpassed the tact of her sex as much as the tact of her sex surpasses +the tact of ours; such were the qualities which made the widow of a +buffoon first the confidential friend, and then the spouse, of the +proudest and most powerful of European kings. It was said that Louis +had been with difficulty prevented by the arguments and vehement +entreaties of Louvois from declaring her Queen of France." [Footnote +159] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 159: "History of England," chap, xi., 1689.] +</p> +<p> +The romance of her life began with her birth, which took place on the +27th of November, 1635, [Footnote 160] in the prison of Niort, where +her father was confined. His life had been full of adventure and +crime, and he was unworthy of the faithful and affectionate wife who +shared his imprisonment. He changed his religious profession several +times, but at the moment of Frances' birth he called himself +Protestant. The child accordingly was baptized in the Calvinist church +of Niort, though her mother was a Catholic, and was placed under the +charge of her aunt, Madame de Vilette, at Murçay, about a league from +the prison. The prisoner, Constant d'Aubigné, was at length released, +and being disinherited by his father for his ill conduct, embarked a +second time for America about the year 1643, [Footnote 161] taking +with him his wife and children. Little Frances suffered so much from +the voyage that at one time she was thought to be dead, and a sailor +held her in his arms, ready to sink her in a watery grave. "<i>On ne +revient pas</i>" as the Bishop of Metz said long after <a name="801">{801}</a> to Madame de +Maintenon, <i>"de si loin pour pen de chose."</i> [Footnote 162] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 160: "<i>Bonhomme</i>," p. 235.] +<br><br> + [Footnote 161: <i>Ibid.</i>, p. 230. ] +<br><br> + [Footnote 162: "One does not return from so far but for a great object."] +</p> +<p> +Notwithstanding her father's evil example, there was enough in Frances +d'Aubigné's ancestral remembrances to have dazzled her imagination in +after life. Her aunt, who had been her earliest instructress, was a +zealous Protestant; and her grandfather, Agrippa d'Aubigné, as a +soldier, a historian, and a satirical poet, was one of the first men +of his day. He had served Henry IV. in various capacities, and was +used to address his royal master so freely as to reproach him for his +change of religion. One day, when the king was showing a courtier his +lip pierced by an assassin's knife, d'Aubigné said, "Sire, you have as +yet renounced God only with your lips, and he has pierced them; if you +renounce him in heart, he will pierce your heart also." +</p> +<p> +Frances' father died in Martinique, having lost all he had gained by +gambling. Madame d'Aubigné therefore returned to France, and devoted +herself to the education of her child. She made her familiar with +"Plutarch's Lives," and exercised her in composition. She would gladly +have kept the task of instruction to herself, but poverty constrained +her at last to resign Frances with many fears into the hands of her +aunt, Madame de Vilette. The effect of this transfer was her becoming +imbued with Calvinist tenets; and when, through the interference of +the government, [Footnote 163] she was removed from Madame de +Vilette's care, and made over to a Catholic relative, she proved very +refractory, and persisted in turning her back to the altar during +mass. Various means of persuasion were tried in vain; and it was not +till the Ursuline sisters in Paris took her in hand that her scruples +vanished, and she consented to abjure her errors and to believe +anything except that her aunt Vilette would be damned. In after-life +she used often to say that her mother and several of the nuns had been +very injudicious and severe with her, and that, but for the kindness +and good sense of one lady in the convent, she should probably never +have embraced the Catholic faith. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 163: "<i>Duc de Noailles," tome</i> I., p. 77.] +</p> +<p> +Only a few years passed before she had to choose between a conventual +life and a distasteful marriage. Her mother was dead, and "the +beautiful Indian," as she was called, was left almost without +resources. She had become acquainted with the comic poet Scarron, and +often visited him. He was five-and-twenty years older than herself, +and hideously deformed. A singular paralysis, caused by quack +medicines, had deprived him of the use of his limbs, his hands and +mouth only being left free. His satirical pieces had been very +popular, and, though fixed to his chair, he received a great deal of +company, and joked incessantly. He was much struck by Frances +d'Aubigné, and appreciated her talents the more highly because mental +culture was rapidly advancing, and the conversation in drawing-rooms +began to be rational. His offer of marriage was accepted by her, for +"she preferred," as she said, "marrying him to marrying a convent." In +the summer of 1652 she became his bride. Such a union deserved a place +in one of his own farces, and gave little promise of happiness or +virtue. But the consequences were far different from what might have +been expected. A change for the better had taken place in public +morals, and Madame Scarron had no sooner a house of her own than she +took a prominent part in the movement. She carefully tended her +helpless spouse; brushed the flies from his nose when he could not use +his fingers, and administered to him the opiate draught without which +he could not sleep. She received his guests with a dignity beyond her +years, and her conduct was regulated on a plan of general reserve. No +one dared address her in words of double signification; and one of the +young men of fashion who frequented the house declared that he <a name="802">{802}</a> +would sooner think of venturing on any familiarity with the queen than +with Madame Scarron. People saw that she was in earnest. During Lent, +she would eat a herring at the lower end of the table, and retire +before the rest. So young and attractive, in a capital of brilliant +dissipation, and with such a husband as Scarron, her example could not +but have an effect. Meanwhile she cultivated her mind, and learned +Italian, Spanish, and Latin. She knew not what might be required of +her, for Scarron's fortune was dwindling away, and he had been +compelled to resign the prebend of Mans. He was a lay-ecclesiastic, +and, like many literary men of that day, bore the title of abbé. +Poverty again stared her in the face, and the servant who waited at +table had often to whisper, "Madame, no roast again to-day!" Devoted +to her husband's sick chamber, she avoided society abroad, and wrote, +only two years after her marriage, letters which might have come from +an aged saint on the brink of eternity. "All below is vanity," she +said, "and vexation of spirit. Throw yourself into the arms of God; +one wearies of all but him, who never wearies of those who love him." +</p> +<p> +Her enemies have strongly contested her virtue at this period, and +appealed to her intimacy with Ninon de Lenclos in proof of their +allegations. This modern Leontium certainly frequented Scarron's +drawing-room and also (such were the dissolute manners of the age) +that of most other celebrities in Paris. But the unhappy woman herself +has left behind her an unquestionable testimony to Madame Scarron's +purity. "In her youth," she says, "she was virtuous through weakness +of mind: I tried to cure her of it, but she feared God too much." She +had, of course, many admirers, and she must needs have gone out of the +world not to have them. But to be admired and courted is one thing, to +yield and sin mortally is another. It might be wished that Madame +Scarron's name had never been mixed up with that of Ninon, to whom +virtue was "<i>faibleese d'esprit</i>" but the freedom of her conduct must +not be tried too severely by the stricter laws of propriety which +prevail among us now. She never forgot Ninon, corresponded with her at +times, aided her when she was in distress, and was consoled by her +dying like a Christian at the age of 90. [Footnote 164 ] She who had +boasted that Epicurus was her model gave the closing years of her life +to God. [Footnote 165] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 164: In 1705.] +<br><br> + [Footnote 165: "<i>Duc de Noailles," tome</i> i., p. 206. ] +</p> +<p> +Madame Scarron's resistance to the importunities of Villarceaux was +well known, and is thus alluded to by Bois-Robert in verses addressed +to the marquis himself: [Footnote 166] +</p> +<pre> + "Si c'est cette rare beauté + Qui tieut ton esprit enchaîné, + Marquis, j'ai raison de te plaindre; + Car son humeur est fort à craindre: + Elle a presque autant de fierté + Qu'elle a de grâce et de beauté." +</pre> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 166: "Marquis, if it is this rare beauty who holds you in + chains, I have reason to pity you; for she as of a temper much to be + feared. She has almost as much pride as she has grace and beauty."] +</p> +<p> +But those who follow the course of Madame de Maintenon's interior life +know perfectly well how to interpret what Bois-Robert called +"haughtiness," and Ninon "weakness of mind." It is a matter of no +small importance to rescue such characters from the foul grasp of +calumny. Gilles Boileau was the only one of her contemporaries while +she was young who dared to throw out any suspicion against her honor, +but this he did evidently to avenge himself on Scarron, against whom +he had a mortal pique. +</p> +<p> +A new era was dawning on France. Richelieu and Mazarin had by their +policy prepared the triumphs of monarchy; Turenne and Condé had +displayed their genius in war; the great ministers and captains waited +for the moment when their master should call them to his service; and +arts and letters were ready to embellish all with their rich coloring. +Louis XIV. really mounted the throne in 1660, and the glory and +greatness of France rose <a name="803">{803}</a> with him. Pascal, Molière, La Fontaine, +and Boileau published their works almost at the same time. Racine +presented to the king the first-fruits of his master mind, and the +voice of Bossuet had already been heard from the pulpit. Scarron +foresaw the brilliancy of the epoch, but he saw also that his own end +was nigh. "I shall have," he said, "no cause for regret in dying, +except that I have no fortune to leave my wife, who deserves more than +I can tell, and for whom I have every reason in the world to be +thankful." Humorous to the last, he made a jest of his sufferings, +and, when seized with violent hiccough, said if he could only get over +it, he would write a good satire upon it. He died perfectly himself, +and was not even for a moment untrue to his character. A few seconds +before his end, seeing those around him in tears, he said, "You weep, +my children; ah! I shall never make you cry as much as I have made you +laugh." He had but one serious interval to give to death—that in +which Madame Scarron caused him to fulfil his religious duties. He had +always been a Christian, and neither in his writings nor in his +conversation had allowed anything prejudicial to religion to escape +him. A chaplain came every Sunday to say mass at his house. "I leave +you no fortune," he said to his wife when dying, "and virtue will +bring none: nevertheless be always virtuous." The point of this +admonition must be gathered from the corruption of the times. Her +mother's last words also had sunk deep into Frances' memory, for she +had warned her "to hope everything from God and to fear everything +from man." Scarron died in 1660, and was soon forgotten. His name +would now scarcely be known, nor would any at this day be conversant +with his comedies and satires but for the exalted position which his +widow subsequently attained. His immediate successors obeyed +unconsciously the epitaph which he had himself composed, and made no +noise over the grave where poor Scarron took his "first night's rest." +</p> +<pre> + "Passants, ne faites pas de bruit, + De crainte que je ne m'éveille; + Car voilà la première nuit + Que le pauvre Scarron sommeille." [Footnote 167] +</pre> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 167: "Poor Scarron his first night of sleep enjoys: Hush, + passers-by, nor wake him with your noise!"] +</p> +<p> +Was there ever a more pathetic joke? +</p> +<p> +When Mazarin died in 1661, the young king summoned his council and +said, "Gentlemen, I have hitherto allowed the affairs of state to be +conducted by the late cardinal; henceforward I intend to govern +myself, and you will aid me with your advice when I ask it." From that +day, the face of society in France rapidly changed. Then, as Voltaire +says, the revolution in arts, intellect, and morals which had been +preparing for half a century took effect, and at the court of Louis +XIV. were formed that refinement of manners and those social +principles which have since extended through Europe. The example long +set by the Hôtel de Rambouillet in Paris was followed by many others, +and numerous <i>salons</i> which have since become matter of history united +all that was most brilliant in genius and talent with much that was +estimable for worth and even piety. +</p> +<p> +The first ten years of Madame Scarron's widowhood were passed in the +midst of these elegant and intellectual circles. The assemblies of +Madame de Sévigné, Madame de Coulanges, Louvois' cousin, and Madame +de Lafayette, the novelist, were, with the hôtels of Albret and +Richelieu, those which she principally frequented. She was in great +distress, and her friends tried to obtain for her the pension her +husband had once enjoyed. But Cardinal Mazarin was inflexible. He +remembered the "Mazarinade," in which Scarron had satirized him, and +refused to grant any relief to his charming widow. But she would be +beholden to none for a subsistence. She retired into the <a name="804">{804}</a> convent +of the Hospitalers, where a relation lent her an apartment, and lived +for some time on a pittance she had hoarded. The queen-mother then +became interested in her behalf, and a pension of £50 a year was +assigned her. "Henceforward," she said in a letter to Madame d'Albret, +"I shall be able to labor for my salvation in peace. I have made a +promise to God that I will give one fourth of my pension to the poor." +She now removed to the Ursuline convent, where she lived simply and +modestly, but visited constantly, and received, as the sisters +complained, "a furious deal of company." Her dress was elegant, but of +cheap materials, and she managed by rare economy to keep a maid, pay +her wages, and have a little over at the end of the year. She might +have accepted the Maréchal d'Albret's offer of a home in her hôtel, +but she preferred entire independence in her own humble asylum. Many a +page could we fill with accounts of the friendships she formed at this +period. To epitomize her life is in one respect a painful task, for +the records we possess respecting her are equally interesting and +copious. She has found at last a biographer worthy of her, and it is +to the Due de Noailles' volumes we must refer those who long for +further details than our space allows us to give. He is the ablest +champion of her honor that has yet appeared, and refutes triumphantly +the calumnies of the Duc de Saint Simon by which so many have been +deceived. +</p> +<p> +At the Hôtel d'Albret Madame Scarron often met Madame de Montespan, +who soon after became the mistress of Louis. The two ladies had many +tastes in common, and an intimacy sprang up between them. How +strangely they became related to each other afterward we shall +presently see. Meanwhile Madame Scarron was overtaken by another +reverse. The queen-mother died in 1666, and with her the pension +ceased. Many splendid mansions were eager to receive and entertain +her, but she declined them all as permanent abodes. A rich and +dissolute old man proposed to marry her, and her friends unwisely +seconded his overtures; but she was proof against them, and wrote to +Ninon to express her gratitude, because the voice of that licentious +woman alone was raised in approval of her conduct. She was indignant +at the comparison her friends made between the unworthy aspirant and +her late husband, and avowed her readiness to endure any hardships +rather than sacrifice her liberty, and entangle herself in an +engagement which conscience could not approve. Constrained, therefore, +by want, she was about to expatriate herself, and follow in the train +of the Duchesse de Nemours, who was affianced to the King of Portugal. +It was a sore trial, for none are more attached to their country, none +endure exile with less fortitude, than the French. She saw Madame de +Montespan once more; it was in the royal palace, and that incident +changed her destiny. The future rivals met under conditions how +different from those which were one day to exist! Madame de Montespan, +though not yet the king's mistress, was already in high favor, and the +patroness of that poor widow who was afterward, by winning Louis' +esteem, to supplant her in his affections, and become, all but in +name, Queen of France. Through her mediation the forfeited pension was +restored, and we find her name in the list of ladies invited to a +court fête in 1688. Nevertheless, her troubles withdrew her very much +from the world, and she thought for a time of adopting a religious +habit. Indeed, it is not impossible that she might actually have done +so, had she not been made averse to the step by the severity of her +confessor, the Abbé Gobelin. With a view of mortifying her ambition to +please and be admired, he recommended her to dress still more plainly, +and be silent in company. She obeyed, and became so disagreeable to +herself and others that she sometimes felt inclined to <a name="805">{805}</a> renounce +her habits of devotion. [Footnote 168] She retired, however, to a +small lodging in the Rue des Tournelles, lived more alone, and, as she +wrote to Ninon, "read nothing but the Book of Job and the Maxims." +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 168: <i>"Duc de Noailles,</i>" tome i., pp. 310-12.] +</p> +<p> +Here fortune came to her relief. The infidelities of Louis XIV. are +unhappily too well known. Suffice it in this place to say that Madame +de Montespan bore him a daughter in 1669, and a son, afterward the Duc +du Maine, in 1670. Circumstances required that the existence of these +children should be concealed, and their mother, in whose heart the +voice of conscience was never stifled, bethought her of the good +Madame Scarron as one who was well fitted to take charge of their +education. Accordingly, she was sounded on the subject. The king's +name was not mentioned, but she was informed that the secret regarding +the children was to be kept inviolate. She hesitated, refused, +reconsidered the matter, and at last consented on condition that the +king himself should command her services. The office was far from +dishonorable in the eyes of the world. Madame Colbert, the minister's +wife, had been intrusted with two of his majesty's children by Madame +de la Vallière. It was not on this point that Madame Scarron was +anxious, but she feared lest she should give scandal and entangle her +conscience by a seeming indulgence to such immorality. Louis at last +requested that she would be as a mother to his babes. They were placed +with a nurse in an obscure little house outside the walls of Paris. +Madame Scarron was to live as before in her own lodgings, but without +losing sight of the infants. It was a point of honor with her to +observe the utmost secrecy. She visited each of them separately, for +they were kept apart, and passed in and out disguised as a poor woman, +and carrying linen or meat in a basket. Returning home on foot, she +entered by a private door, dressed, and drove to the Hôtel d'Albret or +Richelieu to lull suspicion asleep. When the secret was at length +known, she caused herself to be bled lest she should blush. [Footnote +169] In two years' time the number of children had increased, and a +different arrangement was adopted. A large house was purchased in the +country, not far from Vaugirard, and Madame Scarron, now enjoying a +certain degree of opulence, established herself there, and gave all +her time to the task of education. She was lost to the world, and her +friends deeply lamented her disappearance. But she was sowing the seed +of her future greatness. The king, who had a great love for his +children, often saw her when he visited them; the aversion he had felt +for her at first gradually melted away; he admired her tender and +maternal care of his offspring, contrasted it with the comparative +indifference of their own mother, greatly increased her pension, and, +having legitimized the Duc du Maine, the Count de Vexin, and +Mademoiselle de Nantes in 1673, soon after appointed them with their +gouvernante a place at court. Thus, step by step, without her own +seeking, she was led on to exercise a higher and most salutary +influence on the king's moral character, till, in reward of her +long-tried virtue, she was ultimately to fix his wandering affections +and effect his conversion; an object which for so many years she had +regarded as the end of her being. She was nearly forty years of age +when she entered on her duties in the palace; and, in that difficult +and trying position, she set the glorious example of one who was +guided in all things by principle, and who thought that the highest +talents were best devoted to leading an irreproachable life. She had a +work before her, and it was great. She contributed to withdraw the +king from his disorderly habits, to restore him to the queen, and to +bring about a reformation of morals in a quarter where it <a name="806">{806}</a> had +been most wantonly retarded by the royal example. The king, in that +day, was all in all. The ideal of the government was royalty. The +Fronde had died away, and with it the power of the nobles. That of the +people, in the sense in which it is now generally understood, was +unknown; even infidels and scoffers scarcely dreamed of it. The +monarch, like Cyrus [Footnote 170] and the Caesars, believed himself +something more than man. Diseases fled at his touch, and he virtually +set himself above all laws, human and divine. It needed the eloquence +of a Bossuet to convince Louis that a priest had done his duty in +refusing absolution to the mother of his illegitimate children, +[Footnote 171] The success of his arms enhanced his self-esteem, and +the atmosphere of his court was so tainted with corruption that Madame +Scarron often sighed for retirement, and resolved to flee from so +perilous and painful a promotion. Her intercourse with Madame de +Montespan was chequered with stormy dissensions, and the jealousy of +the latter became almost insupportable. The education of the children +was a constant subject of contention, and Madame Scarron, who knew +that they would be ruined if left to their mother, was not disposed to +yield any of her rights. But the Duc du Maine was the idol of his +father and mother, and this served to attach them both to the +incomparable gouvernante, who loved the boy with an affection truly +maternal. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 169: "<i>Deuxième Entretien à Saint-Cyr.</i>"] +<br><br> + [Footnote 170: "Herodotus, Clio," cciv.] +<br><br> + [Footnote 171: "<i>Duc de Noailles," tome</i> i., p. 316.] +</p> +<p> +Being disgusted with the court, and having received from the king a +present of 200,000 francs, she bought in 1674 the estate of Maintenon, +about thirty miles from Versailles, with the intention of retiring +thither. But a rupture between the king and his favorite mistress was +at hand, and on this circumstance hinged Madame Scarron's future +career. +</p> +<p> +In spite of his profligacy, Louis XIV. was at bottom religiously +disposed. His serious attention to business proved him to be a man of +thought and reflection, and, when the great festivals came round, it +grieved him not to be in a condition to fulfil his religious duties. +The sermons of Bourdaloue during the Lent of 1675 touched him, and the +expostulations of Bossuet in private deepened their effect. He +resolved to dismiss Madame de Montespan, and departed to join the army +without seeing her. "I have satisfied you, father," he said to +Bourdaloue: "Madame de Montespan is at Clagny." "Yes, sire," replied +the preacher; "but God would be better satisfied if Clagny were +seventy leagues from Versailles." Meanwhile Madame Scarron, with the +Duc du Maine, went to Barèges, and, as the king had, before creating +her a marchioness, graciously called her, in presence of his nobles, +Madame de Maintenon, we shall henceforward speak of her by the name +which she bears in history. The three most important personages in our +drama were now separated. The king, at the head of his army, received +the letters of Bossuet, conjuring him to persevere in his promises of +amendment, while Madame de Montespan, in her retreat, was pressed by +the same fervid eloquence to return to the path of virtue. But the Duc +du Maine was everywhere entertained as the king's son, and fetes that +vied with each other in splendor awaited him and his gouvernante +everywhere. So popular was the king, so loyal his people, that his +vice passed for virtue or innocent gallantry. +</p> +<p> +Barèges was not then what it has now become. A few thatched cottages +and one house with a slated roof were all it could boast. Madame de +Maintenon and her sick charge, the little duke, had but one room, +meanly furnished, where he slept by her side. The place was then +scarcely known; but the physician Fagon had discovered it during his +excursions among the Pyrenees, and, by making Madame de Maintenon +acquainted with the <a name="807">{807}</a> efficacy of its baths, he raised it to +importance and secured for himself fortune and renown. Here she +received many letters from the king in attestation of his friendship; +and returning hence, she visited Niort and the prison where she was +born, the aunt she had so tenderly loved, and the Ursuline convent +where she had first been schooled and supported by charity. Attentions +were lavished on her in every quarter, and many valuable records of +her family fell into her hands. Among these was the life of her +illustrious grandfather, Agrippa d'Aubigné, written by himself. +</p> +<p> +Her reception by the king was more cordial than ever; but the high +favor in which she stood did not break her resolution to renounce a +court life as soon as circumstances should permit. She corresponded +regularly with the Abbé Gobelin, and often expressed her willingness +to follow implicitly his advice. Madame de Montespan regained her +ascendancy, at least in appearance; but many thought that the king was +fast becoming weaned from her, through the new influence. Madame de +Maintenon exerted daily a more manifest empire. Everything, as Madame +de Sévigné wrote in 1676, yielded to her. One attendant held the +pommade before her on bended knee, another brought her gloves, and a +third lulled her to sleep. She saluted no one; but those who knew her +believed that she laughed in her heart at these formalities. "I desire +more than ever," she said to M. Gobelin, "to be away from this place; +and I am more and more confirmed in my opinion that I cannot serve God +here." Madame de Montespan, during some years, continued to be the +recognized favorite; but the beautiful Fontanges divided with her the +unenviable distinction till, having just been made a duchess, she died +in the flower of her youth. But amidst all this levity, Louis paid the +severe Madame de Maintenon the most delicate attentions, which failed +not to excite the utmost indignation in the breast of the royal +mistress. At length, in 1680, the dauphin espoused the daughter of the +Elector of Bavaria, and Louis, anxious to retain Madame de Maintenon +in the service of the court, made her lady of the bed-chamber to the +dauphiness. In this honorable office she was set free from the bondage +she had endured. She had now nothing in common with Madame de +Montespan; and she exchanged the apartments she had occupied for +others immediately over those of the king, where he could visit her at +will, and, by her lively and flowing conversation, refresh his mind +when weary with business, or jaded with pleasures that had long since +begun to pall. Surrounded by minions of every sort, it was something +new to him to be addressed freely and without any selfish view. This +was the secret of Madame de Maintenon's power over his heart, and he +confessed the potency of the spell. Madame de Montespan was visited +less and less, and Louis passed hours every day in the apartments of +the dauphiness, where he found also her lady of the bed-chamber. A +cabal was formed by the deserted mistresses and some profligate +ministers against the new and truly estimable object of Louis' favor; +but their machinations failed. The sovereign at last broke his chains, +and Madame de Montespan, like Ninon and La Vallière, made profit of +the time which was allowed to her for repentance, but which had been +denied to Fontanges. The miserable death-bed of that young creature, +distracted by remorse, but still clinging passionately to her unlawful +love, deeply affected the king, [Footnote 172] and is said to have +powerfully contributed to reclaim him from his evil habits. The benign +influence of Madame de Maintenon reunited him to the long abandoned +queen, who, with all her exalted piety and Christian virtue, was +deficient, it must be confessed, in tact and discernment, as well as +in those intellectual <a name="808">{808}</a> gifts which would have made her an +acceptable companion to Louis; while her strict devotional practices +and retiring habits—habits which her native modesty and timidity of +character, combined with her husband's neglect, tended to confirm—may +have had no small share in increasing his estrangement. His evenings +were now frequently spent with her; and every member of the royal +family was delighted with the happy change, and grateful to her by +whom it had been brought about. The king himself found the paths of +virtue to be those of peace, and the finer parts of his character were +displayed to advantage. He had naturally a kind and feeling heart, and +was by no means that monster of selfishness and formality which +historians so often make him. [Footnote 173] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 172: <i>Gabourd, "Histoire de France," tome</i> xiv., p. 453, + note. ] +<br><br> + [Footnote 173: <i>"Duc de Noailles," tome</i> ii., p. 28.] +</p> +<p> +After the peace of Nimeguen, Louis XIV., having seen his enterprises +everywhere crowned with victory, became intoxicated with his own +greatness, and arrogant toward foreign powers. But the counsels of +Madame de Maintenon tended to restrain his ambition and modify the +defiant tone of his government. She well knew that such an attitude, +beside being wrong in itself, was the certain forerunner of formidable +coalitions. However lightly she might have thought of the Prince of +Orange, if singly matched with the greatest potentate of Europe, she +wisely judged his talents and prowess capable of inflicting great +injury on France if he were in union with exasperated allies. While +her hand thus nearly touched the helm of state, it was busy as ever in +dispensing private charities; and it was about this time also that she +founded an establishment at Rueil which was the origin of "Saint-Cyr." +"For the first time," she said, in a letter to her brother, [Footnote +174] "I am happy." +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 174: 20th February, 1682.] +</p> +<p> +In 1683 the queen died, and Louis, who had become convinced of her +merits too late, wept over her when expiring and said, "It is the +first trouble she has ever caused me." Madame de Maintenon, who had +staid with her to the last, was about to retire, when the Duc de la +Rochefoucauld, taking her by the arm, drew her toward the king, +saying, "It is no time, madame, to leave him: he needs you in his +present condition." Her position at court was now very embarrassing. +She was aware of the king's predilections, and he was no less +persuaded that she could be attached to him by none but virtuous ties. +The dauphiness requested her to accept the place of lady of honor, but +she steadily refused. Was it indeed that she aspired higher? Could she +fancy for one moment that Louis would exalt her to the rank of his +wife? An anecdote related by Madame de Caylus would lead us to suppose +that the thought had crossed her mind, and that the king himself had +perhaps given her some pledge of his intentions. Madame de Caylus was +astonished at her declining a post of such high dignity. "Would you," +asked her aunt, "rather be the niece of a lady of honor, or the niece +of one who refused to be such?" Madame de Caylus replied that she +should look upon her who refused as immeasurably higher than her who +accepted: on which Madame de Maintenon kissed her. She had given the +right answer. Madame de Montespan was still at court with her +children, but her day was gone by; and she whose silent influence had +wrought her overthrow never triumphed over her, and even deemed it +prudent to abstain from any overt attempt to prevent the king's seeing +her. +</p> +<p> +The decorations at Versailles were at this time conducted on such a +scale as to make that spot one of the wonders of the world. All Europe +was curious to see its gardens or read of their matchless splendor. +Its fountains and cascades were never to be silent, night or day, and +the waters of the Eure were to supply them by means of a canal and +aqueduct more than fourteen leagues in length. <a name="809">{809}</a> Twenty-two +thousand men worked on the line, which traversed the estate and valley +of Maintenon. The aqueduct was there supported by magnificent arcades, +and its entire cost, without counting purchase of land, was about nine +millions of francs. To the town of Maintenon the "very powerful and +pious" lady who bore its name was a great benefactress. She obtained +for it fairs and markets, and founded in it a hospital and schools. +She rebuilt, entirely at her own cost, the church and presbytery, as +well as those of two adjoining parishes. She brought thither Normans +and Flemings to teach the villagers how to weave, and distributed +abundant alms to the poor and infirm. The king staid at her chateau +repeatedly, and inspected the works that were rapidly advancing among +the hills. Racine also was her guest about this period, and was +charmed with his visit. Here, too, in the very house where Charles X., +and with him the direct Bourbon line, afterward ceased to reign, was +probably fixed that remarkable marriage of which we shall have much to +record. +</p> +<p> +Madame de Maintenon was still beautiful, though in her fiftieth year. +She was three years older than the king, and the influence she exerted +over him was no matter of surprise to those who were used to watch her +radiant eyes and face beaming with animation and intelligence. Severe +virtue gave additional dignity to her distinguished and graceful +manners, and, while she yielded to none in conversational powers, she +was also a good listener. The proud king found in her one to whom he +could bow without humiliation, and her conquest of his heart was a +signal triumph of moral worth. The marriage was private, and the +secrecy so well preserved that its date cannot be ascertained. It is +supposed to have taken place in 1685, and was celebrated by the +Archbishop of Paris, in the presence of Père la Chaise; Bontemps, a +valet-de-chambre, who served the mass; and M. de Montchevreuil, Madame +de Maintenon's intimate friend. A union satisfactory to her conscience +was all she required, and this being obtained, she took the utmost +pains to prevent the matter becoming public. The court remained for +some time in ignorance of the marriage; but the fact is beyond all +doubt, and is dwelt on with little disguise by the Bishop of Chartres, +in letters to the king and his wife, and by Bourdaloue in his private +instructions to the latter. While Saint-Simon denounces it as "so +profound a humiliation for the proudest of kings that posterity will +never credit it," Voltaire, with more good sense, maintains that Louis +in this marriage in no degree compromised his dignity, and that the +court, never having any certainty on the subject, respected the king's +choice without treating Madame de Maintenon as queen. [Footnote 175] +There is not the slightest proof that Louis ever contemplated sharing +his throne with her openly, and still less that her ambition extended +so far. In the passage we quoted from Macaulay the reader will have +observed that he introduces the fable with "It was said." He is, in +fact, there following Saint-Simon and the Abbé de Choisy, [Footnote +176] whose "Memoirs" are, in this particular, altogether at variance +with Madame de Maintenon's character as revealed in her letters, with +the modesty and reserve which distinguished her in so high a station, +and with the impenetrable silence she always observed with regard to +the fact of the king being her husband. [Footnote 177] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 175: <i>"Siècle de Louis XIV.," tome</i> ii.] +<br><br> + [Footnote 176: <i>Livre</i> vii.] +<br><br> + [Footnote 177: <i>"Duc de Noailles," tome</i> ii., pp. 131-2.] +</p> +<p> +Though living in the midst of the court, her elevation was, as +Voltaire says, nothing but a retreat. She restricted her society to a +small number of female friends, and devoted herself almost exclusively +to the king. No distinction marked her in public, except that she +occupied in chapel a gilded tribune made for the queen. <a name="810">{810}</a> Louis +spoke of her as <i>Madame</i>, and if the Abbé de Choisy may be trusted, +Bontemps, the valet, addressed her in private as "your majesty." She +was seldom seen in the reception-halls, but the king passed all the +time that was not occupied with public affairs in her apartment. He +rose at eight, surrounded by his officers; as soon as dressed, he was +closeted with his ministers, with whom he remained till midday; at +half-past twelve he heard mass, and in passing and repassing through +the grand gallery, to which the public was admitted, might be +addressed by any one who asked permission of the captain of his +guards. After mass, he visited Madame de Montespan daily till the year +1691, [Footnote 178] and staid with her till dinner was announced. +This was ordinarily about half-past one. Madame de Maintenon, though +she supped in her own room, dined always at the king's table, sitting +opposite him. Then followed shooting in the park, which was his +favorite amusement. Sometimes he hunted the stag, the wolf, or the +wild boar; but from the time he dislocated his arm in 1683, through +his horse's stumbling over a rabbit-burrow, he seldom went to the +chase mounted, but in a calash, which he drove himself, with some +ladies, and very often Madame de Maintenon. Banquets were spread in +the woods, and in the summer evenings gondolas with music plied on the +canal, and Madame de Maintenon's place was always in that of the king. +At six or seven he returned home, and worked or amused himself till +ten, the hour for supper; after which he passed an hour with his +children, lawful and legitimized, his brother sitting in an arm-chair +like himself, the dauphin and the other princes standing, and the +princesses on tabourets. During winter at Versailles, a ball, a +comedy, or an <i>appartement</i> followed every evening in regular +succession. The <i>appartement</i> was an assembly of the entire court, and +sometimes ended with dancing, after music, chess, billiards, and all +sorts of games. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 178: <i>"Duc de Noailles" tome</i> ii., p. 147, note.] +</p> +<p> +There was nothing in Madame de Maintenon's temper opposed to the +ceaseless festivities of Versailles, Marly, and Fontainebleau. She +heightened them, indeed, by the noble pleasures of the mind, which her +influence could not fail to introduce. Her style of dress was +exquisite, and elderly beyond what her age required; and while she +treated all around her with the utmost attention, she was altogether +free from airs of importance. She rose between six and seven, went +straight to mass, and communicated three or four times a week. While +she was dressing, one of her attendants read the New Testament or the +"Imitation of Jesus Christ;" and during the rest of the day her +movements were regulated by those of the king. Whenever she was at +liberty, she passed her mornings at Saint-Cyr, and Louis came to her +regularly several hours before supper. She never went to him except +when he was ill. Her income amounted to nearly four thousand pounds a +year of our money; and of this the larger part was given to the poor. +In vain the members of her family looked to her for promotion, in vain +they reproached her with forgetting the claims of kindred: "I refer +you, madam," she wrote to the Princesse des Ursins, "to the valley of +Josaphat to see whether I have been a bad kinswoman. I may be +deceived, but I believe I have done as I ought, and that God has not +placed me where I am to persecute him continually for whom I wish to +procure that repose which he does not enjoy. No, madam, it is only in +the vale of Josaphat that the reasons for my conduct toward my +relatives will be apparent. Meanwhile, I conjure you not to condemn +me." [Footnote 179] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 179: Letter of 16th February, 1710. ] +</p> +<p> +The poor and unfortunate had no cause for similar complaints. She gave +away between two and three <a name="811">{811}</a> thousand pounds a year. During the +scarcity of 1694, having parted with all she had, she sold a beautiful +ring and a pair of horses, to supply the wants of the sufferers. +"Distribute my alms," she wrote to her steward, "as quickly as you +can. Spare no pains, and repine at no difficulty. Circumstances +require unusual charities. See if peas, beans, milk, and barley-meal, +if anything, in short, will supply the place of the bread which is so +dear. Do in my house as you would in your own family. I leave it in +your charge. Incite the people to courage and to labor. If they do not +sow, they will reap nothing next year." +</p> +<p> +She often visited the needy, and relieved their wants with her own +hand. She would put off buying anything for herself to the last +moment, and then say, "There, I have taken that from the poor." Her +charity inspired others with the spirit of self-denial, and the king +and his chief almoner often dispensed their bounty through her. But +neither poor nor rich diverted her attention from Louis. To his ease, +his tastes, his sentiments—even when they shocked her—his time, and +his very friendships, she sacrificed everything. He was her vocation; +and her own friends could not, as she said, but look upon her as dead +to them. To her the king confided all; and thus the cares of state, +the perils of war, the intrigues of the court, cabals, petitions, +private interests, and even family disputes, were continually rolling +their din at her feet. Princes, princesses, ministers, and a crowd of +persons anxious to secure their own interests, forced themselves upon +her, and broke up all the pleasures of solitude and society, of study, +meditation, and correspondence, for which she pined. But she had +counted the cost, and bore with equanimity the absence of that perfect +happiness which she never expected to attain on earth. The honors +which encircled her were brilliant fetters, and galled her no less +because they glittered. "I can hold out no longer," she said one day +to her brother, Count d'Aubigné; "I would that I were dead!" The sense +of duty was her abiding strength, and she derived consolation from +reflecting that her elevation was not of her own seeking. The path by +which she had been led was strange—so strange that she could not but +believe she had a divine mission to accomplish. It was easy to +interpret her conduct in a worldly and ambitious sense; but when, +since the Master of the house was called Beelzebub, have the children +of his household been rightly understood? Whatever is in the heart +comes out sooner or later in the writings, and those who read Madame +de Maintenon in her letters, will be in no doubt as to what were her +guiding principles. Always true to herself, she was an enigma to those +only who had not the key to her true character. The year of her +marriage was signalized by one of the most important legislative acts +in the history of modern Europe. This was the revocation of the edict +of Nantes, by which, eighty-seven years before, Henry IV. had, shortly +after his abjuration of Protestantism, terminated a long civil war by +granting to the Calvinists freedom of religious worship and admission +to offices of state. The edict itself was as contrary to the spirit of +that age as it would be consonant with the ideas of this. Those who +regarded each other respectively as idolaters and heretics had not yet +learned to live together in social and political brotherhood. The +popes and saintly doctors of those times looked on such fraternity +with horror, and foresaw that, if it became general, indifference and +widespread infidelity would be its certain results. Events have +justified their anticipations; and though it may be doubted whether +this or that act of intolerance, such as the revocation of the edict +in question by Louis XIV., were wise and expedient under the +circumstances, it ought never to be forgotten that the establishment +and maintenance of Catholic unity in a <a name="812">{812}</a> kingdom redounds, +abstractly considered, to the glory of a Christian prince. To this +glory the government of Louis aspired; and while it is clear from +Madame de Maintenon's correspondence that she took no active part in +the matter, it is evident also that she approved it, as did the nation +in general. Voltaire concurs with the Duc de Noailles in exonerating +her from the charge of having instigated the revocation and applauded +its results. No traces of a spirit of persecution can be discovered in +her character. Nothing can exceed the sweetness of disposition with +which she reproved her brother, when governor of Cognac, for having +treated the Calvinists with needless severity. "Have pity," she wrote, +"on persons more unfortunate than culpable. They hold the errors we +once held ourselves, and from which violence never withdrew us. Do not +disquiet them; such men must be allured by gentleness and love: Jesus +Christ has set us the example." [Footnote 180] Ruvigny, a Protestant, +afterward made Earl of Galway by William III., spoke of her to the +king as one who had a leaning to the Reformed religion; and though +nothing could be more untrue, it shows that her zeal as a Catholic +could not have been intemperate. The king himself told her that her +tenderness toward the Huguenots came, he thought, of her having +formerly been one of them; and the historians of the French refugees +in Brandeburg, Erman and Reclam, allow that she never advised the +violent measures that were used, and declare that she abhorred the +persecutions consequent on the revocation. The authors of them, they +add, concealed them from her as far as possible, knowing that she +desired the adoption of no other means but instruction and kindness. +[Footnote 181] In her conversations with the sisters at Saint-Cyr, her +language was always in conformity with these statements. The king, she +told them, who had a wonderful zeal for religion, pressed her to +dismiss some Huguenots from her service, or oblige them to enter the +fold of the Church. "I pray you, sire," she replied, "to let me be +mistress of my own domestics, and manage them in my own way." +Accordingly, she never pressed them to renounce their errors. She +showed them the more excellent way when ever she had an opportunity, +and in good time had the satisfaction of seeing them all embrace the +Catholic faith. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 180: <i>Lettre à M. d' Aubigné</i>, 1682.] +<br><br> + [Footnote 181: <i>Tome</i> i., p. 77.] +</p> +<p> +If, then, Madame de Maintenon applauded the revocation of the edict of +Nantes, she must not be held responsible for the forced conversions, +the dragonades, imprisonments, and emigration in which it issued. Her +approval must be interpreted in the same sense as the brief addressed +to Louis by Innocent XI., [Footnote 182] in which the pontiff +congratulated him on "revoking all the ordinances issued in favor of +heretics throughout his kingdom, and providing, by very sage edicts, +for the propagation of the orthodox faith." The immunities granted to +the Calvinists by Henry IV. involved, according to Ranke, a Protestant +historian, "a degree of independence which seems hardly compatible +with the idea of a state." [Footnote 183] Religious dissent naturally +engendered political disaffection. The Protestant assemblies in the +time of Louis XIII. endeavored to establish a kind of federal +republic. Six times during that king's reign the Calvinists took up +arms. Richelieu maintained that nothing great could be undertaken so +long as the Huguenots had a footing in the kingdom. They formed a +treaty with Spain, with a view to their independence, and were +regarded by the nation at large as a public enemy. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 182: 13th November, 1685.] +<br><br> + [Footnote 183: "Lives of the Popes," vol. ii., p. 439.] +</p> +<p> +Zealously as Madame de Maintenon labored for the conversion of her own +relatives—particularly M. de Vilette and his children—it is no +wonder that she concurred with the king, the clergy, and the people in +thinking that the <a name="813">{813}</a> time was come to withdraw from the Protestants +of France privileges dangerous to religion and to the state, and to +concert more effective measures for their conversion. She held with +Bossuet that a Christian prince "ought to use his authority for the +destruction of false religions in his realm, and that he is at liberty +to employ rigorous measures, but that gentleness is to be preferred." +[Footnote 184] She believed with Fénelon that the religious toleration +which is necessary in one country may be dangerous in another—for the +mild and loving prelate of Cambray agreed at bottom with the sterner +Bossuet on this subject. [Footnote 185] Whether subsequent events +vindicated the political expediency of the revocation; whether the +evils it produced were not greater than the good it proposed; whether +those who recommended it would not, if furnished with our experience, +have wished it had never been carried into effect—are questions of +great importance and interest, but foreign to the purpose of this +paper. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 184: <i>"Politique tirée de l'Ecriture Sainte," livre</i> vii.] +<br><br> + [Footnote 185: <i>"Essai sur le Gouvernement civil," tome</i> xxii.] +</p> +<p> +We have more than once alluded to Saint-Cyr, and it is time now to +give some account of the origin and nature of that noble institution, +which perished with the monarchy and old aristocracy of France, on +which it depended, and of which it was a support. Like most other +great works, its beginnings were small. Before Madame de Maintenon was +raised so near the throne, she used often to meet at the Chateau de +Montchevreuil an Ursuline sister named Madame de Brinon, whose convent +had been ruined. Devoted to the work of education, this lady spent her +days in giving instruction to some children in the village. Her +resources being very low, Madame de Maintenon intrusted her with the +care of several children whom she charitably maintained, and often +visited them and their mistress, first at Rueil, and afterward at +Noisy, where the king placed a chateau at her disposal, and enabled +her to enlarge the establishment. The daughters of poor gentlemen were +then admitted to the school. The king, returning from the chase one +day, paid them an unexpected visit, and was so pleased with all he saw +that Madame de Maintenon had little difficulty in inducing him to +extend his royal patronage much further, and provide means whereby two +hundred and fifty young ladies, of noble birth and poor fortunes, +might be instructed, clothed, and fed, from the age of seven or twelve +years to twenty. The domain of Saint-Cyr was purchased; and twelve +young persons belonging to the establishment, and destined for the +most part to a religious life, were selected as mistresses to direct +the larger institution. They entered on their duties after a noviciate +of nine months, and were called <i>Dames de Saint Louis</i>. Their vows +were simple, had reference to the purpose in hand, and were not +binding for life. The young ladies were nominated by the king, and +were required to prove their poverty and four degrees of nobility on +the father's side. The final transfer of the revenues of the abbey of +St. Denis to the establishment of Saint-Cyr was not approved by the +Holy See till after some years, in consequence of the dispute existing +between Louis and the court of Rome. In 1689, however, Alexander VIII. +formally authorized the foundation, and in the February of the next +year addressed a suitable brief to Madame de Maintenon, expressing the +warm interest he felt in her undertaking. Madame de Brinon was elected +superior for life, but, as she did not altogether second the designs +of the foundress, relaxed the rules, and introduced amusements which +were thought too worldly, a change became necessary. It was not +without much patience on the part of Madame de Maintenon that the +difficulties were at last overcome. Madame de Montchevreuil, their +mutual friend, was charged with a <i>lettre de cachet</i> by which the king +commanded Madame de Brinon to quit <a name="814">{814}</a> Saint-Cyr. She retired to the +abbey of Maubisson, of which the Princess Louisa of Hanover was +abbess, and there passed the remainder of her days in honorable +retirement, and in the enjoyment of a small pension. She was fond of +great personages, and of playing an important part, and this feeling +led to her becoming the intermediary between Leibnitz and Bossuet, in +a correspondence which aimed at the reunion of Catholics and +Protestants, and which, as might have been expected, produced no +results. +</p> +<p> +After Madame de Brinon's departure, Madame de Maintenon devoted +herself more and more to her important enterprise. As the young ladies +were educated for home and the world, not the cloister, they were +indulged occasionally with dramatic representations. This gave rise to +two of Racine's finest pieces. Having been requested by Madame de +Maintenon to invent some moral or historical poem in dialogue, from +which love should be excluded, he produced "Esther," which was first +acted at Saint-Cyr in 1689, in presence of the king. His majesty was +charmed; the prince wept. Racine had never written anything finer, or +more touching. Esther's prayer to Assuerus transported the audience. +Madame de Sévigné only lamented that a little girl personated that +great king. Numerous representations followed, and crowds of eager +spectators, courtiers, ecclesiastics, literati, and religious sat +beside the ex-king and queen of England, to hear the pure and +harmonious verses of Racine recited by the young, the innocent, and +the beautiful, to the richest and softest music Moreau could compose. +This success was but the forerunner of a still greater. At the request +of Louis, Racine wrote another tragedy the following year—viz., +"Athalie;" in the opinion of French critics the most perfect of all +tragedies. But the excitement attending the play of "Esther" had been +too great to allow of a renewal of the experiment. The "comedy," as it +was called, of "Athalie" was performed therefore by "the blue class," +without stage or costume, in presence only of the king, Madame de +Maintenon, James II., and six or seven other persons, among whom was +Fénelon. +</p> +<p> +In the midst of such amusements, pride and frivolity crept into +Saint-Cyr, and Madame de Maintenon became convinced that she had +allowed its pupils more freedom than they could enjoy without abuse. +Reform was indispensable. The <i>Dames de Saint Louis</i> took monastic +vows under the rule of St. Augustin. No effort was spared to inculcate +piety and make religion loved. Bossuet and Fénelon were frequently +invited to address the young people. One of the sermons thus delivered +is found in the works of Bossuet, but the original manuscript is said +to be in the handwriting of the Archbishop of Cambray. It bears, in +fact, the impress of their twofold genius, but the pathos of its style +stamps it as more peculiarly the production of Fénelon. [Footnote 86] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 186: <i>"Duc de Noailles," tome</i> iii., p. 140.] +</p> +<p> +The Duc de Saint-Simon, incapable of mastering ideas of a religious +order, carps and jeers at Madame de Maintenon as one who thought +herself an "universal abbess." Those who carefully examine the annals +of Saint-Cyr, and weigh the difficulties that arose from the various +characters of the superiors chosen, the tendency at one time to relax +and at another to overstrain the religious education of the pupils, +will arrive at the conclusion that few ladies in an exalted position, +and in the midst of all that is most worldly, ever possessed so much +of that wise and loving spirit of government which should distinguish +an abbess, as the wife, friend, companion, and counsellor of Louis +XIV. One might almost say that Saint-Cyr was the passion of her life. +When at Versailles she went there daily, and often arrived at six in +the morning. The young ladies, scarcely yet awake, had the joy of +seeing her beloved and <a name="815">{815}</a> revered figure among them in the sleeping +apartments; and she frequently helped to dress the little ones and +comb their hair, with unaffected and maternal kindness. The +unremitting attention she gave to the establishment was soon rewarded, +and its beneficial effects on society were placed beyond all doubt. +The pupils and mistresses alike of Saint-Cyr were held in great +esteem, and many of them, scattered through the kingdom, filled +important educational and conventual posts; while in Hungary, Austria, +Russia, and the Milanese, institutions were formed on its model. By +interesting the king in its details, and inducing him to visit it very +often, Madame de Maintenon partly secured the other great aim of her +existence, namely, his amusement. +</p> +<p> +Of all the errors that have, from time to time, insinuated themselves +into the minds of Catholics, none has worn a more plausible and poetic +aspect than Quietism. It crept into Saint-Cyr under the auspices of +Madame de la Maisonfort, a person of a peculiarly imaginative and +mystic temperament. She discoursed with like fluency with Racine and +Fénelon, and always appeared brimful of intelligence and devotional +feelings. Madame de Maintenon had received her as a friend, and hailed +with delight her resolution to adopt a religious habit and become one +of the <i>Dames de Saint Louis</i>. She made her profession in 1692, and by +moderating her vivacity for a time deceived others, and perhaps +herself also. Errors akin to those of Molinos were then spreading +fast, and Madame Guyon, their chief propagandist, happened to be a +relation of Madame de la Maisonfort. When the former lady was arrested +for the first time in 1688, her kinswoman and Madame de Maintenon +interceded for her. After this she often visited Saint-Cyr, and +gradually became intimate with the ladies engaged in the institution. +Her manuscripts were eagerly read, and a chosen few who were first +initiated in their mysteries inoculated others with the subtle poison, +until all the novices, one confessor, the lay-sisters, and many under +instruction, abandoning themselves, as they believed, to the sole +guidance of the Holy Spirit, practiced all kinds of mystic devotion, +talked incessantly the pious jargon of Quietism, looked down upon +those who could not embrace the new tenets, and strangely forgot their +vows of obedience to superiors. Nothing was heard but the praises of +pure love, holy indifference, inactive contemplation, passive prayer, +and that entire abandonment of one's self to God which exempts us from +caring about anything, and even from being anxious about our own +salvation. [Footnote 187] Fénelon, by his intimacy with Madame Guyon, +whose director he was, lent life and vigor to these extravagant ideas. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 187: Madame Guyon herself disowned many of the monstrous + conclusions of the Quietists, while her own opinions were in excess + of those of Fénelon.] +</p> +<p> +His elevation to the see of Cambray, in 1695, was regarded by them as +the triumph of their cause, and Saint-Cyr bade fair to rival Port +Royal as a stronghold of suspected tenets. But episcopal authority +interfered at last, and through the remonstrances of the Bishop of +Chartres, Madame Guyon was dismissed, and her books were forbidden. +She continued, however, to correspond with the inmates of Saint-Cyr; +and when, in December, 1695, she was imprisoned anew, they exhorted +each other to remain firm and endure the coming persecution. Bossuet +himself, at the request of Madame de Maintenon, now fully alive to the +danger, came to assist in extinguishing the nascent error, while +Fénelon, on the contrary, defended his own and Madame Guyon's opinions +from what he considered to be exaggerated charges, and wrote his +famous <i>"Maximes des Saints"</i> in opposition to Bossuet's <i>"Etats d' +Oraison."</i> It is a question whether Bossuet was not led, in the zeal +of his antagonism, to make indefensible statements of a different +tendency. Fénelon, in fact, charged him with so doing, and the spirit +<a name="816">{816}</a> displayed by the Bishop of Meaux in defending himself and +prosecuting the condemnation of his former friend, does not present +the most pleasing incident in the great Bossuet's career. Perhaps +Fénelon has won more glory by his ready and humble submission to the +ultimate decision of the Holy See than has Bossuet by his zeal in +procuring a just censure on Fénelon's errors. The temper and ability +with which Fénelon pleaded his cause began to enlist public opinion in +his favor. He utterly disclaimed all participation in the errors of +Quietism, and said he could easily have calmed the heated minds of the +sisters of Saint-Cyr, and have brought them in all docility under +their bishop's yoke. [Footnote 188] But Bossuet invoked the authority +of the king, the decision of his brother prelates, and the judgment of +the Holy See. The Bishop of Chartres, on making a personal inquiry +into the state of things, required that not only Madame Guyon's +writings, but those of Fénelon himself, should be delivered into his +hands. Whatever the merits of the question in other respects, and +whatever opinion may be formed of the respective teaching of these two +great men, there can be no doubt that the <i>"Maximes des Saints"</i> had +fostered prevailing errors. The king expressed great displeasure at +the course events had taken, and by a <i>lettre de cachet</i> in 1698 +ordered Madame de la Maisonfort and another lady to quit the +establishment, and all other infected persons to be removed. They +passed the night in tears in the superior's apartment; and the next +day Madame de Maintenon come to console the community for their loss. +If she erred at all throughout this perplexing affair, it was by +over-indulgence and by forbearing too long. When her duty became clear +and imperative, she was never undecided, nor showed any inclination to +encourage novelties in religion. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 188: <i>"Duc de Noailles," tome</i> iii., p. 241.] +</p> +<p> +A history of Madame de Maintenon, however detailed, must always be +wanting in those personal traits which distinguish most striking +biographies, and this for the simple reason that her habits and +disposition were retiring, and her daily effort was to throw a veil +over herself. That her influence in the long run was enhanced by this +modesty, no one can doubt; yet it is not on that account the less +true, that in the scenes through which she passed it is difficult to +seize and depict her individually. We must, nevertheless, endeavor to +give some idea of her relations with the royal family, by some of whom +she was beloved, by others hated, and by all held in high +consideration. Monsieur, the king's brother, liked and respected her +for Louis' sake, to whom he was sincerely attached; but it was far +otherwise with Madame. A Bavarian by birth, she was completely German +in her tastes, and in the midst of Parisian splendor sighed for her +home beyond the Rhine. She was, she said, a hermit in a crowd, and +passed her days in utter loneliness. She was a Protestant at heart, +intensely masculine, and had little sympathy with Madame de +Maintenon's quiet mode of life. So fond was she of the chase, that she +continued to follow it, though she had been thrown from her horse +six-and-twenty times. Madame de Maintenon was her special aversion, +and this antipathy arose principally from her national prejudices +against unequal marriages. The king's wife was, in her view, an +upstart, and the credit she had obtained at court did not diminish +this impression. She spoke with contempt of her piety as mere +hypocrisy, and laid to her charge every species of enormity. She had +pandered to the dauphin's profligacy; killed the dauphiness by means +of her accoucheur; led the young Duchess of Bourgogne into sin; +monopolized corn during a famine to enrich herself; and never dreamed +of anything but her own pleasures and ambition; she had poisoned +Louvois and, nobody knew why, the architect Mansart; she, with Père +<a name="817">{817}</a> la Chaise, had instigated the persecution of the Protestants; +she had set fire to the chateau of Lunéville; and, from her retreat at +Saint-Cyr, fomented conspiracies against the regent! Truly the poison +of asps was under the lips of Madame Elizabeth of Bavaria. The +dauphiness, on the other hand, neglected by her dissolute husband, +made Madame de Maintenon her friend, and found consolation in pouring +her troubles into her ear, and listening in return to her sage and +tender counsels. After ten years of sickness and sorrow in her married +life, she died of consumption in 1690. "See," said the king to her +unworthy partner, "what the grandeur of this world comes to! This is +what awaits you and me. God grant us the grace to die as holily as she +has done!" +</p> +<p> +The pages of French history present few pictures more replete with +grandeur and interest than the retreat of the great Condé at +Chantilly. Crowned with the laurels of a hundred victories, the +princely veteran there gathered around him a more distinguished staff +than had ever sat in his councils of war—men who, endued with +intellectual might and moral greatness, were to achieve lasting +conquests in the realm of mind. Profoundly skilled himself in history, +philosophy, art, science, and even theology, he loved to entertain +those who, in various ways, had devoted their lives to the triumph of +knowledge and reflection over ignorance and sensuality. All that was +noblest in birth and cultivated in mind met together in his +orangeries, and sauntered among his gardens and fountains. There the +most eminent prelates of their time were seen side by side with the +greatest dramatists, historians, and poets. There was Fléchier and +Fleury; there La Fontaine, Boileau, and Molière; there Rapin and Huet, +La Bruyère and Bossuet. There wit sparkled and wisdom shone as +incessantly as the jets and cascades that rose and fell in light and +music by night and day. Thither came often the entire court, and with +it Madame de Maintenon, a star among stars, brilliant but retiring, to +enhance the glory of the illustrious and aged chief. There, honored by +the king and closeted with him daily, as at Versailles and elsewhere, +she could not fail to receive the willing homage of every member of +the house of Condé. There, too, after the general's death, she saw her +former pupil, the king's daughter, Mademoiselle de Nantes, espoused to +Condé's grandson; and thus, as time went on, she watched the career of +those whom she had educated, and who formed the more noble alliances +because the king had raised them to the rank of royal princesses. +Never did any lady occupy a more remarkable and in some respects a +more enviable position than herself. "There never was a case like it," +says Madame de Sévigné, "and there never will be such a one again." +She united the most opposite conditions. By her union with Louis she +was all but queen, and by her admirable tact exerted over state +affairs a far greater influence than belongs in general to a +sovereign's consort. She had been the servant of that very king of +whom she was now the helpmate; a wise instructress to his children, +and a mother in her affection and care. At one moment she was acting +abbess, controlling the complicated irregularities which had crept +into the religious and secular economy of Saint-Cyr, and at another +she was mediating as peace-maker in the family quarrels and petty +jealousies of pampered courtiers, or by her sage counsels arresting +the ravages of war, and rescuing harmless populations from the scourge +of fire and sword. Children loved to hear her voice, and hung upon her +smiles; the poor and afflicted were fain to touch the hem of her +garment, for they felt that virtue went forth from her; none were so +great as to look down upon her; none so lowly as to think that she +despised them. Her sovereignty over others was that to which men +render the most willing obedience—the sovereignty, not merely of +station or <a name="818">{818}</a> intellect, but of character of sterling worth, of +wisdom learned in the school of suffering, of virtue tried like gold +in the fire. +</p> +<p> +As Madame de Maintenon's talents and merits prevented her being lost +in a crowd of courtiers, or in any way identified with them, so, on +the other hand, her affectionate disposition kept her from being +isolated and closing herself round against any intrusion of private +friendship. So far from it, she had with her a select group of ladies +who were called her familiars, who shared with her, in a measure, the +king's intimacy, accompanied her in her walks and drives at Marly, and +were her guests at the dinners and suppers she gave at Versailles and +Trianon. They were in some sort her ladies of honor, though, like +herself, without any visible distinction. Of these the principal were +Madame de Montchevreuil and Madame d'Heudicourt, both old friends, and +with them nine others, among whom were her two nieces, Mesdames de +Mailly and de Caylus. To each of these a history attaches; for the +constant companions of so extraordinary a woman could not but have +special attractions and remarkable qualities. There were in this +number those who had drunk deeply of the intoxicating cup of worldly +pleasure, and having drained its poisonous dregs, thirsted for the +fountain of living waters. It was Madame de Maintenon's especial care +to encourage such friends in their heavenly aspirations, and lead +them, in the midst of the court, to enter the devotional life. Often +she called the fervent Fénelon to her assistance, and his letters +addressed to Madame de Grammont are a lasting proof of the readiness +with which he answered to the call. If, as all her contemporaries +assure us, it was impossible to combine more that was pleasing and +solid in conversation than did Madame de Maintenon—if, in her case, +reason, as Fénelon expressed it, spoke by the lips of the Graces—how +admirable must she have appeared when she directed her powers of +persuasion to the highest and most blessed of all ends! Neither pen +nor pencil can adequately recall the charms which surrounded her; but +the captive heart of Louis and the unanimous voice of the richest and +most lettered court in Europe attest their reality and power. In her +ceaseless efforts to amuse the king, his immortal interests were never +lost sight of; and if she spoke to him comparatively seldom on the +subject, it was because it occupied all her thoughts. Out of the +abundance of the heart the lips are often mute. +</p> +<p> +In 1686 Louis suffered extreme pain and incurred great danger from a +tumor, which at last required an operation. This circumstance brought +Madame de Maintenon's capacity for nursing into full play. It was she +who watched by his bedside, and alleviated the sufferings of the +nation's idol. The surgery of that day was wretched, and the operation +for fistula which had to be performed was attended with great danger. +Intense solicitude prevailed through the country; for, in spite of all +efforts to prevent anxiety, the report spread rapidly that the king's +life was in peril. The churches were thronged, and the people's +attachment found vent in prayer. The royal patient alone was unmoved. +The <i>grande operation</i>, as it was called, had been decided on six +weeks previously, and the evening before it was to take place he +walked in his gardens as usual, and then slept soundly through the +night, as if nothing were to happen. On waking he commended himself to +God, and submitted to the painful operation with the utmost coolness. +Louvois held his hand, and Madame de Maintenon was in the room. In the +afternoon he sent for his ministers, and continued to hold councils +daily, though the surgeon's knife cruelly renewed the incisions +several times. "It is in God," wrote Madame de Maintenon, "that we +must place our trust; for men know not what they say, nor what they +do." The fourteen physicians of <a name="819">{819}</a> Charles II. were still more +unskilful in his last illness, [Footnote 189] and justify equally the +opinion of the Northern Farmer: +</p> +<pre> + "Doctors, they knaws nowt, for a says what's nawways true: + Naw soort a' koind o' use to saäy the things that a do." +</pre> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 189: "The king was in a chair—they had placed a hot iron + on his head, and they held his teeth open by force." Agnes + Strickland's "Lives of the Queens of England;" vol. viii., p. 447. +<br><br> + "A loathsome volatile salt, extracted from human skulls, was forced + into his mouth." Macaulay's "History of England," chap. iv.. 1685.] +</p> +<p> +In the case of Louis, however, the operator Félix answered to his +name. A cure was effected, and the kingdom was filled with +demonstrations of joy. "Every one," as Madame de Maintenon wrote, "was +in raptures. Father Bourdaloue preached a most beautiful sermon. +Toward the close he addressed the king. He spoke to him of his health, +his love for his people, and the fears of his court. He caused many +tears to be shed; he shed them himself. It was his heart that spoke, +and he touched all hearts. You know well what I mean." After dining +with the citizens of Paris at the Hôtel de Ville, Louis drove through +every quarter amid the loudest acclamations. "The king," wrote his +wife again, "has never been in such a good humor as since he has +witnessed the enthusiastic love the capital bears toward him. I very +much like his sentiments: perhaps they will inspire him with the +design of relieving his people." Absolute as the sovereignty of Louis +was, his subjects delighted in his rule. He was the last of a long +line who, century after century, had formed the nation out of the +confusion of feudal times, and had, of all kings, the best right to +say, if indeed he ever did say, [Footnote 190] <i>"L'état, c'est +moi!"</i> +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 190: See <i>"Duc de Noailles," tome</i> iii., p. 668.] +</p> +<p> +In him the state was summed up, and the kingdom was impersonated in +him. The soldier expiring on the battlefield cried <i>"Vive le roi!"</i> +and vessels have gone down at sea with the entire crew shouting the +same words; for <i>"Vive le roi!"</i> was, in their minds, equivalent to +<i>"Vive la France!"</i> The government of Louis XIV., though despotic, +was, on the whole, marked by moderation, particularly after the death +of Louvois; and if sometimes, seduced by the glory of foreign +conquests and the love of regal display he forgot the interests of his +people and the misery his magnificence entailed on them, Madame de +Maintenon was always near to counteract the arrogant minister, urge +counsels of peace, and heal the bleeding wounds of a loyal population. +Yet she was far from being a meddling politician, Her advice was not +offered, but asked. She abstained from entering into details, and +confined herself to general suggestions of a moral character, dictated +by conscience, not ambition. If she guided, or, rather, gently +disposed, the king to this or that measure, she was in turn guided +herself. Her correspondence with the Abbé Gobelin, Fénelon, and the +Bishop of Chartres sufficiently proves that her highest ambition was +to be a servant of God. That Racine, of whom she was the friend and +patroness, should extol her in his verse [Footnote 191] is not +surprising; but the satirist Boileau, be it remembered, was no less +her eulogist. If Byron's beautiful lines on Kirke White had the more +weight because they occurred in his most biting satire, something of +the same kind may be said of Boileau's testimony to Madame de +Maintenon: +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 191: "Esther," act ii., scene vii.] +<br> +<pre> + "J'en sais une, chérie et du monde et de Dieu; + Humble dans les grandeurs, sage dana la fortune: + Qui gémit comme Esther de sa gloire importune; + Que le vice lui-même est contraint d'estimer, + Et que, sur ce tableau, d'abord tu sais nonmer." + + [Footnote 192] +</pre> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 192: "I know one beloved of God and man, who is humble in + her grandeur and wise in her good fortune; who groans like Esther + over her trying glory; whom vice itself is compelled to respect; and + whom, on seeing this picture, you will name in an instant." Satire + X.] +</p> +<p> +The Duc de Noailles is not the only member of the French Academy who +has arisen of late years to refute the calumnies of Saint-Simon. M. +Saint-Marc Girardin has ably defended the <a name="820">{820}</a> victim of his +malignity in the <i>Journal des Débats</i>, [Footnote 193] and Messieurs +Rigault, de Pontmartin, Monty, Chasles, and Hocquet, have pursued +successfully the same generous and equitable course. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 193: 4th and 16th October, 1856.] +</p> +<p> +When James II., in December, 1688, fled from his kingdom, the +sympathies of more than half the French people were enlisted on his +side. Ignorant of the British constitution, they knew little of the +peril it had incurred through the king's extraordinary extension of +the dispensing power, and they saw in the landing and success of the +Prince of Orange nothing but a horrible domestic tragedy, in which, +through personal ambition and hatred of the true religion, a Catholic +sovereign was hurled from his throne by an unnatural daughter and +son-in-law. They joined, therefore, without any misgiving, in the +cordial reception given to the royal fugitives by Louis, and desired +nothing so much as to make common cause with them, and take vengeance +on their foes. Madame de Maintenon was not among those who pressed +with all ceremony into the presence of the exiled king and queen; but +she visited them in private, and was received as became her station. +The compassion she felt for their fate, her respectful address and +Christian consolations, so won upon Mary Beatrice, that a lasting +friendship was formed between the queen in name, not in reality, and +the queen in reality, not in name. It continued without interruption +during five-and-twenty years, and was cemented by unity of sentiments +and mutual services. The ex-queen had married in her fifteenth year, +and had overcome, by the advice of her mother and the Pope, her desire +to devote herself to a religious life. [Footnote 194] Whatever may +have been her trials in a convent, they could hardly have equalled +those which befel her as queen. A hundred and forty-five of her +letters to Madame de Maintenon are extant, and the readers of Miss +Strickland's "Lives" are familiar with the Chaillot correspondence, in +which the desolate and sorrowful queen pours forth the fulness of her +sensitive heart, and never tires of expressing her love and esteem for +that remarkable friend whom Providence has led across her thorny path. +Often Madame de Maintenon repaired to Saint-Germain to visit her, and +still more frequently the latter came to Versailles to see Madame de +Maintenon. It was some relief to escape for a time from that downcast, +dreary court in exile, where a crowd of poor but faithful followers +gathered around a master equally wrong-headed and unfortunate. The +semblance of royalty which was there kept up only increased the +sadness of the place, and fostered those jealousies, intrigues, and +cabals of which a banished court is so often the parent and victim. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 194: <i>"Duc de Noailles," tome</i> iv., p. 231.] +</p> +<p> +A powerful coalition, in the creation of which the Prince of Orange +was the chief agent, had long been menacing France, and was now +actually formed. Louis found himself opposed to the greater part of +Europe, for the Emperor Leopold, the Germanic and Batavian +federations, the kings of Spain and Sweden, and the Pope himself, +obliged to act on the defensive, adhered to the league of Augsburg. +[Footnote 195] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 195: <i>"Duc de Noailles,"</i> p. 253.] +</p> +<p> +Three powerful armies were sent by the king of France to the seat of +war. The mission of one of them was to capture Philipsburg; and from +the camp before that stronghold the king's brother wrote many letters +to Madame de Maintenon, describing the operations in progress. The Duc +du Maine also, once her pupil, and now in his eighteenth year, wrote +to her from time to time, and received thankfully the advice she +offered him with all a mother's solicitude. The second of the three +armies was charged with the devastation of the Palatinate, and +fulfilled the part assigned it with distressing precision. If its soil +was not to supply the French, it must <a name="821">{821}</a> furnish nought to the +Germans. It was a perfect garden, and Duras received orders to reduce +it to a wilderness. Half a million of human beings were warned that in +three days their houses would be burned and their fields laid waste. +Fiercely the flames went up from city and hamlet, and the fugitives +sank with fatigue and hunger in the snow, or, escaping beyond the +borders, filled the towns of Europe with squalid beggary. Every +orchard was hewn down, every vine and almond tree was destroyed. The +castle of the Elector Palatine was a heap of ruins; the stones of +Manheim were hurled into the Rhine. The cathedral of Spires and the +marble sepulchres of eight Caesars were no more; and the fair city of +Trèves was doomed to the same cruel fate. It was time for the voice of +mercy to speak. Marshal Duras had already written to Louvois, +[Footnote 196] to remonstrate against the barbarous orders he was +compelled to execute, and Madame de Maintenon herself is said to have +interceded with Louis for the suffering people of the Rhine. The Duc +de Noailles, indeed, does not state this, like Macaulay, [Footnote +197] as matter of history, though he allows that it is probably true; +and this variety in the views of the two historians, each anxious to +do justice in this particular to the king's wife, proves how difficult +it is for even the most sagacious and unprejudiced writers to arrive +at the exact truth in reference to bygone days. Macaulay is certainly +inclined to attribute to Madame de Maintenon a much larger measure of +political power than she really exercised; and it is curious to +observe the chain of pure assumptions by which, having taken it for +granted that she "governed" Louis, he arrives at the conclusion that +she induced him to recognize the Pretender as James III. [Footnote +198] In a letter written [Footnote 199] soon after the taking of +Philipsburg, she seems to disclaim all active interference in state +affairs. In speaking of Louvois, she says that she never contradicted +him, and adds, "People think that I govern the kingdom, and they do +not know that I am convinced God has bestowed on me so many favors +only that I may seek more earnestly the king's salvation. I pray God +daily to enlighten and sanctify, him." But it is evident how +completely an earnest recommendation to Louis to spare Trèves, and +stay the ravages in the Palatinate, may have tallied with that unique +and hallowed purpose. Have not those from whom such truculent orders +emanate a terrible account to render? Has not she who dissuades a +ruler from an iniquitous measure done something toward saving his +soul? +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 196: 21st May, 1689.] +<br><br> + [Footnote 197: Hist., chap, xi., 1689.] +<br><br> + [Footnote 198: Hist, chap, xxv, 1701.] +<br><br> + [Footnote 199: 4th October, 1688.] +</p> +<p> +There are stories afloat respecting Madame de Maintenon, and in +everybody's mouth, which the Duc de Noailles scarcely condescends to +notice. That she who always spoke and wrote of Louis in terms of +affectionate homage should have seriously committed herself to such +assertions, as that her daily task ever since her marriage was to +amuse a king who could not be amused, and that he was so selfish that +he never loved anything but himself, is an improbability as +inconsistent with her character and policy as it is at variance with +the facts of the case. That in his latter years her life was +embittered by his fretful and querulous temper, and by the fits of +passion into which he often fell, and that in one of her letters +written at that period she complains of the difficulty of amusing him, +is undoubtedly true; but this and similar complaints ought not to be +stretched beyond their natural meaning, and made to tell too severely +against the king. When, in the early part of 1691, Louis appeared in +the camp before Mons, his wife, separated from him for the first time +since their marriage, retired to Saint-Cyr, alarmed at the dangers he +was about to incur, and unable to conceal her sadness. Consolatory +letters poured in upon her from all quarters, especially <a name="822">{822}</a> from +her spiritual friends and advisers—the Abbé Gobelin, the Bishop of +Chartres, and Fénelon. But, "the selfish monarch who could not be +amused," did he, amid the bustle of a siege, find time to write to a +lady fifty-five years old, whose only business had been to amuse him +or fail in the attempt? He did; and that not once now and then; not +briefly and drily, as a matter of form; not like a man who had little +to say, and still less attachment, to the person to whom he said it. +No; every day in her solitude Madame de Maintenon was consoled by +seeing a royal dragoon ride into the court-yard with a letter for her +from his majesty, and almost every day with one from the king's +brother also. Nor was this all; the king, "who had never loved any one +but himself," proved that there was at least one exception to this +rule, and that he loved his wife. In 1692 she joined him at Mons, by +his command, in company with other ladies of the court, and followed +him to the siege of Namur. Amusements were not wanting in the royal +camp. The king and his courtiers dined to the music of timbrels, +trumpets, and hautboys, and he reviewed his troops in the presence of +carriages full of fair faces. But, with all this, he visited the +different quarters so diligently, and inspected so closely the works +and trenches, riding continually within range of the enemy's guns, +that his wife had almost as much anxiety for his safety as when she +pondered at a distance the cruel chances of war. +</p> +<p> +In spite of his many faults, there was much in Louis XIV. to captivate +the imagination of one like Madame de Maintenon. "No prince," says the +Duke of Berwick, [Footnote 200] "was ever so little known as this +monarch. He has been represented as a man not only cruel and false, +but difficult of access. I have frequently had the honor of audiences +from him, and have been very familiarly admitted to his presence; and +I can affirm that his pride is only in appearance. He was born with an +air of majesty, which struck every one so much, that nobody could +approach him without being seized with awe and respect; but as soon as +you spoke to him, he softened his countenance, and put you quite at +ease. He was the most polite man in his kingdom; and his answers were +accompanied by so many obliging expressions, that, if he granted your +request, the obligation was doubled by the manner of conferring it; +and if he refused, you could not complain." +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 200: Memoirs, vol. ii.] +</p> +<p> +Madame de Maintenon's campaigning life was not altogether free from +disagreeables. On one occasion, writing from Dinant, [Footnote 201] +she relates how they encountered more difficulty in retiring from +Namur than in approaching it. They were eleven hours and a half on the +road, and wholly unprovided with food. She arrived at her journey's +end exhausted with hunger and suffering also from rheumatism and +headache; but, it being an abstinence day, the only repast that +awaited her was oil-soup. The king likewise, though throughout the +campaign he dined ordinarily with all the sumptuousness of Versailles, +found himself obliged sometimes to partake of a cold collation under a +hedge, without quitting his travelling carriage. Warfare would be an +easy calling if such were its worst hardships. +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 201: 12th June, 1693.] +</p> +<p> +In Flanders, as in France, Madame de Maintenon continued to take the +most lively interest in the course of events, martial, political, and +social. Proximity to the scene of action did not induce her to exceed +those limits of reserve which she had long since marked out for +herself. Though informed of all that happened, and forming a sound +judgment on almost every occurrence, though earnestly desiring peace +rather than aggrandizement, and justice rather than glory, she +obtruded no views of her own in the cabinet of the king, nor even +influenced the choice of generals. It was her habit of close +observation, and her exact description <a name="823">{823}</a> of all that passed, which +made Napoleon Bonaparte delight in reading her correspondence, and +pronounce it superior to that of Madame de Sévigné, because it had +more in it. Madame de Maintenon speaks in one place of her own style +as "dry and succinct;" and, indeed, were it not for the piety which +constantly breathes through them, her letters would often read like +the despatches of a general. She is brief, terse, sententious; her +mind being evidently bent on things rather than on words. As a +letter-writer, she resembles Napoleon himself more than any other +French authoress. Her style is free from that vacillation, that timid +adoption of a definite line, which always indicates a weak thinker and +a total absence of system in the mind. Had it been otherwise, she +would never have stood so high in the esteem of foreign courts, nor +would princes and sovereigns, such as the Elector of Cologne, the Duc +de Lorraine, and his mother, Queen Eleanor, have written to ask favors +at her hands. +</p> +<p> +The reign of Louis XIV. lasted so long, that neither his son nor +grandson ever sat on the throne. If the latter, the Duc de Bourgogne, +had not died in his thirtieth year, he might, as the once docile pupil +of Fénelon and Madame de Maintenon, have fulfilled his promises of +excellence, and have left to his successors a rich inheritance of +wisdom. "Telemachus" was not composed expressly for him in vain. He +was born in 1682, and at an early age was affianced to Marie-Adélaïde +of Savoy. The princess was at that time only eleven years old, and +was, by the marriage contract, to remove to France, and be wedded in +the ensuing year. The union of the young couple was celebrated in +1697, but on account of their extreme youth they continued to live +apart two years longer. During this time, Madame de Maintenon +undertook to complete Marie-Adélaïde's education. The instructress was +worthy of a princess destined, as it was believed, to govern France. +All day she sat by her when sick, and Racine read Plutarch's "Lives" +to her during the pauses of the night; Bossuet was her chaplain, and +Dangeau, whose manuscript memoirs of Louis' court have proved so +useful to historians, [Footnote 202] was her knight of honor. She was +the delight of all around, and so charmed the king, that he was never +willing to part with her. But there were no apartments Marie-Adélaïde +so much loved to frequent as those of Madame de Maintenon. Severe as +her admonitions often were, she possessed in the highest degree the +art of attaching young persons to her, and inspired them insensibly +with taste, wisdom, and nobility of mind. She had long been convinced +that the education of princes was conducted, generally, in such a way +as to prepare them for habitual <i>ennui</i>. They learned and saw +everything in childhood, and, when grown up, had nothing fresh to see +or learn. She withdrew her, therefore, as far as possible from the +court, and submitted her to the simple and wholesome routine of +Saint-Cyr. The princess proved extremely docile, and her amiability +was as striking as her diligence. The society of the religious in +Saint-Cyr, so far from putting a constraint on her lively and winning +ways, seemed only to fit her more completely to be the pet companion +of Louis XIV. Her sprightly talk, her opening mind, her elegant +simplicity, amused him in his walks and drives, in the gardens, the +galleries, and the chase; and while he contrived daily some new +diversion for the fascinating child, he could not but trace in her the +happy results of Madame de Maintenon's unwearied attention. She +entered into all her childish pleasures, and even played hide-and-seek +with her, that she might, as she said afterward, gain her ear for +serious truths, and by yielding all she could, have the better reason +for withholding what would have been hurtful. At last—nor was the +time long—Marie-Adélaïde quitted Madame de Maintenon's embrace, and +with her heavenly counsels <a name="824">{824}</a> graven on her memory, and given in +writing into her hands, bidding farewell to the hallowed cloisters of +Saint-Cyr, and to her daily gambols and prattle with the loving and +indulgent king, she took her place beside her destined bridegroom, and +"entered other realms of love." +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 202: They were first published entire in 1856.] +</p> +<p> +Such was the woman of whom the worldly and sceptical speak jeeringly +as the proud widow of Scarron; the intriguing, austere, ambitious +Marquise de Maintenon; the persecutrix of Huguenots, and the despot of +her royal spouse. They know not what they speak, nor whereof they +affirm; for they are incapable of estimating the character of the +righteous. Outward acts are to them an enigma and a stumbling-block, +because the soul and its guiding principles cannot be seen. A true +Christian, such as Madame de Maintenon, is an object of faith, as is +the Church, and as was the Church's Lord in the days of his +humiliation. Seated, to say the least, on the footstool of the throne, +and surrounded by all the pomp and circumstance of royal life, she was +to jaundiced eyes but one in a crowd of princes and courtiers, and +differing from them only in that she was more astute; but, seen as the +prelates of Cambray and Meaux saw her—seen as her letters and +conversations with the nuns of Saint-Cyr exhibit her—seen as the Duc +de Noailles describes her, and "time, the beautifier of the dead," has +rendered her—she was using this world and not abusing it; seeking +society only to improve it, and solitude only to pray; holding all she +possessed in fealty to her unseen King, and making every occupation +subordinate to that of loosening her affections from earthly vanities, +and fastening them wholly upon God. The Duc de Noailles' history does +not end with the fourth volume. It leaves Madame de Maintenon in her +sixty-second year—two-and-twenty years before her death. To trace her +intercourse with Louis during the long and disastrous war with Spain, +called the War of the Succession—her counsels and influence during +the defeats by Marlborough and Prince Eugene, and the triumphant +reprisals of Vendôme and Villars—her grief at the king's death in +1715, when she had reached her eightieth year—her retirement to the +long-loved shades of Saint-Cyr—her devotion and zeal heightening as +age advanced, and the celestial goal was neared—her conversations +with the sisters, and her letters to the Princesse des Ursins—to +analyze her correspondence, and her <i>vade-mecum</i> as published by M. +Bonhomme—to record the pillage of Saint-Cyr, and the outrage done to +her venerable remains, as to those of the royal dead in St. Denis, by +the frantic revolutionists of 1792—would supply ample materials for +another article, but would only confirm the views already formed of +her prevailing character and principles. Enough, perhaps, has been +said to place our readers on their guard against the malice and +fictions of the Duc de Saint-Simon and a host of detractors who rely +too readily on his word, and to dispose them favorably toward a most +judicious and remarkable history, which does honor to the French +Academy and the illustrious house of de Noailles. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="825">{825}</a> +<br> +<h2>From All The Year Round. +<br><br> +A DUBLIN MAY MORNING.</h2> +<p> +When I look down on this gay May morning from a window into Great +Sackville street, where there is a huge column to Admiral Nelson, and +a golden shop-front board dedicated to O'Connell, on the site for his +statue, and which is by-and-by to be made into a French boulevard and +planted with trees—I say, on this May morning it is easy to see that +one of the many great days for Ireland has come round once more. For +the crowds in the great thoroughfares, and the "boys" sitting on the +bridges, and the flags and streamers, and the rolling carriages, and +the general air of busy idleness, tell me that a great festival is +toward; and placards in fiercely carbuncled letters proclaim in an +angry fit of St. Anthony's fire that the Prince of Wales is to "OPEN" +something: which something a still greater scorbutic operation of type +tells us is THE DUBLIN EXHIBITION OF 1865. +</p> +<p> +Not without charms, and marked and special features of its own, is +this Dublin city—to say nothing of the fresh and fair Irish faces and +violet eyes which pass by in streams, or of the cheerful voices and +the gay laughs heard at every turn; or of the giant policemen who wear +moustaches and beards, and thus compete on more favorable terms with +military rivals; or of the rollicking drivers, who stand up as they +drive, very like the <i>cocchieri</i> of Rome, and who look out for "fares" +in a debonnaire indifferent fashion. There is a gay, busy, foreign, +particolored look about the place, which reminds one of a foreign +town. The background is composed of wide spacious streets, Grecian +buildings wonderfully classic in tone and shape, fitted into corners +with porticoes that belong <i>to</i> the street, and under which the people +walk—pretty breaks where the bridges come, and the masts of shipping +seen in the sun half way down a long, long thoroughfare. There are no +warehouses or ugly business associations; but all is shops and +shopping, and color and liveliness, and carriages and walkers. +</p> +<p> +I think, as I look out on this May morning, that it is curious that a +people popularly supposed to want "self-reliance" and "independence," +and who are utterly ignorant of the "self-help" principle, should, +after all, have done some few self-reliant things in this very matter +of exhibitions. Some one tells me that many decades of years before +glass palaces were thought of, and when the universal peace and +brotherhood glass palaces were mysteriously supposed to bring with +them were not quite believed in, this "un-self-reliant" people had +their regular triennial exhibition of manufactures, on the French +model. Further, that close on the footsteps of the Hyde Park +Exhibition came the great one of Cork, and closer again on the +footsteps of Cork the really great Dublin Exhibition of 1853, the +building of which cost nearly eighty thousand pounds, and which was +remarkable for the first international collection of pictures, and for +the first performance of Handel on a colossal scale. Not content with +this, I am told that this people, who were not self-reliant, went +further, had two more successful exhibitions on a smaller scale, and +have now finally girded themselves up for this yet more complete +effort of 1865. Not so bad, this, for our poor wo-begone sister with +the harp, especially when we consider that our well-to-do Scotch +sister has not "fashed" herself with such follies, justly considering +the margin of profit too uncertain or too slight to repay the trouble. +<a name="826">{826}</a> But this is a grim and statistical ungracious view, not all +suited to this Dublin May morning. +</p> +<p> +It is known, then, on this gay Dublin May morning, that the young +prince, who in this island has always been looked to with an +affectionate interest, has been in the city since over-night, and out +at the pretty lodge, which lies out in the "Phaynix." Hence the flags +and the streamers. Hence, too, in front of the palace, the balconies +fringed with scarlet, and the softened and melodious buzz of distant +military music, with the staff officers flying north and south, and +the regiments tramping by. But the flags grow thicker, and the +balconies gayer, and the music more distinct, as I find myself at the +corner of the great <i>place</i>, or square dedicated to St. Stephen, which +is a good mile's walking all round, and near which I see the great +building, with the heavy porches and pillars, round which, and over +which, run delicately, the light entrance of a Moorish-looking glass +temple—a silver howdah on the back of a gray elephant. Such is the +rather novel design for this last comer in the long series of +exhibitions. +</p> +<p> +After all the miles of glass greenhouse, and the long protracted +repetitions of gorgeous decorated pillars and girders, I cannot but +think what a happy combination this is of solidity and lightness; and +acknowledge that in these days, when Paxton Palace succeeds Paxton +Palace with some monotony, there is something original in striking out +the idea of fitting the glass-house to a great solid building, with +huge halls, and long, cool passages, and spacious rooms, and +surrounding the whole with a garden, and greenery, and cascades. +</p> +<p> +There has been the usual crush and pressure, the tremendous toiling +against time, to get all done; the straining of every nerve, the +sitting up all night, the hammering and sawing, the stitching of a +hundred workmen and workwomen, changing the utter disorder and the +naked deal boards and the rude planks of five o'clock last evening to +perfect order—to the regularity of a drawing-room and acres of +scarlet cloth. And in a crowd of light May morning dresses we drift +into the huge concert hall, which is to hold thousands, and to echo to +brass throats, and where there are the great organ, and the orchestra +which holds the musical army a thousand strong: on the floor of which +have grown up beds upon beds of human lilies that flutter and flutter +again, whose flowers are white parasols and gossamer shawls. This +hall, as a feature, is not so remarkable, for there are many great +halls; but at its far end it is open and crossed half way by a +gallery: and through this opening we see far on into a Winter Garden +and Crystal Palace, where are the light airy galleries, with the old +familiar rimson labels, and the French trophies, and the bright +objects, and the great apse like a glass cathedral, and Mr. Doyle's +pale coloring, the faint lines of delicate green, chosen with rare +good taste, which in itself is a novelty. +</p> +<p> +Looking out through the open end of the concert hall, and facing the +organ, I see a grand marone velvet eastern canopy and dais, under +which the Pasha of Egypt is to sit a few months hereafter and receive +his tribes; and on this dais are the nobles and gentlemen gathering, +in the fine rich theatrical suits which give a coloring to a festival, +and of which we have not half enough. Judges in scarlet and ermine, +privy councillors with coats that seem "clotted" with gold, the +never-failing lords-lieutenant and deputy-lieutenants, knights of St. +Patrick, deans, doctors in scarlet, soldiers in scarlet, a lord +chancellor all black and gold, eastern dervishes (it may be, from the +pillow-case look of their caps), a lord mayor of York, a lord provost +of Edinburgh; in short, all shapes of particolored finery. Turning +round for a second, I see that the black musical army has debouched +and taken ground, and that <a name="827">{827}</a> the great orchestra has spread like a +large dark fan from floor to ceiling. I can see "Ulster" in a gorgeous +tabard, flitting to and fro, marshalling grandees, as none so well +know how to marshal them, each according to his or her degree. That +marvellous tabard is so stiff and gorgeous, that when it is laid by, +it surely cannot be hung up or folded or put to sleep on its back like +other robes, but, I fancy, must stand up straight in a wardrobe on its +end, like a steel cuirass. +</p> +<p> +We seem to riot in mayors. The eye can be feasted on mayors; they can +become as the air we breathe if we so choose it. They have flowed in +from every town in the three kingdoms. And it does strike one, with +having such a municipal gathering brought together, that there is a +sort of corporate expression, a kind of municipal smirk or perk, a +kind of smiling burgess air of complacency which makes the whole of +this world akin. Every one, too, seems to be invested with the collar +of the Golden Fleece. +</p> +<p> +Here, also, are many known faces, who wear no scarlet nor gold nor +collars. Faces like that of the famous dog and animal painter whose +four-footed friends look down at him from the walls: faces like that +of the Sir David who invented the most popular toy in the world: faces +from the science and art: from South Kensington, which, as we all +know, is science and art: faces from France, from Canada, Rome, India, +and a hundred other places. +</p> +<p> +Now, I hear the hum of distant martial music, and the yet fainter but +more inspiriting sound of distant cheering. Then the scarlet and +ermine, the privy council clotted gold, the May morning bonnets, +glitter and rustle with excitement. The hum and chatter of voices full +of expectation travel on softly down the glass aisles and into the +great hall. There has been a grand plunging of military troopers +outside, a violent arrest of fiery horses pulled up suddenly, and the +prince and a royal duke and the vice-king and all their attendants +have descended. From the outside, the shouting creeps in gradually, +until at last it comes to its fullest pitch; when the crimson and gold +crowd parts a little, we see this prince standing modestly under the +Egyptian pasha's canopy, with thirty thousand eyes upon him. At this +moment a speck half way up the dark orchestra, but which is a very +skilful and most musical speck, gives a signal with what seems a white +pin, and the musical army advances with the fine Old Hundredth. The +grand Old Hundredth travels out in rising waves through the open end +of the hall into the glass cathedral, then loses itself up and down in +the aisles. For two verses the voices do the battle by themselves; +but, at the third, the trumpets and the grand brass and the rolling of +monster drums burst out, and every syllable is emphasized with a +stirring crash. It is like the deluge after a drought. +</p> +<p> +Then the sun gets up, and the gold and colored figures cross, and +crowd, and flit past, as some business is being transacted under that +Egyptian pasha's canopy; for there are addresses to be read and +spoken, and there is much advancing and backing to be done. Now, the +party under the pasha's canopy breaks up for a time, and the stiff +gold and scarlet and privy council strait-waistcoats, and the +corporate dressing-gowns, having formed themselves into a procession, +take the prince round to look at the place. +</p> +<p> +And there is a great deal to see. There are many charming pictures, +and among the choicest those of which the queen of Spain has stripped +her palaces, and sent here. Is there not a hint of many a Velasquez +most exquisite, and of Mr. Stirling, which are worth a journey to the +Escurial to worship? Here is many a rare Reynolds which Mr. Tom Taylor +might find worth making a note of, and here are walls covered with +noble cartoons of the severe Munich school. These, with the +photographs and water-colors, and mediaeval objects, are common to +many <a name="828">{828}</a> an exhibition held before; but there is one feature +unique—a noble sculpture gallery, artistic, charmingly lighted, +sufficient to delight Mr. Gibson, and drive the Royal Academy to +despair. A sculpture-hall, on which you can look down from a +balustrade in a room overhead, as if into a Pompeiian court. A +sculpture-hall, in which you can look up to an arching glass roof, +and, half way down again, to the balustrade just mentioned, which is +dotted with small statutes. A sculpture-hall, where I can walk round +and think myself in a Roman palace, to which these fine objects +belong, and not in a temporary shed where some scattered objects that +have been lent are shown. For here I see that the Roman studios have +been emptied of their treasures; that Miss Hosmer has sent her Faun, +in toned yellow marble: a marvellous—if the speech be not impolite— +work for a woman. With Story's wonderful Judith, and a Baby Girl by +Mogni—a pendant for the now famous Reading Girl. But it is easy to +prophesy that this Baby Girl will be photographed, and stereoscoped, +and binocularized in a hundred ways, and watched over by policemen +specially, and visited by a steady crowd. This hall and its +contents—the like of which it is no boast to say has not been yet +seen in these kingdoms—is the feature of this exhibition. +</p> +<p> +Then, having seen all that is most curious and beautiful—in the +fashion in which such things <i>must</i> be seen where there is only a +quarter of an hour to see them—the stiff' gold and crimson strands, +which we call the procession, came back to the pasha's dais. And then, +with a crash and a smash, and a thundering of monster drums, and the +rattle and rolling of little drums, and the sharp brassy bark of +trumpets, the true English national Old Hundredth, in which musical +and unmusical—people with ears, and people without, even people with +voices, and people without—can join, then God save the Queen is sung. +Sung! Rather fired off! Discharged! Salvoed! +</p> +<p> +And then the glittering mass begins to dissolve and fade away. The +stage, which has been laid out under the pasha's canopy, gradually +clears. At the door there is a struggle, and the scatter of new +gravel, with the frantic leaping up behind carriages of many footmen, +and the closing in of mounted soldiers. And then the pageant melts +away, and the work of the day is done. +</p> +<p> +As I walk and wander from the light glass arcades to the darker +courts, and from the courts to the open terraces, and hear the hum of +Saxons' voices, and from at least every third mouth the sharp "burr" +of some Saxon dialect, and when I meet burly shoulders and massive +chests which are not of the country, some out-of-place speculations +come into my mind, and I am tempted to make suppositions. First, I +speculate—of course shrinking away from the dry bones of +politics—whether there might not have been some mistake in the old +and constant treatment of a people who seem cheerful and grateful for +a kind word or a kinder act, and who are "willing" and even clever in +their way—and think whether the "want of progress" and want of +"capital" and of "self-reliance," and the want of a hundred other +things which puzzle and dispirit the political physician, may not in +some degree be laid to the account of old mistakes, old laws, old +errors, old harsh treatment, old jealousies and restraints, the folly +of which is now seen and admitted, but the fruits of which remain to +this day? +</p> +<p> +Just as the fruits of a bad education linger in a grown man, and the +marks of early hardship are stamped upon the face and constitution, it +will take many years yet, in the life of a nation, before old faults +are worked out of its constitution. And I think—still in the walks of +the Winter Garden—that if my friendly Briton tell me that his +experience of the lower orders of Irish is that "you can't depend upon +a word they say," I cannot but recollect that half a century ago they +were civilly slaves, without rights; <a name="829">{829}</a> and that a century ago they +were a proscribed caste, against whom one-half the laws of the land +were directed. If we have found them indolent, and disinclined to +perseverance and the making of money, have we not dim recollections of +seeing acts of parliament passed again and again to cripple their +trade? A people must grow up, as a child must grow up; and it is hard +to expect that a child whose body has suffered by an unkind or an +injudicious nurse, should become at once strong under better +treatment. Then I speculate on the mysterious relation of Irishmen to +Irish land, through which the "bit" of land is as necessary as the +"bit" of bread; where a tenant holds his tiny scrap, on which he pays +his thirty-shilling rent; and during the whole year is struggling +desperately to work out of this great estate a few potatoes, and fewer +clothes for himself and family, beside the miserable thirty-shilling +margin for the landlord. I think how some estates have two, four, six, +eight thousand tenants of this valuable class—and think beside, in +answer to a natural objection, how this miserable system was created +for political ends, to multiply voters "to support government," If the +Palace and Winter Garden were twice as long and twice as broad, I +should not have half time or space enough for the speculations that +come crowding on me with reference to this perplexing country. +</p> +<p> +And having made these speculations, and having gone quite round the +garden, I begin—in addition to my speculations—to make some rather +wild suppositions. As, suppose that, for a mere experiment, there were +a greater spirit of charity of speech introduced into our dealings +with this country. Suppose that we gave the people time and reasonable +allowance—looked on with encouragement where there was any good +attempt made, and with indulgence where there was failure. Suppose +that some of our journals gave over writing "slashing" articles, and +some men desisted from speeches and bitter epigrams on the "mere +Irish," which, being copied in every cheap print, and brought to every +cabin door, do incalculable mischief, fatally widening the breach, and +causing England and Englishmen to be sometimes almost hated. Suppose +that there were <i>some</i> little restraint on the traditional stock +ridicule of Irish matters. Suppose that the Englishmen who visited the +country carried themselves with a little less of William the Conqueror +and Strongbow air, and suppose that— +</p> +<p> +But here are the umbrellas, and the sticks, and the gate. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>From Chambers's Journal. +<br><br> +SPEECH.</h2> +<pre> + Be choice and frugal of thy speech alway: + The arrow from the engine of the thoughts + Once shot, is past recall; for scorn is barbed, + And will not out, but rankles in the wound; + And calumny doth leave a darkening spot + On wounded fame, which, as it would infect, + Marks its sad victim in the eyes of men, + Till no one dare approach and know the truth. +</pre> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="830">{830}</a> +<br> +<h2>From The Lamp. +<br><br> +A VISIT TO THE GRANDE CHARTREUSE.</h2> +<br> +<p> +Our pilgrimage to La Grande Chartreuse was an event in our lives worth +remembering. At about half-past five on the morning of the 22d of June +we left Lyons. Nothing could have been more auspicious than the +brilliant sun and balmy air of that early morning. The birds sang +cheerily as we walked from St. Irénée down to the railway station, +where our kind friends took leave of us. The country in the +neighborhood of Lyons was exceedingly pretty; but as we drew nearer to +Grenoble, it became more and more attractive. The railway passes +through two ranges of mountains, whose snow-capped summits stood out +in beautiful contrast to the azure sky. Our only fellow-traveller was +a priest, who for a long time had been intent on his breviary. Amused +perhaps at our exclamations of delight, he entered into conversation +with us; and we were soon very good friends. He expressed particular +interest in the condition of the Catholic Church in England, having +heard that there were many conversions in consequence of the hard work +doing in our missions. He spoke very highly in favor of a visit to La +Grande Chartreuse. He kindly promised always to pray for us, and the +conversion of those we had left behind, and to remember us in the mass +he was about to offer. We reached Grenoble at about twenty minutes to +ten. It will not do to stop to describe the magnificent situation of +this old city, completely surrounded as it is with mountains, between +the rivers Isère and Drac. Until recently it was a frontier town; a +very strong one too, judging from the appearance of the citadel, piled +fortress after fortress up the steep mountain side. The cathedral is +interesting, as having belonged to St. Hugo, the friend of the great +founder of the Grande Chartreuse. +</p> +<p> +We made an agreement with the driver of a carriage to take us to the +Grande Chartreuse; and he promised to take us there in about five +hours, and put us down at the door of the convent; so, at least, we +understood him. We returned to the hotel, got some refreshment, and +started in an open carriage at about twelve o'clock. The road for +several miles runs through a richly cultivated valley, with wooded +mountains on either side. Everywhere the vine was trained in graceful +festoons, and stately walnut and chestnut trees grew along the +roadside, shading us from the mid-day sun with their rich foliage. +Every now and then we caught beautiful glimpses of the distant Alps, +abruptly rising from the green level of the valley, beyond the hills +clad with the dark verdure of the pine forests, piled curiously one +over another, which run the whole length of the plain, forming the +first steps, as it were, of those mighty Alpine mountains which rear +their magnificent heights, shrouded in eternal glaciers, behind these +graduated ranges. Just before reaching St. Laurent du Pont, what was +our astonishment to hear our driver proclaim we should shortly reach +our destination! We could not conceive how that could be, for we were +evidently approaching a small town. How different it looked from all +we had read and heard of La Grande Chartreuse! Our amazement increased +when the carriage was driven up in front of a small inn; the driver, +getting down, opened the door, and said, with evident satisfaction, +<i>"Nous voilà."</i> We demanded an explanation, and his reply was that +this was St. Laurent du Pont, and as far as he could take us. Here we +<a name="831">{831}</a> could either procure another carriage or mules to carry us up +the mountain to the monastery, which we might reach in about two +hours. +</p> +<p> +It was difficult to suppress all the indignation one felt at being so +completely taken in; and we threatened the unfortunate driver with all +kinds of complaints on our return to Grenoble. There was nothing to be +done, so we agreed we had better make the best of it. It was five +o'clock, and we could not afford to waste our time in words; so we +ordered another carriage, and in a few minutes a most rickety, +uninviting conveyance was brought to the door. St. Laurent du Pont is +situated at the opening of the narrow gorge leading to the wild +solitude where the monastery is built. The scenery was grand and +beautiful as we gradually began the ascent about a mile from St. +Laurent du Pont, where the mountains closed upon our road, and the +rocky stream of the Guiers Mort brawling beneath us. Tall pines and +stately trees overshadowed us, rising from the almost naked rocks +themselves. One of the great peculiarities of the Chartreuse mountain +is the extreme luxuriance of the vegetation, mingled as it is with the +huge blocks of limestone, which sometimes formed walls on either side +of our way. We had a miserable horse, which stoutly refused to go +beyond a sleepy walk, the driver and the horse being of the same +dreamy nature. We lost all patience, and got out. No language can +adequately describe the enjoyment of that walk. The scenery, so +sublimely wild; the sound of the rushing torrent, now far below our +road, filled us with awe. The pines, rising like weird giants by the +mountain side, mile after mile; the scene changing and becoming more +majestic with every curve of the road. Every now and then we crossed a +handsomely built stone bridge, erected by the good monks, across the +torrent, and passed under several tunnels cut through the rock. The +sun was declining, and nothing could exceed the beauty of the evening; +we had walked for nearly two hours in almost uninterrupted silence, +for there was that in the solemnity of the scene, as we penetrated +further into the heart of the desert, which filled one's mind with +thoughts and one's soul with feelings which could not be uttered. At +length, on a sudden turn in the road, the breeze wafted toward us the +sound of the chapel-bell, ringing, we supposed, for vespers. This was +truly a most grateful sound to our ears, for we were weary with our +walk and the excitement of the scene, and longed for our journey's +end. A few steps further, and the vast monastery lay before us. How +solemn and silent it looked! The tones of the bell, how sweetly +musical they were! To listen to them, to gaze on that gray pile, and, +high above it, on the lofty snow-capped peaks of the mountains, was an +indescribable rest. How wonderfully grand was that mountain top! and +far beyond the forests of pine rose still more distant mountain peaks, +ascending until they reached the very skies, now gilded with all the +glories of a setting sun. It filled one with peace the thought of all +the centuries that that vast pile had lasted; of the long ages the +voices of the monks had mingled with the varied voices of nature in +one hymn of praise to the almighty Creator of all. We waited until the +arrival of our carriage interrupted our musings. It could go no +further; so, followed by the driver carrying our baggage, we walked up +to the door of the convent of the Soeurs de la Providence, where we +were most hospitably received. A friendly sister took us to our cells, +and said supper would shortly be ready. The blazing logs of pine in a +huge fireplace in the refectory were most cheering, for the evening +air was quite cold in these high regions even at the close of a hot +June day. A maigre supper was served at half-past seven. We were +amused to hear that it had all been cooked by the monks, and sent to +us from the monastery, <a name="832">{832}</a> where nothing but maigre is ever allowed. +</p> +<p> +From eight to nine we walked round the monastery, following a path +close to the dark pine forest, which forms the background to the +building. We could look down from this height upon the cells, church, +and little gardens of the monks. Returning toward the hospice, we met +the reverend mother and a sister; they took us into the little chapel +where we were to hear mass the following morning. It was very plain +and small; there was a grille in front of the altar, on which the +blessed sacrament was not reserved. What a trial this must be to the +good sisters! +</p> +<p> +At half-past nine, rev. mother advised our retiring to our cells, as +we were to be up early the next morning, and <i>en route</i> for St. +Bruno's chapel by half-past four. A very intelligent young guide was +provided us; he told us he had spent his life with the fathers, and +hoped to live there to the end. He was extremely communicative and +willing to answer all our questions. +</p> +<p> +There are about forty monks in this monastery, beside several lay +brothers. The monks live each in his cell, which has a little garden +attached to it. They maintain silence, excepting on Sundays and great +festivals, and during their Monday walk together through the desert +for four hours. They eat alone in their cells, excepting on Sundays; +each one's maigre meal is passed by a lay brother from the cloister +through a little turn into his cell. On Sundays they go to the choir +at all the hours except complin; on other days they only go to sing +matins and lauds at midnight; for high mass and vespers; the other +hours are recited in their cells. Women are not only excluded their +enclosure, but even their church, under pain of excommunication. It +was very tantalizing to hear of their solemn midnight office, sung as +it is in darkness; each monk takes with him into choir a dark lantern, +and for each antiphon he does not know opens a slide which throws the +light on it. It must have a wonderful effect these sudden flashes of +light, lighting up the Chartreux, clothed in their white woollen +habits, with their patriarchal beards and hooded heads. Beside the +divine office, they say the office of our Blessed Lady, and, almost +every day, the office of the dead. Their library was plundered by the +revolutionists, and now forms the public library at Grenoble, one of +the finest small collections of books in France. Nearly all this we +learnt from our guide while walking up to the chapel of St. Bruno. +Before we reached it, far into the midst of a dark forest, we came to +the chapel called De Casalibus, erected upon the very spot where the +first convent stood, which was destroyed by an avalanche. The chapel +of St. Bruno is built over the same rock under which he dwelt, beside +a gushing spring, his only beverage, which supplies the monastery to +this day. +</p> +<p> +The chapel is about an hour's walk above the present monastery. It is +very plain, but adorned with frescoes, representing some of the early +fathers of the order. A most beautiful altar stands at one end of it, +of exquisitely carved Italian marbles, on which has been placed the +same altar-stone on which St. Bruno celebrated the holy mysteries; +behind this is a basso-relievo of St. Bruno, with our Blessed Lady +appearing to him, beautifully executed. We lingered here awhile, loth +to leave so holy a spot. The guide told us that there are frequently +as many as sixty masses said in the Chartreuse church in one morning. +Many hundred priests make their annual retreat here. What place, +indeed, could they find more fitting for the repose their souls thirst +for! Here truly they might die to the world and all its allurements, +and meditate in peace on the deep mysteries of God and eternity. We +descended the mountain to assist at the offering of the holy sacrifice +at seven o'clock in the little chapel we had <a name="833">{833}</a> visited on the +previous evening, It was a great joy to make our communion in this +vast mountain solitude, where all combined to elevate the soul to God. +We had hoped a Carthusian would say mass, but in this were +disappointed, for a secular priest had been requested to do so by the +ladies of his party. +</p> +<p> +At the <i>Homo factus est</i> of the Credo, the fathers prostrate +themselves on the ground, and the mode of celebrating mass is strange, +and differs in many points from the ordinary mass of seculars. As the +blessed sacrament was not reserved in the chapel, we preferred +finishing our thanksgiving beneath the blue sky on the skirts of the +forest of pines. After breakfast we tasted the celebrated liqueur made +by the monks from the wild mountain flowers. It was very good; there +was a certain charm in taking it on the spot where it was made. We had +a talk with the reverend mother, and left with her a long list of +intentions to be given to the fathers, asking especially their prayers +for the conversion of England. This, we were thankful to hear, was +frequently an object of their devotions. Before leaving, our curiosity +to see some of the fathers was gratified; for two came out to give +instructions to some workmen. We began to descend the mountain at +about half-past eight, arrived at St. Laurent du Pont about ten, and +as soon as our carriage of the previous day was ready started for +Grenoble. Once the horse came to a dead stop, and we fancied the +driver wished to prolong our journey as long as he could, that we +might have no time for making the threatened complaints on reaching +Grenoble. As it was, we arrived there five minutes before the time +fixed for our departure at half past-one. There was hardly a minute to +get anything to eat beyond some fruit and bread which we took with us. +So the driver escaped his punishment, after all. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>From The Reader. +<br><br> +DEATH BY LIGHTNING.</h2> +<br> +<p> +People in general imagine, if they think at all about the matter, that +an impression upon the nerves—a blow, for example, or the prick of a +pin—is felt the moment it is inflicted. But this is not the case. The +nerves are not the repositories of sensation; they are but the +conductors of the motion which produces sensation. The seat of +sensation is the brain, and to it the intelligence of any injury done +to the nerves has to be transmitted, before that injury becomes +manifest in consciousness. The transmission, moreover, requires +<i>time</i>, and the consequence is, that a wound inflicted at a portion of +the body distant from the brain is more tardily appreciated than one +inflicted adjacent to the brain. By an extremely ingenious +experimental arrangement, Helmholtz has determined the velocity of +nervous transmission both in warm-blooded and cold-blooded animals. In +a frog, he found the velocity to be about eighty feet a second, or +less than one-thirteenth of the velocity of sound in air. If this +holds good, which it probably does, in the case of a whale, then a +creature of this class, eighty feet long, if wounded in the tail, +would not, as Helmholtz has remarked, be conscious of the injury till +a second after the wound had been inflicted. But this is not the only +ingredient in the delay that occurs between the impression on <a name="834">{834}</a> +the nerves and the consciousness of the impression. There can scarcely +be a doubt that to every act of consciousness belongs a determinate +molecular arrangement of the brain—that every thought or feeling has +its physical correlative in that organ; and nothing can be more +certain than that every physical change, whether molecular or +mechanical, requires time for its accomplishment. So that, even after +the intelligence of an impression, made upon a distant portion of the +body, has reached the brain, a still further time is necessary for the +brain itself to put its house in order—for its molecules to take up +the position necessary to the completion of consciousness. Helmholtz +considers one-tenth of a second necessary for this purpose. Thus, in +the case of the whale above supposed, we have first one second +consumed in the transmission of intelligence through the sensor nerves +from the tail to the head; one-tenth of a second is required by the +brain to become conscious of the intelligence it has received; and, if +the velocity of transmission through the motor be the same as that +through the sensor nerves, a second would be consumed in sending a +command to the tail to defend itself. Thus more than two seconds would +elapse before an impression made upon its caudal nerves could be +responded to by a whale eighty feet long. +</p> +<p> +Now, it is quite conceivable that an injury might be inflicted which +would render the nerves unfit to be the conductors of the motion which +results in sensation; and if such a thing occurred, no matter how +severe the injury might be, we should not be conscious of it. Or it +may be, that long before the time required for the brain itself to +complete the arrangement necessary for the act of consciousness, its +power of arrangement might be wholly suspended. In such case also, +though the injury might be of such a nature as to cause death, this +would occur not only without pain, but absolutely without feeling of +any kind. +</p> +<p> +Death, in this case, would be simply the sudden negation of life, +accomplished without any intervention of consciousness. Doubtless, +there are many kinds of death of this character. The passage of a +musket bullet through the brain is a case in point; and the placid +aspect of a man thus killed is in perfect accordance with the +conclusion which might be drawn <i>à priori</i> from the experiments of +Helmholtz. Cases of insensibility, moreover, are not uncommon, which +do not result in death, and after which the person affected has been +able to testify that no pain was felt prior to the loss of +consciousness. +</p> +<p> +The time required for a rifle-bullet to pass clean through a man's +head may be roughly estimated at one-thousandth of a second. Here, +therefore, we should have no room for sensation, and death would be +painless. But there are other actions which far transcend in rapidity +that of the rifle-bullet. A flash of lightning cleaves a cloud, +appearing and disappearing in less than one-hundred-thousandth of a +second, and the velocity of electricity is such as would carry it over +a distance equal to that which separates the earth and moon in a +single second. It is well known that a luminous impression once made +upon the retina endures for about one-sixth of a second, and that this +is the reason why we see a ribbon of light when a glowing coal is +caused to pass rapidly through the air. A body illuminated by an +instantaneous flash continues to be seen for the sixth of a second +after the flash has become extinct; and if the body thus illuminated +be in motion, it appears at rest at the place which it occupied when +the flash fell upon it. The color-top is familiar to most of us. By +this instrument a disk with differently colored sectors is caused to +rotate rapidly; the colors blend together, and if they are chosen in +the proportions necessary to form white light, the disk appears white +when the motion is sufficiently rapid. Such a top, rotating <a name="835">{835}</a> in a +dark room, and illuminated by an electric spark, appears motionless, +each distinct color being clearly seen. Professor Dove has found that +a flash of lightning produces the same effect. During a thunder-storm +he put a color-top in exceedingly rapid motion, and found that every +flash revealed the top as a motionless object with colors distinct. If +illuminated solely by a flash of lightning, the motion of all bodies +on the earth's surface would, as Dove has remarked, appear suspended. +A cannon-ball, for example, would have its flight apparently arrested, +and would seem to hang motionless in space as long as the luminous +impression which revealed the ball remained upon the eye. +</p> +<p> +If, then, a rifle-bullet move with sufficient rapidity to destroy life +without the interposition of sensation, much more is a flash of +lightning competent to produce this effect. Accordingly, we have well +authenticated cases of people being struck senseless by lightning who, +on recovery, had no memory of pain. The following circumstantial case +is described by Hemmer: On the 30th of June, 1788, a soldier in the +neighborhood of Manheim, being overtaken by rain, placed himself under +a tree, beneath which a woman had previously taken shelter. He looked +upward to see whether the branches were thick enough to afford the +required protection, and, in doing so, was struck by lightning, and +fell senseless to the earth. The woman at his side experienced the +shock in her foot, but was not struck down. Some hours afterward the +man revived, but knew nothing about what had occurred, save the fact +of his looking up at the branches. This was his last act of +consciousness, and he passed from the conscious to the unconscious +condition without pain. The visible marks of a lightning stroke are +usually insignificant: the hair is sometimes burnt; slight wounds are +observed; while, in some instances, a red streak marks the track of +the discharge over the skin. +</p> +<p> +The effects of a shock of artificial lightning on a gentleman of our +acquaintance, who is very sensitive to the electric discharge, may be +here described. Under ordinary circumstances the discharge from a +small Leyden jar is exceedingly unpleasant to him. Some time ago he +happened to stand in the presence of a numerous audience, with a +battery of fifteen large Leyden jars charged beside him. Through some +awkwardness on his part, he touched a wire which he had no right to +touch, and the discharge of the battery went through his body. Here +life was absolutely blotted out for a very sensible interval, without +a trace of pain. In a second or two consciousness returned; the +recipient of the shock saw himself in the presence of his audience and +apparatus, and by the help of these external facts immediately +concluded that he had received the battery discharge. His +<i>intellectual</i> consciousness of his position was restored with +exceeding rapidity, but not so his <i>optical</i> consciousness. To prevent +the audience from being alarmed, he observed that it had often been +his desire to receive accidentally such a shock, and that his wish had +at length been fulfilled. But while making this remark, the appearance +which his body presented to him was that of a number of separate +pieces. The arms, for example, were detached from the trunk, and +seemed suspended in the air. In fact, memory, and the power of +reasoning, appeared to be complete long before the optic nerve was +restored to healthy action. But what we wish chiefly to dwell upon +here is, the absolute painlessness of the shock; and there cannot be a +doubt, to a person struck dead by lightning, the passage from life to +death occurs without consciousness being in the least degree +implicated. It is an abrupt stoppage of sensation, unaccompanied by a +pang. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<a name="836">{836}</a> +<br> +<h2>From The Dublin University Magazine +<br><br> +LONDON.</h2> +<br> +<p> +A Dublin saunterer of antiquarian propensities pacing the flags in +front of Christ church, or elbowing his troublesome way down the +narrow defile called Castle street, can scarcely escape a certain +sense of awe as he looks on the houses and the passengers, and darts a +thought back through dim and troubled time till he strives to arrive +at an idea of' the first inhabitants and the scene in which they +played out their short parts. +</p> +<p> +Passing over the mysterious and weak race that preceded the Gaels, he +fancies these last in their quaint garb going about their ordinary +occupations, or rushing to their earth mounds and dykes to repel the +fierce Northmen. Then pass before his mind's eye the successive races +of different speech, and different garb, and different interests—the +Danes, Dano-Celts, and the Anglo Normans, employed in fierce struggles +with each other, and each looking on the events of his own times as +paramount to all that ever agitated society till then. All now quiet +and silent in the dust. The shopkeeper attending to his customers, the +tippler stepping into the corner shop for a dram, and the carman +smoking his pipe, and giving his beast a mouthful of hay, are as +unconscious of any personal connection with the dead generations as if +they had sprung full grown and furnished with clothing from the fat +glebe of the neighboring Phoenix Park. +</p> +<p> +So would feel still more intensely an archaeologist on Tower Hill, or +by the Fleet Ditch, or on London Bridge, if the ever hurrying and +feverish crowd would allow him to concentrate his thoughts on +anything. +</p> +<p> +How it should make the feelings of the most dried up anatomy of an +archaeologist glow, when, throwing his thoughts nearly nineteen +centuries back, he sees the mighty robber conducting his band, guarded +by strong defences of bronze, and leather, and wood, to the bank of +the then clear river, and preparing to invest and destroy that +ill-armed but heroic body of brave men on the other side, who, in +defence of their weak children, and loving and high-souled wives and +daughters, will soon send many an armed and ruthless Roman soldier to +shiver on the cold banks of Styx. +</p> +<p> +And what was the profit of all the plotting, and all the unjust +warfare, waged by men single or in masses against those they +considered their foemen? They shortened the career of their opponents, +they shortened their own lives. They preferred a short and turbulent +existence to the longer and quieter span intended for them, they +passed away, and were either speedily forgotten, or remembered but to +be cursed. +</p> +<p> +It is a bewildering occupation to a stranger to contemplate a map of +London in order to acquire some distinct notion of the number and +arrangement of the streets (an idea of the inhabitants is out of the +question), to ponder how the countless multitude can be fed and +clothed, and to reflect that if old mother earth should lose her +fruit-bearing qualities for one year, how little would avail the +beauty, the bravery, the wit, the ingenuity, the industry, and the +intelligence of the three million inhabitants, to prevent the circuit +of famed London from becoming a vast charnel-house. +</p> +<p> +Our earliest historians were the poets, these were succeeded by the +romancers. Geoffry of Monmouth, translating the "Chronicle of Kings" +brought from Brittany, informed the <a name="837">{837}</a> people of the twelfth +century that Brutus, great-grandson of Eneas, after many voyages and +adventures, founded a town about where the Tower has long stood, and +called it New Troy. This was afterward changed to Trinobantum. Lud, +brother to Cassibelan, again gave it his own name—<i>Caer Lud</i>. Hence +Ludstown softened to London. Other derivations for the city's name are +not at all rare. From the Celtic words <i>Leana</i>, marsh or meadow; +<i>Linn</i>, a pool; <i>Lung</i>, or <i>Long</i>, a ship; and <i>Dunn</i>, a fort, it is +easy to make out the fort among the meadows, the fort of the pool, or +the fort of the ships. The sister city, Dublin, is simply black pool. +</p> +<p> +As ancient Dublin occupied at first only the hill of which the castle +occupies the south-eastern spur, so Tower Hill, Ludgate Hill, +Cornhill, and Holborn Hill, formed the site of the original British +Dun or Duns. Hence the most interesting portion of London to an +antiquary must include those places of strength. But as the more +easterly eminences have much longer ceased to be fashionable than our +Fishamble and Essex streets, and the traditions of London literary +characters from the time of Elizabeth date from regions further west, +most writers choose to expatiate on the buildings that lie between +Whitehall and Temple Bar, and on the remarkable personages and +incidents connected with them. Charles Knight was unable to say his +say concerning the modern Babylon in fewer than six royal octavo +volumes, and the portly octavo lately put forth by Mr. Thornbury is +concerned with a very small area of the city, Temple Bar being at its +south-east angle, and the Strand, St. Martin's lane, Holborn, and +Chancery lane its boundaries. +</p> +<br> +<h2>THE STRAND.</h2> +<p> +Temple Bar, that narrow neck through which the struggling sands find +their way with difficulty from the Strand and the Fleet portions of +the great hour-glass, and which is looked on by shallow readers as a +relic of hoar antiquity, dates only from 1670, four years after the +great fire. It forms the point of junction between the cities of +London and Westminster, and in early times was only provided with +posts, rails, and a chain. These were succeeded by a wooden house with +a narrow gate-way and a passage on one side. The present structure is +incumbered with the statues of Elizabeth, James I., Charles I., and +Charles II., all distinguished, according to Mr. Thornbury, by feeble +heads, crimped drapery, and feet and hands kept whitish by the rain, +the non-projecting portions of the bodies rejoicing in more than a +century of dark atmospheric deposits. +</p> +<p> +Mr. Thornbury's selection includes the long line of palaces that once +adorned the Strand or River-bank street, the haunts of artists in St. +Martin's lane, the traditions of Long Acre, the reminiscences +connected with Drury lane, and the old houses of the nobility in +Lincoln's-Inn Fields. +</p> +<p> +One of the most remarkable of the fine buildings of the Strand is that +which bears the name of the ambitious brother of Jane Seymour, the +Duke of Somerset, who boasted that he could muster retainers to the +number of 10,000. To erect his palace, which, by the way, was +unfinished at his death, he demolished the parish church of St. Mary, +and pulled down the houses of the bishops of Worcester, Llandaff, and +Lichfield. He would also have appropriated St. Margaret's at +Westminster, but the mob would not sanction the sacrilege. "Moreover, +he destroyed a chapel in St. Paul's Church-yard, with a cloister +containing the Dance of Death, and a charnel-house (burying the bones +in unconsecrated ground)." To crown his acts of rapine he stole the +stone of a church of St. John near Smithfield. It is not worth +mentioning the carrying away of the stone of the Strand Inn, it being +the property of the lawyers, who could afford to be robbed. +</p> +<a name="838">{838}</a> +<p> +The Danish consort of our Solomon I. here delighted all who had no +objection to spectacles, in which the handsome queen and her ladies +masqueraded to their own and their admirers' content. Rare Ben Jonson +was surely elated by the lists of royal and noble personages who +presented his masques. From this same noble residence Charles I. had +some trouble in dislodging the Gallic followers of his sturdy queen, +with whom his hard-headed and wooden-shoe-abhorring subjects had come +to be at deadly feud. As they were rather too tedious in "shifting the +halter, and traversing the cart," the poor king was obliged to write +thus to Buckingham: +</p> +<p class="cite"> + "STEENIE,—I have received your letter by Dick Greame. This is my + answer. I command you to send all the French away to-morrow out of + the town, if you can by fair means (but stick not long in + disputing), otherwise force them away, driving them away like so + many wild beasts until you have shipped them, and the—go with them! + Let me hear no answer but of the performance of my command. So I rest, + "Your faithful, constant, loving friend, C. R. + "Oaking, the seventh of August, 1626." +<br><br> + "The French inventing all sorts of vexatious delays, the yeomen of + the guard at last jostled them out, carting them off in nearly forty + coaches. They arrived at Dover after four days' tedious travelling, + wrangling and bewailing." +</p> +<br> +<p> +Queen Henrietta taking part in a masque at Christmas in 1632-3, and +Prynne's <i>Histriomastix</i> happening to be published the next day, the +poor man lost his ears for an uncomplimentary remark on women-actors, +which was found in the margin, though it could not possibly have been +written with any reference to the queen's appearance on that occasion. +</p> +<p> +To Somerset House returned Henrietta Maria after the restoration, and +there the garrulous Pepys paid his respects to her as well as to +Madame Castlemaine. "By-and-by, in came the king and Duke and Duchess +of York. The conversation was not a very decorous one, and the young +queen (Catherine of Braganza) said to Charles, 'you lie,' which made +good sport, as the chuckling and delighted Pepys remarks, those being +the first English words he had heard her say; and the king then tried +to make her reply, 'confess and be hanged.'" +</p> +<p> +The most striking object in the old days of the Strand was the new +Maypole which replaced the old one taken down by Oliver's Parliament. +It was of cedar wood, 134 feet high, and stood in front of the church +of St. Mary. It was brought in two pieces from below Bridge, the +splicing made secure by iron bands, three crowns fastened toward its +top, and then the tall article was raised by twelve sailors to a +vertical position, and firmly imbedded. The operation was happily +accomplished under the superintendence of the Duke of York in four +hours. Then sounded trumpets and drums; and morris-dancers in motley +attire, and enlivened by the music of pipe and tabor, danced in glee +around it, while thousands of throats became hoarse with loyal +shouting. James would have found little enjoyment in the general glee, +if he could at the moment have had a prophetic glimpse of his wife, +with her infant son folded to her breast, pacing along the river bank +in doubt and fear, and watching for the friendly boat that was to +convey her from the unfriendly city. +</p> +<p> +When the pole that succeeded this was obliged to abdicate, it was +presented to Sir Isaac Newton, who again presented it to the rector of +Wanstead, and in Wanstead park it helped to support the largest +telescope then known. +</p> +<p> +From this memorable if unedifying goal, Pope started the racers in the +Dunciad: +</p> +<a name="839">{839}</a> +<br> +<pre> + "Amidst the area wide they took their stand, + Where the tall maypole once o'erlooked the Strand; + But now, as Anne and piety ordain, + A church collects the saints of Drury lane." +</pre> +<p> +In the old palace of the Savoy once lived John of Gaunt; John, King of +France, the Black Prince's captive, died there; George Wither, the +poet, is buried there; and there also was Geoffry Chaucer married. +Simon, earl of Montfort, once lived within its precincts; but where +kings, archbishops, and high nobles once walked and held high council, +pickles are now sold, printing types set up, and glass rolled out and +spun. +</p> +<p> +Wat Tyler's mob being forbidden to plunder, and supposing a couple of +barrels to contain money, flung them into a great fire. The money, +alas, was gunpowder, as in the Dunleary ballad, and blew up the great +hall, shook down the neighboring houses, killed sundry of the social +reformers, and reduced the palace to ruins. +</p> +<p> +Henry VII. instituted within its precincts a house of refuge for every +indigent person passing down the River-side-road, and by a natural +process of abuse the poor wayfarers derived little advantages from it. +Loiterers, sham cripples, and vagabonds of both sexes begged abroad +all day, and came in the evening to the Savoy to sup and sleep. Edward +VI. transferred a good portion of its revenue to Bridewell Prison and +Christ's Hospital. Mary replaced the charity on its old footing, much +to the enjoyment of inveterate beggars; but Elizabeth in her turn +disagreeably surprised the lazy inmates and the corrupt governor, and +they had to look out for victims in other quarters. +</p> +<p> +The building had not lost its privilege of sheltering imposture and +knavery in the last century, having served as an asylum for fraudulent +debtors in Queen Anne's time; it became the darling haunt of such +chaplains as Mr. Lever's Reverend Paul; and in 1754 we find in the +<i>Public Advertiser</i> this precious document put forth by them: +</p> +<p class="cite"> + "BY AUTHORITY.—Marriages performed with the utmost privacy, + secrecy, and regularity, at the ancient royal chapel of St. John the + Baptist in the Savoy, where regular and authentic registers have + been kept from the time of the reformation (being two hundred years + and upward) to this day, the expense not being more than one guinea, + the five-shilling stamp included. There are five private ways to + this chapel by land, and two by water." +</p> +<p> +Wither, the Cromwellian poet, who had a hard time of it after the +restoration, lies in the Savoy. Denman, petitioning for his life, used +this ingenious device: "As long as Wither lives, I shall not be +considered the worst poet in England." +</p> +<p> +It is not easy to a passenger sauntering or hurrying down the Strand +at this day, admiring the facade of Somerset House, glancing into the +windows of rich shops, elbowing his way through an eager and bustling +crowd, and having his ears stunned by the thundering rumble of cabs, +busses, and wagons, to fancy it once a sandy and marshy road, and the +footpath very disagreeable to the feet, and interfered with by bushes +and thickets. Three water-courses from the northern fields found their +way across it to the river, and these were spanned by three bridges. +The building of Westminster Abbey encouraged the erection of the first +houses along the River-side-way, but the bad state of the road made a +subject for a petition so late as the reign of Edward II. +</p> +<br> +<h2>PUBLISHING IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY.</h2> +<p> +Of the coffee-houses in the neighborhood of the Strand and Fleet +street frequented by the witty and the learned from the restoration to +the close of last century, we shall gladly speak if our limits permit. +Meanwhile, being on a literary subject, we must not omit to mention +that the father of <a name="840">{840}</a> Mudie's and all other circulating libraries +in London, was established at 132 Strand, in 1740, by a bookseller +named Bathoe. +</p> +<p> +Had there been such establishments in Pepys' time, they would have +saved him some money and some trouble. Witness his disappointment +about "Hudibras:" +</p> +<p class="cite"> + "26th of September, 1662. To the Wardrobe. Hither come Mr. + Battersby, and we falling into discourse of a new book of drollery + in use, called 'Hudibras,' I would needs go find it out, and met + with it at the Temple; cost me 2<i>s</i>. 6<i>d</i>. But when I come to read + it, it is so silly an abuse of the presbyter-knight going to the + wars, that I am ashamed at it, and meeting at Mr. Townsend's at + dinner, I sold it him for 18<i>d</i>." (The new book of drollery + continuing to be the rage), "February 6th, 1663. To a bookseller's + in the Strand, and there bought 'Hudibras' again. I am resolved once + more to read him, and see whether I can find him an example of wit + or no." (Success very doubtful.) "28th November. To Paul's + Church-yard, and there looked upon the second part of 'Hudibras,' + which I buy not, but borrow to read." (He bought it a few days + after, however.) "The world hath mightily cried up this book, though + it hath not a good liking in me, though I had tried but (by?) two or + three times reading to bring myself to think it witty." +</p> +<p> +We find him a few days after these researches purchasing "Fuller's +Worthies," the "Cabbala, or Collection of Letters of State," "Les +Delices de Holland," and "Hudibras" again, "now in great fashion for +drollery, though I cannot, I confess, see enough where the wit lies." +</p> +<p> +Pepys' great acquaintances seem to have discovered this sore spot in +his mental configuration, and to have angered it oftentimes by quoting +"Hudibras" at him, and chuckling over the fun, which, alas, was the +reverse of fun to him. +</p> +<p> +It was long after the introduction of printing into the country that +bookseller's shops became an institution. At and before the time of +the great fire, St. Paul's Church-yard was the chief bookselling mart. +On the 31st November, 1660, Pepys bought a copy of the play of Henry +IV. in that place, "and so went to the new theatre, and saw it acted, +but my expectation being too great, it did not please me as otherwise +I believe it would, and my having a book did, I believe, spoil it a +little." +</p> +<p> +Poor Pepys! A leaf out of the scandalous chronicle of the court would +have interested him more than all the wit and wisdom of Shakespeare. +He tells us in his diary how his wife and he laughed a whole evening +over a pamphlet written about the queen. +</p> +<p> +The fire destroyed thousands of fine works in the Church-yard; and so +much was the value of books increased, that Ricaut's "Turkey," 8<i>s</i>. +before the fire, could not be got under 55<i>s.</i> after it. +</p> +<p> +Later in time, Little Britain, from Duck-lane to the Pump, became a +literary quarter. When Benjamin Franklin first visited London he took +lodgings in Little Britain at 3<i>s</i>. 6<i>d</i>, per week, next door to a +bookseller's, from whom, as circulating libraries were not in vogue, +he purchased volumes, read them, sold them again to the same man, and +bought others. +</p> +<p> +A great deal of information on bookselling and other subjects that +interested the people near 200 years since, may be obtained from the +perusal of the "Life and Errors of John Dunton," bookseller, an +autobiography. The son of a clergyman in Huntingdonshire, he says he +learned Latin so as to speak it pretty well extempore, but he could +not get on well with the Greek; and this, coupled with an affection +entertained for a "virgin in his father's house," such passion +carefully concealed from its object, completely unhinged the classical +and clerical designs of his father on him. He became a bookseller's +apprentice, and in <a name="841">{841}</a> 1685 a bookseller in his own person. He +speaks very disparagingly of the mere men of letters of his day. He +says, good simple-minded man, that what they got per sheet interested +them more than zeal for the advancement of literature. Very little we +blame the poor fellows, but they were really inexcusable for +pretending to have ransacked the whole Bodleian Library, to have gone +through the fathers, and to have read and digested all human and +ecclesiastical history, while they had never mastered a single page in +"St. Cyprian," nor could tell whether the fathers lived before or +after our Saviour. +</p> +<p> +That was the golden age of sermons and pamphlets, the latter occupying +the place of our monthlies. Mr. John Dunton's first essay in the +publishing line was "The Sufferings of Christ," by the Rev. Mr. +Doolittle. All the trade took copies in exchange for their own books, +a feature peculiar to the business 160 years since. John throve and +took a helpmate to himself, not Mrs. Mary Saunders, the virgin before +mentioned. The beautiful Rachel Seaton, the innocent Sarah Day, the +religious Sarah Briscow, had successively paled the image of the +preceding lady in the mirror of his rather susceptible heart, and at +the end he became the fond husband of Miss Annesley, daughter of a +nonconformist divine. The happy pair always called each other by the +endearing and poetic names of <i>Iris</i> and <i>Philaret</i>, but this tender +attachment did not prevent Philaret from leaving Iris alone, and +making excursions to Ireland, to America, and to Holland, and delaying +in those regions for long periods. These separations and distant +wanderings did not tend to make our bookseller's old age comfortable +and independent. +</p> +<p> +Dunton has left an interesting account of most of the then eminent +booksellers in the three kingdoms. He says that in general they were +not much better than knaves and atheists. He also gave information of +the writers he employed, the licensers of the press, etc. It would +appear that the publishing business of the time was in a very vigorous +condition. The shoals of pamphlets satisfied the literary hunger of +those to whom, if they lived in the nineteenth century, <i>Athenaeums</i> +and <i>Examiners</i>, <i>Chambers's Journals</i> and <i>All the Year Rounds</i>, +would be as necessary as atmospheric air. The chief booksellers of +that day, if not to be compared with continental Alduses or Stephenses +or Elzevirs, were men of good literary taste and much information. Of +the booksellers amber-preserved in the "Dunciad," Dunton mentions only +Lintot and Tonson. The disreputable Curll was not known in his day. +This genius, embalmed in the hearts of the rascally paper-men of +Holywell street, being once condemned for a vile publication, and +promoted to the pillory, cunningly averted the wrath of the mob by a +plentiful distribution of handbills, in which he stated his offence to +be a pamphlet complimentary to the memory of good Queen Anne. Edward +Cave, in starting the <i>Gentleman's Magazine</i>, 31st January, 1731, gave +healthy employment to many a pamphleteer, though he diminished the +number of separate pamphlets. +</p> +<br> +<h2>BEN JONSON AND LINCOLN'S INN.</h2> +<p> +Our fancy to speak of books, and their writers and sellers, has led us +aside from the area marked out by Mr. Thornbury for his own +explorations, so we must return to bounds, within which we find +Lincoln's-Inn Fields. These inns were originally established as places +of entertainment, where pilgrims and other travellers were hospitably +attended by the monks. The town houses of noblemen were also called +inns, just as in Paris they were styled hostels. The inn in question +derives its name from the Earl of Lincoln, Henry de Lacy, to whom it +was granted by Edward I. Many eminent men have used chambers in +Lincoln's Inn, since it became the resort <a name="842">{842}</a> of legal students. Sir +Thomas More had chambers there, and there Dr. Donne, the poetical +divine, attempted to study law in his seventeenth year. Dr. Tillotson +preached to the lawyers (with what effect is not told) in 1663, our +own Archbishop Ussher in 1647. Sir Mathew Hale was at first a wild +student of Lincoln's Inn, till reclaimed by the sight of a drunkard +seized by a fit. Shaftesbury; Ashmole, the antiquary; Prynne, of +pillory notoriety; Secretary Thurloe; Sir John Denham; George Wither, +omitting mention of modern celebrities, all endeavored to penetrate +the mysteries of law and equity in this long-enduring institution. +</p> +<p> +One of the most remarkable, though not the most reputable, of lawyers +connected with Lincoln's Inn was Sir Edmund Saunders, who gave his aid +to the crown while endeavoring, in 1683, to overthrow the charter of +London. The following extract concerning him is taken from Granger: +"Sir Edmund Saunders was originally a strolling beggar about the +streets, without known parents or relations. He came often to beg +scraps at Clement's Inn, where he was taken notice of for his uncommon +sprightliness; and as he expressed a strong inclination to learn to +write, one of the attorney's clerks taught him, and soon qualified him +for a hackney writer. He took all opportunities of improving himself +by reading such books as he borrowed from his friends; and in the +course of a few years became an able attorney and a very eminent +counsel. His practice in the Court of King's Bench was exceeded by +none. His art and cunning was equal to his knowledge, and he gained +many a cause by laying snares. If he was detected he was never put out +of countenance, but evaded the matter with a jest, which he had always +at hand. He was much employed by the king (Charles II.) against the +city of London in the business of the <i>Quo Warranto</i>. His person was +as heavy and <i>ungain</i> as his wit was alert and sprightly. He is said +to have been a mere lump of morbid flesh. The smell from him was so +offensive that people held their noses when he came into court. One of +his jests on such occasions was, 'That none could say he wanted issue, +for he had no less than nine on his back.'" +</p> +<p> +The literary students of the inn, as they sit in their lonely +chambers, or converse with their comrades, Arthur Pendennis and Mr. +Warrington, in the pleasant grounds, delight to fancy brave old Ben +Jonson helping to raise the wall on the Chancery lane side, and +reciting a passage from Homer. Whether Sutton or Camden sent him back +to college to pursue his studies is not so certain. His fighting +single-handed in Flanders in the sight of the two armies, and the +subsequent carrying away of the <i>"Spolia Opima"</i> of his foeman, were +in strict accordance with the practice of the heroes of his studies. +His college life and his deeds in foreign fields were all over in his +twenty-third year, 1597, when we find him a player and writer for the +stage in London; his critics asserting that he walked the boards as if +he were treading mortar. Poor Ben, with a countenance compared to a +rotten russet apple, and described by himself as remarkable for a +"mountain belly and a rocky face," was equally ragged in temper. +Quarreling with a brother actor, he killed him in a duel in Hogsden +Fields, and was brought very near the gallows-foot for his non-command +of temper. He had not the gentle character nor the expansive intellect +of his friend, the "Gentle Shakespeare," nor did his characters +embrace entire humanity, nor did he possess the soaring and +far-seizing imagination of his brother poet and player, but he more +closely pictured the modes of society in which they moved, the social +and politic features of the locality and the era; all those outward +manifestations, in fact, that distinguish the intercourse, and the +morals, and the character of this or that locality or time, from those +of <a name="843">{843}</a> its neighbors. Hence a better idea can be had of the scenic +features of Old London, and the costumes, the idioms, and usages of +its people at the end of the sixteenth and beginning of the +seventeenth century, from the literary remains of Ben Jonson than from +those of William Shakespeare. Aubrey remarked that "Shakespeare's +comedies would remain wit as long as the English tongue is understood; +while our present writers reflect so much upon particular persons and +coxcombeties, that twenty years hence they will not be understood." +</p> +<p> +London was Ben Jonson's world; its people, such as they appeared to +him, the whole human race. The humorists that he knew were reproduced +with the utmost truth—and the class-modes and manners that came under +his observation were sketched from and to the life. There was local +truth of costume and character, but little generalization. +Illustrative instances abound in all his plays and poems. In +Elizabeth's time, Finsbury Fields were covered with trees and +windmills. So we find Master Stephen ("Every Man in his Humor"), who +dwells at Hogsden (Hoxton), despising the archers of Finsbury and the +citizens that come a-ducking to Islington Ponds. "The Strand was the +chief road for ladies to pass through in their coaches, and there +<i>Lafoole</i> in the 'Silent Woman' has a lodging to watch when ladies are +gone to the china houses or the exchange, that he may meet them by +chance, and give them presents. The general character of the streets +before the fire is not forgotten. In 'The Devil is an Ass' the lady +and her lover speak closely and gently from the windows of two +contiguous buildings. Such are a few of the examples of the local +proprieties which constantly turn up in Jonson's dramas." +</p> +<p> +To those who accuse rare Ben of intemperate habits it is useless to +object that he lashed intemperance and the other vices of his time as +severely as the most rigid moralist could; there are too many +instances extant of the sons of Satan correcting sin in their speeches +and writings. However, the club at the Mermaid in Friday street to +which he belonged, consisted of such men as we cannot suppose to be of +intemperate habits, nor willing to cherish a noted drunkard. For Sir +Walter Raleigh, Shakespeare, Beaumont, Fletcher, Selden, Cotton, +Carew, Martin, Donne, flashes of wit, and sallies of imagination, and +touches of genial humor, had more charms then beastly wallowing in +liquor. Hear what Jonson himself says in his invitation to a friend to +supper where canary, his darling liquor, was to flow: +</p> +<pre> + "Of this we will sup free but moderately, + Nor shall our cups make any guilty men, + But at our parting we will be as when + We innocently met. No simple word + That shall be uttered at our mirthful board + Shall make us sad next morning, or affright + The liberty that we'll enjoy to-night." +</pre> +<p> +It was to the middle aisle of the old cathedral of St. Paul's that +Jonson and others like him resorted to obtain such wayward and +grotesque characters as would take the attention of an audience. It +was the favorite lounge at the time of coxcombs, bullies, adventurers, +and cut-purses. Here a new man, wishing to be in the height of +fashion, would bring his tailor, and set him to mark the garb of the +foremost gallant in vogue. Country squires anxious for a varnishing of +courtly polish, would be found there observing the dress and demeanor +of the people of fashion, and afterward flinging away the produce of +their good lands in entertainments shared with these envied darlings +of the courtly goddess. <i>Captain Bobadil</i>, we may be certain, was met +among the crowd at Paul's. Here it was that all those niceties of the +mode which crop up through his plays were observed. In the "Midas" of +Lily, quoted by Charles Knight in his "London," are found collected +several of these distinctive marks of the courtier <i>comme il faut:</i> +</p> +<p> +"How will you be trimmed, sir? Will you have your beard like a spade +<a name="844">{844}</a> or a bodkin? A pent-house on your upper lip, or an alley on your +chin? A low curl on your head like a bull, or dangling locks like a +spaniel? Your mustachioes sharp at the end like shoemakers' awls, or +hanging down to your mouth like goat's flakes? Your love-locks +wreathed like a silken twist, or shaggy, to fall on your shoulder?" +</p> +<p> +Few dramatists in his or our days would venture to speak so fearlessly +to his audience as honest Ben Jonson: +</p> +<pre> + "If any here chance to behold himself, + Let him not dare to challenge me of wrong; + For if he shame to have his follies known, + First he should shame to act 'em. My strict hand + Was made to seize on vice, and with a gripe, + Squeeze out the humor of such spongy souls + As lick up every idle vanity." +</pre> +<p> +Our bard was not left to struggle with the hardships of an ordinary +theatrical career. He was employed to compose the plots and verses of +the stately and splendid masques in which Elizabeth, and Anne of +Denmark, and her "Royal Doggie" delighted. Had space permitted, we +should gladly have quoted some of the verses and stage directions of +these court shows. Among the rest is an Irish masque in which Dennish, +Donnell, Dermott, and Patrick come in their long glibbs and shaggy +mantles to present their compliments to King <i>Yamish</i>, and +congratulate him on the marriage of some lord or other. Having been +roughly received by the janitors, they sounded their grievance aloud: +</p> +<p> +"<i>Don</i>.—Ish it te fashion to beate te imbashaters here? and knock +'hem o' te head phit te phoite stick?" +</p> +<p> +"<i>Der</i>.—Ant make ter meshage run out a ter mouthsh before tey shpeake +vit te king?" +</p> +<p> +They announce their intention to dance as well as that of their +masters, who as yet stand outside: +</p> +<p> +"<i>Don</i>.—But tey musht eene come, and daunch i' teyr mantles, and show +tee how teye can foot te <i>fading</i> and te <i>fadow</i>, and te phip a +dunboyne I trow." +</p> +<p> +"<i>Der</i>.—Tey will fight for tee, King Yamish, and for my mishtress +tere." [Footnote: 203] +</p> +<p class="footnote"> + [Footnote 203: As out of all late or still living writers, not + natives of Ireland, there are not three who quote our + peasant-pronunciation correctly, so it is more than probable that + Jonson, acute as his observation was, mistook the pronunciation of + his own day.] +</p> +<p> +After much soft-sawder about their love and their loyalty to Shamus, +six men and boys danced to bagpipes and other rude music. Then the +Irish gentlemen danced in their mantles to the sound of harps; and one +of them called on a bard to celebrate the fame of him who was to make +Erin the world's wonder for peace and plenty: +</p> +<pre> + "Advance, immortal bard; come up and view + The gladdening face of that great king, in whom + So many prophecies of thine are knit. + This is that James, of which long since thou sungst, + Should end our country's most unnatural broils." +</pre> +<p> +Would he had done so! Ben was not so blind but that he could spy out +some little defects in Solomon and his queen. As he could not apply +his talents to their correction, he recompensed himself in unmerciful +handling of court vices. Toward the end of James's reign he enjoyed a +competent fortune, and owned an extensive library. Distress and +illness succeeded; but Charles I. being made aware of his forlorn +condition, granted him an additional pension, and that tierce of +canary, whose successors have been drained by all poet-laureates since +his day. A blue marble stone lies over his remains in the north aisle +of Westminster Abbey. The epitaph, RARE BEN JONSON, was cut in the +flag at the order and charge of Jack Young (afterward knighted). +Eighteen-pence requited the sculptor. +</p> +<p> +Whether we have improved on the feats of artists of another kind, in +Queen Anne's reign, is questionable. At Bartholomew Fair, in the reign +of that good-natured sovereign, a girl, of ten years, walked backward +up a sloping rope, driving a wheelbarrow behind her. <a name="845">{845}</a> Scaramouch +danced on the rope with two children, and a dog, in a wheelbarrow, and +a duck on his head. Our authority leaves us in some doubt as to the +relative positions of man, children, dog, duck, and wheel-barrow, and +whether the duck took position on head of dog or man. The eighteenth +century was inaugurated by an intelligent tiger picking the feathers +from a fowl in such style as to elicit the hearty applause of a +discerning public. Continental sovereigns of our own time prefer the +stirring spectacle of men and horses gored by sharp horned bulls. The +tiger merely removed the feathers from the skin of the dead fowl; the +viscera of the living quadruped follow the thrust of the bull's horn. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>Translated from Etudes Religieuses, Historiques, et Littéraires, par +des Pères de la Compagnie de Jésus. +<br><br> +THE ORIGIN AND MUTABILITY OF SPECIES.</h2> +<br> +<p> +<i>Origines et Transformations de l'homme et des autres êtres. lre +partie. Par</i> TRÉMAUX. Paris: Hachette. 1865. +</p> +<p> +Anthropology is a recent science, and yet its votaries have produced +numerous treatises. The delicate questions which it raises have given +birth to various and contradictory opinions. The most important +problem of this science is that which relates to the origin of man. At +what epoch did man for the first time tread the surface of our globe? +How did he appear? What cause produced him? Two first class scholars, +Humboldt and Bompland, said, not long ago, "The general question of +the origin of the inhabitants of a continent is beyond the limits +prescribed to history, perhaps it is not even a philosophical +question." Bolder than they, the anthropologists put a question a +thousand times more complex, as to the origin of the whole human race, +and they do not hesitate to believe that, sooner or later, science +will be able to answer it with certainty. As to the present, we may +say, <i>Quot capita, tot sensus;</i> the most opposite ideas divide the +world, and <i>it is the main discord which pervades science.</i> These last +words are those of M. Trémaux. To remedy this confusion, the learned +traveller puts forth a new idea, which in his opinion should, in +throwing light on all the aspects of the question, cause the discord +to vanish; trace the way we ought to follow; and at no very distant +day arrive at a complete solution. It remains to be seen whether these +happy auguries will be realized, or if, on the contrary, the theory of +M. Trémaux, added to the others, will not have the fatal effect of +increasing the confusion it would abolish. +</p> +<p> +The opinions relating to the origin of man may be reduced to three. In +the first place, we will state that of the monogenists, who behold in +all the human types scattered over the world only races and varieties +of the same species, and regard mankind as descending, or at least as +capable of descending, from a single couple primitively sprung from +the hands of the Creator. This opinion is evidently conformable to the +Bible narrative; this reflection will not escape the sincere +Christian, and we must make it at the risk of exciting the pity or +indignation of certain positivists, who reproach us with bringing into +scientific questions prejudices and arguments which are +extra-scientific. +</p> +<a name="846">{846}</a> +<p> +The opinion of the polygenists is diametrically opposed to the +preceding. According to them, the typical differences which exist +between the races of men are so decided, so profound, that they could +not be the result of the conditions of existence; these differences +are then original; men, instead of belonging to a single zoological +species, form a genera or even a family, the bimanous family; +community of origin is then impossible, and the account in Genesis +must be considered as legendary. +</p> +<p> +Lastly, a third school separates itself entirely from the preceding, +and considers the question under discussion as a phase of the general +question—the stability of the species. The naturalists connected with +this school regard the species as something essentially changeable. +They deduce this opinion from the examples of the endless varieties of +forms which our domestic animals above all others present. It is +possible, by known processes, to obtain, after several generations, +products so different from the primitive type, that to judge them by +the form only we should believe in the existence of a new species; the +continued fecundity between the two varieties alone attesting the +specific unity of both types. Would it not be possible, by new +methods, or by a better employment of the means already known, to +arrive at such a complete transformation that the fecundity between +the new and the primitive species should cease to exist, or at least +cease to be unlimited? We should have thus obtained a novel species by +a simple transformation due to the forces of nature. The result which +man might obtain at the end of several generations, nature, left to +itself, would inevitably arrive at, after a longer or shorter time, +according as circumstances should be more or less favorable. This is +admitted by Lamark, and the two Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire; it is admitted +also by the English naturalist Darwin. The latter regards all animals +actually existing as descending from four or five progenitors; an +equal number would suffice for plants. He even adds that, guided by +analogy, he would willingly admit that, all organized beings, plants +and animals, descend from one single primordial type, and that man +should constitute no exception to the general laws; he springs from +the ape or some extinct type, and thence from the primitive. +</p> +<p> +It is to this last school that M. Trémaux belongs: the title of his +book sufficiently shows it. He concedes the variability and the +transformation of the species; but separates himself distinctly from +Darwin relative to the causes which produce this variation. +</p> +<p> +M. Trémaux' book may be summed up entirely in the statement of the +great law of the improvement of beings which is printed in large +letters on the front page of the first part: "The improvement of +creatures is or becomes proportionate to the degree of elaboration of +the soil on which they live! And the soil is in general elaborated in +proportion as it belongs to a more recent geological formation." To +prove this law, and to deduce from it every possible consequence, is +the object of the book. +</p> +<p> +The first requisite in judging a work is to understand its aim or end. +Thus we have endeavored to seize the sense and the bearing which the +author attaches to the great law he thinks he has discovered. Such a +soil gives such a product, we are told. We understand this when the +direct fruits of the earth are in question--that is, of the vegetables +which draw directly from the earth the principles which should +assimilate them. But as to animals, what influence can the soil +exercise over them? This is what M. Trémaux should have explained, and +what he has forgotten to tell us. Must we understand that the land, by +virtue of its chemical and mineralogical composition, possesses a +mysterious action of an unknown nature, determining according to the +case the improvement or degeneracy of the species of <a name="847">{847}</a> animals? +Such is in fact the meaning which many passages seem to attribute to +this law. Thus, after having shown that the causes generally assigned +cannot explain those typical changes which nature presents, the author +adds: "By the action of cross-breeding, food, and climate alone, we +shall meet with contradictions at every step. With the action of the +sun, the whole globe exhibits the same effects." Since it is neither +through food nor by climate that the sun acts, it is by some +mysterious agency; and behold us thus, in the nineteenth century, +thrown back upon occult causes. May we be permitted to observe that +this is not scientific? +</p> +<p> +Entirely engaged in proving by facts the law which must serve as a +oasis to his system, M. Trémaux seems never to have thought of +explaining to himself the manner of the earth's action. Thus, beside +numerous places which clearly imply an immediate action, others could +be quoted which only attribute to the soil an indirect action due to +the aliments drawn from it. For example, <i>apropos</i> of cretinism, we +read: "This scourge is above all endemical, because in fact those +persons who can profit by the <i>products</i> of another soil feel in a +lesser degree the unfavorable results of that condition." And further +on: "To avoid living permanently on a soil which produces cretinism is +the sole remedy, or rather the only palliative, against its pernicious +effects on man. It is best to abandon it completely, or at least <i>to +make use of products other than those destined to feed its +inhabitants.</i>" In brief, what is necessary to bring humanity to +perfection? "Firstly, To choose carefully those lands whose products +are more directly intended for man. Secondly, To have recourse to +every proper means of improving the land. Thirdly, Planting with +suitable trees those lands which are unfavorable to the growth of +human food. Fourthly, To subject to agriculture those forest lands +which occupy a favorable soil." +</p> +<p> +These passages appear clear that it is not of itself, but by its +productions, and also doubtless through its climate, the soil acts on +man and on the animals. This explanation is more philosophical than +novel. +</p> +<p> +Between the monogenists and the polygenists, the question reduces +itself very nearly to this: Can beings differing so much as the +Europeans and the Bushmen, the Hottentot and the Australian, descend +from the same ancestors? No, reply the polygenists; for the +differences are greater than those which characterize certain species. +In order to meet this objection, the monogenists have had recourse to +what is called the middle theory, and to that of the cross-breeds. The +whole of the external circumstances under which the representatives of +a species exist, constitute what is called the middle or medium, to +which monogenists, supporting themselves on undoubted facts, attribute +the power of gradually changing the medium type of a species. The +crossing of many types thus modified will give birth to new forms, +all, however, belonging to one common kind. +</p> +<p> +Where do we find the difference between this middle theory and the law +of M. Trémaux? In nothing but a greater or less importance attributed +to the influence of soil; and even this difference is more apparent +than real. The <i>fundamental law</i> so understood—and it appears to us +hard to understand it otherwise—constitutes no novel idea or theory; +it is nothing more than a variation of the classic theory of the +influence of media. +</p> +<p> +How is this law proved? It is impossible for us to follow the author +in the development of his arguments. He gives proof in them of rare +learning, and of profound and varied knowledge of ethnography. We +observe the marked predilection of M. Trémaux for the soil of Africa, +which he has ably described in special works. But when we have +finished reading him, and would give an account of his arguments and +of their value, we do <a name="848">{848}</a> not find in them all the elements of +conviction. We know that many writers have expressed an opinion very +different from ours, but even should we be deemed too exacting, we +must acknowledge that an attentive perusal has not convinced us. There +are no doubt remarkable coincidences in the work; but they are not of +a sufficiently trenchant character, and, moreover, most of the facts +may be explained otherwise than by the influence of soil. Let us give +some examples. "We cannot meet with a single instance of a +civilization which has developed itself, nor even been maintained in +cases of emigration, under adverse geological conditions." Nothing is +more natural, in fact. Why should emigrants on the way of civilization +settle preferentially in unfertile countries? For it must not be +forgotten that what are here called geological conditions refer simply +to the fertility of the soil. +</p> +<p> +Another argument extensively developed is drawn from the persistence +of the same types in the same countries. After having examined Africa +and Europe from this point of view, the author concludes thus: "In +short, what have the migrations from the East peopling the West +produced? They have created Hellenes in Greece, Romans in Rome, Gauls +in France, and children of Albion in England." Must we conclude, from +this persistence, that the conquering races have in each generation +felt the influence of the soil, so as to resemble after some centuries +the former populations? Such is the reasoning of M. Trémaux. But the +same fact is appealed to by polygenists, who interpret it in a +different manner. According to them, this persistence proves that the +conquering race has always been absorbed by the indigenous; and they +do not fail to conclude from it that between these two races +illimitable fecundity, the specific character of unity, is hardly ever +realized. +</p> +<p> +We read at the same page: "If we pass over other continents, the same +results strike us on all sides. On certain points of Australia and +America, the English type is attached from the very first generation." +This fact is stated by some naturalists, but it is denied by others. +We can say as much of the pretended transformation of negroes. Messrs. +Reiset, Lyell, and E. Reclus tell us that they are transformed in +about one hundred and fifty years to approach the white type by one +quarter of the distance which separated them from it. But American +anthropologists, who are nearly all polygenists, resolutely affirm the +contrary. +</p> +<p> +Thus we see the facts are difficult to ascertain, and still more +difficult to interpret. It is one of the grand difficulties of +anthropology. We rarely succeed in agreeing about the facts +themselves, which only happens in some exceptional cases supported by +perfectly exact statistics; and many facts are not of a nature to be +consigned to the columns of an official register. Even in a case where +the facts are placed beyond doubt, they are generally of a nature to +be variously interpreted, and every one with preconceived ideas +tortures them at his pleasure, and does not fail to find in them a +confirmation of his theories. M. Trémaux is so filled with his idea +that he finds proofs in support of it even in politics; and +reciprocally, does not hesitate, in the name of geology, to counsel +princes on the manner of governing their subjects. For example, we +remember the war carried on in 1848 by Hungary against Austria. At +that time Transylvania withdrew from the common cause and rallied to +the Austrian government. The emperor Francis Joseph rejoiced at this +result, hoping to easily propitiate the Croats; but he experienced +from them an unexpected resistance, and their assembly of notables +declared that Croatia should continue to share the fate of Hungary. +Upon this M. Trémaux says: "This would appear paradoxical if we +considered only geographical positions, but consult <a name="849">{849}</a> geology and +all this will appear perfectly rational, since Transylvania reposes +like Austria upon a great surface of old ground; whilst Hungary, +Croatia, and Dalmatia stand upon more recent layers." We leave our +readers to appreciate this. +</p> +<p> +The author adds: "As to Venetia, not only is its soil of recent +formation, but it possesses a distinct and very different nationality; +thus each one recognizes its unalterable tendencies." +</p> +<p> +What caused the sanguinary war which has just desolated America? Why, +because the Southerns, dwelling on virgin soil, fought for their +independence and would not be governed by men from old lands. And +reflecting that the new lands of the South are more fitted to improve +the races which cultivate them, M. Trémaux fears not to predict, +notwithstanding the unforeseen victory of the North, that "in the +future the South will govern the North, if it be not separated from +it." +</p> +<p> +As to Ireland and Poland, it is again in the name of geology that our +author defends their independence. Not hoping to obtain this result, +he at least gives the princes who govern them wise counsels for their +guidance. +</p> +<p> +Let us come to the scientific conclusions which the author pretends to +draw from his principle in favor of natural history in general and of +anthropology in particular. Since the soil acts so energetically in +the modification of types, it is evident that the species ought to be +essentially variable. Let a race be found isolated on a favorable +ground, without any communication with the rest of mankind, and the +modifications will be produced, transmitted, and increased in every +generation; and, after a longer or shorter time, the new type will be +so different from the old one, that illimitable fecundity will no +longer exist between them; there will only be one species the more. +Transformations in reality are not made as rapidly as might be +believed, because the isolation which we have supposed never exists. +It thence follows that the crossings with the primitive race, or even +with a race on the road to degeneracy on an imperfect soil, constantly +check the effect of the superior soil. At length there is an +equilibrium between these two causes, and then there appears a medium +type, which preserves its identity so long as the circumstances remain +the same. This necessarily happens in a period of several thousand +years, like our historic period. But if we take in at a glance several +thousand ages, we shall understand that the geological changes +effected by time on the surface of the world will cause the action of +the soil to prevail over the influence of crossings, in such a manner +as to modify slowly but progressively the types and the species. +</p> +<p> +Starting from these principles, what does M. Trémaux require in order +to explain the actual state of creation? A simple <i>primordial cell</i> or +<i>utricle</i>, the most simply organized being, whether animal or +vegetable matters little. If this being so simple existed at the epoch +which geologists term the <i>Silurian period</i>, it is many millions of +ages past. Since then the surface of the globe has been constantly +modified and ameliorated, life has been constantly developed, and form +been brought nearer to perfection. It is thus that even in the most +elementary beings nature has arrived at the numerous and complicated +forms which we know. In this manner man at his appointed hour appeared +on earth, where he strove to improve himself and is striving in that +direction still. M. Trémaux does not exactly admit that we are +descended from apes. No; but he contends that both man and ape sprang +from one common source, which has now disappeared; and that whilst the +quadruman, placed under unfavorable geological conditions, has +suffered from its inevitable influence and been degraded, man has on +the contrary, under happier influences, developed himself, and is +become able, by <a name="850">{850}</a> his intelligent activity, to combat those +external influences. Hence his actual superiority—hence his future +progress. +</p> +<p> +A serious objection here presents itself. Does the influence of the +soil perfect the <i>instinct</i> of animals as well as their bodies? Has _it_ +given man that intelligence which, better than all zoological +characters, especially distinguishes him from the brute creation? M. +Trémaux meets this difficulty with a reply which might have been taken +from Nysten's dictionary. In his comparison "of man with the ape," he +tells us "that M. Gratiolet divides the subject into two sections, the +one referring to organization, the other to faculties. He concedes the +resemblances of the first, he refuses to acknowledge those of the +second, without observing that <i>these differences in faculties</i> are +only the consequence of a greater or less degree of organic +development." This philosophical heresy does not slip by chance from +the writer's pen; we find it repeated in several places, nearly in the +same terms. Moreover, in refuting another passage from Gratiolet, he +says: "I am astonished that Gratiolet does not recognize in instinct a +rudiment of intelligence; in the constructions of the beaver, in the +nests of birds, in the cells of bees, elements of sculpture and of +design, etc." +</p> +<p> +M. Trémaux divides the opinions of Gratiolet into two; the first part +is serious, and is that of the learned anatomist; the second is that +of sentiment, wherein he speaks by the same title as the philosophers +<i>who develop the void of their entities</i>. This contempt for philosophy +well explains the strange ideas of our author about the intelligence +of man and the souls of brutes. To see nothing between both but a +difference of organization is not philosophical. A little metaphysics +would spoil nothing, and it really does not require a strong dose to +behold the abyss which separates human intelligence, capable of +seizing the abstract and the absolute as well as the concrete and the +continent, from that of brutes, acting by instinct, able only at the +most to combine some sensations, without ever having any general +ideas. +</p> +<p> +We think we have now given a pretty exact epitome of M. Trémaux' +ideas. The whole work rests upon an ill defined principle, which, in +the sense in which we have understood it, the only one which appears +to us to be feasible, cannot be considered new. This principle, +although true in a certain sense and within certain limits, is not to +be proved irrefragable, as the basis of any theory should be. The +consequences which are sought to be drawn from the premises are not +necessarily contained in them, and many bear not the seal of a +wholesome philosophy. We shall perhaps be thought a little too severe +upon this work. We think we should be so, especially as the author is +in many respects recommendable. <i>Apropos</i> of the question of species, +M. Trémaux writes: "M. Kourens has his merits, but they lie elsewhere; +it is in his researches on the periosteum and on the vital cord that +he acquires them." We may be allowed to use the same expressions and +to say: "M. Trémaux deserves well, but not herein; his actual labors +on ethnography and archaeology are very good. Read the account of his +travels to Soudan and into Asia Minor, and you will acknowledge him a +man of talent and undoubted science. But as to his theoretical ideas +on the question of the species, he must not reckon upon them to +support his reputation." Some journals may waste their incense upon +him; the <i>Constitutional</i> may exclaim: "The veil has been lifted.… a +new law is about to unite all disputants. … the arguments of M. +Trémaux abound, and we feel only an embarrassment in choosing." +<i>L'Independance Beige</i> will join the chorus. Even the <i>Moniteur</i> will +grant its approval. But all this is no set-off against the opinions of +the learned, and M. Trémaux knows very well that our great naturalists +do not <a name="851">{851}</a> look upon his ideas as acceptable, or his arguments as +conclusive. +</p> +<p> +It will be observed that we have not spoken of the Bible, although its +narrative appears compromised by the transformation theory. We believe +it to be useless to mix up theology with scientific debates, at least, +when it is not directly attacked. Now, M. Trémaux is far from +attacking revelation; he does not believe his ideas reconcileable with +Genesis; he never speaks of the Bible narrative but with the greatest +respect. Hence we believe it advisable to show great tolerance toward +sciences which are still in their infancy, which require their elbows +free for development, and which must wander a little in unknown +countries, free to make a false step from time to time. It is thus +they will progress and arrive at the truth. +</p> +<p> +We will add one last remark on the address of the anthropologists. The +origin of man concerns historians as much as naturalists; for this +reason we should not, in works of this character, neglect historic +monuments. Of all those monuments, books are the surest. Even in +abstracting the special value which the Bible possesses as an inspired +volume, it is not the less true that it is a document which must be +considered, and which as a written document has an incontestably safer +meaning than all the fossils in the world. +</p> +<p> +For a higher reason we should beware of all theories or hypotheses +which do not agree with the sacred text. The Bible no doubt is not +intended to instruct us in the secrets of the natural order, and it is +perhaps for that that we find in it so little relating to these +subjects; but the Holy Ghost, who inspired the sacred writers, could +not have dictated to them errors, and every assertion which would be +contrary to the <i>clear</i> and <i>certain</i> sense of a passage in it should, +for this reason, be rejected as untrue. When the sense is obscure or +doubtful, which is nearly always the case in passages relating to +physics, we should, we think, be very cautious, and it is prudent for +the learned to be on their guard, for fear of falling into very +numerous and grave errors. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>From The Victoria Magazine. +<br><br> +WISDOM BY EXPERIENCE.</h2> +<br> +<p> +What a shame! What abominable interference! What cruelty! What +tyranny! These and many other strong expressions of the same kind +proceeded from a collection of rose-stocks planted ready for budding. +They were all fiercely angry and indignant, and first one and then +another uttered some exclamation of disgust, and then all joined in a +chorus of maledictions on the gardener who had done them so much +injury. It was in the month of June that their feelings were so much +excited, just when the sap was most active, and they were throwing out +their most luxuriant shoots. I don't know how they went on when the +gardener first dug them up out of the hedges, and cut away all their +side branches and left only a single straight stem. If they did not +make a fight for it then, it must have been because their sap was all +dried up, and their leaves had fallen off, and they were in low +spirits, and did not much care what became of them. But even then I +don't think they yielded without a struggle, and I have no doubt there +was a good deal of scratching and dragging back, <a name="852">{852}</a> and a great +show of independence and sullenness. But they had not the spirits to +keep up resistance, and the gardener did not give them much chance, +for he pruned them close, and planted them in rows just far enough +apart to prevent the possibility of their having much intercourse, or +of the evil disposed corrupting the more docile. But it was different +in June, when, as I said, the sap was active, and their branches began +to grow out on all sides, so that they could reach each other and even +take a sly pinch at the gardener or any of his friends who happened to +come near. And the particular irritation now was because the gardener +had discovered how wild they were becoming, and set resolutely about +restraining them. First of all he cut off all the suckers that grew +from the roots, and the lower shoots, leaving only those that grew at +the crown of the stock, and then he put them all straight up, and +would not let them loll about or hang over the path—a habit they had +got into which was very disagreeable to those who passed by. And if +they would not stand upright without, he fastened them to pieces of +board let into the ground. This was a great grievance, but I think +they most rebelled at having their lower boughs cut off, for if left +to themselves they would have spread and puffed themselves out in a +most ridiculous way. +</p> +<p> +Now it so happened that Madame Boll, a stock of a former year which +had been budded, but left in its place and not removed with the rest +into the flower-garden, heard their exclamations of anger and +impatience, and having perhaps gone through some such phase of feeling +herself, and thus gained wisdom by experience, she thought she would +try if she could put their case to them in a better light; so she took +advantage of a little lull in the storm, and said in a gentle, +ladylike tone, +</p> +<p> +"My young friends, I am very sorry to see you so unhappy; but perhaps +if you will hear what I have got to say, you might think better of +your present position." +</p> +<p> +"Well," said Miss Strong, who was tossing her long arms about in a +very excited way, only luckily she was out of reach, "if you are going +to take the gardener's part, and preach patience and submission, and +that sort of thing, I can tell you you had better keep your remarks to +yourself, or if I can get at you, I'll spoil that neat head-dress of +yours, which, let me tell you, is not half as pretty as hundreds in +the hedgerows, or as ours would have been, if we had been left to our +own devices as we were last year;" which tirade she ended with a +scornful laugh in which many of the others joined. +</p> +<p> +But little Miss Wild-Rose, who was nearer, said quietly, +</p> +<p> +"Perhaps it would be as well to hear what is said on the other side; +particularly as, it is too hot to go on screaming and abusing people +who don't seem to care about it;" and as several of the others were of +the same opinion, Madame Boll took courage, and said what was in her +mind. +</p> +<p> +"Perhaps it may give you more confidence in me to know, that when I +was first placed here I had many of the same thoughts and feelings +that you appear to have. I did not know why I was taken out of the +hedgerow, and trimmed and restrained, and not allowed to have my own +way; and I confess I thought it very hard. Particularly I was +indignant, as no doubt you will be when the time comes (for you have +still a good deal to undergo which you know nothing about at +present),—I was, I say, very indignant when the gardener cut a slit +in the only shoot which he had left me, and which was growing very +luxuriant, and I was quite proud of it; and introduced a meagre little +bud from another tree, and made me nourish and strengthen it, though I +knew that my own shoot would suffer by it; and so it turned out; for +after a while, when the bud began to grow, he cut away <a name="853">{853}</a> my +natural shoot altogether, and left only that which had been inserted." +</p> +<p> +Here Miss Strong broke in. +</p> +<p> +"You were very tame to submit to it. I would have banged and twisted +about till I had got rid of it some way or other." +</p> +<p> +"Ah!" said Madame Boll, "we shall see; you are stronger and more +resolute than I was. All I know is, I could not help myself." +</p> +<p> +"Cowardly creature!" muttered Miss Strong, scornfully. But Madame Boll +resumed: +</p> +<p> +"I soon got used to the change, and gradually began to take an +interest in the bud I had adopted; and though of course Miss Strong +may affect to despise its beauty, I can assure you that most people +have a different opinion." +</p> +<p> +Whereupon, Madame Boll gave herself airs, and coquettishly moved aside +a leaf or two, and displayed a most perfect and symmetrical rose. +</p> +<p> +"But," said Miss Wild-Rose and her party all in a breath, "do you mean +that we shall all bear roses like that?" +</p> +<p> +"Not all, certainly, possibly none of you exactly like, for there are +hundreds of varieties, and many of them much more beautiful. It will +be just as the gardener fancies, though he is generally guided in his +selection by the habit and vigor of the stock, I daresay he will give +Miss Strong, who is so energetic, a bud of Gloire de Dijon, or Anna de +Diesbach, and you, being weaker, will have Devoniensis, or Niphetos." +</p> +<p> +Miss Strong gave a scornful toss at this, but did not vouchsafe any +remark, though I think she felt rather complimented, and the others +began to muse, since it must be so, what rose they would be likely to +have, and which would become them best. +</p> +<p> +A little time after this it turned out just as Madame Boll had +said—the gardener came one morning and began to bud the stocks, and +just as he was preparing Miss Wild-Rose for the operation, a young +lady came by, and asked what bud he intended for that one, for, she +said, "I want a Devoniensis, and I think it would just suit it." +</p> +<p> +"I have got a Devoniensis bud here," he said, "and will put it in." +</p> +<p> +"And that tall one I think I should like for Gloire de Dijon." +</p> +<p> +"I will try," he said, "but somehow I am half afraid I shall have some +trouble with it, for though vigorous it is rather awkward, and the +thorns are very spiteful. To say the truth, I am half afraid of it, +and have been leaving it till the last." +</p> +<p> +"But what," said the lady, "is this in the corner? Surely it is Madame +Boll; and such a beauty! What is it doing here?" +</p> +<p> +"To say the truth, ma'am, I overlooked it when I planted the others +out, and now it must remain where it is for another year." +</p> +<p> +"Well," she said, "I hope the others will take pattern from it and do +as well." +</p> +<p> +"So," said Madame Boll, after they were gone, "that accounts for my +being left here: I must confess I was a little mortified, for I +thought it was a slight; but I generally find, if we wait awhile, +everything comes right in the end, and possibly my being here has done +you some good, or given you comfort; and if so, instead of regret, I +ought to feel pleasure. But now, my young friends, I will tell you a +conversation I overheard one day, between the young lady who was here +just now and another, which your foolish behavior a short time ago +brought to my mind. They were talking about the children in the +school, and how difficult it was to make them feel the advantage of +being submissive and conforming to their rules. They said they were so +anxious to have their own way, and seemed to think it was a pleasure +to their teachers to thwart them, or make them do what they did not +wish, and not that it was intended for their good; and if their +teachers thought they paid too much attention to their dress, <a name="854">{854}</a> +and wished to be smart, and wear flowers and feathers, when they ought +rather to be adorning their minds, and beautifying their tempers, and +enriching their understanding, they were ready to cry out, as you did +just now, 'What tyranny!' 'How interfering!' 'Why can't they let us +dress as we like?' But what they were particularly complaining about +on that occasion, was that the children would persist in wearing hoops +which stuck out their clothes, and made them take up twice as much +room as they otherwise would have done. For, it seems, the benches +where they sat were only large enough for them if they sat close +together, which they could not do with hoops on, so they were obliged +to tell them they could not take them into the school if they did not +lay aside their hoops, and some of them were foolish enough to say +that they would not come to school if they were not allowed to wear +hoops. Now, it struck me, this was just like your folly in wishing to +keep your wild-growing suckers and lower branches, when you know very +well that they would take away all the nourishment which is needed to +bring the beautiful rose-buds to perfection; the bud, in your place, +answering to the knowledge and other excellences which it is the +object of education to impart to their ignorant and lawless natures, +and which, in after years, when they are able to appreciate them, they +prize highly, and can hardly understand what it was that made them so +averse to go through the process necessary for their acquirement." +</p> +<p> +A year or two afterward I saw the young lady and the gardener looking +at a bed of beautiful roses on the lawn, and heard the young lady ask +what had become of the Devoniensis she had asked him to bud. +</p> +<p> +"Don't you see it, ma'am," he said, "growing against the wall? I think +it is almost the gem of the whole garden." +</p> +<p> +"Oh, what a beauty!" she exclaimed; "and how well it has grown!" +</p> +<p> +"Yes, ma'am," he said; "it has always done well; it seemed to take to +it kindly from the very first, and has never gone back at all. But I +had a good deal of trouble with this one; perhaps you may remember my +saying I thought it likely I should. It is that strong growing one you +remarked at the same time when you told me to bud the Devoniensis. It +won't make much show this year. It wasted so much energy in putting +out side-shoots and suckers. But I think it has got out of its bad +ways, and next year I hope it will make quite a grand tree." +</p> +<p> +"Oh!" she said, "and here is my old friend Madame Boll, I see. I am +glad you put it here, it is well worth a good place." +</p> +<p> +"You hear," said Madame Boll, after they were gone, to her neighbor +Gloire de Dijon, "what they say of us, and I hope you have become +reconciled to the change, and will let the good that is in you show +itself." +</p> +<p> +Whereupon there seemed to come rather a lachrymose murmur from the +dwarfed shoot of Gloire de Dijon. "But am I not to flower at all this +year?" +</p> +<p> +"Well, my dear," said Madame Boll, tenderly, "I do not wish to be +severe or say anything to hurt your feelings, but you must know that +your present disappointment is the natural result of your past +conduct. You were so determined to indulge in perverse and self-willed +suckers, and you never let the gardener touch you without trying to +prick his fingers or tear his clothes. And now all you want is a +little patience. Who knows but you may be allowed to bloom in the +autumn, and perhaps win the prize at the last flower show? But if not, +why it will be all right next year. Do you think it was no +mortification to me to be neglected and almost unnoticed last year, +and that, as it appears, entirely owing to the carelessness of others, +and not from any fault of mine? Well, you see, I have got over it; and +very likely next year <a name="855">{855}</a> you will have the gratification of hearing +the lady praise you as she did me just now. Be thankful that +experience with you has not come too late." +</p> +<p> +When Madame Boll ended, I could see on the edge of one of her delicate +leaves a drop of dew, and I said to myself, "How very like a tear!" +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>From The Month. +<br><br> +LABORERS GONE TO THEIR REWARD.</h2> +<br> +<p> +In the days in which we live, more perhaps than at any other time, +education, the school, and the college are made the positions of vital +importance in the battle-field of contending principles. Services +rendered and losses sustained on such points are, therefore, worthy of +special notice, of particular gratitude, or of sorrow. In the month of +May of this year two souls went to their rest, both of whom had +labored long, signally, and successfully in the cause of Catholic +education—especially for the higher classes; both of whom have left +behind them institutions in which their spirit is enshrined: destined, +we trust, to continue through centuries yet to come the work, the +beginnings of which were committed to those whose loss we are now +lamenting. On the 14th of May Monsignor de Ram, the restorer of +Catholic university education in the countries over which the French +revolution had swept, died peacefully, but almost without warning; and +a few days later, his decease was followed by that of the reverend +mother Madeline Sophie Barat, the foundress and first +superioress-general of the congregation of the nuns of the Sacred +Heart. Let us devote a few lines to each. +</p> +<p> +Monsignor de Ram was born at Louvain, of parents distinguished for +piety and noble descent, September 2, 1804. He early devoted himself +to the service of the Church; was ordained priest, March 19,1827; and +became at once professor in the ecclesiastical seminary of his native +diocese, Mechlin. He had no sooner grown up than he was struck by +observing that his native language, the Flemish, which of all European +tongues most nearly resembles our own, was almost wholly without books +of a good tendency. The reason was evident. The population by which it +is spoken is comparatively small, and is hemmed in by others which +speak French, Dutch, or German. Hence it has almost sunk into a +<i>patois</i>. Men who speak Flemish to their servants and laborers read +and write in French. The first labors of Mons. de Ram were devoted to +meet this want, by publishing several very useful books in Flemish. He +was only thirty when the bishops of Belgium resolved to erect a +Catholic university. The attempt could never before have been made; +for in Belgium, almost more than anywhere else, education had for two +hundred years been seized by the state, and used to an irreligious +purpose. The revolution of 1830, though not made by the Church nor in +its interests, had given it a freedom which it never possessed before. +The first use made of this freedom by the bishops of Belgium was to +erect a Catholic university, and the young and zealous priest de Ram +was set over it by their deliberate choice. To its service he devoted +the rest of his life. Beneath his care were trained during thirty +years a continual succession of young men, who are at this day the +strength of the Church in Belgium, and to a considerable degree in +France. <a name="856">{856}</a> England also has sent students there. Those who have had +the happiness of attending the meetings of the Catholic congress in +Belgium must, we think, have been struck by the high Catholic tone of +a number of young men of the middle and higher classes, and by their +intelligence. For those men Belgium and the Church are indebted to the +Catholic university of Louvain, and of that university Monsignor de +Ram has, until his death, been the soul. On Friday, May 12, he +returned from attending a meeting of the academy of Brussels. On the +evening of Sunday, 14th, he had entered into the unseen world. His age +was only sixty; and as he was willing, so it might have been expected +that he would be able, to continue for years to come the labors in +which his life had been spent. Such was not the will of his Lord, +whose call he was at once ready to obey. +</p> +<p> +At Paris, on the morning of Monday, May 22, only seven whole days +later, the superioress of the Society of the Sacred Heart had attended +the mass of the community. She had completed in the preceding December +her eighty-fifth year. Her day of labor was at last over. She was +seized with apoplexy, and never recovered the power of speech. She +gave, however, clear signs of intelligence, and received the viaticum, +as well as the last unction. On the 24th the blessing of the Holy +Father reached her by a telegraphic message. On the 25th she slept the +sleep of the just. +</p> +<p> +She was born in December, 1779. She had an elder brother, who before +1800 was a priest, and had joined himself to a society which was +formed at Vienna in the latter part of the French revolution, under +the title of the "Fathers of the Sacred Heart." The first superior of +this society, Father Tournely, had been a pupil of the illustrious +Father Emery at St. Sulpice. His object seems to have been to continue +under another name the spirit and practices of the Society of Jesus, +which had been swept away twenty years before by the insane union of +the monarchs of Europe with the revolutionary infidels, until times +should allow of its re-establishment. This, however, he did not live +to see. His successor, Father Varin, joined it at its restoration. He +relates that the great desire of Father Tournely was the foundation of +a congregation of nuns devoted, under the protection of the Sacred +Heart, to the education of young persons of their own sex. At one time +he had hoped to see this project carried into execution by the +Princess Louisa of Bourbon-Condé, who actually came from Switzerland, +where she was in exile, to Vienna, to confer with him on the subject. +But God called her to the contemplative life, and she became a +Benedictine. Father Tournely, however, never doubted its execution. +Walking one day on the fortifications now destroyed, but then +surrounding Vienna, he said to Father Varin, alluding to this +disappointment, "Dear friend, I thought this had been the work of God, +and if it is not, I confess I do not know how to discern between the +spirit of truth and the spirit of falsehood." Then, after remaining +silent awhile in recollection, he turned to his friend, with something +of fire more than natural in his expression, and added: "It is the +will of God. As to the occasion and the instrument, I may have been +deceived; but, sooner or later, this society will be founded." His +friend used to say that the impression left by these words, and the +manner in which they were spoken, never faded from his mind. They +impressed him with the same conviction; and he added, that when he +repeated them to his brethren, it took possession of all their minds. +</p> +<p> +"In truth," said Fr. Varin, "God had not chosen for the commencement +of this work instruments great in this world. That the glory might be +his alone, he was pleased that the foundation of the building should +be simplicity, littleness, nothingness." +</p> +<p> +Fr. Tournely died soon afterward, <a name="857">{857}</a> in the flower of his age. Fr. +Varin succeeded him, and the conclusion of the revolution enabled him +and his brethren to return to Paris. To Paris they went in the year +1800. It was exactly the moment when to human eyes the night seemed +darkest, but when the morning was ready to spring. Pius VI. died a +prisoner in the hands of the infidel French revolutionists, August 29, +1799. "At this moment," says Macaulay, "it is not strange that even +sagacious observers should have thought that at length the hour of the +Church of Rome was come. An infidel power in the ascendant, the pope +dying in captivity, the most illustrious prelates of France living in +a foreign country on Protestant alms, the noblest edifices which the +munificence of former ages had consecrated to the worship of God +turned into temples of victory, or into banqueting-houses for +political societies, or into theophilanthropic chapels; such signs +might well be supposed to indicate the approaching end of that long +domination. But the end was not yet. Again doomed to death, the +milk-white hind was still fated not to die. Even before the funeral +rites had been performed over the ashes of Pius VI., a great reaction +had commenced, which after the lapse of [sixty-five] years appears to +be still in progress." As yet, however, no human foresight would have +observed the tokens of that reaction. Paris was no longer the city +where the eldest son of the Church was enthroned, and where the great +of this world were rejoiced to heap their wealth upon any new plan +which promised to promote the glory of God. Still, Napoleon Bonaparte +had just seized the reins as first consul, and there was at least +toleration to priests. The community lived in a single mean room, +which served them as dormitory, refectory, kitchen, and study. Here +Fr. Varin was sitting upon the edge of a very shabby bed, and by his +side sat one of his community, Fr. Barat. "I asked him what relations +he had. He said, one <i>little sister</i>. The words made a strong +impression upon me. I asked how old she was, and what were her powers. +He said she was eighteen or nineteen; that she had learned Latin and +Greek, and translated Virgil and Homer with ease; that she had +qualities to make a good teacher; but that for the present she had +gone to pass some time in her family." Father Barat, good man as he +was, was not above human infirmity, and like other elder brothers, +however proud he might be of his younger sister, could never fancy +that she was really grown up; for when he said she was about eighteen +or nineteen, she was one-and-twenty. Two months later she came to +Paris. "I went to see her, and found a young person of very delicate +appearance, extremely retiring, and very timid. What a +foundation-stone! said I to myself, in reply to the feeling I had had +within me when her brother had mentioned her to me for the first time. +And yet it was upon her that it was the will of God to raise the +building of the Society of His Divine Heart. This was the grain of +mustard-seed which was to produce the tree whose branches have already +spread so wide." +</p> +<p> +On November 21, 1800, she dedicated herself to the Sacred Heart, under +the patronage of the Blessed Virgin, together with an intimate friend, +Mlle. Octavia Bailly, who shared her aspirations. It was the first +streak on the sky which told of the coming day. The day the society +was formed, in 1802, she became superioress of the first house, which +was at Amiens. In 1806, a second was founded at Grenoble; that year +the first general congregation elected her superioress-general. In +1826 there were seventeen houses, and the rules were approved by Leo +XII. Before her death she had under her rule ninety-seven houses and +3,500 nuns. She had been superioress of the congregation for +sixty-three years; and it is probable that the majority of the French +ladies now living who have received a religious <a name="858">{858}</a> education at all +have received it at the hands of herself or of her children in +religion. +</p> +<p> +Her body was taken to Conflans, where is the novitiate in the +neighborhood of Paris. During three days her cell was visited by all +whom the rules of the community permitted to enter—the nuns of the +different houses in Paris, pupils present and former of all ages. Not +only these, but many priests were so desirous to have medals, +chaplets, etc., touched by her remains, that two sisters, who were +continually employed, were hardly able to satisfy the general desire. +</p> +<p> +At the beginning of this short notice we spoke of sorrow and a sense +of loss as feelings natural in those interested in the great works +undertaken by such laborers as Mons. de Ram and Madame Barat on the +occasion of their removal from the scene of action. We need hardly do +more than allude to the other feelings which must at the same time +blend with and qualify these; to the joy and exultation that must +always hail the close of a noble career long persevered in, from the +thought of the rest and the crown that have been so faithfully won; +and to the confidence that the works which those who have been removed +from us have been allowed, while in the flesh, so happily to found, +promote, and guide, will certainly not suffer by the Providence that +has now, as we trust, placed them where they are enabled to see, +without any intervening shadow, the value of the great end for which +these works were undertaken, and where their power to help them on is +to be measured, not by the feeble and inconstant energies of a will +still subject to failure and perversion, but by the mighty intensity +of the intercession of those who are at rest with God. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>MISCELLANY.</h2> +<br> +<p> +<i>Mont Cenis Railway</i>.—Pending the completion of the great Mont Cenis +tunnel, a temporary railway on inclined planes is to be carried along +the present road over the mountain. The French Government, on its +portion of the line, will use locomotives with a peculiar mechanism, +to produce adhesion, on a middle rail placed between the two ordinary +rails. On the Italian side a traction carriage will be employed, which +will wind the carriages up by means of a drum acting on a heavy fixed +cable laid along the line. The mechanism of the traction wagon will be +put in motion by an endless wire rope actuated by water-wheels at the +base of the incline. +</p> +<br> +<p> +<i>Homes without Hands</i>.—A new book by Mr. Woods, with the above title, +gives an account of the habitations, "which are never marred by +incompetence or improved by practice," constructed by various animals, +classed according to their principles of construction, and illustrated +by some excellent engravings, from drawings made expressly for the +work. The author first describes the homes of the burrowing mammalia, +and then proceeds to those of the social birds and insects. The mole +appears to take the first place in Mr. Wood's list of mammalia. "This +extraordinary animal does not merely dig tunnels in the ground and sit +at the end of them, but forms a complicated subterranean +dwelling-place, with chambers, passages, and other arrangements of +wonderful completeness. It has regular roads leading to its feeding +grounds; establishes a system of communication as elaborate as that of +a modern railway, or, to be more correct, as that of the subterranean +network of metropolitan sewers." … "How it manages to form its +burrows in such admirably straight lines is not an easy problem, +because it is always in <a name="859">{859}</a> black darkness, and we know of nothing +which can act as a guide to the animal." The real abode of the mole is +most extraordinary. "The central apartment is a nearly spherical +chamber, the roof of which is nearly on a level with the earth around +the hill; and, therefore, situated at a considerable depth from the +apex of the heap. Around this heap are driven two circular passages, +or galleries, one just level with the ceiling, and the other at some +height above. The upper circle is much smaller than the lower. Five +short descending passages connect the galleries with each other, but +the only entrance into the keep is from the upper gallery, out of +which three passages lead into the ceiling of the keep. Therefore, +when the mole enters the house from one of his tunnels, he has first +to get into the lower gallery, to ascend thence to the upper gallery, +and so descend into the keep." The mole appears unequalled in +ferocity, activity, and voracity. The fox prefers to avoid the labor +of burrowing, and avails itself of the deserted home of the badger, or +even the rabbit; for, though it needs a larger tunnel than the latter, +the cunning animal finds its labor considerably decreased by only +having to enlarge a ready-made burrow instead of driving a passage +through solid earth. +</p> +<p> +Of the weasel tribe, the badger is the most powerful and industrious +excavator; there are several chambers in its domicile, one of which is +appropriated as a nursery, and is warmly padded with dry mosses and +grass. The rabbit, like the eider duck, lines her nursery with the +soft fur from her own breast; but Mr. Wood deprecates this being set +forth as an act of self-sacrifice, and held up as an example of such +to human beings, and declares it to be as purely instinctive as the +act of laying eggs. +</p> +<br> +<p> +<i>The Wealth of Mexico</i>.—M. Laur, the engineer deputed by the French +government to explore the mineral wealth of Mexico, and who has +already published several reports in the <i>Moniteur</i>, has completed his +task. These reports, according to a paragraph in the <i>Moniteur Belge</i>, +are shortly to be published in a more extended form, giving the exact +situation, extent, and richness of the principal mineral veins of that +country. It is hoped that under the new administration many of the old +workings, abandoned during the civil wars, will be resumed, and that +they will prove as valuable to the empire as they were during the +early days of the Spanish occupation. +</p> +<br> +<hr> +<br> +<h2>NEW PUBLICATIONS.</h2> +<br> +<p> +DIE HEILIGE ELIZABETH. Ein Buch für Christen, von Alben Stolz. +Freiburg im Breisgau. 1865. 8vo, pp. 315. +</p> +<p> +The Life of Saint Elizabeth of Hungary. A book for Christians, by +Alben Stolz. +</p> +<p> +The author of this new life of Saint Elizabeth is one of the popular +Catholic writers of Germany, if not the foremost. He is the Abraham of +Sancta Clara of this century. +</p> +<p> +The principal events of the saint's life are narrated in simple and +familiar language. The point treated of in each chapter is concluded +with a practical instruction. These are far from being dry. We would +suggest the translation of this book into English, were it not that it +is, like all this author writes, thoroughly German, and exclusively +adapted to the circumstances and difficulties of the Catholics of +Germany. What our Catholic English reading public needs, is that some +of our writers should take a lesson from this agreeable as well as +edifying writer, and do for them what he is doing with so much zeal +for the good of his countrymen. +</p> +<br> +<p> +WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE. By His Eminence Cardinal Wiseman. 32mo, pp. 64. +Boston: Patrick Donahoe. +</p> +<p> +This is an American edition of the lecture of the late Cardinal +Wiseman on William Shakespeare, which appeared in THE CATHOLIC WORLD +for July. It contains, in addition to the lecture, an appendix, in +which the eminent author makes suggestions for, and observations on, +"a tercentenary memorial of Shakespeare." <a name="860">{860}</a> The cardinal suggested +a splendid edition of the great poet's works, illustrated, and printed +in the best and most elaborate style possible. His eminence went into +the most minute details in regard to the manner in which such an +edition should be illustrated, printed, bound, etc. The binding and +paper of this little volume are excellent; but the type from which it +is printed is too small. We are sorry Mr. Donahoe did not get it out +in larger type. Were it not for this slight defect, the book would be +faultless. +</p> +<br> +<p> +NATIONAL LYRICS. By John Greenleaf Whittier. Illustrated. 32mo, pp. +104. Boston: Ticknor & Fields. +</p> +<p> +This is another of the cheap volumes of poetry issued by Ticknor & +Fields. It contains several of Mr. Whittier's earlier pieces, as well +as many of his late poems. Among the latter are "Barbara Frietchie," +and "The Poor Voter on Election Day." +</p> +<br> +<p> +SYBIL: A Tragedy, in Five Acts. By John Savage. 12mo, pp. 105. New +York: J. B. Kirker. +</p> +<p> +This tragedy was written by Mr. Savage—well known in the literary +world as the author of several excellent poems, and now editor of the +New Orleans <i>Times</i>—some years ago, and met with a good reception in +the cities in which it was played. It contains many good passages of +high poetical merit, and is, we should think, well adapted for the +stage. The scene is laid in Kentucky, in the beginning of the present +century, and describes society as it is supposed to have existed at +that time. +</p> +<br> +<p> +A GENERAL HISTORY OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH, +FROM THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE CHRISTIAN ERA +UNTIL THE PRESENT TIME. +By M. l'Abbé J. E. Darras. With an Introduction and Notes. By the Most +Rev. M. J. Spalding, D.D., Archbishop of Baltimore. New York: P. +O'Shea. +</p> +<p> +We have received numbers 9, 10, 11, and 12 of this excellent history. +Number 12 brings the work down to the pontificate of Sixtus III., 432. +</p> +<br> +<p> +THE MARTYR'S MONUMENT. Being the patriotism and political wisdom of +Abraham Lincoln, as exhibited in his speeches, messages, orders, and +proclamations from the presidential canvass of 1860 until his +assassination, April 14, 1865. 12mo, pp. 297. New York: The American +News Company. +</p> +<p> +The title of this handsome volume sufficiently explains its purpose. +The origin of the work is set forth in the following extract from the +preface: +</p> +<p> +"A few days after the assassination of President Lincoln, the +publishers of the present volume received the following letter from +the distinguished gentleman whose name it bears: +</p> +<p class="cite"> + "<i>Gentlemen</i>: Collect and publish, in the speediest possible manner, + the inaugural and other addresses of Abraham Lincoln, his + proclamations, messages, and public letters, indeed, all he has + written as President, and you will contribute to the mournful + celebrations of the American people your share of lasting value, and + of far more impressive eloquence than the most fervent orator could + utter. You would thus make the martyr rear his own monument, which + no years, no centuries, could level and cause to mingle again with + the dust.<br> + "Your obedient,<br> + "FRANCIS LIEBER.<br> + "NEW YORK, April 18, 1865." +</p> +<p> +This book is got out in elegant style, and will be valuable hereafter +on account of the many documents it contains which relate to the late +civil war. +</p> +<br> +<p> +<i>Received</i>: PASTORAL LETTER OF THE RT. REV. M. DOMENEC, D.D., BISHOP +OF PITTSBURG TO THE CLERGY AND LAITY OF THE DIOCESE, PROMULGATING THE +JUBILEE: together with the late Encyclical of the Holy Father. +Published at the office of the Pittsburg <i>Catholic</i>. +</p> +<br> +<p> +THE STORY OF THE GREAT MARCH, FROM THE DIARY OF A STAFF OFFICER. +By Brevet-major George Ward Nichols, aid-de-camp to General Sherman. +New York: Harper & Brothers. +</p> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Catholic World; Volume I, Issues +1-6, by E. 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